Plato stood in the hallway, looking in at him. Then the dog turned and padded into Courtney’s room.
He didn’t blame the dog.
If he didn’t have to endure his own company, he wouldn’t, either.
Chapter Eleven
“How’s the leg coming?”
Mason sat on a chair on Courtney’s back deck, watching Plato romp around in the snow that had fallen overnight.
She’d gone to church that morning. Probably to pray that their folly during the middle of the night wouldn’t result in a pregnancy that would come with more complications than she wanted.
Namely…him.
“Mase?”
He focused on Cole’s voice, coming from the cell phone he held to his ear. “Bad connection,” he lied. “Leg’s doing fine. Gonna be out of the cast in a few weeks.” He wasn’t going to entertain the notion that his leg wouldn’t be ready, even if Courtney had cautioned that it might not be.
“Then you’ll be ready to go back active after Thanksgiving,” Cole was saying, and at the word active, Mason tuned in more carefully.
“Yeah. If not before.” The cast was supposed to come off a few days before the holiday. “I could be back in Connecticut by then.” He should have felt more enthusiasm at the prospect. His inactivity over the past weeks had driven him buggy. Not even going over some case files with Axel had been enough to alleviate that.
“No need to rush,” Cole said. “I’ll be in Wyoming for the holiday, anyway.” Mason could hear a faint smile in his boss’s voice. “My daughter-in-law invited me. Expect it’ll drive Brody nuts, but driving him nuts is one of my remaining pleasures in life.”
Mason still found it hard to believe that his boss had a son, even one he was estranged from more often than not.
But it just went to prove that—for men like them—families and work weren’t a combination destined for success.
“We’ll talk when I’m there,” Cole finished. “And I can see for myself that you’re not trying to get back before you’re ready.”
Mason’s molars ground together. Yeah, he’d had a rocky start to his recovery. But since that first week here with Courtney, he’d been a model—okay, nearly model—patient.
At least he hadn’t managed to crack his casts after that first episode.
The rest of the time, he’d alternated between grumpy and grumpier. It was still astonishing that she’d tolerated as much as she had.
“Fine,” he told Cole. “Thanksgiving. But after that I’m back to work. Even if I have to ride a desk for a few days, I’m back to work.”
Cole snorted. “Don’t blow that smoke around, Mase. I know you’ve been meeting regularly with Ax.”
He shifted in his chair. Plato was sniffing around the back edge of the property like he’d found something interesting. “All I did was work up a few profiles for some cases.”
“And you haven’t done any profiling since the bombing,” Cole countered. “You had me put you in security, despite everything I said at the time. If I’d known all it would take to get you back to where your real talents lie was to break your arms and legs, I’d have done it years ago.”
Mason politely told his boss what he could do with his comment. Cole responded with a rusty laugh before he hung up.
Mason shoved the phone in the pocket of the jacket that Axel had loaned him. It was too tight in the shoulders, but it was serviceable enough. He whistled to Plato, but the dog was still digging around in the corner of the yard, showing no signs of stopping.
He pushed to his feet and swung down the steps. He took the crutches only because he didn’t want to have to put up with the stink of a wet cast on top of the inconvenience of the thing in the first place. “Plato, what-cha hunting, eh?” He reached the dog, and balancing on one crutch and holding his cast aloft over the snow, he leaned over and nudged the dog’s big head aside.
A wet, bedraggled kitten was lying still in the snow.
Mason grimaced. “You had to find a dead kitten?”
Plato whined and pawed at the snow around the kitten. Afraid the dog would decide to use it as a toy, he leaned over and scooped it up in his hand.
The body was still warm. Still alive.
He found himself chuckling and realized his laugh sounded just as rusty as Cole’s laughter had. He rubbed his thumb over the minuscule head, and the kitten’s skinny, wet tail curled. The kitten couldn’t have been more than a few weeks old. Mason tucked the little animal inside his shirt and looked at Plato. “Any more?”
