“I’m here, aren’t I?” she snapped. She took a deep breath. “I’ll be fine. Stay home. You don’t want to come all the way up here.” Having her mother around was the last thing she needed. She’d considered not telling her what had happened, but the house had felt big and exposed, and every year or two Bev had a deluded moment when she thought her mother would make her feel better.
“It certainly would be a hassle,” Gail said. “I’m right in the middle of a cleanse.”
“I’ll have a security system installed.” She thought of the neighbors. “Maybe get a dog.”
“By the way, your cat hasn’t moved since you left.”
“She’s like that.”
“Kate tossed a load of laundry on top of her, and she didn’t do a thing.”
Sadly, Ball wouldn’t be much help defending the house. But Bev missed her terribly. “She’s getting old.”
“Careful, or that’s how you’ll end up. A lump on the couch.”
The digs were so common she barely noticed them anymore. “Is Kate done with her intervals yet?” Bev heard the machine groan as it shifted levels, and a distant sound of panting during a long pause. Kate, her twenty-two-year-old half-sister, was her best bet. Her closest friends would do anything for her, but quitting their jobs and leaving their husbands and toddlers seemed a bit much for a few office supplies jammed under a door. And Kate was family. She’d benefit from cleaning away the bad blood as much as Bev would.
“Hey,” Kate said on the phone, breathing hard. “What’s up?”
“Don’t let Mom come up here and interfere.” Kate was the baby and the favorite. She could finagle anything.
“She’s kind of freaked about her sister trashing the house,” Kate said.
Not so freaked about Bev being in the house while it happened, though. “You know, it’s gorgeous up here. Feel like a change of scene?”
“To Oakland? Isn’t it nasty?”
“God, not at all. It’s beautiful. You wouldn’t believe the view.” Bev threw her mind around for something else tempting. Kate had just got her B.A., had no job, and as much as she was doted on by their mother, complained often of living at home. “The house is right next to a huge park. Lots of redwoods with running and hiking trails.”
“Really?” Bev heard her pause to take a drink. “Any indoor equipment?”
“Oh, sure. There’s a treadmill and a chin-up bar and all kinds of crap. And more at the office. Everything.”
“Really? How’s the weather?”
“Cool. Not so hot. Sunny in the afternoons, fog in the morning. You should see it roll in over the Golden Gate Bridge.”
“I don’t know,” Kate said. “I was thinking about taking a few classes. Something marketable. Nobody’s hiring.”
“UC Berkeley is right down the street. They have an extension catalog.” She paused. “If you think you could keep up. It is Berkeley, after all.”
“Of course I could keep up. Just because I did two years of community college doesn’t mean I’m not as smart as the boring dorks who didn’t have any fun in high school.”
“Like me?” Bev was smiling.
“You think you got me, don’t you, with that Berkeley crack?’
Laughing, Bev knew she did. “I’ll pay for your gas,” she said just as Kate hung up on her.
Now Bev just had to make it through tonight. Leaving on the lights she changed into sweats, made herself a quick ham sandwich, and turned on the TV.
After the third close-up on the clinically probed remains of a murdered brunette, she realized TV was a mistake. The room, the house, the neighborhood—all too quiet. She got up and checked the locks again, the windows, then feeling exposed with all the black windows staring at her, sank down and sat on the floor.
When the doorbell rang she jumped.
Then sighed in relief. She got up and hurried to the door, paused to compose her face, and pulled it open.
“You’re just going to pop it open like that?” Liam stood in front of her, arms over his chest, glowering. “You didn’t even wait to see if it was me?”
“I checked the peephole.” She should have. But she’d known—known—it was him.
“You couldn’t have. I ducked.”
“Ducked? Why?”
“To see if you’re being careful,” he said. “Obviously not.”
“You didn’t seem so worried about me an hour ago.” She meant to sound cynical, not petulant. But after breaking into the house for her—which had been a vision of male physical prowess that would probably resurface in her dreams—he’d just left her there alone.
