The Welcoming

by Nora Roberts

  “Who was driving the car?”

  “I don’t know. I swear it,” he said. Roman took a step toward him, and he gripped the arms of his chair. “Listen, I got in touch with Block the minute this happened. He said he’d hired somebody. He couldn’t have done it himself, because he was on the mainland. He said the guy wasn’t trying to kill her. Block just wanted her out of the way for a few days. We’ve got a big shipment coming in and—” He broke off, knowing he was digging himself in deeper.

  Roman merely nodded. “You’re going to find out who was driving the car.”

  “Okay, sure.” He made the promise without knowing if he could keep it. “I’ll find out.”

  “You and I are going to work together for the next few days, Bob.”

  “But . . . aren’t you going to call Royce?”

  “Let me worry about Royce. You’re going to go on doing what you do best. Lying. Only now you’re going to lie to Block. You do exactly what you’re told and you’ll stay alive. If you do a good job I’ll put in a word for you with my superior. Maybe you can make a deal, turn state’s evidence.”

  After resting a hip on the desk, Roman leaned closer. “If you try to check out, I’ll hunt you down. I’ll find you wherever you hide, and when I’m finished you’ll wish I’d killed you.”

  Bob looked into Roman’s eyes. He believed him. “What do you want me to do?”

  “Tell me about the next shipment.”

  ***

  Charity was sick of it. It was bad enough that she’d given her word to Roman and had to stay in bed all day. She couldn’t even use the phone to call the office and see what was going on in the world.

  She’d tried to be good-humored about it, poking through the books and magazines that Lori had brought up to her. She’d even admitted—to herself—that there had been times, when things had gotten crazy at the inn, that she’d imagined having the luxury of an idle day in bed.

  Now she had it, and she hated it.

  The pill Roman had insisted she swallow had made her groggy. She drifted off periodically, only to wake later, annoyed that she didn’t have enough control to stay awake and be bored. Because reading made her headache worse, she tried to work up some interest in the small portable television perched on the shelf across the room.

  When she’d found The Maltese Falcon flickering in black and white she’d felt both pleasure and relief. If she had to be trapped in bed, it might as well be with Bogart. Even as Sam Spade succumbed to the Fat Man’s drug, Charity’s own medication sent her under. She awoke in a very poor temper to a rerun of a sitcom.

  He’d made her promise to stay in bed, she thought, jabbing an elbow at her pillow. And he didn’t even have the decency to spend five minutes keeping her company. Apparently he was too busy to fit a sickroom call into his schedule. That was fine for him, she decided, running around doing something useful while she was moldering between the sheets. It wasn’t in her nature to do nothing, and if she had to do it for five minutes longer she was going to scream.

  Charity smiled a bit as she considered that. Just what would he do if she let out one long bloodcurdling scream? It might be interesting to find out. Certainly more interesting, she decided, than watching a blond airhead jiggle around a set to the beat of a laugh track. Nodding, she sucked in her breath.

  “What are you doing?”

  She let it out again in a long huff as Roman pushed open the door. Pleasure came first, but she quickly buried it in resentment. “You’re always asking me that.”

  “Am I?” He was carrying another tray. Charity distinctly caught the scent of Mae’s prize chicken soup and her biscuits. “Well, what were you doing?”

  “Dying of boredom. I think I’d rather be shot.” After eyeing the tray, she decided to be marginally friendly. But not because she was glad to see him, she thought. It was dusk, and she hadn’t eaten for hours. “Is that for me?”

  “Possibly.” He set the tray over her lap, then stayed close and took a long, hard look at her. There was no way for him to describe the fury he felt when he saw the bruises and the bandages. Just as there was no way for him to describe the sense of pleasure and relief he experienced when he saw the annoyance in her eyes and the color in her cheeks.

  “I think you’re wrong, Charity. You’re going to live.”

  “No thanks to you.” She dived into the soup. “First you trick a promise out of me, then you leave me to rot for the next twelve hours. You might have come up for a minute to see if I had lapsed into a coma.”

  He had come up, about the time Sam Spade had been unwrapping the mysterious bird, but she’d been sleeping. Nonetheless, he’d stayed for nearly half an hour, just watching her.

  “I’ve been a little busy,” he told her, and broke off half of her biscuit for himself.

  “I’ll bet.” Feeling far from generous, she snatched it back. “Well, since you’re here, you might tell me how things are going downstairs.”

  “They’re under control,” he murmured, thinking of Bob and the phone calls that had already been made.

  “It’s only Bonnie’s second day. She hasn’t—”

  “She’s doing fine,” he said, interrupting her. “Mae’s watching her like a hawk. Where’d all these come from?” He gestured toward half a dozen vases of fresh flowers.

