Her troubled gaze fell to his. “I suppose, by rights, we should call it quits now.”
Noah stood as well. “Because pretending each other doesn’t exist in a town the size of a peanut is going to work so well?”
“I hate this,” she muttered, and he pulled her into his arms again.
“We could just play it by ear, you know,” he said into her hair.
“Except—”
“Clothes will stay on. Promise.”
She leaned back, frowning. “You sure you’re okay with that?”
“Strangely enough, yeah.” His heart hammering in his chest as he thought, Dude, who are you? “Because, you know that bonding thing? I’m thinking, in this case, you wouldn’t be the only one with a problem if we fooled around.”
“He said, gritting his teeth—”
“I’m serious, Rox.” His hands moved to her shoulders so he could look her in the eyes. “Unless one or the other of us changes our mind about what we want, long term. And somehow I’m not seeing that happen. So,” he said, releasing her, “we better get our rears in gear if we have any hope of getting this done before Dad gets home tomorrow.”
Then he turned to drag the first of many reindeers and bears and such out of their oft-taped boxes, silently chewing out fate’s ass.
“What are they doing now?” Charley asked Eden, who, her stew on the stove, apparently had nothing better to do than stand at the window holding her little dog and watching the goings-on across the street. And report to Charley.
“Hard to tell from here—if I’d known, I would’ve brought my opera glasses—but after he hugged her, they talked some more and now they’ve gone back to decorating the house. No kissing, though. So kinda inconclusive.”
Charley pushed himself out of the nice, comfy chair and joined her at the window, exchanging distrustful glances with the dog. “You think she told him?”
Eden turned her head, making the wide-neck black sweater she was wearing slide off one shoulder, exposing a bright red bra strap. “While I’m far from deaf,” she said, tugging it back up, “I don’t have supersonic hearing. Nor am I clairvoyant.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” Charley said, thinking about that shoulder. And where it led. “You always seem to guess right when I’m about to…you know.”
Eden rolled her eyes and looked back out the window, only to smile when Charley bumped his hip into hers, not even caring when the dog growled at him. “Looks like they’re gonna be a while,” he said, giving her moony eyes. “Wanna mess around?”
“Actually, I think we should follow their example and do some decorating ourselves.” She set down the dog, who gave her a dirty look before mincing over to plop in her leopard print bed by the fireplace. “Give the place some holiday cheer.”
“I’d much rather you give me some holiday cheer.”
“You got your holiday cheer this morning, you can wait a few hours for the next dose. So whatcha got? In the way of decorations, I mean?”
Charley pushed out a loud, pity-me sigh and started for the garage, marginally cheered when, chuckling, Eden grabbed his hand and pulled him back around to give him a compensatory kiss, and he suddenly felt so happy it nearly made him dizzy.
Then he glanced out the window one last time at his mixed-up niece, so determined to get what she wanted she couldn’t see it was smack dab in front of her face. “I know it’s not up to me to fix her, but it seems so…unfair.”
“She’s a smart girl. She’ll figure it out,” Eden said.
But the question was, he wondered as Donna’s old Jeep Cherokee pulled into the driveway, would Noah?
His mother got out of her beat-up Explorer, a big, goofy smile stretching across her face as she took in what they were doing. “I can’t believe you even thought about this.”
“Day after Thanksgiving means leftovers and decorating,” Noah said. “Wouldn’t seem right otherwise. Besides, I thought it would cheer Dad up.”
“Or tick him off that he didn’t get to do it himself,” Donna muttered, then sighed. “To be honest, I’d totally forgotten until I overhead one of the nurses talking about setting up her tree.” Then she noticed Roxie. “And how on earth did you get dragged into this?”
“Believe it or not, I volunteered,” she said, and his mother shot him a look that plainly said, Good Lord, she’s as crazy as we are. “How’s Gene doing?”
