The Second Time

by Janet Dailey

  “No thanks.” If she let her mother have her way,,, Randy would eat with them every night. “It’s time he learned he has to come home for supper.”

  “I’ll send him home,” her mother promised reluctantly and walked to the door. “Call if you need anything.”

  “I will.”

  Her mother’s car hadn’t left the driveway before Dawn was hauling the small stepladder into the living room so she could hang the pleated drapes at the windows. The two small side windows were a snap, but the large front window proved to be more of a hassle than she expected.

  That area of the floor was warped, which meant the ladder wasn’t balanced on all four legs so it rocked with each shift of her weight. Add to that, the drapes were wider by necessity and more awkward to handle because so much had to be held on her arm. She only had one hand free to fit the hook into its sliding eye-bracket, and to reach that she had to balance a knee on top of the ladder and stretch on tiptoe. It wasn’t a position that promoted security. Dawn wished now that the ceilings that gave the house so much character weren’t quite so high.

  After much struggling, balancing, and stretching, she got one half of the front window set hung. There was still the other half to go. She moved the ladder over and observed how much it rocked. She debated waiting until Randy came home so he could hold the ladder steady, then decided to try it.

  She tugged at the hem of her jean shorts and gathered up the large panel, laying it over her arm. Her bare feet gripped the slatted steps of the ladder while it seesawed under her moving weight. Dawn took her time, testing the swaying rock of the ladder so she wouldn’t accidentally overbalance the wrong way.

  Then the slow process began of stretching and aiming for the eye, trying to hook it before it slid away and not losing her balance when the ladder rocked to a different three-point stance. It was nerve-wracking. When she heard footsteps crossing the veranda, Dawn sighed with relief.

  As soon as the front door opened, she called, “Will you come over here and hold this ladder steady so I can finish hanging these drapes?”

  She expected a grumble of protest from Randy, but none was voiced as she fumbled one-handed with the next hook to hold it in a position of readiness. When she felt a hand gripping the ladder, she made the final stretch for the bracket.

  Suddenly there was a hand stroking the back of her thigh. Her eyes widened in shock at such familiarity from her son. She let go of the hook and swung her arm around to knock away his hand, turning to look at the same time.

  “Randy!” His name was out of her mouth before Dawn saw Slater standing beside the ladder. “It’s you!” She was almost relieved as her heart started beating again.

  “I should hope it’s me and not our son.” There was something lazy and warm about the way he was looking at her. It did things to her pulse that still hadn’t recovered from her initial start.

  Since they had moved into the house, Slater had dropped by unannounced a couple of times, but Dawn had been expecting Randy and simply hadn’t anticipated it might be anyone else. On his previous visits, Randy had always been at home. It was the first time they’d been alone since that night in his office.

  “I didn’t hear your car.” Dawn noticed the way his dark hair gleamed with sun-burnished lights streaking through it. She wanted to reach down and smooth his unruly forelock the way she so often did Randy’s.

  “That’s because I walked,” Slater replied.

  “If you’re here to see Randy, he hasn’t come home yet.” Dawn turned back to the window and adjusted the drape material folded over her arm.

  How many times had she seen Slater in the last two weeks? Easily more than a half a dozen times, sometimes on a matter related to the house and others when he’d come to see Randy. Even when the terms had been friendly, there had been a tension between them. It was difficult to be with him without wanting to touch and be closer.

  “I suspected he wasn’t.” His voice was dry with amusement at her obvious announcement. Its tone altered when he added, “The drapes really make the room look different.”

  “They look good, don’t they?” she said with smiling pride in the result, and grasped the hook she had dropped earlier to aim it for the eye bracket.

  Just as she stretched for it, his hand trailed down the silken-smooth back of her leg. His touch went through her nerve ends like liquid lightning. She missed the bracket.

  “Will you stop that?” she demanded.

  “You have nice legs,” Slater remarked with no remorse.

  “Thank you.” The compliment was almost as awkward to handle as his wayward hand.

  His playful orneriness was unsettling. Her task was a difficult one requiring concentration and coordination. Slater was affecting both. She started to reach for the bracket again, then paused to look over her shoulder at him.

  “Don’t touch my leg. Okay?” she asked for his word, not liking the little silver light that danced in his charcoal-dark eyes.

  “Okay,” he agreed smoothly. Satisfied that he meant it, Dawn focused her gaze on the target and made her move for it. “You do have nice legs,” Slater repeated. “Dirty feet, but nice legs.” He ran a finger down the ticklish sole of her bare foot.

  It was like testing her reflexes—all movement was involuntary. Her knee jerked, changing the center of her balance and tipping her forward. She yelped and grabbed for the top of the ladder to keep from going headfirst through the window.

  The momentary fright had her heart beating like a racing motor. Her breath was coming in little gasps. It wasn’t until her senses started quieting down that she felt his hand gripping the back pocket of her jean shorts. Obviously Slater had grabbed her to prevent her from pitching forward. But his efforts to save her weren’t appreciated since he had been the cause in the first place.