  “Oh, Lori brought up the daisies with the magazines. Then the ladies came up. They really shouldn’t have climbed all those stairs. They brought the wood violets.” She rattled off more names of people who had brought or sent flowers.

  He should have brought her some, Roman thought, rising and thrusting his hands into his pockets. It had never crossed his mind. Things like that didn’t, he admitted. Not the small, romantic things a woman like Charity was entitled to.

  “Roman?”

  “What?”

  “Did you come all the way up here to scowl at my peonies?”

  “No.” He hadn’t even known the name for them. He turned away from the fat pink blossoms. “Do you want any more to eat?”

  “No.” She tapped the spoon against the side of her empty bowl. “I don’t want any more to eat, I don’t want any more magazines, and I don’t want anyone else to come in here, pat my hand and tell me to get plenty of rest. So if that’s what you’ve got in mind you can leave.”

  “You’re a charming patient, Charity.” Checking his own temper, he removed the tray.

  “No, I’m a miserable patient.” Furiously, she tossed aside her self-control, and just as furiously tossed a paperback at his head. Fortunately for them both, her aim was off. “And I’m tired of being stuck in here as though I had some communicable disease. I have a bump on the head, damn it, not a brain tumor.”

  “I don’t think a brain tumor’s contagious.”

  “Don’t be clever with me.” Glaring at him, she folded her arms and dropped them over her chest. “I’m sick of being here, and sicker yet of being told what to do.”

  “You don’t take that well, do you? No matter how good it is for you?”

  When she was being unreasonable there was nothing she wanted to hear less than the truth. “I have an inn to run, and I can’t do it from bed.”

  “Not tonight you don’t.”

  “It’s my inn, just like it’s my body and my head.” She tossed the covers aside. Even as she started to scramble out of bed her promise weighed on her like a chain. Swinging her legs up again, she fell back against the pillows.

  Thumbs hooked in his pockets, he measured her. “Why don’t you get up?”

  “Because I promised. Now get out, damn it. Just get out and leave me alone.”

  “Fine. I’ll tell Mae and the rest that you’re feeling more like yourself. They’ve been worried about you.”

  She threw another book—harder—but had only the small satisfaction of hearing it slap against the closing door.

  The hell with him, she thought as she dropped her chin on her knees. The hell with everything.

  The hell with her, He hadn’t g
one up there to pick a fight, and he didn’t have to tolerate a bad-tempered woman throwing things at him, especially when he couldn’t throw them back. Roman got halfway down the stairs, turned around and stalked back up again.

  Charity was moping when he pushed open the door. She knew it, she hated it, and she wished everyone would leave her in peace to get on with it.

  “What now?”

  “Get up.”

  Charity straightened her spine against the headboard. “Why?”

  “Get up,” Roman repeated. “Get dressed. There must be a floor to mop or a trash can to empty around here.”

  “I said I wouldn’t get up”—she set her chin—“and I won’t.”

  “You can get out of bed on your own, or I can drag you out.”

  Temper had her eyes darkening and her chin thrusting out even farther. “You wouldn’t dare.” She regretted the words even as she spoke them. She’d already decided he was a man who would dare anything.

  She was right. Roman crossed to the bed and grabbed her arm. Charity gripped one of the posts. Despite her hold, he managed to pull her up on her knees before she dug in. Before the tug-of-war could get much further she began to giggle.

  “This is stupid.” She felt her grip slipping and hooked her arm around the bedpost. “Really stupid. Roman, stop. I’m going to end up falling on my face and putting another hole in my head.”

  “You wanted to get up. So get up.”

  “No, I wanted to feel sorry for myself. And I was doing a pretty good job of it, too. Roman, you’re about to dislocate my shoulder.”

  “You’re the most stubborn, hardheaded, unreasonable woman I’ve ever met,” he said. But he released her.

  “I have to go along with the first two, but I’m not usually unreasonable.” Offering him a smile, she folded her legs Indian-style. The storm was over. At least hers was, she thought. She recognized the anger that was still darkening his eyes. She let out a long sigh. “I guess you could say I was having a really terrific pity party for myself when you came in. I’m sorry I took it out on you.”

  “I don’t need an apology.”

  “Yes, you do.” She would have offered him a hand, but he didn’t look ready to sign any peace treaties. “I’m not used to being cut off from what’s going on. I’m hardly ever sick, so I haven’t had much practice in taking it like a good little soldier.” She idly pleated the sheet between her fingers as she slanted a look at him. “I really am sorry, Roman. Are you going to stay mad at me?”

