“I’m so glad you told me. I would hate to turn people off without knowing it. Not that I see many people, however. You’re the only close neighbor I have.”
“And why are you living way out here?” She didn’t mind going on the offensive with this man; it would keep him from doing the same to her.
“Maybe,” he said with a maddening grin, “it’s for the same reason that you’re living where you are.”
She let the knife drop into the sink. “So you can think things over?”
“Sure. Is that so strange?”
“Well, no,” she said reluctantly.
“All right, then. Maybe,” he said, leaning even closer so that he was looking directly into her eyes, “we can accept that we each have our reasons for living out here. And even accept help when we need it.”
“If you’re saying that I owe you for giving me refuge from the storm, I hasten to remind you that I was willing to walk home.”
“But I wasn’t willing to have you caught in a flash flood in the arroyo or falling down and hurting yourself. With a storm like this one in the offing, no less.”
“Is there salad dressing? Or should I make some?”
“Oh, make some. By all means,” he said. He set the meat loaf and the mashed potatoes on the table.
She didn’t have to measure; she never did. She dumped approximately one-third portion each of olive oil, cider vinegar and water into a custard cup and drizzled it over the salad. Then she seasoned the whole liberally with salt, garlic salt, and pepper before tossing it around in the bowl. Noelle had shown her how to do this years ago, and it made a light dressing, tart but flavorful.
There were only two chairs at the table, so presumably Conn McTavish didn’t have more than one visitor at a time. He held one chair for her, adroitly sliding it beneath her as she lowered herself to its seat. Conn had manners, then. Most guys didn’t know how to seat a woman properly, and she wasn’t accustomed to having the chair hit the back of her knees at precisely the right time.
“So,” he said from across the table. “Help yourself.” He dealt himself a large portion of meat loaf and shoved the platter toward her.
She filled her plate, and he said, “The salad is good. You’ll have to teach me how to make the dressing.”
“I’ll tell you now,” she said, and did. It gave them something to talk about as the trees outside swept back and forth in a fearsome dance; wind and faraway thunder kept the windows and doors of the cabin rattling. At least it was warm in here, with the fire hissing and spitting in the fireplace, and at least Conn seemed to have made up his mind to be pleasant company.
Or had he? This man had a way of retreating every so often, withdrawing into himself in a way that almost challenged her to say something. Perhaps she was being touchy about this, and maybe she was expecting too much from a man who, judging from the way he lived, was not accustomed to being with people. And yet she didn’t think he had always been that way. His attention to the social graces told her that he had been no hermit.
She glanced around the cabin. There was no telephone here, but then, she didn’t have one, either. There was no computer, no fax machine, no copier. Did he work at all? Or did he make his living with his birds somehow? It seemed impossible that falconry, as he had described it, could produce enough income to live on, but there was probably a lot she didn’t know.
“Something wrong?” he asked.
“I—um, well, no. I was only wondering what it is that you do for a living.”
“Ah. The inquisitive mind wants to know.”
This was much too close to the slogan of a well-known tabloid newspaper, and she bit her lip. She hated the tabloids, and her well-being and her baby’s depended on not attracting their attention. But he couldn’t know that.
“Yes, I suppose it does,” she said, hardly skipping a beat.
“As it happens, falconry is my hobby. So, if you were wondering, the birds do not support me.”
“I see.”
She was trying to think of some other conversational avenue when the lights flickered and died. It was a relief not to have to school her expression to look blank, and she closed her eyes, thanking the powers that be for this providential loss of electricity. Sometimes things really did go her way, she reminded herself. Everything couldn’t be awful all the time. It only seemed that way now and then.
“I’ve got candles,” Conn said, and he dug around in a drawer before finding a box of matches. He struck one, and a wick flared. He brought the candle to the table and set it between them.
