"You might miss a few of these Texas-sized potholes if you'd quit staring at me and keep your eyes on the road," she told him, her tone a little sharp.
He glanced from her feet to her face. No amount of makeup could hide those big brown eyes now that he'd noticed them. Doe eyes. He felt as if he might fall into them before he managed to jerk his gaze back to the road. "I was wondering how you manage to walk in those shoes," he said, to make conversation.
"One step at a time, cowboy. Just like everybody else."
He glanced sideways at her, saw her lips quirk in a slight smile and knew she was teasing him a little. He didn't say any more, but sent Baxter, who sat between them, a wink.
A short while later he pulled the pickup to a stop. "This looks like a good place to start," he said. "What do you think, Baxter?"
Bax glanced through the windshield, and his eyes lit up when he spotted the giant ice-cream cone on top of the small log building.
Jasmine rolled her eyes. "Hell, you're just determined to make me fat, aren't you?"
Luke shrugged. "I'm guessin' you could eat nonstop for about a week and still have a ways to go for that, woman."
She smiled at him suddenly. Right out of the blue. "Thank you."
"Shoot, that was no compliment. Why do you city girls always take being malnourished as a good thing? You're downright scrawny." He looked at Baxter. "I say we get her a triple scoop super mocha sundae with extra whipped cream."
"Yeah!" Baxter said, giggling.
Jasmine was glowering at Luke again. "I'll have a soda," she said. "Diet."
"Darn. Looks like Bax will have to eat that sundae, then."
Bax laughed as if he would bust a gut, and Jasmine's glower eased away. Maybe she was starting to understand that he was kidding here, trying to keep Baxter's mind off his troubles.
He thought so even more when Jasmine ordered a small cone with a chocolate dip. They ate at one of the umbrella shaded picnic tables outside. He got momentarily lost in watching Jasmine eat ice cream. It was suitable fodder for the Playboy Channel, he figured. Or maybe it was just him. When they finished, he hauled them all over to the Wal-Mart, found a parking spot and stopped the truck.
Jasmine looked at the store, then sent Luke a doubtful glance.
"Anything you could possibly want or need, this is the place you'll find it," Luke promised her. "Hair care, clothes, shoes, even groceries. Knock yourself out."
"If you say so." She drew a breath and reached for Baxter's hand.
"Jasmine?" Luke said, and she looked back at him. He made his eyes as sincere as he could. "Why don't you let Baxter hang with me while you get your shopping done? I just have a few errands in town. Heck, I take Bubba with me all the time. Sometimes for the whole weekend, and he hasn't once gone home with so much as a mosquito bite."
She bit her lower hp. Luke noticed it, then made himself stop noticing it. "I don't know…" she said. Which meant she was wavering.
"You said you had a lot to do. And you know it'll be easier without him in tow. I promise, I won't let him out of my sight, not even for a second."
"Please, Mom?" Baxter asked.
She met Luke's eyes again, and he saw her message clearly. Let anything happen to my boy and I will kill you slowly. But aloud she said, "Oh, all right."
Bax squealed with delight and clapped his hands together. But while he celebrated, Jasmine reached out, and her slender hand, with its deadly nails, locked around Luke's arm with surprising strength.
"It's important you keep that promise about not letting him out of your sight," she told him, her voice very low. "Very important. And if you see any strangers paying him undue attention, get him out of there. Watch him, Luke."
The way she said it, the intensity in her eyes and the pressure of her hand on his arm … all those things combined delivered a message he would have preferred not to have received. The kid was in danger. Or Jasmine believe him to be. So those "bad guys" Baxter had mentioned twice were not just unpleasant characters or casual enemies, were they?
What the hell was going on with these two?
Too late to ask. She released him, leaned down to kiss her son's face and got out of the truck. "You be good, Baxter. You stay close to Luke, you hear?"
"I'll be good, Mom. Really."
