by Alison Kent
“Of course it’s okay with me.” As if Lauren should have to ask. “But what are you going to do about Anton?”
“Are we still together, you mean?”
“Yeah. I guess that’s what I was wondering.”
“Why? You want to try your luck with him?”
This time it was Macy who shoved her foot against Lauren’s hip, then shoved again for good measure. “With Anton? Me? Are you kidding? Why would I break my own best-friend rules?”
“I guess that means you’ll kick my butt if I go after Leo?” Lauren asked, fighting a teasing grin of evil proportions.
That was all it took. Lauren’s one simple question. And Macy’s couldn’t fight her feelings anymore.
She was in love with Leo Redding.
The thought of Lauren with Leo, of any woman with Leo…Macy wasn’t sure which was stronger—her desire to scratch out Lauren’s eyes, or the need to go after Leo and fight for what was hers.
“Macy?”
Macy turned to her best friend. “Yeah. I think I would have to kick your butt.”
Lauren tossed her head back and laughed maniacally. “I knew it. You’ve fallen in love with the man.”
Macy nearly shook her head off her neck. “Don’t say that.”
“Why not? It’s so obviously the truth.”
“I don’t want to love him. He’s all wrong for me.”
Lauren poked a pestering finger into Macy’s shoulder. “He’s all right for you, or else kicking my butt would be the last thing on your mind.”
“Oh, really, Miss Know-It-All.” Macy narrowed her eyes. “And why is that?”
“Get real. You’re about the size of a munchkin.”
“A munchkin? I’ll show you a munchkin.” Macy launched herself the length of the sofa, ice cream and all. Lauren screeched, her spoon flying, her mocha-java swirl ending up a cold flattened mess between her chest and Macy’s.
The two rolled off the sofa and onto the floor, where the hardwood suffered the brunt of the chocolate–chocolate chip. The floor and Macy’s hair. Lauren giggled and slid a glob of ice cream all over Macy’s shirt.
Macy was not about to be outdone in a cat fight. She grappled with Lauren, rolling into the coffee table, tumbling back to bump her head on the bottom of the sofa frame.
“Ouch.”
She yelped and Lauren, blond hair a tangled mess, laughed and said, “Is that all you’ve got, Munchkin?”
“No. Actually I have this,” Macy answered, her legs caught beneath Lauren’s but her right hand free and full of chocolate–chocolate chip.
Lauren sputtered and spit and blew through the mess of melted milk product Macy mashed into her face. “Okay, okay. You win. You’re not a munchkin.”
Dripping from wrist to elbow, another scoop at the ready, Macy asked, “Is that an apology? Or are you just trying to avoid my throwing arm?”
“Both,” Lauren admitted, and sat back, winded, messy and smeared with ice cream from forehead to chin.
Macy sat up, too, grimacing. If she looked half as bad as Lauren…If only Leo could see me now.
Lauren sighed. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I’ve missed having fun with you.”
“Uh-huh. Like my kind of fun can even compare to the fun you have with Anton.”
“I guess that’s one of the only nice things about condoms. Less of a mess to clean up after.”
Macy wrinkled her nose. “Speaking of condoms, I owe you.”
“Don’t worry about it. What’s a bit of rubber between friends?”
“Uh, safe sex?”
“Yeah, well. There is that, I guess.” Lauren pulled off her thermal top and used it to wipe her face.
“You’d better get that into the wash.” Macy nodded toward the ball of crumpled cotton. “Or you’re going to have a huge stain on your hands.”
“Better than having a huge stain on my chest.”
Macy followed the direction of Lauren’s gaze down her own smeared front. Rolling her eyes, she shrugged out of her red flannel pajama top.
The two women sat there, wearing only their bottoms, splattered with ice cream and sharing a rare friendship and a frustration with men.
Lauren was the first to speak. “So, what to do we do now?”
“I don’t know about you, but I’m going to take a shower and get rid of this sticky gunk.”
“I mean, what are we going to do about our lives? Why do they have to be so complicated?”
