Present Danger

by Susan Andersen

  “Yeah,” James replied with surprising cheer.

  “Tell ‘em what the doctor said,” Bob called from the kitchen, his head buried in the Jacksons’ refrigerator. James did.

  “That’s very encouraging, James,” Lola said, watching him closely. “It’s wonderful news. Is that why you look happier?”

  “Yeah. That and the fact that I’m not quite as stiff as I was this morning.” He turned to Otis. “I’ve got a favor to ask of you. I’m sorry to impose the minute you get home, but I wondered if you’d go with Bobby to pick up the Jeep.” He glanced down at himself ruefully. “My reflexes aren’t all they should be and I’m afraid that clutch would kill me before I drove a mile.”

  “No problem.”

  “Thanks, Otis. I owe you.” He edged toward the door. “Well, I think I’ll go upstairs and make myself a milkshake. Then, uh, I’ve got to talk to Aunie.” He smiled sheepishly at Lola. “I know I won’t get an argument from you when I say I owe her both an apology and thanks for her help.”

  “No argument, mon. But Aunie’s not home.”

  “Oh.” He battled his disappointment. He’d really wanted to get this over with. Then one well-muscled shoulder inched toward his ear. “I’ll catch her later then, I guess.”

  “James, it’ll have to be a lot later. She’s gone, mon.”

  James went very still. Slowly, he turned his head and pinned Lola in place with the intensity of his stare. “Whataya mean, gone?” Christ, she hadn’t moved out, had she? He knew he’d been a little rough, but, shit, that was no reason to just pack up and leave.

  “Her friend Mary called shortly after you left for the hospital this mornin’ and invited her to spend the holidays wid her family. They live somewhere over on the canal.” Lola watched James carefully. “Aunie accepted.”

  “She’s not gonna be here for Christmas?”

  “No.”

  It was just as well, he told himself … just as well. Hell, it actually made things simpler.

  He didn’t know why his gut, all twisted up in knots, didn’t seem to agree.

  CHAPTER 10

  Aunie could hear her phone ringing through the door as she fit her key into the latch. Mary had just dropped her off after their holiday with her family and as Aunie was burdened with purse, suitcase, and a large sack of groceries, she didn’t rush to unlock the door. Not many people knew her unlisted number, and of those who did, Mary was on her way home; she was planning to go down and visit Lola as soon as she unpacked; James wasn’t likely to call her, and neither was his brother Bob. The college office had her number but they were closed for the holidays, and she’d only received a handful of other calls which had invariably turned out to be either wrong numbers or an occasional charitable organization that had somehow gotten hold of her unlisted number.

  By the time she had unlocked the door, closed it behind her, and unloaded her purse and suitcase on the nearest chair, the phone was no longer ringing. She shrugged indifferently. It could have been her attorney, she supposed, but if that were the case, he’d call back. She carried her groceries into the kitchen.

  She’d had a wonderful time at Mary’s parents’ house, but she was glad to be home. Fed up with James and his inexplicable attitude the morning following his attack, she had jumped at the opportunity to get away. But it hadn’t been long before she’d begun to wonder how he and his brother were faring in the aftermath of their ordeal. She had also missed the Jacksons.

  As soon as she had put the groceries away and unpacked her suitcase, she gathered the Christmas presents she had bought for Lola and Otis and let herself out of her apartment. Minutes later, she was knocking on the Jacksons’ door.

  “Hoppy New Year, woo-mon!” Lola exclaimed upon opening the door. She reached out and gathered Aunie to her breast in an enthusiastic hug. Aunie hugged her tightly in return. After a lifetime spent with an undemonstrative family, she was still getting used to being embraced this way. Unaccustomed to it as she’d been, at first she’d felt stiff and uncomfortable with Lola’s tactile ways. But it was a habit to which she was discovering she could rapidly acclimate, as it always left her feeling appreciated and flushed with warmth.

