She was terrified she wouldn’t be around long enough to make it last.
In her heart, she knew Otis was right. She couldn’t abandon Frank now. If it took every ounce of courage she possessed, she would see this through to the end.
Chapter Seven
Frank stood in the doorway of his private woodworking shop at home, unable to tear his gaze away from two intricately carved, skillfully crafted cabinets in unfinished cherry and oak. He rarely did his cabinetry at home, but these had been special orders and he’d spent his spare time rushing to complete them. His dedication had saved them from the fire. He wondered, though, if they would ever be finished, if the twining flowers along the edges would ever reach as high as he’d intended.
His gaze moved on to the smaller, partially carved blocks of wood that sat amid the fragrant shavings on top of his worktable. Smooth, polished pieces, ready for a summer gallery showing, lined a shelf along one wall. Each one was a triumph of his artistic imagination over nature. It wasn’t until he’d studied the grain of the wood that he decided what shape it would take. It was as if each square or rectangular block spoke to his mind’s eye. Stepping inside, he slowly approached the complete figures, his heart aching at the prospect of never again being able to create such beauty.
He’d heard it said that the first step in any difficult task was always the hardest, and this one had been pure hell. It had taken him days just to work up the courage to come this far. He’d insisted that Kevin shut the door to the back room the day he’d come home from the hospital. He’d skirted the room ever since, not even glancing at the closed door when he could avoid it. He’d spent the days going for walks. Long, exhausting walks. Nights, he’d lain in bed and thought of Jenny and a future that seemed even emptier without her. It was still impossible for him to accept that she hadn’t come, that she’d meant it when she’d said there could be nothing between them. And he thought of the painful revelation that, to her way of thinking, might have made it impossible for her to come. He drifted to sleep eventually filled with terrible questions.
When he’d awakened late this morning, he’d known he could no longer put off the inevitable. He had to know just how bleak the future was, just how crippling his injury had been. Once he knew that, maybe he’d know what to do about Jenny as well, whether he dared to pursue her, whether he’d have the strength to help her face her own demons.
Now that he was inside the room with happier memories crowding in, risking it seemed like a lousy idea. Maybe it would be better not to know just how terribly inept his fingers had become. Maybe he should just accept that fate had intervened and set his life on a different course. But what course? What the hell would he do with the rest of his life if not this?
For years, beginning at the age of seventeen, he had taken safe, low-paying, unskilled jobs to help out at home. Only when his extra income was no longer needed had he dared to begin the uncertain career that had beckoned to him from the first time he’d held a stick of wood and been taught whittling by his Tennessee-born father. From the first day of his apprenticeship to a master craftsman, he’d been filled with a soul-deep sense of accomplishment. What if all that was truly over? How would he handle it? Could he go back to those other less challenging, less satisfying jobs?
Finally, when he could bear it no more, he reached for one of the unfinished pieces. Gritting his teeth against the pain, aware of the tautness of his skin as it stretched almost beyond endurance, he closed his hand around the chunky block. With an artist’s tender touch, he rubbed his still raw fingertips over the wood, stroking it as if it were alive, caressing the rounded shape of a blue jay’s belly as it emerged from the uneven surface.
There were those who said that it was possible to distinguish each fragile feather on figures he’d carved. On this piece he had yet to complete the basic carving, much less start the delicate detail. Fingers trembling, he reached for his knife. Slowly, painfully, he closed his hand around it, defying Jenny’s warning not to rush his attempts to hold smaller objects, not to allow his expectations to soar too high. With grim determination, he touched knife to wood, only to have the sharp instrument slide from his feeble grasp.
With a muttered oath, he picked it up and tried again, ignoring the agony, ignoring the sting of perspiration that beaded across his brow and trickled into his eyes, ignoring the sick churning of fear in his belly. Again, the knife clattered to the floor.