“How romantic,” Dana said, and then cursed herself for a fool. Why hadn’t she kept her mouth shut? There was nothing romantic about this, nothing at all. She had been given shelter by a man who probably wished he hadn’t come across her out there on the trail, and he couldn’t possibly have any romantic feelings at all about a woman whose stomach was way out to here and who seemed to annoy him, anyway.
But he only smiled at her, and somehow she could have melted. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d sat across a table from a virile, handsome man and had his full attention. Oh, sure, she’d gone out with Philip often enough, but he was a busy network executive who considered her a trophy, and usually when they did go out it was with groups of people that he wanted to impress. Most times they’d been followed by reporters and photographers who had hollered at her to “turn this way, please,” and at Philip to put his arm around her for a picture.
She had hated going out in public with Philip, and she had hated being treated as nothing more than a piece of arm jewelry. But she hadn’t realized it then. It was all part of the life that she had left behind.
The baby did a flip-flop, and she took heart from the fact that it was such an active baby. It was the only thing from her former life that she wanted to keep, and keep it she would. She never wanted to be as alone as she’d felt in the early days of her pregnancy when she’d had to decide what to do, knowing that Philip and his over-bearing mother would want her baby to bear his name and would likely fight for custody.
“I asked you if you’d like some dessert,” Conn said, and Dana realized that she’d tuned him out completely. Embarrassed, she shook her head.
He didn’t talk and neither did she as they cleared the table. Afterward, Dana excused herself and went into the bathroom, which was in a lean-to off the kitchen. She stared at herself in the cloudy mirror over the sink. She looked tired, she thought, and her face seemed puffy. Maybe it was only because the mirror distorted her image. Whatever it was, she had eaten off most of her lipstick, and she hadn’t brought any with her. Feeling dispirited, she wiped off the rest of the lipstick and went back out into the main room, where Conn was reading by the light of the candle.
The storm hadn’t abated in the least. The little house was snugly built, though, and although the wind scoured the outer face of it, its fury could not penetrate the stalwart stone. Sighing, Dana took up her seat on the couch and repositioned the pillows behind her. This drew a look from Conn, but he didn’t comment. She leaned her head against the back of the couch and closed her eyes.
When she opened them, Conn was puffing air at the fire with an old leather bellows, sending up a swirl of sparks. She stirred and straightened, and he turned around.
“I was wondering if you would wake up,” he said.
“Was I asleep?” she asked. Her mouth felt dry and cottony, and her legs were stiff.
“Yes,” he said. “I didn’t want to wake you, because I figured you needed your sleep.”
“I have to get home. What’s the storm doing?”
“Hail and the whole works. You won’t be going anywhere.”
Alarmed, she set her feet wide apart and struggled up. She knew she looked ridiculous as she did it, but this was what pregnancy did to a person. For a moment she was embarrassed, but if Conn noticed her awkwardness, he gave no sign.
She went to the window and pulled aside the drapery. Hailstones were shredding the leaves of the trees and bo
uncing off the ground. She turned around and gazed at Conn bleakly.
“You’re staying here tonight. I’ll give you my bed, and I’ll take the couch.” He reached around her to pull the drapery closed again.
“Bed?” There was no bed here. Unless the couch pulled out and made into one.
“Oh,” Conn said, looking abashed. “It’s up in the loft. On second thought, I guess I’d better take the bed. You can sleep on the couch.”
“I can’t—”
“Why can’t you?” he demanded.
At a loss for words, she shrugged. She didn’t have a toothbrush. She didn’t have her makeup. She didn’t have a way to get out of here, and that was the worst knowledge of all.
Conn went to a closet and dragged out a puffy comforter and a pillow in an embroidered case. He tossed them on the couch and rubbed the back of his neck.
“You know where the bathroom is if you want to wash up,” he said. “Other than that, all I can say is, sweet dreams.”
“Thank you,” she murmured. “I’m grateful for your hospitality.”
