Aidan uttered a frustrated sigh and took the towel from her hands. He struggled to not stare at her, especially not at the sliver of naked skin that was visible through the open collar of her shirt, which had slipped to the side a little. Ryan might have told him that she was more like a pal than a difficult woman, but Aidan knew from experience that Kayleigh Fitzpatrick was definitely woman enough, especially when she was naked. Despite her tomboyish clothes and her short hair, no man would have seen anything but a desirable woman in her. Aidan may have spent seven years in jail, and hadn’t seen a lot of women during that endless period, but his appreciation of that pretty face—with its large green eyes, the cute nose and generous mouth, and its prominent dimples—went far beyond his pent-up hunger for a female.
“If you’re afraid your brothers might try to beat me up for having sex with their sister, you can stop worrying,” Aidan offered, but only after he’d managed to push aside the image of a naked Kayleigh and cleared his dry throat. “It’s not that easy to beat me up.”
She snorted and made a face, handing him one of the cleaned plates to towel dry. “If I were of the opinion that you deserved a beating, I’d take care of it myself. I wouldn’t yell for my brothers to help me with a thing like that. No,” she added, “I don’t think there would be any trouble on that front. We’re both adults, after all, but I know my mom. She might get the idea that she needs to play matchmaker and pair us off for good.”
A relationship was the last thing Aidan wanted to think about at the moment, but the rejection implied in her words still hurt. “Are you that repulsed by the idea of having a jailbird for a boyfriend?” he asked, his voice flat.
She gave him a snotty sidelong glance. “That’s nonsense, Aidan. You and I both know it was a one-night stand. Nothing more, nothing less. I have never allowed my mom to meddle in my love life.”
He was silent as he set down the dried plate. “If I’d known you were Shane’s sister,” he admitted grudgingly, “I’d never have bought you a beer and picked you up.”
“I don’t want to rob you of your illusions, Aidan, but I was the one who picked you up,” she clarified.
Aidan threw the towel down on the counter. “And you made me pay for all the drinks, and the next morning, you didn’t even offer me a cup of coffee.”
“Well, it seems I’ll have to be a bit more hospitable this time around.”
Chapter 5
Kayleigh silently cursed her brother. She’d have liked to give Ryan a colonoscopy right now—without drugging him beforehand, of course. She was rummaging through the closet for bed sheets while her “guest” moved into the empty room right across the hall from her own bedroom.
Despite the fact that only half an hour ago, she had convinced Aidan that this would be no problem for her at all, a strangely queasy feeling was spreading in her stomach.
This feeling had nothing to do with the fact that her house guest was a convicted criminal, but much more with her realization that the man she’d slept with and sent on his merry way had turned out to be her sister-in-law’s brother, and that he would be staying in her house for the coming days. Kayleigh knew she shouldn’t freak out just because Thorne’s brother had seen her naked. Right now, however, she would have preferred not knowing how well Aidan O’Shea was able to drive a woman crazy, fall into a ten-minute post-coital coma, and then wake up to ravish her once again.
She kneeled in front of her closet and pulled out a few sheets when she felt heat infuse her cheeks at the turn her thoughts had taken. She’d never been a prude, and neither was she of the opinion that sex should be taken all that seriously, so she couldn’t fathom why she felt so disconcerted by Aidan’s presence in her house.
She sighed in frustration and sat back with the sheets in her arms, digging her fingers into the soft fabric and thinking back on the night she had encountered Aidan at O’Reary’s. She remembered being frustrated about her inability to keep Alec’s attention long enough to make him forget the blonde doll on his arm and watching him leave with that sweet-faced bimbo. Yes, it had been the night after Hayden’s birthday party. She’d gone to the pub, found herself face to face with Aidan, and decided he was the exact opposite of the man she couldn’t seem to catch.