With each faulty effort, with each demoralizing defeat, his determination wavered, but he tried again…and again. Sweat ran down his back. His arms and shoulders ached from the effort of trying to master no more than a firm hold on what had once seemed a natural extension of his body.
It was on his tenth try or his thirtieth—he had lost track—when he heard the whisper of sound. He turned to find Jenny standing in the doorway, her face streaked with sympathetic tears. The leaden mass that had formed in his chest grew heavier still at the sight of her brokenhearted expression.
“How’d you get in?” he asked dully, his shoulders slumping.
“I knocked. I guess you didn’t hear me. I tried the door and it was open.” With her distraught gaze fixed on his hands, she said, “You shouldn’t be doing this. It’s too soon.”
“I had to try. I had to know the worst.”
Something that looked like guilt flickered in her eyes. “I should have been here,” she said, almost to herself. Her gaze rose, then met his. “You’re my patient. I should have come the first day you missed your outpatient appointment.”
“Why didn’t you?” he asked accusingly.
“It just seemed so complicated. I kept thinking you would come back to the hospital. Today, when you missed the second appointment, I knew there was no choice. I had to come.”
The weight of her guilt got to him. “Don’t go blaming yourself,” he said, feeling a twinge of guilt himself. Had he known that staying away would bring her to him? Maybe so. Maybe the real blame was his. He said only, “I knew the risk I was taking by not continuing the therapy. I figured a few days off couldn’t matter all that much.”
“A few days?” she questioned. “Or were you really giving up?”
He shook his head. “Not until today.”
Tears welled again in her eyes, but she blinked them away. “I won’t let you do that, Frank.”
Those tears were going to be his undoing. “Don’t cry,” he pleaded, his own voice ragged with emotion as he found himself offering comfort to a woman whose slightest smile had come to mean comfort to him. He yearned to take her in his arms, to touch her as he had no right to touch her, to show her what she’d come to mean to him.
She started to speak again, then shook her head.
“What the hell,” he said with pure bravado, hoping to win a smile, an end to the unbearable tension throbbing between them. “I can always hold the handle of a saw. Maybe I can build houses.”
“You will carve again,” she vowed. “I promise.”
Grateful beyond belief that she had come at last, Frank was still in no mood for promises that might never be kept. In a gesture of pure defiance, he swept his arm across the worktable, sending wood and tools flying. “No, dammit! Don’t lie to me, Jenny. Never lie to me. Let me adjust. Let me get on with my life.”
A familiar mutinous expression settled on her lips, firmed her jaw. She swiped away the tears. “What kind of a life will it be, if you can’t do what you love?” she demanded. “You can’t stop trying.”
“I can,” he said, just as stubbornly. “And I will.”
She sucked in a breath and stood straighter, every inch filled with that magnificent indignation that could have daunted kings or generals. He was no match at all when she declared, “I won’t let you.”
Frank’s laugh was mirthless, just the same. “Jenny, there’s not a blessed thing you can do about it,” he mocked.
As if he’d thrown down a gauntlet in some medieval challenge, she marched into the room. “Watch me,” she said, picking up
the first tool she came to and slapping the handle into his hand. “Squeeze it, damn you.”
Raw pain seared his flesh, but by instinct his fingers curved around the instrument, the skin stretched taut, the nerve endings on fire.
“Tighter,” she demanded, her body pressed against him in a way that had him thinking of things far softer than oak, far more compelling than carving. The force of the desire spiraling through him shook him to the very core of his being.
Their gazes clashed, hers filled with furious determination, his own filled with God knew what revelation. When the knife threatened to slide from his grasp again, she folded her own hand around his, adding enough pressure to secure it. Every muscle in Frank’s body tensed at this new and very difficult strain, but he refused to let go, refused to acknowledge the agony of the effort. Jenny was clearly willing to goad him into trying, and he was too stubborn and too proud not to accept the challenge. Nor could he bear the thought of her moving away. God help him, he wouldn’t deny himself the sweet, sweet pleasure of her nearness.