His mother did a you don’t want to know hand waggle, then tromped around to the back of the car and opened the hatch, the sun flashing off the silver clasp thing holding up most of her hair. “He’s coming home tomorrow. If they don’t kick the big pain in the patoot out sooner.” Except it was perfectly obvious how scared she’d been of losing that pain in the patoot. Peering into the car, she shook her head. “Since I was in Santa Fe, anyway, I figured I may as well pick up a few things at Sam’s Club. Big mistake.”
Aside from the normal supplies—toilet paper and paper towels and eighteen packs of tomato and chicken noodle soup—everything else was for his father. Plaid shirts and a new pair of slippers. Hardback novels by two of his favorite writers. A treadmill. And—
“You can’t be serious?” Noah hauled the boxed inflatable—an eight-foot-tall snow globe sheltering a trio of caroling polar bears—out of the depths of the truck. Behind him, Roxie giggled. “And you can just hush,” he said, and she giggled harder, which only made Noah more morose, thinking about how much he was going to miss making her laugh.
“So you’re not the only one who wants to cheer him up,” Mom said. “And anyway, when you love somebody you give them what makes them happy.” She made a face at the inflatable’s box. “Even when it hurts.” Then she looked at Roxie and smiled, and Noah heard the Gong of Doom go off in his head. “Honey, why don’t you come inside and help me make up a couple of turkey sandwiches?”
“I’ll never understand,” Donna said, shoving up her sweater sleeves as she regarded the inside of her refrigerator, “how I can feed so many people at Thanksgiving and still have this many leftovers. There’s ham, too, if you like. And I suspect—” she hefted the turkey carcass to the counter “—you’re well aware I don’t need help to make a few sandwiches.”
“Yeah,” Roxie said, sitting at the kitchen table, “I kinda figured you had that down by now. So what’s up?”
One eyebrow lifted. “Why don’t you tell me?”
“Is this you being mama bear looking out for her cub?”
Donna laughed. “As if I could. And anyway, the cub is plenty able to look out for himself. Has been for some time. Which I’ve been told in no uncertain terms. However, after raising a whole slew of cubs, Mama Bear is extremely observant. And nosy.” Peeling back the foil, she cut her eyes to Roxie. “I’ve never seen him act around any other gal the way he does around you. You ask me, he’s got it bad.”
Heat flooding her face, Roxie lowered her eyes, worrying a little silver ring on her pinkie her mother had given her when she turned sixteen. “I accepted a job in Austin. This morning. I start in a couple of weeks.”
“Oooh.” Donna’s brow crinkled. “I see. Does Noah know?”
“Yeah. I just told him,” she said, adding, because she’d only promised Gene she wouldn’t say anything to Noah, “did his dad tell you why he wanted me to come to the hospital?”
“No, as a matter of fact.” Donna hauled a carving knife out of a block in front of her and start shaving off slices of white meat, then glanced in Roxie’s direction. “I’m not gonna like this, am I?”
“Probably not. He did everything but promise me a dowry if Noah and I got together.”
“Oh, Lord, that man,” Donna sighed out. The knife set down, she turned, her arms crossed under her breasts. “Although with you going to Austin, I suppose the point is moot, anyway.”
“Heh,” Roxie said, thinking, So this is hell. Colder than I expected, but whatever.
“Oh, honey…love really sucks sometimes, doesn’t it?”
Figuring there was no
point in denying it, Roxie got up and snatched a piece of cut turkey, cramming it into her mouth. It wasn’t chocolate, but sometimes you can only work with what you’re given. “I feel like I’ve been ambushed,” she muttered, chewing.
“That’s pretty much the way it goes,” Donna said, handing her another piece of turkey.
“It’s so unfair.” With great difficulty, Roxie swallowed the dry turkey mush in her mouth. “Noah was supposed to be the same Good Time Joe he was in high school. In fact, you have no idea how much I counted on that. He wasn’t supposed to have…grown up.”
Donna smiled. “It does happen eventually. Even to boys.”
“Except…he still doesn’t see himself doing the kids-and-mortgage thing. Which doesn’t make him less of a grown-up, but it does mean I could never do what Gene asked. Even if I wasn’t leaving.” She tried to swallow again, only to nearly choke. Donna yanked a bottle of organic milk from the fridge, pouring a glass and handing it to Roxie. She washed down the mashed turkey, then said, “Which should be a solution, right? Out of sight, out of mind? So why do I feel like I’m being ripped apart inside?”