  She spent the next couple of hours visiting with her friend. They exchanged Christmas presents and news of how their time apart had been spent. “James is back to normal,” Lola informed her almost immediately. “Paul’s recuperation has been slower, but he has been released from the hospital. He’s in a new program to kick his drug dependency, and so far, he’s doin’ very well.” She explained the way it worked, then waved a hand impatiently. “But that is not the big news.” Momentarily she looked shamefaced. “Of course, it is big news; it’s very important. It’s just not my big news.”

  “Tell me your big news,” Aunie demanded. She could sense Lola’s suppressed excitement.

  “Otis and me, we signed up wid the adoption peoples,” Lola blurted. She laughed exuberantly. “Aunie, we’re goin’ to get a baby!”

  “Oh, Lola, that is wonderful news! When? How?” Lola’s laughter was infectious and Aunie joined in, reaching out to squeeze her friend’s hand. “Start from the beginning and tell me everything. I want details, lots and lots of details.”

  Lola grinned into the cup of tea she held in both hands. Looking up, she rolled the cup between her palms while she related all the pertinent information. Her smile never diminished.

  Aunie learned it would take approximately six months for the Jacksons to get a child. First they would have to complete a series of interviews, home studies, and physicals, as well as have their financial and family histories reviewed.

  Lola asked Aunie if she’d be willing to write one of the three personal references the Jacksons were required to obtain from nonfamily members. Gaining Aunie’s assent, she launched into a description of the scrapbook she was trying to put together. Of all the information the caseworker had furnished them with, Lola was most intrigued by the family album they were asked to provide.

  “It’s to show to the birth mother,” she explained. “And we can also write her a letter explaining why we would like to adopt her baby, specifyin’ what our values are and what kind of parents we think we’d be. The birth mother is given three albums to choose from, and if she wants, she is given the opportunity of meetin’ us. I’m real excited ‘bout it, Aunie. The only problem I can see is gettin’ pictures that don’t make Otis look like a killer.”

  “Just make sure he smiles in them,” Aunie suggested. “He has those beautiful, whiter-than-white teeth and his smile changes his entire appearance.”

  “Yes,” Lola agreed. “And I wanna get at least one picture of him playin’ wid a niece or nephew. He’s so big and looks so mean, but he’s always so gentle wid the childrens, and it shows.”

  “Remember Thanksgiving, when all the kids were hanging on him when he walked across the room?” Aunie smiled in reminiscence. “God, Lola, remember how he laughed? That would make a great picture.”

  “Ooh, woo-mon, I like that idea very much. I want to get some shots of Otis’s entire clan anyway, to show the birth mother that her baby would be comin’ to a family ready-made wid a grandma and aunts and uncles and cousins. Maybe I can get them all together this weekend and use up a couple rolls of film.”

  They discussed the possibilities for an additional forty-five minutes before Aunie finally rose to go. She was reluctant to leave the warmth and excitement of Lola’s company but feared overstaying her welcome. Lola was probably anxious to contact the various members of Otis’s family to arrange for the weekend photography session, and with everyone’s busy schedules, that was bound to be a time-consuming endeavor. She was too polite to make her calls while Aunie was still there or to ask her to leave, so Aunie took matters into her own hands by thanking her for her Christmas present once again and asking her to give Otis his when he returned from the lumber store, where he and James had gone to pick out baseboards for the upstairs hallway. She reiterated her congratulations on the Jac
ksons’ decision to adopt and took her leave.

  She knew the prospect of a little solitude should be appealing after the more than a week she’d just spent being constantly surrounded by people at Mary’s family home. But once back in her apartment, Aunie found herself at a bit of a loss for something to do. Looking around at the dust that had accumulated during her absence, she decided somewhat despondently that cleaning was probably as good a way as any to occupy her time.

  Admiring one last time the new addition for her gallery wall of boys, which had been Lola’s Christmas gift to her, she set it aside and built a fire in the fireplace. She changed into a Penn State sweatshirt and a pair of leggings, twisted a bandana into a band to tie her hair up off her face, and got out her dust rag and vacuum. Turning up the stereo, she took her time, removing all her books and decorations from the bookshelves and tables, dusting each surface and item separately instead of employing her usual slapdash method of a swipe here and a swipe there.