  She’d had to let go of everything. The unhung drape material was swinging drunkenly from the rod, attached to it by the first few hooks. She knew she wouldn’t get the material folded so neatly again, which meant the material would be more cumbersome on her arm.

  “Damn you, Slater MacBride,” Dawn swore angrily. “You know the bottoms of my feet are ticklish.”

  “I think I’d forgotten how ticklish you are.” There was a throaty chuckle in his voice. “Sorry. I won’t do it again.”

  “You’d better not,” she warned, unimpressed by his apology and its accompanying promise. “If you do that again, I’m liable to get myself killed.”

  “I certainly don’t want that to happen,” Slater murmured with an obvious effort to contain his amusement.

  Dawn began hauling up the dangling portion of the drape panel and looping it over her arm. In her irritable mood, she didn’t take as much care as she might have to keep the material from wrinkling.

  “Will you just hold the ladder and keep your hands to yourself?” she demanded. “Don’t touch me anywhere.”

  “I’ll be as still as a mouse,” he assured her.

  Her first tries were tentative, not completely trusting him. Gradually, Dawn realized he intended to keep his word. The work went smoother after that.

  When she had threaded the last hook through its eyes, she let her aching arms fall to her side and gazed with satisfaction at the smoothly hanging drapes with their crisp pleats spaced in neat rows. Not once had Slater intervened or even broken the silence. With the job done, she’d lost her irritation with him.

  “They look great, don’t they?” Dawn was eager to hear someone’s opinion other than her own.

  “Perfect,” Slater agreed.

  Unbending her knee, Dawn straightened her leg so her foot could find the ladder rung and join its twin. Her hands gripped the flat top of the ladder for balance so she could begin her descent.

  With the first step, an arm hooked her legs and tugged her off balance so she was turning. A second arm circled her hips to finish the turn and lift her off the ladder. Her startled outcry was ignored and Dawn had to grab for his shoulders to keep from overbalancing.r />
  Held high in the air by strong arms that hugged her hips to his chest, Dawn was helpless to do anything about it. She looked down at Slater’s laughing features. The physical contact she’d longed for and the possessive gleam in his eyes made it impossible for her to even fake anger.

  “Will you put me down?” There was a breathless catch in her voice.

  “I don’t think so.” He was eye-level with her breasts that were angled away from him by her arched back, but he seemed quite fascinated by their nearness, and their movements under her cotton-thin blouse.

  Dawn knew he was staring at them to disturb. It was confirmed when his glance flickered upward to measure her reaction. And there was one. Her lips were parted and her eyes were darkening with want. But she was too aware of recent bad experiences in his arms to give rein to her own desires.

  “For a reformed alcoholic, you certainly play around with fire a lot.” It was a husky accusation, a veiled attempt to remind him of his resolution concerning her.

  His grip loosened, letting her slide down a few inches. “But there was a condition to my abstinence,” Slater reminded her and nuzzled the blouse buttons that fastened the material across the valley between her breasts.

  “What?” It was hard to think when sensation was trying to dominate her thought process.

  His mouth shifted its area of interest to rub over the material covering the rounded sides of her breasts. “I said I’d stay away from you until I decided what I wanted.” His murmuring voice was partially muffled by the cloth.

  “And you decided?” Her eyes were closed and her head was bent toward him as her hands curled around his neck.

  Slater eased her a little farther down to nuzzle the hollow of her throat, his lips and breath warm against her skin. “There was more agony doing without you, so I’ve decided to learn to live with my addiction.”

  She was lowered the last few inches until her toes touched the floor while he continued to nibble on her neck and to rub her jaw. Happiness soared through her at the news that he was bringing a close to his inner conflict.

  “I thought you’d never make up your mind,” she declared throatily.

  “You don’t know what it’s been like for me since you came back,” he asserted. “You’re all I thought about. When I wasn’t around you, I wanted to be. I dragged out closing the sale of the house just so I could have a legitimate reason to talk to you privately—away from Randy. I couldn’t hold an intelligent conversation with anybody for more than five minutes without my mind wandering off with thoughts of you.” His breath mingled with hers as his mouth became poised just above her lips. “It came down to a simple understanding. You’re here—and I want you.”

  Her fingers tunneled into the thickness of his hair to force his head down. The union of their lips was a hungry testament of their need for each other that could not be culminated in a merely sexual act. Their bodies strained for more intimate contact, reaching wildly for the ultimate closeness that could never be adequately achieved.

  As if coming from a great distance, there was the sound of running footsteps. The significance was lost on the entwined couple until the front door burst open and the intrusion startled them into breaking off the torrid kiss.

  Chapter Eight

  Randy halted abruptly, holding the door open and looking a little embarrassed as if he wasn’t sure whether he should stay or go. Slater recovered first and withdrew his arms from around Dawn. Self-consciously, she smoothed the front of her blouse where it had ridden up.

  “Grandma said I was to come home for supper,” Randy said.

  “Yes,” Dawn nodded a little jerkily.

  “I was just helping your mother off the stepladder,” Slater explained.

  Randy suddenly grinned and let go of the door, his light eyes glittering knowingly. “Next you’ll be trying to convince me you two were practicing mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. I’ve been around, you know.”