On a soft moan, Noah’s mother took Roxie into her arms, holding her tight for several seconds before releasing her to snitch her own piece of turkey. “You know…nothing ever scared that boy growing up. Nothing. And he’s got the scars to prove it.” She wagged the turkey at Roxie. “So why the idea of settling down, having kids of his own, rattles him so badly, I have no idea.”
Sipping her milk, Roxie walked over to the window to watch Noah set up a family of lit reindeer on the front end of the lawn. “Me, either. But damn…it seems such a waste.”
A soft chuckle preceded, “Do you trust the goofball?”
Roxie wheeled around. “You’re calling your own son a goofball?”
“Oh, you have no idea some of the things I’ve called my boys over the years. Well?”
A second or two passed before Roxie slowly nodded. “Yes, I do. Because he’s never played the player with me. He’s always been totally up front about his expectations. We both have, actually.”
“Then the foundation is there, believe it or not. Now all you can do is have faith that if this is meant to work out, nothing or no one can stop it.”
Roxie smiled, not having it in her to disabuse the woman of her fantasies.
Noah walked into the office and shut the door, barely muffling the noise from a half dozen power tools doing their thing. The past few days had been beyond busy. Not that Noah couldn’t handle it, he was handling it all just fine—and loving it—but between his dad’s return home on Saturday and his consequently needing to help his mother out, then his diving headfirst into his new duties even before the shop reopened after the holidays, he hadn’t seen Roxie since the day after Thanksgiving. Meaning he felt like a game show contestant playing against a relentlessly ticking clock.
“Lunch?” he said when she answered Naomi’s phone.
“Oh, um…really swamped here,” she said, her voice sounding strange. And strained.
“Dinner, then? Although it might be late, I’m not getting out of here before seven these days—”
“Can’t. Charley and I are going to Eden’s—”
“Boss?” Benito said as he opened the door, knocking as an afterthought. “Oh, sorry—didn’t realize you were on the phone.”
Waving Benito inside, he said, “Tomorrow?”
“I’ll call you, how’s that?” she said. And hung up.
Noah frowned at the phone for a couple of seconds before clipping it back on his belt. His father’s—now his—right-hand man frowned in concern.
“Everything all right?”
“Not sure,” Noah said, feeling like his brain was stuffed with Silly Putty. “You need me?”
“Yeah. Thought you’d want to look over these specs for that new job before we get started.”
Forcing himself back to the present, Noah considered the barrel-chested, bulbous-nosed man in front of him, who’d been working for his father since before Noah was even born. Who’d taught him even more than his father had. And who probably needed him to sign off on a project about as much as he needed Noah to teach him Spanish.
“You really think that’s necessary?”
Thick, salt-and-pepper brows lifted on a weathered face. “I jus’ figured, you’d want to do things like your dad.”
One side of Noah’s mouth lifted. “Which doesn’t answer my question.”
He could see the older man try to hide his smile underneath his heavy mustache, but it wasn’t working. “I like to think of myself as a smart man, Mr. Noah. Smart enough to play the game however the boss man wants. No skin off my nose, you know?”
Dude was a master of diplomacy, that was for sure. “And what if I said I completely trust you to handle things on your end? Probably a lot better than I would.”
Benito gave him a quizzical look. “I’m real flattered. But in this case, your daddy had the right idea, making sure at least two people know what’s going on. So if it’s all the same to you, I’d feel better having that second set of eyes.”
“Then I’m good with whatever works for you.”
The foreman nodded, then said, “Anything else?”
“Yeah. That you won’t laugh too hard at my stupid questions.”
“Not sure I can promise that,” Benito said, his dark eyes sparkling. “Damn, it seems like yesterday when you were a baby, coming in here with your daddy an’ building towers outta wood scraps over there in the corner. And now, here you are. The boss.”