But the dog had turned to face the house again. He wagged his tail and gave a soft bark.
“Good dog.” Mason started for the house, and the dog trotted ahead of him. Inside, he shrugged out of his borrowed jacket and left the crutches propped against the table. He fished the kitten out from inside his shirt.
His eyes, or hers—Mason couldn’t tell at this point—were open. He grabbed a clean dish towel and wrapped it around the cat. Then, even though he wasn’t supposed to put weight on his cast, he limped over to the refrigerator without his crutches and poured a small amount of milk in a coffee mug.
With the cat in one hand and the milk in the other, he sat down at the kitchen table, where he’d earlier left the newspaper and his reading glasses. He slipped on the glasses and peered more closely at the cat, rubbing it with the towel until the short gray fur dried and stuck out at all angles and he could hear the faint rumble of a small purr. Then he dipped his finger in the milk and rubbed it over the kitten’s tiny snout. “Come on, tiger,” he murmured. “Show a little life so I’ve got a reason to find your mama.” And the other kittens that had to be around, since he didn’t think any cat could ever have just one kitten in a litter.
Watching silently from the back doorway, Courtney pressed her hand to her stomach. Plato lifted his head and noisily flopped his tail, apparently breaking Mason’s intense concentration on the kitten, so small it was easily eclipsed by his big hand.
He looked up at Courtney over the rims of his narrow glasses, and her stomach took its usual free-falling tumble.
“I didn’t hear you come in.”
Spurred into motion by his voice, she finished closing the door behind her. “I figured.” She unwound the plaid scarf she’d tossed around the shoulders of her coat and folded it over the back of the chair next to Mason.
Since she’d locked herself in her bathroom the night before—well, it had been the wee hours of the morning, really—she hadn’t spoken two words to him.
Like the coward that she was, while he’d been in the bathroom, she’d left him only a written note telling him that she’d gone to church before she’d snuck out.
She’d heard the shower running, but since he hadn’t left out the duct tape for her to see, she’d taken her cue that he wasn’t interested in performing their usual shower ritual anymore.
Considering everything, she couldn’t really blame him.
Now, she deliberately pushed aside the tangle of emotions inside her and finished pulling off her coat as she eyed Mason and the tiny kitten. “I’m doubting that you’ve been to a pet store at this hour on a Sunday morning. So, what gives?”
“Plato found him. Or her.” His attention was firmly back on the little kitten as he coaxed it to lick another drop of milk off the tip of his finger. “Buried in the snow by the back fence.”
Courtney looked through the window. There was a house under construction on the other side of the back fence, but it wasn’t occupied. Her neighbors to the right had a cat, but she knew for a fact that she was at least twelve years old. Hardly a likely candidate for whelping a litter of kittens. And the couple that lived on the left had only two little dogs. “No sign of more kittens?”
He shook his head. “Didn’t look. I went off Plato’s lead.”
“I doubt he’d lead you astray,” she said. “And I’m glad to hear you weren’t tramping around in the snow. I’ll check in the corners of the garage after I change clothes.” But it was hard
to tear her eyes away from Mason.
She’d known he got along well with Plato. But then everyone did. Even self-proclaimed non-dog-lovers. But she hadn’t given any thought to whether or not Mason was, in general, an animal person.
Despite the hours and days she’d spent in his company, living under the same roof, struggling not to get too sucked in to the alluring aura of domesticity, she realized yet again just how much she didn’t know about him.
Unfortunately, when she witnessed something new—like now—it didn’t do anything to lessen his appeal.
How could she ever imagine the sight of his big body, hunched over such a tiny little creature, would make something inside her ache in a way that had nothing to do with passion?
Her throat felt tight. She quickly escaped to her room to change out of the dress she’d worn to church and into a pair of jeans and a thick sweater. In the bathroom, she pulled her hair back in her usual ponytail and stared at herself in the mirror. “Nothing has changed,” she told her reflection.