  Slater laughed silently and glanced at Dawn. “Smart kid. Yours?”

  “No, yours,” she countered, smiling now, too.

  “It’s time the three of us had a discussion.” He took her hand and drew her with him as he crossed to the sofa. Randy ambled over in the same direction and flopped in the armchair, eyeing them curiously.

  “A discussion about what?” Dawn inquired into the subject matter as she settled onto a seat cushion beside Slater.

  “I have a small problem, which I believe Randy shares,” he said. She frowned slightly because the conversation wasn’t taking the turn she expected. “We’re father and son, but it’s awkward for either of us to openly claim the relationship. We constantly would have to explain why his name is different from mine. It’s probably more awkward for Randy because kids tend to call others names that can hurt.”

  A glance at Randy noted the tightness around his mouth, an admission that what Slater was saying was true. Dawn had known it was a potential problem, but she hadn’t realized it had already surfaced.

  “I’ve come up with a way to solve the problem,” Slater announced.

  “You have?” Randy gave him a wide-eyed look that was full of hope.

  “Your mother and I can get married and have your name legally changed to mine.” A faint satisfied smile curved his mouth as he explained his solution.

  “That’s great!” Randy declared, but Dawn kept her silence, stunned—not by his backhanded proposal—but his justification to Randy for their marriage. Then Randy laughed loudly. “When you do that, my name will legally be Randy MacBride MacBride. I’ll be a MacBride twice.”

  “I guess you will.” Slater smiled along with him.

  Dawn finally found her voice. “I thought this was supposed to be a discussion between the three of us. It sounds like the two of you have made a decision without even asking my opinion,” she pointed out. “It is going to affect me.”

  “I wanted to hear what Randy thought of my solution before I asked you about it—privately,” he stressed the latter, an engaging smile deepening the corners of his mouth.

  “Randy—” she turned to her son, struggling to keep calm until she found out what Slater had to say, “—why don’t you go get cleaned up for supper.”

  This was a discussion she didn’t want postponed. She needed her suspicions put to rest, and soon, or they’d eat away at her.

  “Okay.” He pushed out of the chair and paused. “You know you think it’s a good idea, too.”

  “Go,” she urged without denying his statement.

  Her gaze followed him as he left the room and lunged up the stairs, taking the steps two at a time. She waited until she heard him in the upstairs bathroom before she glanced at Slater.

  “Did you mean that about getting married?” she asked, with a searching look.

  “Like Randy said, it’s a good idea,” he repeated while his fingers curled tighter around her hand.

  “It’s never any good for two people to get married for the sake of a child,” she insisted, wanting him to give her a better reason than that. “It wouldn’t be any good for us, either, even if it makes the situation easier for Randy.”

  “It’ll be good.” He slipped an arm around her waist and pulled at her hand to draw her closer to him.

  Her free hand pushed at his shoulder to keep from being drawn into his embrace while she turned her face away from his descending mouth. “I have to know why you want to marry me—whether it’s only because of Randy.” She wouldn’t be persuaded into accepting by his kisses.

  When she drew her head back to look at him, Slater sighed heavily and didn’t try to pursue his quarry. “Don’t you know?” There was a half-teasing light in his eyes. “Maybe I want to marry you for your money?”

  Dawn went white. “If that’s supposed to be a joke, I don’t think it’s very funny.”

  “I don’t suppose it is,” he agreed, the light fading. “It would be poetic justice, wouldn’t it? This would be my first time at the marriage altar, so I should be wedding money—a
ccording to you.”

  Hurt that he would continue with this terrible joke—if it was a joke—Dawn tried to twist her hand out of his grasp and pull it free. Slater just laughed in his throat and gathered her into his arms.

  “You didn’t think I was serious?” He rebuked her for questioning his motive while his gaze burned possessively over her features. “I thought I’d made it plain before Randy ever walked in the door how I felt about you.” His lips brushed her cheek in a gentle and reassuring caress.

  “It was cruel to tease me like that.” There was a hint of desperation in the way her arms went around him to cling. If it hadn’t been for her own guilty conscience about the way she had treated him long ago, she probably would have laughed off his joking suggestion. “I’m too sensitive, I guess.”

  “It was a foolish way for me to let you know that I was putting all that kind of thinking behind us.” Slater took part of the blame. “But it’s something we both have to tread lightly around, it seems.”

  Dawn suspected he was right. There were too many years of hurt that couldn’t be wiped out with the wave of any magic wand—even love. But understanding that would carry them a long way in overcoming it.

  “I’m still curious about something.” She reluctantly drew back so she could see his face, but this time made no attempt to expand the circle of his arms.

  “What’s that?” He playfully kissed the tip of her nose.

  “Why did you allow Randy to think we were getting married because of him?” she asked.

  “Because I wanted him to see how our marriage would benefit him, then gradually ease him into discovering that he was going to have to share a lot of your time with me.” A sudden smile flashed across his features. “And I wanted him on my side just in case you got stubborn and thought we should wait awhile before tying the knot.”

  “Trying to gang up on me, were you?” Dawn accused with a provocative look through the tops of her lashes.