“You know the drill,” she said finally, her voice oddly breathless. “Ten minutes an hour.”
“Who’s going to be around to make me?”
“I am.”
“Your job as my therapist ended when I walked out of the hospital.”
Green eyes sparked with emerald fire. “Like hell. A condition of your discharge was that you continue therapy as an outpatient. If I hadn’t come today, Dr. Wilding would have sent me over to find out where the hell you’ve been.”
Despite himself, Frank’s lips twitched with amusement. A whisper of relief sighed through him, and he felt himself begin to relax. “Think you’re pretty tough, don’t you?”
That earned a dimpled smile that faded quickly into a clearly feigned scowl. “You bet,” she declared.
“And if I don’t cooperate?”
“You don’t want to know what kind of tortures I can invent for an uncooperative patient.”
He chuckled, fully aware of the kind of tortures she could impose without even trying. His body ached from them. “Is that so?” he taunted. His gaze fastened on the lush curve of her lips.
“Care to test me?” she taunted right back.
“Lady, I intend to give you a run for your money.” He winked as he said it, suddenly feeling better, more hopeful, even if hope was folly. “By the way, what do I get if I cooperate?”
“You get to work again.”
“I had something a little more intimate in mind.”
“I’ll just bet you did,” she retorted. As if suddenly aware of the way her body had molded itself to him, she backed away, a step only, but it was too far for him. Frank wanted to curse at the sudden deprivation.
“You finish that blue jay and then maybe we’ll talk,” she said.
“Talking is the last thing on my mind,” he said bluntly so there could be no doubts about his intentions.
A blush crept into her cheeks, but her eyes were stormy. Hands on slender hips, she said, “Mister, if your hands heal half as well as your libido, you’ll be in great shape in no time.”
At the sound of a deep-throated chuckle, they both whirled around to see Tim lurking in the doorway. Amusement danced in his eyes. “Hey, Bro, what’s this about a libido? I thought I had the reputation in the family for chasing skirts.”
Disgruntled by the untimely interruption, Frank said, “Listen, Bro, you’re interrupting my therapy.”
“Oh, is that what this is? Where can I sign up?” He winked at Jenny, and the brazen little hussy winked back. Frank wanted to throttle them both as the charged atmosphere disintegrated. Another few seconds of sparring, another half dozen words of challenge and Jenny would have been in his arms, maybe even in his lonely king-size bed just down the hall. A betting man—Otis—could have made book on it.
“If you don’t get out of here in the next ten seconds, your broken arm will qualify you,” Frank said grumpily.
Jenny shook her head. “Okay, enough, you two. I’m out of here. Play nice.”
Tim’s eyes widened at the teasing admonition. “You sound just like Ma.”
“Is it any wonder, when you sound like a couple of five-year-olds?” She turned her very best, most intimidating therapist-to-patient glare on Frank. “And you, ten minutes every hour. Got it?”
“Have you ever thought of a career in the military?” he inquired.
“Why, when I have guys like you to order around already? Be at the clinic tomorrow. Bring your tools with you. We might as well work with the things that are relevant to you.”
“Why not have the sessions here?”
There was no arguing the logic of the suggestion, but Jenny’s instantly terrified expression spoke volumes. She wasn’t about to spend an hour a day with him in his home, where they both knew that therapy would take second place to mounting desire.
“Policy,” she said tightly, her tone daring him to contradict her.
Much as he wanted to, suddenly Frank didn’t have the stamina for it. The previous hour had stolen the last of his reserves of energy.
“I’ll be there,” he said.
When she nodded, secure again in the victory, he added, “But don’t think you’re one bit safer there, Jenny.”
Patches of pink colored her cheeks for the second time in minutes. Avoiding Tim’s laughing gaze and Frank’s challenge, she scooted to safety.