Unfortunately, the woman staring back at her with the pitying expression told her that everything had changed. It had been changing since the moment Mason had rolled into her house, and that slow, downhill slide had gone into free fall when he’d given her that incredibly beautiful baby rattle.
She truly believed that she couldn’t possibly have conceived a child last night. She hadn’t exaggerated. The timing was wrong.
“But you wish the timing was right,” she whispered to her reflection. Not because she wanted a baby, period.
But because, from the moment she’d realized they’d both forgotten to use that darn condom, it had become startlingly clear that the baby she wanted was his.
Only his.
Nothing had changed. Mason was still going to leave.
And everything had changed.
The woman in her mirror gave her a sad smile, and she turned away.
He was still in the kitchen with the kitten. Only now, Plato had managed to perch his big, oversized body on a kitchen chair next to Mason and was resting his head on the table, his nose only inches away from the minuscule feline.
Afraid the burning behind her eyes would get out of control, she hurried past both the males in her household and went outside.
The cold was mercifully bracing as she tramped around the perimeter of her yard, pushing through the small drifts of snow for any sign of more kittens, even though she didn’t expect to find any. Plato would have discovered them first, if there were any. So after her yard was bordered by her footprints, as well as Plato’s, she gave up, went into the garage and used a flashlight to search out all the shadowy corners.
Again, no kittens. No mama cat.
The cold air was penetrating her sweater, and she went back inside, rubbing her hands together as she nudged the door closed with her hip.
“Should have worn a coat,” Mason said.
She shrugged. “When I was a kid, I used to run around in the wintertime wearing shorts. Drove my folks nuts.” She peered around his shoulder at the kitten that was now curled into a ball, seemingly content in its bed of bright red kitchen towel. “We could take it to Evan. My cousin’s husband? He’s the vet around here.”
“Dump it off on him?” Mason looked at her over the rim of his glasses, a frown on his face.
No.” She shook her head. “I mean to have him—her—whatever it is—looked over.”
“He can’t have been in the snow for long,” Mason said. “I don’t think he would have survived.”
Courtney couldn’t disagree with that. She reached past Mason to run her finger gently over the sleeping kitten’s fur. “Do you have pets?”
“I had a cat once.” His expression closed, and he nudged Plato off the chair. “Never seen a dog that big sit on a chair like that.”
“He knew lots of tricks already when I adopted him. A good friend of mine had raised him from a pup. When she died, I took him in.”
He gave her a quick look. “What happened?”
“To Margaret, you mean?” She crossed her arms and leaned against the counter. “Pancreatic cancer.” She looked at him. “She was one of my instructors from nursing school in Cheyenne. She was a foster mother, too. For the human variety, not just the canine. What happened to the cat you had?”
His brows yanked together. “My ex-wife took her.”
The ex-wife again.
Courtney studied her thumbnail. “How long were you married?”
“What is this? Twenty questions again?”
“Just being inquisitive.” She smiled coolly. “Do you still love her? Is that why you don’t want to talk about it?”
He sighed noisily. “Do you like talking about your failures?”
He had a point. “Sorry.” She nodded toward the kitten. “So, do you want Evan to look the kitten over?”
He grimaced. “Yeah. And no. I’m not still in love with Greta.”
There should be no earthly reason for her to be relieved hearing it. But she was. Mostly because she knew Mason wasn’t lying. If he didn’t want to tell someone the truth, he simply didn’t say anything at all.
That was something that she did know about him.
“Well, Sunday dinner is at my uncle Dan’s today. You can bring the kitten. I’m sure Leandra and Evan will be there as usual.”
“Dinner,” he nearly barked. “I thought you meant taking the cat to his office or something. You can take the cat.”
“You’re the one who rescued it.” She tilted her head slightly. “What is so horrifying to you about attending a simple dinner? You’ve been over to my folks’. What’s so different about this?”
“It’s Sunday dinner! That stuff’s for family.”