An hour later Jasmine emerged from the store, her arms loaded down with shopping bags. She'd cashed both her own paycheck and Rosebud's on her way out of Illinois, so cash wasn't a problem. Not yet, anyway. As she entered the store, she practically bumped into a woman she didn't know. The woman had a baby on her hip. Jasmine muttered an apology, but the woman only stepped back, looked at her closely, and then smiled and said, "You must be Jasmine!"
Jasmine frowned, going on instant alert. "How do you know who I am?"
She was a pretty thing, with a Lois Lane
look about her, and her baby was utterly gorgeous. Fat cheeks, blond curls. A little boy, six or seven months old, by Jasmine's best guess, wearing a tiny baseball cap with his jumper. The woman went right on speaking. "You're new in town. You're shopping right where my cousin said you'd be shopping. And of course, there are the nails. They clinched it."
"Not the nails again," Jasmine muttered, relaxing a bit as it hit her this must be yet another Brand.
"They're gorgeous," the woman said. "Let me take a few of those for you." She helped herself to three of Jasmine's bags, holding them in one hand and her baby in the other arm. "I'm Penny. My husband Ben is Garrett's brother. And this is Zachary, our son."
"He's adorable," Jasmine said, looking at the bright eyes that stared right back at her. The baby smiled and cooed. Then Jasmine said, "Did Luke send you here, then?"
"Uh-huh. He said to pick you up. He and Baxter, your own adorable little fellow, will meet you at the dojo in a bit. Okay?"
Jasmine shrugged. "Fine, I guess." She walked with Penny Brand out to her car, which turned out to be a hulking four-wheel-drive SUV in a pretty shade of forest-green. They stashed the bags in the back and the baby in the car seat, then got into the front.
As she fastened her seat belt, Penny said, "By the way, welcome to Quinn. I can't tell you how glad I am to meet you. It's like fate sent you along at the perfect time."
Jasmine frowned. "Why would you say that?"
Penny shrugged, turning the wheel, expertly pulling into the light traffic of town. "Baxter tells me you're a dancer."
"Um, yeah." She wondered if Luke had elaborated on that, if he'd told his cousin-in-law that she danced, all right—at a strip joint in the seedy part of Chicago.
"I think that is so incredible. God, I've always wished I could dance. I just seem to have two left feet. Were you formally trained or self-taught?"
So Luke hadn't told her the rest. Hell, he must be a throwback. You could only fake so much—she didn't think you could fake the kind of … chivalry, or whatever antiquated moral value prevented him from spilling her secrets to his family. And glancing at Penny, she saw yet another woman who seemed kind, friendly, genuinely interested in her, and not sporting any ulterior motives. She was beginning to think it didn't make a lot of sense to believe every single person she met was an incredibly talented actor, trying to snow her, up to no good.
My God, could these people genuinely be this nice?
"I, um … Chicago School of Dance," she said finally. "For three years. I worked two jobs to pay my tuition. But I had to drop out when Bax came along."
"Wow," Penny said, looking a little awed now. "You must be incredible. You're more than I could have hoped for." She seemed to be battling a full-blown face-splitting smile.
"Hoped for … for what?"
"Oh, just let me show you around the place first. We'll talk more after."
Jasmine studied the woman curiously as Penny drove into a parking lot and cut the engine. She glanced into the back. "Anything perishable back there?"
"No, nothing."
"Great. Let's go in then." She hopped out of the car, whipped open t
he back door and gathered up her baby. Then she headed toward the entrance of the large building.
It looked to Jasmine like a big old warehouse of some kind. Ribbed metal siding, a white metal roof. But the giant sign across the peak in front read The Dojo Spiritual Fitness Center, and underneath that, in slightly smaller script, Karate, Tae Kwon-Do, Tai Chi, Chi Gung, Yoga, Meditation.
As they walked toward the entrance, she wondered if Luke's cousin Ben looked anything like David Carradine. Then she thought to glance around the parking lot. "I don't see Luke's truck," she said. She opened the door, holding it for Penny.
"Oh, he'll be along," she said, coming inside with the baby.
Inside, the place was even more impressive. Hardwood floors, stacks of mats, sliding walls that could divide the huge space into four separate rooms at will, and the walls … the walls had long, elegant dragons painted on them in brilliant reds, oranges and purples.