His mouth twitched. “Need rescuing again?”
“If I did it would hardly be polite of you to rub my nose in it.”
He bent down and picked up a cylindrical sack at his feet she hadn’t noticed before and pushed past her into the house. “Polite is overrated.”
“What are you doing?”
He walked over to the sofa, reached into the sack, and pulled out a red sleeping bag, spreading it out over the cushions then sitting on top of it. The light material puffed up around him. While Bev stared, he began taking off his shoes. “Since somebody else wants you gone more than I do, I’ve decided to change tactics.” With his shoes parked on the floor, he lifted his legs to stretch out on the couch.
She’d been too upset before to notice the jeans. Now she had to tear her thoughts away from muscled thighs encased in worn denim to hear him. “You’re sleeping here?”
“If anything else happens, I want you to know it wasn’t me. Even if something happens to you at Fite—big or small—it won’t be me. I’m not saying I’ll bend over to help you, and I’m still going to point out how much happier you’ll be in L.A., but I’ll be real obvious about it. Nothing sneaky.”
She sat down on the edge of a chair. “Like, say, dumping a decade’s worth of paperwork on my desk?”
“Not that it wouldn’t be useful to go over past lines if you really were going to stick around as the owner of the company, but since you won’t, I’ll have to be patient. You’ll become unhappy enough to leave without any help from me.”
“And sleeping here will prove this?”
“At least I won’t have to worry,” he said. “You didn’t have the sense to go get a hotel room, and though I sympathize about not going over to my mother’s, I am related to the woman and have to obey her on occasion or I don’t get my favorite dessert on my birthday.”
“You don’t have to stay. I know you’re not the one trying to keep me out of the house.”
“Ah, but you weren’t so sure earlier. Part of you has some doubt. I should let you think I’m capable of such a thing, but I have my chivalrous side and can’t bear the thought that you think I might do you harm. I guess I’m old-fashioned.”
Bev was quite sure he could do her harm just by sitting there looking like that. He had a frayed hole over one knee, and she imagined touching the bare skin underneath. “If I thought you might hurt me, I wouldn’t let you sleep right down the hall from me.”
“Good. Then we’re on the same page.” He yawned, not seeming to notice her staring. “One reason I was such a strong competitor was that I always found the shortest distance between two points. Efficiency. Adjust my stroke, shave my hair, wear the new suit—whatever worked. To hell with convention or expectation or pride.” He slid down onto his back and cupped the back of his head with his hands, exposing a sliver of bare abdomen above the jeans and a tantalizing peek of green underwear. Boxers. With white stripes. “Me sleeping on your couch is the most efficient solution to our dilemma.”
She frowned. He could not sleep here. “No dilemma. I’ll go to a motel.” She turned to walk away.
“Too late now,” he called after her. “I need you to give me a ride to BART in the morning.”
She stopped. Turned around. “Where’s your car?”
“My sister took it. Just a few minutes ago.”
“I’ll give you a ride now. BART runs
late, right?”
He closed his eyes and sank lower onto his back. “No.”
“No?”
“You don’t mean it, anyway, or you’d be gone already. You’re glad I’m here. You don’t want to pay for a motel. You don’t want to be at my mother’s.” Then he peeked up at her out of one eye. “And you don’t want to be alone.”
Chapter 10
The way he looked and spoke like he saw right through her made her stomach hurt. “And I don’t want to be with you.”
“Sure you do,” he said. “Now you can turn off a few lights. Save the East Bay grid a few megawatts.”
“I was just about to do that before you barged in.”
“Liar. Nice girls don’t lie so much.”
Her body flooded with heat. “You come in here babbling about efficiency, and now you’re calling me names—”
“Don’t get upset. Upper-level managers need to control their tempers. Your aunt had such a problem with that. But then again, you two have so much in common.”
She pointed a finger at him. “I am not upset. I am calmly instructing you to get your ass off my sofa and get the hell out of my house.”