“No need for that. I’ll see you in the morning.” He spared her a nod and pulled a ladder down from the loft. Then he climbed it rapidly. She heard him up there, presumably taking off clothes that he then tossed on the floor in a series of muffled thumps. Soon the sounds ceased, and she heard the rustle of bedclothes.
She wondered if he slept in a single bed, or if it was a double. Maybe it was even king-size, though she wasn’t sure the loft was big enough for that. She wondered if the bed was plump with a quilt and pillows or stark and austere, the sheets as rough as a monk’s.
She wished she had thought to ask him if he had an extra toothbrush. She could still taste the garlic from the salad.
She spread the comforter out on the couch before lying down. The pillow was soft goosedown, and she shoved the couch pillows around her stomach and between her legs so she would be comfortable lying on her side. After she had blown out the candle, she listened for sounds from the loft as her eyes adjusted to the darkness.
For a while she remained wide awake. The baby aimed a few rabbit punches at her kidneys, shifted slightly, then was still.
She had almost dozed off when she heard the soft sound of Conn’s deep breathing above her. It was oddly reassuring to know that he was there, and she snuggled deeper into her warm nest before falling asleep to the soothing rhythm of rain on the roof.
Chapter Two
Conn dreamed that night, a long convoluted nightmare about climbing to a hidden city of caves honeycombing the mountainside. He was looking for a nest of hawks that he somehow knew was there, but he kept sliding backward. And he was terrified of falling, of losing his step on the loose scree of the path up the mountain. He scrabbled for purchase in the crevices until his fingers bled and his shoulders ached, but he never found the nest. Which was a shame, because if he’d found it, he could have removed one or two of the nestlings and raised them to be fine hunting birds.
The dream ended abruptly when he lost his grip on a ledge and fell backward. He heard himself cry out, and then he woke up.
His heart pounded wildly in his chest. He’d had this dream before, many times. It always ended the same way—with a fall from which he could not save himself.
He felt safe and relieved when he realized that it had only been the same old nightmare. What would happen if he didn’t wake up? he wondered. Would he keep falling until he met an ignominious end? Would he dream his own death?
Today was different. He had a guest who might have been awakened by his cry. He stretched and listened for sounds from below, and when he didn’t hear any, he stood up and looked over the loft railing.
Outside the morning was a clean wash of blue and green with an overlay of golden sunshine. He didn’t see much of Dana except a blanketed mound on the couch and a silky spill of short reddish-gold hair on the pillow. He wondered if she had slept well; he wondered why she really had chosen to move into that tumbledown little cabin over near the creek. He didn’t believe her story, not for a minute. It sounded fishy. But he would respect her right to privacy.
That was a laugh, and the corners of his mouth curved upward in a rueful smile. He’d been fired over a privacy issue, which was why he wasn’t working at present. He’d been here for five months now, trying to make sense of a life that had gone seriously awry at the age of thirty-five.
He pulled on clean clothes and made his way quietly down the ladder. The old boards of the cabin’s floor creaked slightly under his weight as he tiptoed out the back door. Dana didn’t wake up, though, or if she did, she didn’t stir.
He traversed the short distance to the mews and checked his hawks. Demelza seemed none the worse for wear; still, he wouldn’t work her today. The others, he would.
When he went back into the cabin, he was surprised to see Dana up and about. She was standing at the kitchen counter mixing orange juice concentrate with cold water.
She looked around with a shy smile. “I hope you don’t mind,” she said.
“Mind? Of course not.” But he had to admit that it seemed strange to find a pregnant woman in her stocking feet making herself comfortable in his kitchen.
“The electricity came back on during the night,” she observed. She nodded toward the windows in the living area. “And there’s a rainbow.”
The rainbow arched upward out of a swirling mist into a clear blue sky, one of the prettiest ones he had ever seen.
“Nice, isn’t it? It even looks as if it ends over at my cabin.”
He didn’t reply to that; his stomach was rumbling. He realized that he couldn’t eat without feeding her too.
