“Which means something,” he said, “besides that your brain has unlimited storage.”
She had to laugh some at that, even as she groped for the words. “I think my shark was dying. At least sick. I had a sick shark, and I was trying to push it anyway, pull it along. My shark was tired. But you always make it about me, you know that?”
“I do? I don’t think so. That thing we did before . . . that was all about me.”
“That would be why I had that orgasm, then. The one I barely felt.”
His body shifted under her hands, because he was laughing. Silently. “I can’t help it if you’re twisted.”
She smiled herself, there in the dark, wrapped in the security of being understood. “You’re the least selfish person I’ve ever known. And you’ve been a hero so many times over. So if April came back, if she wanted to try again? What would you say?”
No hesitation at all. “I’d say hell, no. You think I’m loyal? I’m not. Not if there’s no loyalty coming back. And you and me? That’s got nothing to do with her. I stayed mad at you without any help from April.”
This time, she was the one who laughed. But afterwards, she sobered. “What about Gracie?”
“What about her? That loyalty thing you talked about? She’s got that from me. Forever. There’s nothing that’ll change it.”
“No, what about April? What’s your custody agreement? I know it’s none of my business,” she hurried to add, “but I see you with her, and I have to wonder.”
A long silence, and then Evan said, “Nothing.”
“What? What do you mean, nothing?”
“She took off. I told you.” And if a man could be said to withdraw while still holding you, Evan was doing it.
“But . . .” she began.
“I’ve had Gracie since she was three weeks old,” Evan said. “Her mom never even called. Nobody’s going to let April have her. They couldn’t.”
“Evan. I’m not a family law attorney, but no. You need it spelled out.”
He was quiet for so long, she wondered if he’d fallen asleep, but that was impossible. “I don’t want her to come back. Does that answer your question? I want her to stay gone. And you know, we could sleep a little here. Since we wore each other out and all.”
He let it bother him for a couple more minutes, and then he let it go. Gracie was safe and asleep a few yards away in the white crib where he’d first laid her down after the trip home from the hospital, when she’d been so tiny she’d fit in his cupped hands. When he’d wondered how on earth he could protect something that fragile, and had known that he was going to do it anyway. And Beth was falling asleep beside him in a bed that smelled like vanilla and flowers. She stirred and shifted, then wrapped her leg over his and turned toward him in sleep as if she needed to be closer. His hands were touching nothing but warm, soft woman, and his body was telling him life was good.
Everything was fine. Everything was perfect right now, and right now was what you got. He fell asleep.
He woke, as always, at the first wail. Beside him, Beth stirred and made a protesting sound, and he said, “It’s OK. Just Gracie. Go to sleep.” And as a consolation prize, when he came back to bed after some pacing and patting and patience, she was still there, still warm, and still soft. His bed was a much nicer place than it had been for seven long months. He’d take that.
When the “Da-da-da” woke him again, he sat up with a start, registered from the light seeping in around the edges of the curtains that it was morning, and also registered that he was alone.
Had Beth left? Walked back to Dakota’s, wondering if it would be awkward in the morning? In her heels and without her underwear, because she’d rather do that than face him in the morning light?
No. She wouldn’t have.
Wait. Gracie wasn’t crying anymore, or making any noise at all. He was out of bed in a flash, not bothering to pull on his jeans, his heart beating hard.
He got to her room in about three steps, and Beth turned at his entrance. She had Gracie in her arms, was bouncing her the way the baby liked, as if she knew how. Wearing the yellow dress again, but barefoot, her hair damp. She wasn’t wearing any makeup, either. She looked fine.
“Look,” she told Gracie with another bounce, “it’s your daddy. Guess I’m too slow, huh? I was going to change her diaper,” she explained to Evan. “But I wanted to snuggle her for a minute first.”
Gracie looked over her shoulder, gave him the joyous early-morning smile that was the reason you had no choice, then bent herself backward and held out her arms to him. He went over, took her from Beth, said, “Morning, princess,” and then might have had to vary the routine a little. He had to put his arm around Beth, too, and he had to kiss her. Sweet, soft, and good-morning-baby.