"Come on in, please," Penny said. "It's just as well no one's here right now. Maybe I can convince you to indulge me just a little bit."
"I don't follow."
But Penny was already rushing through the place, pointing this way and that. "That little room beyond the Plexiglas window is where the controls are for the sound system, the lighting, the divider walls, etc. It doubles as an office. The other doors over there are the rest rooms, and that final one leads upstairs. The entire second floor of the place is where we live."
"Wow. Must be tons of room."
"Oh, there is. I'll show you around up there later, if you like." She pulled a mat from the stack near the wall and set the baby down on it. Then she dipped into her purse for a handful of baby toys and put them down in front of him. Zachary grinned and gurgled and sat up by himself, then reached for his toys. "That's a good baby," Penny said. She left him and walked the four steps into the control room and office, and a second later Jasmine heard strains of music wafting from unseen speakers.
Penny came back out again, smiling. "Will you show me just a little?" she asked.
Jasmine frowned, then she got it. "You want me to dance?"
"I know it sounds silly, but, oh, please, I really do have a reason for asking. And I've loved dance all my life. And it's just you and me here, after all. Please?"
Jasmine shrugged. "To tell you the truth, it's been killing me not to have time to dance in the past few days—or a gym to practice in." She glanced behind her toward the door. The music was seeping into her muscles, making them twitch with longing. "Back in Chicago there was a gym right around the corner from the apartment. Rosebud and I used to go every day while Bax was at school. Kept us in shape, you know? I mean, it isn't like we had the chance to use our classical training much any other time…"
She found herself stretching as she spoke. Falling into her old patterns automatically, almost feeling as if Rosebud were with her, right now. In that old gym with the smelly locker room, their cheap boom box plugged into a wall socket, sitting on the floor. A handful of boys usually waiting for the room to free up so they could shoot hoops, heckling them.
She and Rosebud giving it right back. Then dancing until those mouthy punks were just gaping, awestruck.
And then she was dancing. It came to her as naturally as breathing. She let herself forget everything that had happened. For a brief time she was back there in that smelly gym around the corner. And Rosebud was with her, dancing in perfect synch. Closing her eyes, Jasmine gave herself over to the music, let it bend and move her body with its notes and rhythms. Moving her arms in graceful arcs. Dancing was her sweetest release—her haven where no hurt could get in. She lost herself completely to the music, to the dance, forgetting her audience of one woman and one baby. Forgetting the violence she had come here to escape. Forgetting everything, she danced.
Luke and Ben walked up to the front door of the dojo and heard music. "Guess they got bored waiting for us," Ben said.
Luke smiled at him, glancing down at the boy attached to the small hand that had been nestled inside his larger one for most of the afternoon now. He liked that feeling a little bit too much. He knew he shouldn't let himself get as fond of Baxter as this, feel as protective of him as he did. He shouldn't get a little soft spot in his chest every time those round wire-rimmed glasses slid down the kid's nose. It was not a good idea to get this attached to a child like Bax, with a mother like Jasmine. She wouldn't like it. She would probably rebel violently against it. He knew that instinctively. Moms like Jasmine didn't like other people getting close to their sons.
But that thought—along with every other coherent thought he might have had—abandoned his brain when he stepped into the dojo and saw her. At first he didn't fully comprehend. Had Ben finally hired a professional dance instructor for that class Penny wanted to add to the selection here? But what would a dancer this good be doing in a backwater town like Quinn?
And then he realized what his gut had known from the first glance. That dancer was Jasmine. She swirled and dipped, and when her arms moved they were liquid. Her hair flew when she whirled, and she moved faster and faster until she was only a blur in his eyes. And finally she stopped, ending bent low, almost hugging herself, her breaths rushing in and out in short, shallow puffs and her skin damp and glowing.
For some reason, Garrett's words floated into his mind. "You're doomed, cuz." And he thought maybe he was. That was it for him—the moment when he walked in and saw her dancing. He didn't want it to be. But he saw now that he'd never had much choice in the matter. Otherwise, what was the heavy object that nailed him in the chest like a two-by-four just now?