  “That might be the best solution.” Anger had nothing to do with what he was feeling at the moment. She looked so appealing with that half smile on her face, her hair tousled, the nightshirt buttoned to her chin and skimming her thighs.

  “Want to slug me?”

  “Maybe.” It was hopeless. He smiled and sat down beside her. He balled his hand into a fist and skimmed it lightly over her chin. “When you’re back on your feet again I’ll take another shot.”

  “It was nice of you to bring me dinner. I didn’t even thank you.”

  “No, you didn’t.”

  She leaned forward to kiss his cheek. “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  After blowing the hair out of her eyes, she decided to start over. “Did we have a good crowd tonight?”

  “I bused thirty tables.”

  “I’m going to have to give you a raise. I guess Mae made her chocolate mousse torte.”

  “Yeah.” Roman found his lips twitching again.

  “I don’t suppose there was any left over.”

  “Not a crumb. It was great.”

  “You had some?”

  “Meals are part of my pay.”

  Feeling deprived, Charity leaned back against the pillows. “Right.”

  “Are you going to sulk again?”

  “Just for a minute. I wanted to ask you if the sheriff had any news about the car.”

  “Not much. He found it about ten miles from here, abandoned.” He reached over to smooth away a line between her brows. “Don’t worry about it.”

  “I’m not. Not really. I’m just glad the driver didn’t hurt anyone else. Lori said you’d cut your arm.”

  “A little.” Their hands were linked. He didn’t know whether he had taken hers or she had taken his.

  “Were you taking a walk?”

  “I was waiting for you.”

  “Oh.” She smiled again.

  “You’d better get some rest.” He was feeling awkward again, awkward and clumsy. No other woman had ever drawn either reaction from him.

  Reluctantly she released his hand. “Are we friends again?”

  “I guess you could say that. Good night, Charity.”

  “Good night.”

  He crossed to the door and opened it. But he couldn’t step across the threshold. He stood there, struggling with himself. Though it was only a matter of seconds, it seemed like hours to both of them.

  “I can’t.” He turned back, shutting the door quietly behind him.

  “Can’t what?”

  “I can’t leave.”

  Her smile bloomed, in her eyes, on her lips. She opened her arms to him, as he had known she would. Walking back to her was nearly as difficult as walking away. He took her hands and held them hard in his.

  “I’m no good for you, Charity.”

  “I think you’re very good for me.” She brought their joined hands to her cheek. “That means one of us is wrong.”

  “If I could, I’d walk out the door and keep going.”

  She felt the sting and accepted it. She’d never expected loving Roman to be painless. “Why?”

  “For reasons I can’t begin to explain to you.” He stared down at their linked hands. “But I can’t walk away. Sooner or later you’re going to wish I had.”

  “No.” She drew him down onto the bed. “Whatever happens, I’ll always be glad you stayed.” This time she smoothed the lines from his brow. “I told you before that this wouldn’t happen unless it was right. I meant that.” Lifting her hands, she linked them behind his neck. “I love you, Roman. Tonight is something I want, something I’ve chosen.”

  Kissing her was like sinking into a dream. Soft, drugging, and too impossibly beautiful to be real. He wanted to take care, such complete, such tender care, not to hurt her now, knowing that he would have no choice but to hurt her eventually.

  But tonight, for a few precious hours, there would be no future. With her he could be what he had never tried to be before. Gentle, loving, kind. With her he could believe it was possible for love to be enough.

  He loved her. Though he’d never known he was capable of that strong and fragile emotion, he felt it with her. It streamed through him, painless and sweet, healing wounds he’d forgotten he had, soothing aches he’d lived with forever. How could he have known when he’d walked into her life that she would be his salvation? In the short time he had left he would show her. And in showing her he would give himself something he had never expected to have.

  He made her feel beautiful. And delicate, Charity thought as his mouth whispered over hers. It was as though he knew that this first time together was to be savored and remembered. She heard her own sigh, then his, as her hands slid up his back. Whatever she had wished they could have together was nothing compared to this.

  He laid her back gently, barely touching her as the kiss lengthened. Even loving him as she did, she hadn’t known he’d possessed such tenderness. Nor could she know that he had just discovered it in himself.

  The lamplight glowed amber. He hadn’t thought to light the candles. But he could see her in the brilliance of it, her eyes dark and on his, her lips curved as he brought his to meet them. He hadn’t thought to set the music. But her nightshirt whispered as she brought her arms around him. It was a sound he would remember always. Air drifted in through the open window, stirring the scent of the flowers others had brought to her. But it was the fragrance of her skin that filled his head. It was the taste of it tha
t he yearned for.