  By the time she got around to chasing dust bunnies across the hardwood floor with a dust mop, she had admitted to herself that part of her restlessness stemmed from a latent disappointment that she hadn’t seen James. She had half hoped he and Otis would return while she was still at the Jacksons’. She’d really wanted to see for herself that he had fully recovered.

  Face it Franklin, a little voice whispered in her ear as she opened one of the dining area windows and vigorously shook the dust mop out of it, you just wanted to see him, period.

  Convinced it would be dangerous to do otherwise, she had tried assiduously to put her one amorous encounter with James completely out of her mind. Except for sometimes late at night or during an occasional unguarded moment, she had been fairly successful at it, too.

  But during the holidays, she and Mary had taken several walks on the beach. And during the course of one of them, the subject of sex had been introduced into their conversation. Aunie had found herself describing the dismal failure of her love life with Wesley.

  “I always thought I’d be a natural at sex—you know?—the way some people are at certain sports,” she’d confided. “I’d had opportunities before Wesley, but I always chickened out. It just didn’t seem right, somehow, to lose my virginity to someone I only knew superficially. Then, with Wesley, I thought: This is it. Look out world, ‘cause you’re about to meet the last of the red-hot lovers. Instead, it turned out I was totally inept.”

  “From what you’ve told me, it sounds more like a case of Wesley’s being a lousy lover.”

  “Do you think so?” Aunie had asked hopefully.

  “Yeah. I do. You know what you oughtta do, Aunie? You oughtta take a stab at seducing James. I bet he’s a regular hotshot in bed.”

  “I bet he is, too,” Aunie had replied glumly. “The only problem is, I’m not his type. In fact,” she’d said, eyeing her friend with a hint of sourness, “you’re more his type than I am. I hear he likes them tall, blonde, and busty. Just my luck I’m short, brunette, and practically bustless.”

  “That may be, toots, but I noticed he didn’t spare me a second glance the night we went out. You he looked at like he wanted to eat you up with a spoon.”

  Ever since that conversation, the memory of that night in her apartment had kept coming back to haunt her with increasing frequency.

  He’d made her feel things, that night, that she’d only dreamed of feeling before. For the first time in her life, she had felt totally desirable as a woman, sexy and seductive. After Wesley’s lack of passion, the way James had effortlessly dominated her every sexual response had left her shaken and weak-kneed … and although it probably wasn’t very liberated of her to admit, she’d loved it. She’d loved her own helpless response and his hunger. She’d loved the uncompro-mised passion, unleashed and utterly demanding. It had undermined her control as few things in her life had ever been able to do. Imagine … up against a door. She couldn’t help wondering, had the act been followed through to its natural conclusion, would he actually have made love to her in that position?

  Knowing James … probably.

  She’d only had sex in a bed, with the lights off and her body properly bathed, perfumed, and gowned. She had a gut feeling, however, that none of those little niceties were prerequisites in James Ryder’s personal book of carnal knowledge.

  And this is the man you’d like to seduce? her properly raised alter ego demanded with fastidious horror.

  She didn’t even have to think about it. Yes.

  Yes, yes, yes.

  The only problem was … she had grave doubts about ever actually summoning the nerve to attempt it. Not without encouragement at any rate, and despite Mary’s heartening words, she didn’t believe that was something she was likely to receive.

  Aunie sighed. Tucking her new photograph under her arm, she grabbed her dust rag and rolled the vacuum cleaner into her bedroom. She might as well clean up in here and then decide on the perfect spot to hang her newest hunk. Looking at her prospects realistically, she had to accept the fact that it was quite likely her boys were as close as she was likely to get in the foreseeable future to an unclad man.

  And if that wasn’t a depressing thought, she didn’t know what was.

  Considering the licentious nature of her thoughts, it wasn’t too surprising that when the doorbell rang and she opened it to find James lounging against her door frame, her heart kicked hard against her chest wall and then commenced a furious drumming. She was completely flustered. One dusty hand flying self-consciously to her tied-back hair, she wet her lips with a nervous tongue. Oh, great. Here she’d been fantasizing the big seduction, and he had to show up when she looked like Chambermaid Cathy.