While her brother’s partner was blond, had a charming smile, and dressed his athletic body in tailored suits, Aidan O’Shea had reminded her of the leader of a motorcycle gang, or a guy who carried around tree logs as a hobby, before chopping them up with his bare hands. If a movie company came to town looking for extras to play Canadian lumberjacks, Aidan would be their obvious choice. He was tall, with broad shoulders and strong limbs, and he had this rugged, angular face. Most of the time, he was silent and wore a grim expression.
Before that night, Kayleigh would have ridiculed the idea that former inmates were popular with the ladies or that they could take anyone’s breath away. Now she had to ask herself if there wasn’t a grain of truth in the cliché.
The man who’d carried his bulging duffel bag into the room across the hall a few minutes ago had told her he’d spent the last six months as a welder on an oil rig. Must be taciturn and self-sufficient, she surmised. He didn’t strike her as the most affable and funny guy in the world, either, but that was exactly the kind of vibe that had attracted her when they first met. She tended to like men with a certain bad-boy attitude, who didn’t play games and didn’t pretend to be anything they weren’t. She didn’t have to pretend with them, either.
Kayleigh had fancied his rugged, calm, straightforward demeanor, since it had struck her as the opposite of vanity. And on that night, it had been enough to take him home.
After an admittedly terrific night, she had sent him packing in the morning. And while she hadn’t completely forgotten him in the following few days, she had pushed down the memory deep enough to be able to sleep soundly again.
She wasn’t sure that would be the case tonight.
She had no problem with Aidan’s seven-year prison sentence. First of all, she knew the story behind his conviction, and second, her parents had raised her to believe that people could be rehabilitated. Why should she look down on a grown man for the crimes he’d committed as little more than an adolescent, and—what was even more important—which he’d paid for in full? No, the fact that Aidan O’Shea had served time and was now staying under her roof was not what would cause her sleepless nights.
She couldn’t sit on the floor in front of her closet forever, so she rose to her feet slowly and then tiptoed barefoot though the hall. She stopped on the threshold to the guest room and took a moment to stare at the broad back that was outlined under a denim shirt as its owner put a stack of neatly folded t-shirts into one of the drawers of the empty dresser.
When Aidan heard her timid knock on the door frame, he turned around and gave her a questioning look.
She answered with a curt smile and lifted the sheets in her arms, then threw him the folded swaths of cotton. “I thought you might need those.”
He caught the not-so-neat pile in midair and put it all down on the bed. “Thanks.”
“If you need another pillow or more blankets, let me know.”
“Everything’s fine, thank you.” The corners of his mouth curved downward as he crossed his heavily muscled arms, which bulged provocatively under his shirt. “Tomorrow I’ll start looking for an apartment.”
“Why don’t you take your time and try to fully arrive in Boston first?” she suggested involuntarily. “I don’t mind having you here, Aidan.”
Curiosity flared in his blue eyes. “Do you really intend to tell me I’m part of the family now, too?”
She licked her lips. “Well, you are—kind of. We both have the same nephew, after all.”
He squinted in mock horror.
Kayleigh burst into raucous laughter. “What?”
“That sounds … wrong,” he grumbled and shook himself.
“Why?”
“It sounds like incest,” he said without hesi
tation.
“Very funny,” she murmured, before knocking again on the door frame. “If you get hungry or thirsty, just help yourself to whatever you can find in the fridge. I’m going to leave you alone and go to bed now.”
She had already turned around when he spoke again, hesitant now.
“Kayleigh?”
“Hmm?” She turned back and brushed a strand of hair from her forehead, trying to read his inscrutable face.
He seemed to have to force himself to say the following words. “It’s really nice of you to let me stay here.”
“No biggie.” She gave a casual shrug. “Mi casa es su casa.”
Kayleigh turned away and had already reached her own room when he called her name again. “Yes?” she asked, sticking her head out of her own door.
Without the slightest hint of a smile, he nodded at her. “The new haircut suits you really well.”
After a moment of surprise, she ran a hand through her hair and smiled mechanically. “Uh, thanks.”