Hot sex was good. Hot sex was great, and if it had a little edge to it, it was even better. But waking up and kissing a woman who looked absolutely, positively happy to be starting her day with you? That wasn’t bad either. He let her go, laid Gracie on the changing table, got her out of her sleeper, and asked Beth, “How do you know how to change a diaper?”
“I babysat, of course. And it’s not like it’s hard.” She was relaxed this morning in a way he hadn’t seen in a long time, leaning up against the dresser and watching him like she had all day and no place she’d rather be. “My dad thinks everybody ought to learn to work, including the privileged. Especially the privileged. He has things to say on the subject. And I was a dream babysitter. The kind who reads a book on the couch or does her homework instead of letting her boyfriend in the minute the kids go to sleep. I was much in demand.”
“So what happened?” he asked. “To turn you into that wild woman?”
She laughed at him. “What do you think? You happened. You at the beginning, and you right now. It was nothing but you, boy.”
“That so.” He didn’t smile, but it was an effort. He tossed the old diaper into the pail, kept a hand on Gracie’s stomach, because she was kicking and wriggling like usual, and felt around for an outfit. “Ponies?” he asked his daughter, holding up a romper printed with merry-go-round horses on poles. “Or are we going for the butterfly outfit today? What’s your pleasure?”
Gracie gave her baby chuckle, grabbed for the horses and tried to stick the romper into her mouth, and he said, “You want to match Beth, huh? Good plan. Because Beth’s mighty pretty.”
“What can I do?” Beth asked. “Bottle?”
“Sure.” He got a wriggling Gracie into her outfit and snapped up the legs. “In the kitchen. Bottles and formula over the sink. The can has directions on it.”
“I can do that,” she said. “If you want to get ready.”
“Man. All by myself? That would be living.” He took his restraining hand off Gracie, and Beth picked her up, kissed her on top of her head the way he always had to do, and he thought, So that’s OK, then. And shut down any other thoughts he might have had.
When he came out of the bedroom again, showered, shaved, and dressed for the day in his overalls, the two of them were in the kitchen. Specifically, in the white wicker rocker in the sunny spot near the back door. Gracie was drinking her bottle and rubbing her head the way she liked, and they did match. Yellow dresses, blonde hair, blue eyes, and happiness.
He was in so much trouble here.
“Hey,” Beth said softly, looking up at him with her face too open, too vulnerable. He wanted to tell her not to show that face, that it wasn’t safe, but he couldn’t say it. Maybe because he wanted to see it. “She’s so beautiful, huh?”
That lump in his throat needed to go. She was helping out, that was all. She wasn’t his girlfriend.
The bottle was empty, and Beth pulled the nipple out of Gracie’s mouth, then helped her stand up. Gracie liked to practice her walking. Beth must have noticed that, too. “What now?” she asked.
“She gets cereal. Breakfast. It’s not even six-thirty, though. Why are you up?” He grabbed the Peter Rabbit bowl, the box of ric
e cereal, and a jar of pureed plums and started to mix things up.
Beth’s smile didn’t look quite as joyous now. “I normally wake up at five. In the office by seven-fifteen, you know. Can’t afford to get out of the habit. Want breakfast?”
“You don’t have to make it.” He took Gracie from her, set her in her high chair, tied her bib on and fastened the tray down, hooked a kitchen chair with a foot and dragged it over, and started their baby-bird routine. “I usually have cereal myself. Without pureed plums.”
“Well, since I’m here,” Beth said, opening the fridge, “let’s have eggs. Which isn’t about you, so don’t get nervous that I’m practicing my domestic skills on you like some cautionary tale in a men’s magazine. It’s because I want eggs. It’s funny, though. When I started my breakdown, my mom kept nagging me to eat and offering to cook, and I never wanted to bother. But lately, I’m starved. I must be coming up out of the dark place.”
“You must be.” He spooned some more purplish glop into Gracie’s open mouth. What he didn’t say was, “You can practice your domestic skills on me.” Cautionary tale was just about right.