“Life isn’t a bit complicated if you refuse to grow up.”
“You can’t refuse forever.”
“Wrong. I can. I plan to. And to hell with the uptight Leo Reddings of the world.”
“MR. REDDING? I have a Macy Webb to see you?”
Leo waited for the smoky wreckage of the dropped bomb to clear before he glanced up from the corporate dissolution he was drafting. Macy was here. At his office. In public and in broad daylight. What could she possibly want?
Besides his hide.
He stared over the rims of his glasses at the response button on his speakerphone, wondering if he could have imagined the intercom call. But he knew that he hadn’t because it wasn’t his lunch of spinach, jack cheese and black bean quesadillas churning in his stomach like a wild bull gone mad. No, it was the explanations and truths, the apologies he owed her scrambling for coherence in a madcap dash.
“Send her in, Ruth.”
He placed his pencil in the center of his legal pad and sat back in his chair. The same chair he’d sat in three nights ago with his bottom half buck naked and Macy and her mouth between his legs. Not the image he needed to have on his mind while he waited to see her.
He hadn’t seen her since he’d left the loft the night they’d returned home from the firm’s apartment, shredded sheet balled up and held beneath his arm, to find Lauren had moved back. Without warning. Reminding Leo that Macy’s life was a never-ending series of unexpected events, a constant flurry of whims and spurs of the moment, having the effect of a big wet blanket thrown on his fire. The blanket was a good thing in the long run. Made sure he thought with his thinking head.
He’d had to get out of there before saying any of a dozen things he knew he’d regret. Like he’d had it up to his eyeballs with the constant interruptions, the total chaos and lack of order, and when did she plan to grow up and settle into a civilized adult routine?
But before he’d opened his mouth, he’d realized how much he would sound like a pompous pig—and unlike a civilized adult. That self-analysis had been damn hard to swallow, so he’d pulled back, his mental gears seizing up, his emotional gears freezing. And then he’d left.
But the time away from her didn’t mean thoughts of Macy hadn’t crossed his mind. They had. Repeatedly. Constantly. He was still working to figure out why.
Correction, Counselor. You don’t want to admit to the why.
He’d spent the two days prior to moving out of her place consulting with an interior design firm recommended by Anton, and arranging to have the things the consultant considered worth keeping transferred from storage into the condo.
He didn’t know why he hadn’t told Macy his place was complete. It wasn’t finished, but it was livable. Maybe he hadn’t wanted to hear her tell him he’d worn out his welcome. Maybe he’d wanted to leave in his own time, on his own terms.
So why hadn’t he? Left when and how he’d wanted? Packed his belongings and thanked her for the hospitality? What reason could he possibly have had for sticking around, living out of a suitcase, bunking in a borrowed bedroom, surrendering his privacy to the resident of the loft’s life-size aquarium?
The minute she opened the door and stepped into his office, he knew. He knew. Hell, yes, he knew.
“Hello,” she said, and closed the door behind her. “I hope you don’t mind me dropping by. I’ll only stay a minute.”
“Stay as long as you like.” He gestured to the set of navy leather wing chairs facing his desk. “I need to take a break. And
it’s nice to see a friendly face.”
“Is that what I am?” She tilted her head to one side. “A friendly face?”
She was more than that. And she was here. And the ton of bricks between his shoulder blades weighed no more than a feather now that he’d seen her face. And now that he’d seen the rest of her? Looking nothing like his Macy? Just the icing on the cake of the forever fantasy he no longer denied.
She wore a black leather skirt, straight, slim and knee length, and a top in stark white, sleeveless, with antique silver buttons from the shirt collar to the hem riding her waist. She carried a black lace shawl, a black leather clutch.
And though she wore black pumps that he was sure were the height of fashion but looked uncomfortable as hell, she wore no stockings. Her bare legs were the sexiest thing he’d ever seen. He couldn’t take his eyes off her body as she walked, the way the leather hugged her hips and her thighs strained the skirt’s confines as she placed one foot in front of the other on her way from the door to his desk.