His grin widened, and she chided herself for falling into his trap. “You talk like that in the preschool, Bev?” He had wriggled deeper into the couch and showed no sign of getting up. All those muscles would make him too heavy to lift.
“There’s nothing efficient about you being here,” she said. “It is, in fact, a waste of your time.”
“No, actually, it is not, or believe me, I would be happily snoozing in my own bed instead of having to lie here thinking about my promiscuous, parasitic sister taking advantage of my clean sheets.” He rolled to the side, pulled up his knees, and tugged a corner of the sleeping bag over his shoulder. “If I hadn’t promised my mother I’d sleep on your couch tonight, she would have insisted on being here herself until you were forced to go back to her house and meet my brother, who, incidentally, is lonely.”
“Lonely?” The way he had said it, and the unfocused look in his eye, suggested he was not entirely sober. “Unlike you?”
He laughed, not a cynical nasty laugh, but big and relaxed. “Very unlike. He might even be a—” he stopped himself and closed his eyes. “Never mind. But trust me. Not alike.”
“And meeting him would have been inefficient? How?”
“Women make him nervous. If my mother took you in, he’d probably end up sleeping at my place. As if I want more company. This way, I suffer for one night and Mark can continue his studies at Mom U.”
“Mom U—?”
“Any chance you have something figured out for tomorrow night?” He kicked at the sleeping bag and flipped onto his back. “Because this couch sucks.”
“Good. I don’t want you tempted to stay.”
“I so know what you mean. I should buy it off you for my place. Maybe my sister will get the hint.”
Bev stared at him, his eyes closed and his long legs draped over the cushions, and consoled herself that Kate would be driving up the next day. Turning off a few lights would be good. If bad guys broke in, they’d go for him first. She’d leave the lights on near the sofa to make sure they’d see him there.
“All right then,” she said, finally relaxing enough to yawn. Her nerves had been frayed all week, and the shock of the break-in had charred her dwindling composure. Having him there did make her feel better. She walked over to retrieve the remains of her ham sandwich on the coffee table. “I guess I’ll see you in the morning.”
He cracked open an eyelid. “That’s it? No more fight?”
She shook her head and yawned again. “I’m too tired. And you’re right—I was afraid to be alone.” The uneaten sandwich on her plate looked more appetizing than it had earlier. She picked it up to take a bite on her way to the kitchen.
“White bread has a higher glycemic index than pure table sugar, you know.”
She had just been about to toss it in the garbage. Now she stopped and rotated in place to see him watching her. She lifted the sandwich to her mouth and slowly ate every bite, his eyes never leaving hers. “Mmm,” she said, then licked her lips.
He didn’t say anything but the contempt in his eyes transformed into something worse, something she’d endured her entire life in her Orange County enclave of exercise and fitness nuts—evangelical zeal. “I’ll make you breakfast in the morning,” he said. “Before you die of nutrient deprivation.”
If there was one thing Bev knew about herself, it was that—unlike every woman in her family—she had never suffered from nutrient deprivation. Eating everything and anything would do that for you. Forgetting to be afraid of the shadows, she went around the house, turning off lights and trying not to peek at him sprawled on the couch, watching her.
He sat up. “You’re wearing Fite.”
She glanced down at her sweats then back up at him. “They were at T.J. Maxx.”
His gaze dropped down to her thighs, down over her calves, to her feet, slowly back up. “They fit you pretty well.” Then he frowned. “You sleep in them?”
Smiling, she nodded. “Nice and stretchy.”
“Never exercise, you said. Never?”
“Nope.” She turned around to let him judge her big soft butt while she turned off a wall sconce on the way to her bedroom. “And never will.”
Just as she walked out of sight she heard his low voice rumble out from the living room.
“We’ll see about that.”
She woke to the smell of vanilla. Her eyes popped open, expecting a sugar cookie on her pillow, only to see Liam standing next to her bed holding a beer stein as big as his shoe.