“That stuff is for whoever is welcomed,” she corrected him mildly. “And when I saw my aunt and uncle at church this morning, they specifically mentioned they hoped you’d come.”
His eyes narrowed slightly. “You mean they hope that you go since you’ve been giving the whole Sunday deal a miss since I got here.”
She shrugged. “Don’t take it personally. Sunday afternoons are also when I have a chance to play catch-up around here. Laundry and housecleaning don’t happen on their own. Everyone in my family is used to my hits and misses.”
He didn’t look entirely convinced. “Fine. Just so the cat can get looked over.”
She hid a smile. “We’ll need to leave in an hour or so.”
He nodded grumpily and picked up the nearly empty mug he’d been finger-dipping from, and with one long arm, reached over to set it in the sink. Then he grabbed his crutches, pulled to his feet and headed out of the room.
But before he made it, he turned back around to scoop the kitten out of the towel and tuck it neatly inside his shirt pocket. “Body warmth,” he muttered.
Then he crutched out of the kitchen.
Courtney looked down at Plato. The dog was staring after Mason, his dark brown eyes soft.
She rubbed his head between his ears. “I know,” she murmured. “I love him, too.”
Then she went through the arch to the dining room, stopping next to the computer on its narrow desk. She slowly sat down and moved the mouse.
The screen saver cleared.
Number 37892 came into view.
She stared at the computer screen for a moment. And then with the flick of a finger, she turned off the computer.
“She looks fine to me,” Evan said later that afternoon after he’d gone to his truck to get the vet bag that went everywhere with him. He held up the kitten in his hand and tickled her little belly, which had grown round with all the milk she’d consumed. “A little too young to be weaned, but Mason’s obviously got that covered.”
He looked over at where Courtney and Mason were sitting, in the kitchen of her aunt and uncle’s house, surrounded by several children who were all anxious to see the new kitten.
Everyone else who’d come to dinner was in the family room, loudly watching a football game. Loud, becau
se half the room was rooting for one team and half for the other.
“It is strange that the mother cat wasn’t nearby.” Evan handed the kitten to Courtney. “She might have gotten trapped in a garage or something.”
“I checked with both of my neighbors before we got here,” she said. She cradled the cat so that Shelby and Chloe—the two oldest children—could stroke its fur. “Be gentle,” she reminded them and looked back at Evan. “They haven’t seen a stray cat around at all, either.”
Evan sighed a little. “Well, if she doesn’t turn up in the next day or so…” He shook his head, his gaze going to the children.
“Wouldn’t there be other kittens?” Mason asked.
Evan lifted his shoulder. “Not necessarily, if the mother was particularly young herself. A first litter. Without being able to examine the cat, it’s all speculation.” He smiled and rose from the table, scooping up his three-year-old son, Lucas, as he did. The boy chortled and reached for the kitten, then smiled widely when the kitten snatched its tail out of his fingers. “Looks to me like you’ve got yourselves another family member,” Evan commented. “Come on, Luke.” He hefted his son up to his face. “Let’s find your mom and Katie, and you can play with the kitties at home.”
“Katie don’t play,” Lucas complained.
“Katie is one year old,” Evan reminded him with a patient grin. “Soon enough, there will come a time when you’ll wish you could get her to stop playing with you. I know, ’cause I had a little sister, too.”
“Uh-huh,” Lucas said emphatically. He peered over his father’s shoulder as they left the kitchen, his little hand opening and closing in a wave.
“What are you gonna name her, Auntie Court?” Chloe and her soon-to-be cousin, Shelby, leaned shoulder to shoulder against the table.
“She’s Mason’s cat.” Courtney ignored the sidelong look she earned from the man at that. “It’s up to him.”
“She’s not my cat,” he said.
“You found her.”
“Plato found her. Guess that makes her Plato’s.”
The girls giggled wildly at that particular notion.
Courtney's Baby Plan Page 15