Only when she had sashayed out of the room, the determined picture of feigned self-confidence, did Frank collapse onto his workbench. He was exhausted with the strain of coming into this room, of confronting his frailty all over again. The swing of his emotions from hope to defeat and back again had taken its toll.
Tim’s expression immediately turned worried. “You okay?”
“Just a little tired.”
“From the therapy, or from the stress of keeping your hands off the therapist?”
Frank grinned ruefully. “The only interest the therapist has in my hands is their increasing manual dexterity.”
“Sounds promising.”
“Very funny.”
Tim’s expression sobered. “What about you? You’re really attracted to her, aren’t you?”
“What’s not to like? She’s beautiful. She’s bright. She’s caring. She’s gentle. She’s sexy. And all she feels for me is pity.” He said the last as a diversion, praying it wasn’t entirely true, unwilling to admit it might be.
“I don’t think so.”
“You didn’t see the look on her face when she walked in here an hour ago.”
“Did it ever occur to you that maybe it was compassion, not pity? Jenny strikes me as a woman who feels things deeply. Maybe what she was feeling was the ache inside you. Anyone who knows you can see what kind of hell you’re going through.”
Frank prayed that Tim was right, that his own instincts about Jenny’s susceptibility to him were equally on target. He regarded his brother curiously. “You know something, little brother? I think maybe I’ve been selling you short all these years. Under all that flirtatious, chauvinistic attitude beats the heart of a true romantic. I predict that once you truly fall for a woman, it’s going to be a crash heard round the entire Bay area.”
“God, I hope not. We have enough quakes as it is.”
* * *
Jenny discovered that just because Frank was on her turf, just because he’d agreed to continue the therapy at the hospital’s outpatient clinic, it didn’t stop the lingering looks. Every time their fingers brushed, her whole body came alive. It was the most amazing reaction. She would have sworn that his were the damaged nerves, yet she felt as if it were her own that were healing. Contact meant only to guide took on a deeper meaning. She began to long for those casual, innocent touches, needing them for the good they did her, rather than the comfort and guidance they gave him. It had been years since she’d allowed herself to hunger for that kind of physical closeness.
She was careful, though, to make sure that there were alway
s other patients around. When the scheduling failed her, she begged Carolanne to stay in the therapy room to finish paperwork.
“What are you afraid of?” Carolanne demanded. “Frank Chambers is getting too close, isn’t he? He’s tearing down that wall of reserve, brick by brick.”
“That’s about it.”
“What’s so terrible about that?”
“Yeah,” an all-too-familiar voice echoed. “What’s so terrible about that? I’m a nice guy.”
With a fiery blush creeping up her neck, she turned to meet Frank’s laughing eyes. Carolanne made a beeline for the door. “Traitor,” Jenny muttered as her so-called friend left.
When Carolanne had gone, she bustled around the therapy room, giving orders, avoiding Frank’s gaze, ignoring the thudding of her heart, the quick flare of heat deep inside.
“What’d you do last night?” he inquired casually as he dutifully began his exercises.
She blinked up from the paperwork she was pretending to read and stared at him. He didn’t usually ask personal questions. “What?”
“I asked what you did last night.”
“Why?”
He grinned. “What’s the problem? That’s a fairly typical question among friends. Fits right in there with ‘Hi, how are you?’ So, what did you do?”
She had to search her brain to recall what had filled the lonely hours until sleep had claimed her. “I read a paper on the importance of infection control in burn therapy.”
“Sounds dull,” he said, but he looked smug for some reason that eluded her.
“Actually it was fascinating.” She launched into a desperate detailing of every word she could remember. She was only sorry the paper had been so short. More of the medical jargon might have dampened the unmistakable gleam she saw in his eyes.
“Still sounds dull,” he said when she’d finished. “How come you didn’t have a date?”
“Why the sudden interest in my social life?”
“I’ve always been interested in your social life. I’ve just never asked about it before.”
“Why now?”
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