“You think that feels weird?”
Benito chuckled, then clamped his meaty hand around Noah’s upper arm. “You know something, it takes a real man to admit he doesn’t know it all. You’re gonna make Mr. Gene real proud of you.”
“That’s what I’m hoping,” he said, as the nonconversation with Roxie replayed in his brain, and he realized he’d never be able to fully concentrate on business until he figured out what was going on with her. Getting up to snag his barn coat off the rack by the door, he nodded in the general direction of the desk. “I need to go out for a while. Can you hold down the fort?”
“Sure thing. No problem,” Benito said with a wide smile. Then he winked. “Although it might cost you.”
The coat half on, Noah frowned at the other man. “How much does—did—my father pay you?”
The other man snorted. “Not enough. Not that I’m not grateful for the work—”
“Say no more.” Noah hiking the coat onto his shoulders, digging in the pocket for his keys. “I’m not that familiar with the finances yet, but let me talk it over with Silas, see what we can do.”
Affection gleamed in the man’s dark eyes. “You know, sometimes you hear about these family businesses, the father passes it along to his kid, and the kid doesn’t want it, or isn’t interested, or the whole thing goes to hell in a handbasket, you know?” He shook his head, then extended his hand. “I’m proud to work for your daddy for more than thirty years. And God willing, I’m proud to work for you for thirty more.”
“Same goes, Benito,” Noah said, clapping the man’s hand and giving it a hearty shake before heading toward the door. “I won’t be long.”
“Take your time, boss,” he heard behind him. “Everything’s under control.”
In there, maybe, Noah thought as he stomped out to his truck. In his head, not so much.
Chapter Eleven
Funny, Roxie thought—when she looked up from the clinic’s computer to see Noah looming over her—how you think you’ve got your feelings about somebody all sorted out until there they are, in front of you, and suddenly you don’t know squat. Especially when the sight of the looming somebody makes your mouth go dry and your stomach turn inside out, and pheromones are flitting about like frakking sugarplum fairies.
“Noah! What on earth are you doing here?”
Angling his head toward the doctor’s open office door, he called out, “Hey, Naomi—you got a pr
oblem with me taking Rox out for lunch?”
“What? Now hold on just a minute—!”
“Not at all,” the doctor said, coming to the door. At which point Roxie shot her a you’re-not-helping glare. “Although Roxie might.”
She turned the glare on Noah. “Thought I said we were busy?”
Noah glanced around the empty waiting room, prompting Naomi to say, “Yeah, I know. Slowest afternoon we’ve had in forever. Can’t believe it myself.”
“A lull,” Roxie said. “It’ll pick up. With appointments. And things.”
“So where you taking her?” Naomi said.
“Evangelista’s. Where else?”
“Oh! Bring me back a couple of cinnamon rolls, would you?” She dug in her pocket for a five-dollar bill, handed it to Noah. “And a cup of coffee?”
“Oh, see,” Roxie said, banging her knee as she sprang up from behind the desk. “I need to make coffee, I can’t go.”
“Baby,” Naomi said, “you know I adore you, but you can’t make coffee to save your life.”
Pocketing Naomi’s five—because, you know, Roxie was just a bystander, this had nothing to do with her—Noah gave her a funny look. “You can’t even make coffee? Now that’s sad. Get your coat, it’s freezing out there.”
“I can’t, I’ve got—” At Noah’s glower, she muttered, “Fine,” and trudged to the closet.
“What’s this all about?” she said, once they were in Noah’s truck. Black. Like a hearse. Fitting, somehow.
“You want to call it off, then call it off. Because this avoidance crap is not you.”
Okay, that was her bad, hoping he’d be so busy this thing between them would simply die a natural death, and she wouldn’t have to actually act on the conclusion she’d come to the moment she saw all that hope in his mother’s eyes. “I don’t want to have this discussion in the truck—”
“Or on the phone, or probably not at Ortega’s, either. Well, tough. We’re together for the first time in days. We’re talking.”
“I thought men didn’t like talking.”
Husband Under Construction Page 16
