Hush, Little Baby

by Judith Arnold

Chapter Five

  NEITHER OF THEM spoke during the drive to the Arlington Inn.

  Once Tara had returned to Levi’s house keep an eye on D.J., he and Corinne got into his car and headed toward downtown Arlington. They traveled through his drowsing neighborhood, streetlamps spilling light through the night-black foliage, windows shedding amber rectangles onto shadowed front yards. Occasionally they passed another car, but Arlington at ten-thirty on a weeknight was far from lively.

  Next to him, Corinne sat quietly, her gaze distant. She wasn’t thinking about him, but he was sure as hell thinking about her.

  Something had happened when she’d taken D.J. in her arms—and Levi would bet his next commission that was what she was thinking about: the way D.J. had nestled into her embrace and grown serene, the way all his tension and anger had melted away once he’d felt her arms around him. He’d clearly wanted her to hold him; the instant Levi had passed D.J. over to Corinne, he’d been transformed.

  He’d wanted Corinne.

  It was a yearning Levi could definitely relate to.

  That was the notion that obsessed him while Corinne silently pursued her own thoughts. As he cruised down Hauser Boulevard, eerily traffic-free at this hour, Levi admitted that there was a whole lot more to her than her long legs, her expressive eyes and her obvious intelligence. Something inside her, something D.J. had detected right away but Levi could only sense, had altered the atmosphere in his home, reshaped the molecules in the air. Something about her had cast a spell.

  Was it just that she was a woman? Was it that D.J. was looking for breast milk and any woman with breasts would have sufficed? Or was it something particular about Corinne that D.J. had been responding to?

  If the kid hadn’t been in his life right now, Levi would have made a play for Corinne. Why not? Even though they had to rework a contract, he could still think about her in terms other than professional. She was smart and attractive; he was single; no harm in trying.

  But that would have been all it was—a try, a play. No big deal.

  In any case, D.J. was in Levi’s life, and thanks to D.J., Levi viewed Corinne in an entirely different light. When he’d sat next to her on the futon, with D.J. in her lap and the whisper-soft pressure of her arm against his… Something had happened. He didn’t know what. He just knew it was something.

  The inn loomed ahead, its colonial façade quaint enough to illustrate a postcard. He steered onto the circular drive and coasted up to the front door, then shut off the engine. He had to speak, to get her attention, to release some of the tension building inside him. He couldn’t just let her climb out of the car when everything felt so unresolved between them, unrealized but there, just waiting for them to acknowledge it.

  He didn’t know what to say, other than her name. “Corinne.”

  She turned to him. Her eyes had an almost otherworldly shimmer to them, as if she was still lost in a meditation that didn’t include him. Yet when she spoke, she made it clear that her focus was immediate and practical. “What are we going to do about Gerald’s house?”

  At the moment, that project seemed irrelevant to Levi. But he knew it was important. It represented accomplishment to him and income to the firm. It was a job and he wanted it done.

  Yet sitting beside Corinne, her hair shiny and inviting, her lips pursed as she awaited his answer, he just couldn’t bring himself to care about the Mosley house. “Let’s meet tomorrow,” he said, warning himself that if they did, he’d have to keep his mind on the blueprints and the contract and not on any mystical powers Corinne might possess when it came to soothing cranky babies.

  “Can we do that?”

  “If you stay in Arlington we can.”

  “I mean, what about D.J.?”

  He chuckled grimly. “Barring a miracle, he’ll be at the meeting, too.”

  She didn’t smile.

  He couldn’t believe the prospect of seeing D.J. tomorrow annoyed her, not after tonight. Not after she’d cuddled him. Not after her touch had stopped his tears. But on the chance that it did, he braced himself for her objection.

  All she said was, “What time?”

  “Should we try for nine-thirty again?”

  “Nine-thirty didn’t work today.”

  No, but other things had worked. And if Levi’s brain ever clarified itself, he might even figure out what those things were. “Let’s try for nine-thirty, anyway.”

  “All right.” Twisting away from him, she reached for the door handle.