She sat in the chair he’d offered, crossing one leg over the other, her heels giving the impression that her legs went on forever, when he knew exactly how short they were and how far they reached around his hips and how she had to lift herself up to dig her heels into his backside and how he’d never known another woman so hungry…. For his body, yes. But more so for his company, both in silence and conversation.
He looked up and met her gaze and hoped her smile wasn’t at his expense. If it was, then his poker face had gone the way of the dodo. What had they been talking about, anyway? “You’re smiling. I’d say that qualifies as friendly.”
One brow lifted over her lightly accented eyes and she reached up to pat and tuck at the hair clipped in an untamed twist at the back of her head. “I could be an enemy bearing gifts.”
He’d called her the enemy once. Before he’d spent any time in her company. When he’d thought she had no brain and no business sense. When he’d thought she lacked the aggressive nature to go after what she wanted, the balls to drive a hard bargain.
“Are you? Bearing gifts?”
“As a matter of fact, I am.” She opened her clutch, pulled out a one-pound bar of Ghiradelli chocolate, leaned forward and set it in the middle of his desk.
Leo stared at the gold foil wrapping, took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes, hoping he’d see what he was obviously missing. Always with the surprises, this one, which pleased him no end. “Belated Valentine’s Day?”
She laughed, a light little trill of a sound. “I didn’t even think about it being February.”
He returned his glasses to his face. “Nothing says ‘welcome to the neighborhood’ like chocolate?”
She shook her head. Loose tendrils of hair escaped her clip to tumble into her face. “I say my welcomes with popcorn.”
She hadn’t taken what they’d done together that lightly. He knew she hadn’t. The same way he knew why she joked about things he considered significant. Her jokes, her pajamas, her bedroom under the sea—insulators, keeping her safe from whatever it was that threatened her out here in the big bad world.
Hotshot lawyer, he’d finally figured that much out.
He picked up the candy, made a pretense of studying both sides of the wrapper, then looked into her eyes and made sure he had her attention. “Thank you. For the chocolate. And for the welcome.”
Her discomfort became obvious in the way she repeatedly smoothed the lines of her skirt that didn’t need smoothing, the way she ended up wrapping all ten fidgety fingers around the top of her clutch.
“The chocolate is for game night. It’s tomorrow. If you want to come. Maybe you’ve won the sailing trip.” She gave a small shrug of one shoulder, a hesitant move, almost as if she dreaded his answer to her invitation and to her unasked question about his scavenger hunt success.
The latter he wasn’t quite ready to reveal. The trip was no longer his goal. As far as attending game night…“What time?”
“I try to get started by eight.”
He nodded, considering. “And your newest game involves chocolate?”
She laughed again. “Actually, the chocolate is the dessert. It’s probably going to be a quick evening. I haven’t quite gotten the details worked out on my next game idea.”
Leo lifted a brow at that. If nothing else, Macy had always taken care of her gIRL-gEAR business. “I figured with Lauren back, you’d have been spending all kinds of time brainstorming.”
“Oh, we have been. Just not about work.”
Macy lifted the corner of her mouth, and Leo knew he didn’t want to ask because he didn’t want to hear how often he’d been the subject of their dialogue.
“I’ll see what I can do. And thanks—” he gestured with the chocolate “—for dessert.”
“You’re welcome.” This time she worked at smoothing the hem of her blouse and wrapping her fingers in the long end of the dainty silver chain she wore at her waist. “There was one other thing.”
“Another gift?”
“If you want to look at it that way. It’s more about your list for the scavenger hunt.”
“Oh?” He had absolutely no idea where this was going.
“This is technically cheating. And it could make the difference in whether or not you win, but…” She bit at her lip, then released it, shook back her hair and lifted her chin. “Do you remember teasing me about the dirty little secret I’ve never even shared with my best friend?”
He did and he said so.
“Well, it’s not so dirty. And it’s not so little.”
“I’m fine with the list, Macy. You don’t have to tell me.”