“I’m not thirsty,” she said, though the sight of him and his tousled blond hair and his rumpled t-shirt did make her want a drink. Even his hands, wrapped around the brown mug, were sexy—not too hairy, not too skinny, just solid and clean and shapely.
Christ. I’ve lost it. She rolled her head back on her pillow and closed her eyes, the vision of long tapered fingers burned onto her retinas.
“It’s a protein smoothie.” He dropped the mug with a thunk on the nightstand. “I made one for both of us. Sorry to wake you but the ice is melting.”
She cracked open an eye. “I had protein in my kitchen?”
“No, which is why I had to walk over to my mother’s.” His mouth flattened. “She says hello, by the way. I’ve assured her you are not dead.”
She looked up at him from flat on her back, reluctant for him to see her sit up without a bra on. She pulled the covers up to her chin. “Very not dead. And yourself? How was the couch?”
“God-awful. Even my elbows are sore,” he said, rubbing them. “ How much do you want for it?”
Smiling, she looked over at her breakfast without picking it up. “Why the beer mug?”
“Only one big enough.” He bent over, picked it up, and shoved it towards her. “Sit up and drink it before it loses its froth.”
“Froth?”
“Best part.” He nudged the rim of the cold, wet glass under her nose. It was going to leak onto her sheets unless she sat up.
Bravely deciding it was her duty to demonstrate how real breasts reacted to gravity, she wriggled upright and took the glass in both hands. “Thanks. I don’t usually drink this stuff.” As she feared, his eyes fell to her chest and stayed there.
He cleared his throat and to her surprise sat down on the edge of her bed, pulling the comforter taut over her lap. “Do you like it?”
Bev met his eyes over the glass, took a sip, and nodded. It was delicious.
“I put in a few of my mom’s home-grown strawberries,” he said. “And it’s real milk, which I like, but I know some people—”
She wiped her lips. “It’s good, thank you. Cold, but sweet.” Like you, she thought, then felt a stabbing alarm that she was starting to like him. That she had always kind of liked him. But then she assured herself she should like her top VP—though not because he brought her high-prot
ein beverages in bed and had gentle, intelligent eyes.
He slapped his thighs and got to his feet. “Drink all of it. It won’t keep in the fridge. And from the looks of the groceries you’ve got around here, you need the sustenance.” He strode out of the room, his old jeans hugging each firm buttock, and Bev wondered if he had slipped something into the smoothie because she felt herself getting hot and energetic.
Snap out of it.
She took another sip, her tongue getting used to the cold, and gulped down a thick mouthful. It wasn’t waffles, but it was pretty good. Very good. It would have gone great with a cheeseburger and fries.
With a sigh, she leaned back on her pillows and listened to the sound of water running in the kitchen, thinking it gave the house a cozy feel it desperately needed. She didn’t have to worry about break-ins or angry relatives—her executive vice president was on duty with big muscles and a sour disposition. She was safe.
When she had drank as much as she could, she got out of bed and called out to him. “It’ll only take me a minute to get dressed, so I can give you a ride to BART.”
He didn’t answer so she took a few steps into the hallway and peeked into the kitchen. The clock radio over the microwave was playing Green Day while Liam rinsed out the blender in the sink, humming to himself with his back to her. The kitchen window faced south, picking up a low ray of morning sun that lit up his messy blond hair. He’d tied an apron around his waist, an ancient pink polka-dot thing trimmed with red gingham, and he was barefoot.
Like the kids in Jurassic Park facing the velociraptors, Bev froze where she was, terrified of being seen but mesmerized. She drank in the sight of his broad back framed in domestic bliss for a moment, then tip-toed backwards back to the bedroom, not breathing, as though disaster would strike if he saw her.
She closed and locked the door, letting out her breath in a whoosh. He was barefoot. Wearing an apron. In her kitchen.
It’s true what they said about porn: you know it when you see it.
Grateful the mug was still chilled, she lifted it to her forehead and counted to ten. Her heart raced—not from happiness, but from panic.
Love Handles (A Romantic Comedy) Page 13