***
Aidan heard someone clear their throat. He slipped out from underneath the sink, only to find Kayleigh standing over his legs with her hands on her hips. She seemed surprised to see him half in her cabinet and half on the floor, fiddling with the pipes.
“Good morning,” he said politely and pointed at the toolbox at her feet. “Could you hand me the pipe wrench really quickly?”
“The pipe wrench?”
“Yes,” he replied patiently, squinting back into the dark interior of her lower cabinet, into which he’d wriggled his broad shoulders a few minutes earlier, trying to find the reason for the gurgling noises he’d noticed when he’d tried to make a pot of coffee. “The pipe wrench is like a pair of tongs, but adjustable—”
“I know what a pipe wrench is,” she snapped, half annoyed and half amused. Seconds later, she handed him the tool. “What are you doing?”
Aidan crawled back into the cabinet, frowned up at where the drain met the pipe, and put the pipe wrench around it. While he turned, he explained, “I wanted to make coffee, and I noticed something’s wrong with the drain, so I searched for a toolbox and then started checking all the valves and connections. Now I’m taking out this pipe to put in a new piece, before the whole thing rusts away and causes a flood in your kitchen. I hope that’s okay.”
“Okay?” she asked with a note of mockery in her voice. “Of course that’s okay! The entire house seems to be filled with leaky pipes, so I certainly don’t mind if you keep at least one water main from bursting.”
He raised his head to get a closer look at the drain connection, and while he put in the new length of pipe, he asked, “Could you shine that flashlight in here real quick?”
“Sure.” Her head appeared next to his shoulder, and then she directed the beam of the flashlight on the connection. “Ugh,” she commented. “I really ought to clean this cabinet. I hope you’re not allergic to dust and dirt.”
He cracked a smile, shook his head, and grabbed the wrench again. He used it to tighten the nut, and then he checked all the connections for wetness. “Turn on the water, please.”
She slipped out, got to her feet, and turned on the faucet. The new pipe remained dry, and the gurgling noise had stopped, so Aidan exhaled and pushed out from underneath the sink. Then he sat up and wiped his hands on a rag. “Now it should work just fine.”
“Thank you,” she said simply, and then held out her hand. Aidan stared at it for a second, before grabbing it and letting her help him to his feet. He closed the cabinet door and threw the rag in the sink.
He didn’t want to seem nosy, because too many questions would have sounded weird, but he was curious. “What happened to your old apartment?”
With a weak smile and an amused roll of her eyes, she turned away and opened another cabinet on the opposite side of the kitchen, taking out two coffee mugs. “You mean, why did I move out of a brand-spanking-new apartment in which everything worked just fine to move into a house that was last renovated when we were at war with Vietnam?”
Aidan bent down to close the toolbox. He gave a casual shrug. “It’s a nice enough house, though it needs quite a few repairs, I suppose.”
“Very diplomatic.” She nodded and poured them both a coffee. “Heath called it a witch’s cottage, and then Ryan concluded that it would suit me perfectly.”
“Your brother is a real comedian.” He lifted the heavy toolbox and looked straight into her eyes. “It really is a nice house, but your old place wasn’t bad either.”
“My landlord wanted to sell the entire building and asked me if I wanted to buy my apartment. But I figured, if I buy anything, it should be a house, not a shoebox. Since most of my family lives close by, I started looking in this neighborhood, and here I am. I fell in love with the garden.” She pointed at the green space outside the window. “Once it’s properly renovated, it’ll be a real gem, but until then … well.” She shrugged.
“It’s not even that much work,” Aidan said as he carried the toolbox into the closet off the kitchen. “I took a look around, and I have to admit, this house has a solid foundation, which is really the jackpot. Places like this were built to last for eternity. You could have picked far worse.”
He closed the closet door and found himself looking into her surprised eyes.
“You sound as if you know what you’re talking about,” she stated and handed him one of the coffee mugs.
He took it and drank a few sips, then licked the coffee from his lower lip. “My dad was a roofer, and later he owned a hardware store. I picked up a few things in my youth.”