She got to her feet, started to pace, first the small strip of space between the chairs and his desk. But she obviously had a lot on her mind because she moved to pace from wall to wall, bookshelf to bookshelf.
“Did I tell you I was the youngest of six kids?” she finally asked, and Leo sat back for the tale.
“My parents were great. My brothers and sisters were great. What am I saying?” she asked with a little laugh. “They’re all still great.”
So far, so good, Leo thought, but still he waited.
“I know you’ll find this hard to believe, but growing up? I was an incredible cutup.” She’d stopped in front of one bookshelf to run her finger over the spines of the leather-bound volumes, frowning. “Some heavy-duty stuff you’ve got here.”
He didn’t want to give her too much of a reply, hoping if he said less, she’d say more. Because, in all the hours they’d spent talking, in all their scavenger hunt discovery, Macy had revealed few details of her life before gIRL-gEAR. He, on the other hand, had spilled his guts about everything from losing his mother to his dog.
He’d been unnerved by how distractingly comfortable he’d felt around her, and as a result he was critical of the way she lived her life instead of curious about it. It was a wonder she’d offered him the chocolate, much less the invitation to come over and play. “That heavy-duty stuff is required reading for all us esquire types. Designed to curtail our cutting up.”
She gave a snort worth a thousand words and continued browsing. “My mom did her curtailing with her eyes. She could stare a hole right through any excuse we gave her or set fire to any backtalk with just one look. But she was always there when we needed her, you know?”
No, he didn’t know. But he was glad Macy did. “And your dad? He was around?”
“Oh, yeah. All the time.” Her eyes brightened for emphasis. “He worked a lot, selling parts for rigs and pipelines. Then, after the oil boom busted, he sold whatever he could. Cars. Insurance. Medical supplies. He did okay, but my mom had to go to work. Which meant the six of us kids had to pitch in.” Macy’s mouth pinched up in a grimace. “Trust me. We were not used to pitching.”
Leo smiled. “Spoiled?”
“You can’t even imagine.”
He could, but he kept it to himself.
“I was young, seven or eight I guess,
when things started going bad financially for my folks. They never fought over money. But a part of me wanted them to.” She walked back to her chair, standing behind it, running her palms across the curved back, down the sides and up again. “Fighting would’ve been so much better than silence.”
Leo didn’t think that sounded so bad, but then he wasn’t Macy. His father issuing orders, his mother refusing to acknowledge the militant commands, had been all young Leo had known. He’d welcomed the quiet when she’d finally left, until he came to realize that he’d never see her again.
The fact that his father hadn’t had much to say afterward he’d counted as a blessing. Except his father hadn’t had much to say since, leaving Leo wondering what had been the point of his parents’ relationship when they were as unhappy apart as they had been together. As suitable mates, they’d failed miserably. As role models, they’d fared better, and he’d learned a valuable lesson in compatibility.
“I’d never known two people could love each other that much,” Macy was saying as Leo realized he’d done the unthinkable and let his heart overrule his mind. “Neither would say anything for fear of hurting the other or adding more stress to the buckets of the stuff each one carried. It was like…”
Her hands slowed, stopping as they came together in the center of the chair’s back. “I don’t know. Like by ignoring their problems they wouldn’t exist, you know? Like they’d be letting the other hold on to the fantasy of our old life.”
The Webbs had seen their share of rough times, as had the Reddings. Leo didn’t deny either, but he didn’t get why Macy was making her story out to be The Grapes Of Wrath. “But you said they were doing great now?”
“Yeah. Everything’s good now. But for a while…” She let the sentence trail off and gave a tiny shake of her head. Her eyes clouded over. “It really was tough on all of us. My dad, especially. He just…closed up. And it hit me hard. I’d always been Daddy’s little girl because I was the youngest and, face it, I am the proverbial poster child for small.”
She did self-deprecation well, Leo thought, watching as she went back into motion, moving behind the twin to the visitor’s chair and measuring the width of the curved back with the spread of her fingers.