  He had to let her go—and he had to restrain himself from doing something stupid, like telling her how beautiful she looked in the slanting light from the beveled-glass fixture above the inn’s front door, and how beautiful she’d looked less than an hour ago, when she’d had D.J. cradled in her arms, and maybe mentioning that she had the most tantalizing mouth he’d seen in a long time.

  If he were young and carefree, with nothing to lose, he’d kiss those lips. But he’d aged a lot in the past month, and he couldn’t take the risks he used to.

  Still, she was about to get out of his car. And he wished she wasn’t.

  He extended one hand and brushed his fingertips against her cheek.

  Her gasp was tiny, but he heard it. Or maybe he felt it, a small stirring of air. A faint, anxious smile flickered across her lips, and she shoved open the door.

  What was he, crazy? Not for caressing her cheek but for thinking it was such a big deal.

  It was a big deal. With a total lack of manners—and an urge to protect them both from what would happen if he got out of the car with her—he remained in his seat as she swung her legs out and stood. She closed the door without slamming it, walked slowly and carefully, to the inn’s entry and vanished inside. The door swung shut behind her, abandoning him to his car and his drive home.

  Only when she was gone did he realized he’d been holding his breath.

  *

  SHE HAD strange dreams all night, dreams of holding a baby to her breast…dreams of Levi Holt kissing her breasts. Steamy, X-rated, embarrassing dreams of Levi touching her, suckling her, sliding his hands over her body as she lay beneath him on that futon in the makeshift nursery. These erotic dreams were intertwined with dreams of D.J. reaching for her, clinging to her, babbling at her in gibberish that somehow distilled into words in her mind: “I love you.” And Levi whispering, “I love you,” as her silk blouse dissolved beneath his questing hands.

  She never had dreams like that. Not X-rated dreams, not romantic dreams, not maternal dreams. She rarely had any dreams at all.

  When she woke up, she felt more tired than she had the night before. Her cheek tingled where Levi had touched it, as if his fingers had branded her.

  A shower revived her slightly. Two cups of coffee and a toasted bagel in the inn’s dining room revived her a bit more. When she felt coherent enough to hold up her end of a conversation, she returned to her room and telephoned Gerald on her cell phone.

  “Corey!” he said cheerfully. He thrived on a minimum of sleep, often working late into the night and arising without fail at six a.m. every day. “Are you still in Arlington?”

  “Yes.”

  “So, what’s going on? How much is this disaster going to cost me?”

  “I don’t know yet.” She sighed. “Levi Holt and I still haven’t had a fruitful meeting.”

  Gerald laughed. “Fruitful? What’s that, some new business jargon?”

  “You know what I mean,” she retorted, not willing to share his mirthful mood. “Levi and I met, but we haven’t gotten anywhere on the contract yet.”

  “You’ve been there a full day now. What have you done?”

  We talked about our childhoods. We drank wine. We fed the baby. “We discussed his theory of architecture,” she said, so it wouldn’t sound as if she’d completely wasted her time in Arlington. “I brought my laptop with me, Gerald—I’m getting other work done, too. It’s just this baby thing with Levi. It’s hard to have a sustained meeting.”


  “So, you haven’t had a fruitful meeting and you haven’t had a sustained meeting.”

  “I’m hoping to have a fruitful, sustained meeting with him today,” she said, although she wasn’t sure that was really what she was hoping for.

  Of course it was what she was hoping for! She didn’t want the meeting to disintegrate into another console-the-crying-child session, nor did she want it to wander off into another philosophical discourse on the significance of natural light inside a building. She didn’t want to find herself distracted by Levi’s towering height, his penetrating eyes, his sensuous mouth and the friction of his lightly callused fingertips against her face. She didn’t want to hold his nephew and feel her heart crack open in sympathy over everything that poor little baby had lost—and everything Levi had lost, too.

  “And you’re going to save me money?” Gerald pressed her.

  “I’m going to try to keep you from losing money,” she corrected him. “Getting rid of the bad design features you agreed to is going to cost something. I’ll try to make sure it doesn’t cost you too much.”