“How about breakfast? Eggs? Bacon?” he asked.
“I could skip the bacon. Since I’ve been pregnant, I can’t stand the smell of it cooking.”
“Sausage then.”
“That sounds good.”
He bent over and removed a frying pan from the cabinet. “How do you like your eggs?”
“Any old way will do.”
“Scrambled?”
“Fine.”
He flicked his eyes toward the bathroom. “You can take a shower if you like.”
“I don’t want to be a nuisance.”
“Don’t be silly. You’re not. I insisted on bringing you here.”
“A quick shower would feel good,” she said.
He showed her where the towels and soap were, and she disappeared into the bathroom and closed the door. He soon heard the shower running, and he thought, What have I gotten myself into?
He liked living here by himself. He stayed away from the townspeople because he had little in common with them. And now he’d opened his door to someone who might want to visit back and forth, who might want to be friendlier than he did. A woman. Women could be talkative. They had a need for socializing. He had an idea that it wouldn’t be long before this woman would be walking over to borrow a cup of sugar or asking him to dinner or suggesting that they take intimate walks together.
He didn’t want that. He wanted nothing more than to work with his birds and ignore the world until such time as he deemed it possible to return to normal life.
And that wasn’t yet. Not by a long shot.
Dana emerged from the shower as he scraped the scrambled eggs onto two plates.
“Mmm. Looks and smells wonderful,” she said.
So do you, he thought. It was an involuntary reaction to the way she looked, so pink and damp around the edges, and the way she smelled, which was clean and fresh.
Good thing he had only thought those words, not said them. Rather than let her know that he found her attractive, he merely grunted.
“You can sit over there,” he said, more or less ungraciously. He didn’t pull the chair out for her as he had last night. He didn’t want her to get the idea that he liked her company.
She may have picked up on this because she ate quickly, and she didn’t speak.
When he had finished eating what w
as on his plate, he cleared his throat. “I’ll be flying my hawks today. I’ll drop you off at your place.”
“I can walk.”
“There’s no need. I’m going to Shale Flats, and your cabin is only a short detour.”
“Before I go, may I see the birds?”
He hadn’t expected this, and it threw him off balance. “You’ll see them in the truck.”
“I meant in their cages. Where they live.”
Her tone made it sound as if she wanted to make sure he wasn’t mistreating them. Well, he wasn’t. He knew a lot about birds, had let them take on more importance in his life than a mere hobby. So, even though he didn’t share the hawks with most people, he’d show her that he kept them clean and comfortable.
She helped him stack the dishes in the sink and offered to wash them, but he told her he was in a hurry to get out in the field. He led her outside and back to the mews. Inside it was cool and damp from the rain last night. The birds were quiet on their perches.
“What are their names?” Dana wanted to know. She was eyeing the hawks with an interest that he hadn’t foreseen, and he pegged her attitude as—well, polite. Not belligerent, as she had been yesterday. The fact that she wasn’t baiting him allowed him to warm to the topic.
“You know Demelza, the kestrel. She’s what used to be called a sparrow hawk. Roderic is my red-tail hawk, and Fairleigh is a gyrfalcon. This merlin is Nickel. The ones on the other side are Suli, Rosalie, and Muscatel.” He pointed to a compact bird with deep blue plumage. “That’s Aliah, my female peregrine, top of the heap. She’s called a falcon, but if she were a male, she’d be called a tiercel, from the Latin word for third, because the males are one-third the size of the females.”
“She’s beautiful.” Dana stood beside Roderic, a magnificent bird with cinnamon-colored tail feathers and a noble profile. “He’s gorgeous, too,” she said.
“Not ‘he.’ She.”
“I thought Roderic would be a male’s name.”
He couldn’t help grinning at her in amusement. “Roderic is indeed a male, but hawks are always referred to as ‘she.’”
Pregnant and Incognito Page 3