  Life was so unfair.

  “Hiya, Magnolia,” he said, pushing away from the door frame and sauntering uninvited into her apartment. She had to step back hastily to keep from being bowled over. “How was your Christmas?”

  “Fine,” she croaked. Oh Gawd, she had to get a grip. Her mouth was dry, her cheeks felt flushed, and she had an awful sensation of imminent exposure, as if a neon sign were about to blink on over her head, broadcasting her thoughts. “And yours?”

  “Not bad,” he replied. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and shifted uncomfortably. “Listen, the reason I stopped by…” His words trailed away when she abruptly shifted to block the entrance to the short hall that led to the bedroom and bathroom. Why the hell was she looking so guilty? A thought struck him and his eyebrows drew together. “What’s goin’ on, Aunie? Y’ hidin’ a man in the bedroom?”

  That struck Aunie as almost funny, considering. “Don’t be ridiculous,” she retorted with an unnaturally high-pitched laugh. “I’ve been cleanin’ and … and hangin’ my newest hunk.”

  “Yeah?” he said doubtfully. The little pulse in the base of her white throat was fluttering like a trapped bird, and her elegant cheekbones were flushed scarlet. “And what else? Fantasizing about him while you gave your vibrator a test flight?”

  “Mistah Rydah!” The outrage was unmistakable.

  “I guess not, huh?”

  “Most certainly not!” Her cheeks felt as if they were on fire. As if she would ever admit to such a thing even if she had been doing it! Did the man’s gall know no bounds? “What, exactly,” she inquired through her teeth, “do you want?”

  “Huh? Oh!” Nicely done, Ryder, James thought wryly. You came to apologize and instead you’ve already managed to piss her off. He still thought she looked more like a woman who’d been caught with some guy’s hands down her pants than someone doing a little light housecleaning. The thought, however, had the ability to make him inexplicably irritable, so he shoved it aside. He scratched beneath his lower lip. “Listen, Magnolia, I didn’t come here to give you a bad time.”

  The look she shot him said you could have fooled her, but James plowed on doggedly. “I never really thanked you properly for everything you did for me last week.” He rolled his shoulders uneasily. Reaching out, he tweaked the perky little
tails poking straight up from the knot of the colorful headband that held back her shiny hair. He thought they were cute—they looked kind of like little rabbit ears. “And I owe you a major apology for the way I acted the next morning. It was uncalled for, and I’m sorry.”

  “You were hurtin’,” Aunie excused him and James marveled at her generosity. She was mighty quick to forgive, he noted, as she stepped closer and inspected his face, her ire of a moment ago apparently forgotten. “You seem to be fully recovered,” she finally decided. “How’s your brother? Lola tells me he’s in a very promisin’ rehabilitation program.”

  “It’s nothing short of miraculous, Aunie,” James informed her enthusiastically. “I never thought I’d see the day when Paul had a real chance of kickin’ his habit, but so far he’s doing incredibly well.”

  “I’m glad,” she said softly. Then, as if remembering something, she exclaimed, “Oh! Wait here. I’ll be right back.” She whirled on the ball of one foot and trotted from the room. An instant later she was back, extending a small, exquisitely wrapped present. “This is for you.”

  Oh shit. James stared at it, feeling rotten. “I wish you hadn’t,” he muttered. “I didn’t get you anything.” He didn’t tell her about the cherry red sweater that had drawn him over to a table in Nordstrom’s three separate times before he’d finally walked away for good, leaving it unpurchased.

  Aunie smiled. “Don’t worry about it, James; I didn’t expect anything from you. Believe me, this is not extravagant. Open it.”

  He did so, reluctantly. But when he opened the little white box. his eyes snapped up to lock with hers and he laughed. “Coated rubber bands?”

  “I noticed you use actual rubber rubber bands for your ponytail,” she said with a smile, pleased with his reaction. “Any woman could tell you they’re the absolute worst for your hair. They break it off.”

  “No kidding. That must be one of those little beauty secrets only females ever seem to know.” He reached up and slid off the rubber band holding his hair clubbed back, wincing as it snagged a few hairs.