  “Do your best,” Gerald requested. “It’s what I’m paying you for.”

  That wasn’t true. He was paying her because she had a damned good business head on her shoulders and he needed someone with her talent and training in his life. She bristled at his attempt to pull rank on her, to act bossy. “I’ll do what I can,” she snapped. “But remember—you were the one who signed the contract. You were the one who said yes to all those stupid steps going up and down from the living room to the family room, and from the living room to the library, and from the kitchen to the family room, and—”

  “I know, I know,” Gerald said placatingly.

  She was still seething, but she decided unloading on him would serve no purpose. “I should be back in the city by tonight,” she said. “I’ll let you know if I’ve accomplished anything.”

  “I’m sure you’ll accomplish miracles. You’re wonderful, babe. I’ll talk to you this evening.”

  “Fine. ’Bye.” She pressed the disconnect button before either of them could say anything more. She was simmering with anger, practically boiling over it with it.

  It took her a few minutes to figure out why she was so furious. Not because Gerald had pulled his boss-man routine on her—he did that on occasion, and she knew better than to take him seriously when he did. No, she was angry because she hadn’t made any progress with Levi yesterday, because she’d let herself become sidetracked instead of remaining focused on her task. Because she felt an odd affinity for his bereft nephew. Because Levi had those mesmerizing eyes.

  Because she didn’t want to return to the city tonight.

  The realization stunned her. She sank onto the edge of her unmade bed and shook her head. Why didn’t she want to go home? Her Manhattan apartment was a lot more comfortable than this hotel room—and the bagels in Manhattan were much tastier than that ring of dough she’d just been served in the hotel’s dining room. She had work awaiting her back home, tasks she couldn’t accomplish on her laptop while she was sixty miles away from her office.

  Gerald was in the city. His imperious attitude notwithstanding, he was less her boss than her partner, her ally, her best friend. They were each other’s social lives; they worked so many hours a day, they had no time to meet other people, and that had never bothered her before.

  It bothered her now, when she contemplated the possibility that Levi could be a friend. Maybe he could even be a social life.

  Nonsense. He was her adversary, and with a baby in his care, he had no time for a social life, either—certainly not one involving a woman from out of town. By the time they finished their fruitful, sustained meeting this morning, they’d probably be growling at each other through gritted teeth.

  Sighing, she shoved away from the bed, retrieved her shoes from a corner of the closet and wedged her feet into them. She was wearing another suit, a plain brown silk blend which was a year newer than yesterday’s gray suit but just as staid, and simple jewelry that conveyed solemn determination. She poked through her tote to make sure it contained everything she might need and slid her hotel room key into a pocket of her jacket. Then she left, determined to keep her meeting with Levi fruitful and sustained, determined not to think about how holding D.J. last night had filled her with an inexplicable warmth, something deep and radiant and totally baffling.

  Determined, as well, not to think about how Levi’s hand had felt against her cheek.

  She arrived at the barn-like headquarters of Arlington Architectural Associates at nine twenty-five, entered and strode directly through the downstairs area, smiling and nodding at the slender young woman who abandoned her drafting table and started toward Corinne as if to ask her what she wanted. She figured that if she walked purposefully enough, she wouldn’t have to chat with any of the downstairs employees, explain her reason for being there and listen while they warned her that Levi was having a rough morning. She already knew D.J. would be in his office, probably screaming his tonsils out. That wasn’t going to stop her from doing her job.

  She had to do it—not just because Gerald expected her to but because the only way she could shake off her unsettling feelings about Levi and the baby was to finish her business with him and go home.

  The young woman—in beige capri pants today, with a turquoise T-shirt and her hair adorned by a matching turquoise ribbon that looked like the bow on a gift-wrapped birthday present—backed off, evidently impressed by Corinne’s I-know-where-I’m-going attitude. Corinne climbed the stairs to the hay-loft level, turned left and halted in front of Levi’s door. She didn’t hear any screams. Maybe D.J. was asleep.

  She knocked.