Luke heard clapping. He blinked out of the stupor her dance had evoked in him and looked around. Ben was there, clapping slowly along with Penny. On the floor, wide-eyed, little Zachary grinned and copied them, smacking his tiny hands together repeatedly. Baxter clapped, too, louder and harder than anyone else.
Jasmine lifted her head, eyes wide in surprise. Her eyes seemed to find Luke's as if by radar, and then she lowered her gaze. Her face was already flushed with heat and exertion, but Luke thought it got even redder. Was she blushing? And how much sense did that make? She danced half-naked for men for a living. How could dancing this way, in front of him, fully clothed, make her blush?
"I told you my mom was the best dancer in the world!" Baxter said, his little chest puffing out.
"You sure did, Bax," Luke said.
"That was incredible," Penny said through her smile. "Incredible! Wasn't it, Ben?"
"Blew me away," Ben said. "Okay, Penny, you win."
Penny looked at him, brows rising high. "I get to have my dance class?"
He nodded. "Can't deprive the Quinn kids of learning something that powerful, now can we? And as for the teacher, well, we couldn't top what I've just seen here if we advertised for six months. If Jasmine wants the job, it's hers."
Penny clapped her hands together. Everyone was smiling. Everyone, Luke noticed, except for Jasmine. She was still staring at him, and it hit him that maybe she was waiting for him to make some comment about what he'd seen just now. Everyone had raved about her dancing except for him, and, uh, little Zachary on the floor there. Although at least the little one had clapped and drooled. Anyway, before he could find words, Jasmine looked away from him, as if Ben's words had finally registered.
"What job?" she asked.
"I want to add dance classes to our schedule, for the local kids," Penny said. "I have almost fifty parents interested already. But I couldn't do it without a qualified teacher, and I just didn't know where to find one." She smiled. "Until now."
Jasmine sent a swift glance toward Luke yet again. It took a moment before it dawned on him what she was waiting for. She was expecting him to inform his cousins what kind of dancing she had been doing up until recently. To tell them that they wouldn't want a woman like her teaching ballet and the like to young impressionable kids.
"I really … don't think I'm … qualified," Jasmine said at last.
Luke swallowe
d hard. "You're right. You're not. What you're qualified for is dancing on some Paris stage while people throw roses at your feet."
Those big brown eyes went wider. Her lips pulled slightly, and she lowered her head. "You know better than that Luke."
"No, I don't. I've never seen anything like that before, Jasmine. And I already know how wonderful you are with kids. So I'd say you're more than qualified to take this job on, if you want it. And … if you're planning to stay around Quinn awhile."
"Are you?" Penny asked.
"Are we, Mom?" Baxter echoed.
Luke looked at Baxter's hopeful expression and wondered how much his own mirrored it. He tried to school himself into a less obvious countenance, but he couldn't help hoping she would say yes.
Jasmine looked from one of them to the other and, sighing, closed her eyes. "I don't know. I'm sorry, I just … I don't know."
Being in Quinn, Texas, at night was as different from being in Chicago as being on another planet would be. It wasn't the sounds, or the lack of them. Or the smells, or the lack of them. It was the feeling. A safe, secure, utterly fictional feeling that all was right with the world. People who lived in small towns were seriously deluded. Lulled into believing in the spell places like this could cast.
Baxter was tucked safely in Luke Brand's big bed, sound asleep already. Jasmine sat outside on the porch swing, rocking slowly, breathing honeysuckle-laden night air and listening to the endless chorus of background music. Coyotes warbling their sad, lonely cries. Cicadas chirping madly. The distant moan of the wind. Above her, beyond the porch roof, were stars. She didn't think she had ever seen so many stars in the sky in her life. They spread like a twinkling blanket over the world.
The creak of the screen door and heavy footfalls spoke of Luke's approach even before he sat down beside her on the swing. He gave a push of his big boots and sent the thing into greater arcs than before. Then he crossed his arms behind his head and leaned back, stretching out his long legs.
THE HOMECOMING Page 8