When Gracie was playing with her rings on her highchair tray and they were eating eggs and toast at the kitchen table, Beth said, “Your kitchen’s so homey. Everything looks new, too. Did you have that done?”
“Nope. I did it. I told you.”
She looked around. “You couldn’t have done it all by yourself, though. It takes a lot of guys. My mother’s remodeled the kitchen twice, and both times, my parents moved out while it happened. It was a big deal. Electrical, plumbing, cabinets, countertops, flooring . . . it’s a lot, and it takes forever. These are wood floors, and those are . . . what? Granite countertops?”
“Quartz.” He looked around, tried to see it through her eyes. It wasn’t big, but it sure was cozy, and nothing made a house yours like doing the work. Cabinets in a pale blue-green, farmhouse sink, off-white stone countertops, and that oak floor. “Yeah, it was a lot. Luckily, I can do a lot.” He took another bite of eggs and enjoyed the hell out of impressing her. He might be playing it down, but oh, yeah. He was trying. “I’m guessing you’ve only known guys who can do one thing. They focus on that one thing and figure they can pay for everything else.”
“Comparative advantage,” she agreed. “Most efficient use of their time.”
“Yeah, well.” He spread jam on his toast. “Might be efficient, but is it better? Something to think about.”
She put her head on one side like an inquisitive bird, looking so different from that first day when he’d seen her in the lake. Relaxed, that was what it was. She was relaxed. Right now, in fact, she was swinging her legs up and settling them in his lap, then snuggling down into her chair like no lawyer ever. He smiled at her and put a hand around an ankle, felt that delicate gold chain she’d bought just for him, and rubbed the tiny gold heart between his fingers. “Yeah,” he said. “The industrial revolution’s got a lot to answer for. People weren’t made to specialize like that. Not if they want to be happy.”
“Mm. Nice historical reference. So what else did you do in the house?” She was going to finish that whole plate of food, too. She wasn’t even thinking about playing with it. She was just eating it.
“Pretty much everything. It’s been six years. I did a whole lot when Gracie was coming, but I haven’t done anything since then. No time for it.”
“What else would you do? It looks perfect.”
He wasn’t going to share that. That dream had died. Except, somehow, he was gesturing out the window with his second slice of toast. “I thought, doors here. Brick patio. Like that.”
“Oh,” she said, and sighed. “If they were French doors, with the panes and the handles, those curving kind. And if the bricks were weathered, or even better—flagstones. The ones that are all different shapes, like you don’t need to be perfect, like you can take it easy. And if you had a thing over the patio. Those are lilacs along the side of the yard, aren’t they?”
“Yep. And the ‘thing’ is a pergola, if you mean a structure.”
“And flowers for shade,” she said as if she’d seen straight into his mind and gone right to the snapshot there. “Roses. Climbing ones. White, or maybe pink. If the pergola was white? Or is that too girly?”
“Not for a house with a girl in it.” He needed to stop this. Beth wasn’t going to be playing house with him, however much in sync they were on their backyard plans. This was pretending, and it had to stop. “Gracie,” he added, reminding himself as much as her.
“Oh,” she said. “Right. I wanted to talk to you more about that anyway.”
“About what? Gracie?” He reached for her, because her nose was running again, and she was starting to make some protesting sounds like she hadn’t been held nearly enough this morning. “She likes the pergola idea. Also, she wants a dog. A dog, roses, and a white picket fence. She’s kind of traditional.”
Beth smiled, then was serious. “Have you talked to an attorney at all about custody?”
His arm tightened around Gracie. What the hell? “No.”
“Evan.” Beth swung her legs down from his lap and stood up. “More coffee?”
“Yeah. But we need to leave in fifteen minutes.”
“I can tell you this in two.” She refilled their cups from the pot, brought them back, and sat down again. “I haven’t researched it fully yet, but the first thing’s obvious. You need to petition for custody. You’ll never have a stronger position. Gracie’s a baby, her mom left when she was a newborn, and she hasn’t been back. You could get people to swear to that, right?”