  “Come on in,” called a man whose voice she didn’t recognize. Had she approached the wrong office?

  Lacking a better option, she opened the door and let out her breath. This was Levi’s office. She recognized the teak desk, the cork board, the drafting table and the stroller in the corner. She didn’t recognize the room’s sole occupant, however, a man who looked quite at home, half-sitting and half-leaning against Levi’s desk, his legs stretched out and his arms folded across his chest.

  “Dennis Murphy,” he identified himself. A good looking man with a shock of tawny hair and the sort of smile that was impossible not to return, he shoved away from the desk and extended his right hand to her. “You’re looking for Levi, right?”

  “Yes.” She shook his hand. “I’m Corinne Lanier. I have a nine-thirty meeting scheduled with him.”

  “He’s changing the kid’s diaper. He should be back any minute.”

  “Okay.” She was still smiling at Dennis Murphy, although she couldn’t think of a good reason why. “Do our meetings with him overlap?” she asked, concerned that Levi would make her cool her heels in some other part of the building while he attended to whatever business he had with this guy.

  “No,” he said laconically.

  Was Murphy going to participate in her meeting with Levi? Was he a part of the construction team? Clad in a well-cut suit, a silk tie and buffed leather loafers, he certainly wasn’t dressed to break ground, or whatever the step after breaking ground was.

  Maybe he was one of Levi’s partners, another architect who believed in opening a building to natural light. Or maybe—

  “I’m Levi’s lawyer,” Murphy told her.

  His lawyer? Did Levi intend to play hardball this morning? Had he called in his hired gun to intimidate her? After last night… She couldn’t believe it! She’d thought they had some sort of friendship going, or at least an understanding, a mutual respect, a willingness to handle their disagreement in a civil manner.

  Bringing a lawyer into the picture was not civil.

  Rage zapped like an electrical charge along her spine, drawing her taller, squaring her shoulders. Glaring at the lawyer, she gave herself a mental pep talk. She would not let Levi and his legal hit man intimidate her. She would not let them steamroll her. She’d get
the damned fireplace out of the master bedroom and the damned wine cellar out of the pantry, and Levi could tell his lawyer to stuff his briefs.

  The lawyer had once again propped himself comfortably against Levi’s desk and was regarding her curiously, his arms folded and his gaze assessing. “Are you involved with one of Levi’s projects?” he asked.

  She didn’t want to talk to him. Without Gerald’s lawyer by her side, she knew she was outgunned. But she was stuck with this meeting, and if she didn’t answer he’d think he’d cowed her. “Yes,” she said crisply.

  “Which one?”

  “How many does he have?” Good—instead of giving the lawyer information, she could get information from him.

  He grinned. “He’s always got a few things going, each in a different stage of development. And the collaborative projects with the other architects—it’s hard to come up with a specific number. Of course, his schedule is so screwed up these days…” Footsteps on the walkway outside the door alerted them to Levi’s return. “He hasn’t played poker in weeks. It’s criminal.”

  “Poker?” Was he involved in some sort of illegal gambling? Why would his lawyer call it criminal?

  Levi entered the office with D.J. perched on his shoulder. D.J. was awake, facing the direction Levi came from and chirping happily. Seeing Corinne in his office, Levi smiled. “Hi! You’ve met Murphy?”

  “Your lawyer,” she muttered.

  “Tell him he should play poker,” Murphy urged her.

  “Poker.”

  “We play every Tuesday night,” Murphy explained. “He hasn’t come since he got D.J.”

  “I can’t get a sitter on a school night,” Levi defended himself.

  “So bring the baby. Evan’s kids can play with him. Or Fil can take care of him.”

  “I’m not going to dump D.J. on Fil.”

  “Fil?” Corinne interjected, annoyed at being ignored but relieved that Murphy seemed more concerned about Levi’s absence from some poker game than about his contract with Gerald.

  “Evan’s fiancée,” Murphy told her.

  “She’s got her hands full with his kids.” Levi hoisted D.J. a little higher on his shoulder. “Maybe everyone should come to my house for poker. Let Evan find a sitter.”