“I see,” she said curtly and drank her coffee, leaning against the kitchen table and avoiding eye contact. “Didn’t you want to inherit his business?”
He exhaled on a sigh and buried one hand in the pocket of his jeans. “That wasn’t possible,” he explained, trying to sound casual. “Thanks to the bad economy, Dad lost the store when he couldn’t pay his mortgage anymore. And I …” Aidan’s face twisted into a weak smile. “And after his death I went down a less legal path.”
“Tough luck,” she sighed without reproach.
“Tell me about it.” Aidan set the mug down and leaned against the sink. “At least I inherited his knack for handiwork. If you have anything else that needs fixing, I’d be glad to help out. That would make me feel better about sleeping here, too.”
Kayleigh drained her coffee and threw him a critical glance over the rim of her mug. “You’re my guest, Aidan. You don’t have to work to earn your keep or anything.”
He wrinkled his nose. “I don’t have anything better to do anyway.”
She pretended she hadn’t heard that and instead inquired, “Did you sleep well? It seems you woke up rather early.”
“I’m not a late sleeper,” he replied with a shrug. “But I did sleep very well, yes. Much better than on the bus.”
Kayleigh smiled a little and then glanced at her watch with a sigh. She was fully dressed and wearing shoes, so Aidan assumed she was ready to leave for work. He didn’t know whether she expected him to leave the house, too, and return once she got home. The fact that he’d been in jail was not conducive to anyone trusting him further than they absolutely had to.
“Man, I’m running late. I need to get to work.” Kayleigh put her mug in the sink, getting so close to him in the process that he could smell the coconut shower gel she’d used.
He swallowed and, since he didn’t know what to say or do now, made a noncommittal sound.
“Oh, I almost forgot this,” she suddenly said. He looked down into her fresh face and found her hand out, palm up.
“What’s that?” he asked of the key in her palm.
“A key,” Kayleigh said with deliberate enunciation and a hint of mockery in her voice. She seemed to enjoy sounding like an elementary school teacher. “You use it to lock and unlock doors, Aidan.”
“I know what a key does,” he shot back. “I spent seven years watching the warden use o
ne to lock me in my cell for the night.”
“Ha, ha, who’s the comedian now?” She rolled her eyes, pressing the key into his limp hand.
Aidan stared down at it and frowned. “Are you sure you want to give me a key to your house?”
Kayleigh didn’t seem to understand the question, because she opened the fridge and took out a small bottle of juice, then grabbed an apple from the bowl on the table and bit into it. He liked her apparent ease, so undemanding and straightforward, as she slipped into her denim jacket. “Why not?” she asked innocently. “Do you want to have to climb through a window to get back inside?”
He hated that she forced him to state the obvious. “I spent several years in jail, Kayleigh,” he stated in a grim baritone.
“So? Martha Stewart did, too, and I’d be so glad if she visited my kitchen and whipped up something yummy.”
“That is not the same thing.”
Aidan watched her sling her bag over her shoulder while holding the apple with her teeth, then clip a pager to her belt, take the green fruit into her hand again, and continue to chew as she asked, “Are you going to clear out my shack and sell all my electronics?”
He shook his head sullenly. “Of course not.”
She raised her free hand. “Then enjoy yourself. There’s some lasagna in the fridge, but I’m not sure how long it’s been in there. But the teriyaki chicken is from yesterday’s lunch, so that should be okay to eat.”
Before he could add anything, she practically ran out of the house, leaving him to his own devices.
Aidan heaved a heavy sigh and proceeded to think about what had gotten him into this strange situation. Kayleigh seemed to be the least difficult woman in the world, yet she had thrown him out of her apartment after a phenomenal one-night stand, only to leave him alone in her house now and hand him a freaking key—even though she didn’t really know him. Had he been in her shoes, he’d have thought twice before allowing a convicted criminal into his house, never mind the family connection.
More Than A Feeling (The Boston Five Series #3) Page 6