“Yeah.” He didn’t want to talk about this. It made him want to pace. “Dakota and Russell, obviously. José, maybe. My mom.”
“Mm. Family’s probably not as good. Especially your mom. But I’ll bet you could get Blake, too. Blake Orbison—that’s some credibility. And I wouldn’t wait. If April comes back and takes Gracie for any time at all? The second she does that, your case just got weaker.”
“That’s not happening. I’m not letting April take her.” He must have tightened his hold on Gracie too much, because she squawked, and he let her stand up on his thighs while he held her under the arms and tried to get a grip on himself.
“You don’t get a choice,” Beth said.
“The hell I don’t.”
“Evan.” She was leaning across the table now, her face intent, all the lawyer back. “I don’t do family law, but I know the basics. And the basics are—both parents have equal rights to that child unless the courts say otherwise.”
“Not if one of them left.”
“Yes if one of them left. How does the court know that? You need proof. You need custody.” She studied him for a minute, her eyes as always looking too deep. “But you’re afraid to rock the boat.”
“Well, yeah. Of course I am.”
“You need to rock it anyway.” She wasn’t tentative now. This was that other Beth, the one she must be in the rest of her life, the one he hadn’t seen. “Possession is nine-tenths of the law. Right now, you have possession, and you have nine-tenths. Sort of. Not really. April has one-tenth, and that number bumps up the second she comes back. She’s the mother.”
That had pretty much ended their cozy kitchen time. He’d dropped Beth off at Dakota’s, had kissed her goodbye and said, “If you wanted to come by tonight, we could barbecue or something.” Knowing he was in over his head, and saying it anyway.
Six days. She was here six more days. And if he wanted to make those six days count? Well, it wasn’t like he was giving anything up for it. It wasn’t like there was anybody else in his bed.
Sucker for women, he heard as he watched her walk barefoot up the driveway in that gauzy yellow dress and that mess of blonde hair, swinging her sandals by their straps and looking like an ad for summer. She turned at the door and waved, and he told his heart to settle down and headed to his mom’s.
Work. Real life. Now.
W
as it that easy? Of course not.
“So,” his mom said when she’d taken Gracie out of his arms. “Beth Schaefer. Honey, are you sure?”
“Nope,” he said. “I’m not. But seems I can’t help myself.”
“I’m not saying she’s a bad person,” his mom said. “I’m saying she’s not a strong one.”
“Like April. And I’m a rescuer,” he finished for her. “Beth said the same thing.”
“There aren’t really princesses,” his mom said. “Or if there are, and they’re in a tower, it’s not your job to get them out.”
“See,” he said, “and that’s just what she told me.”
His mom’s blue eyes studied his face. “She told you she’d changed.”
“No. Maybe she told me she wanted to.”
“People don’t change.”
“Don’t they?” He looked at Gracie, and she smiled back at him in that way she had. The way that squeezed his heart dry. “I’d say they do. If something matters enough. Or somebody. And I’m not saying that’s me,” he said before his mom could answer. “I’m saying I like her, but I know she’s not on my path. She’s crossing it, that’s all, and that’s just fine.”
“Oh, honey,” his mom said. “Tell that to somebody who hasn’t been there. Tell it to somebody who doesn’t know you.”
He was up on the scaffolding early that afternoon when José said, “Boss?”
He knew it was her before he turned around. In her overalls again, a blue T-shirt this time, and her hair in a shorter braid. And that hair was silver. Wasn’t it?
“Hey,” she said. She had a thumb hooked in the pocket of her overalls like she was tough, and his heart did that funny squeeze-thing again.
“Well, hey, beautiful,” he said.
“Can I come up and help you?”
Workers’ comp. Liability.
The hell with it. He’d get her safe. “Sure. Just look out coming up the ladder.”
She climbed up and onto the platform with him, and he didn’t kiss her, because his guys were looking. “Show’s over,” he told them. “Back to work.” He asked Beth, “Here to talk, or here to help?”
No Kind of Hero (Portland Devils Book 2) Page 21
