ONCE UPON A VALENTINE

by ALLISON LEIGH,

  “Sure thing, ma’am.” His appreciative gaze lingered on Beatrice as he headed outside where his associates were already waiting in the truck.

  “You have an admirer,” she told Beatrice and then held up her key. “I need to turn this in. I can meet you at Pax’s if you want to go on ahead.”

  “I took the metro over. He warned me parking was terrible here. Go ahead. I’ll wait, then we can ride together, if you don’t mind giving me a ride.”

  Shea walked around to the manager’s unit and left her key in the drop box. She would have liked a chance to question him more about the elevator business, but he wasn’t in. When she rejoined Beatrice, Marsha-Marsha was even more restless. “I can take her.”

  “We’re fine,” Beatrice assured her and headed out the door. “Did I tell you that I landed two more jobs as a result of the Fresh Grounds event?” she asked once they were situated inside Shea’s car.

  “No.” As she drove away, Shea watched the building for a moment in her rearview mirror. Was she really going to miss the place or just the independence that it represented?

  She stopped at a red light and glanced at Beatrice. “More fundraisers?”

  “One is. The other’s a huge wedding.”

  “I’m sorry we didn’t get the story run on the auction.”

  Beatrice lifted her shoulder and smiled slightly. “Not the end of the world. The auction made twenty percent more than they’d hoped, and that was the point of the event in the first place. All in all, I am perfectly pleased with the results.”

  “Even without media coverage.” No other outlets had mentioned the auction either.

  Beatrice gave her a calm smile that was uncannily like her brother’s. “Even without,” the other woman assured blithely. Then she nodded toward the windshield. “Light’s green.”

  Fresh butterflies danced inside Shea’s stomach. She still wasn’t sure what madness had made her agree to move in with Pax. But now that she had, there’d been no turning back.

  So she ignored the fluttery little buggers and drove through the intersection.

  * * *

  The second Pax opened the door to his apartment that evening, he knew Shea was there. Not just because Beatrice had called to let him know when she and their mother had left Shea, or because of the way his nerves twitched, but because Hooch wasn’t standing in the foyer, wagging his tail so hard his whole body shook.

  Pax closed the door and set his keys on the narrow table in the hallway. He saw three packing boxes stacked against the wall, still taped closed. He walked past them and headed quietly into the living area. No boxes there. Nothing new at all.

  Except Shea and her cat.

  One was perched on top of the bookcase, warily watching him as he entered. The other was curled up in the corner of his couch, sound asleep with her hair streaming like a waterfall over the couch’s arm. Hooch was stretched out beside Shea, taking up most of the real estate, which undoubtedly explained the cat’s climb to safer territory. Though he looked at Pax, the dog clearly wasn’t interested enough in his human’s arrival to bother moving his head away from its resting place on Shea’s thigh.

  Pax rounded the couch and reached down to scratch the dog’s head. “So much for devotion, eh?”

  Hooch’s tail flopped a few times.

  “I don’t blame you, buddy, believe me.”

  Shea had found the throw that Pax’s housekeeper, Graciela, usually kept folded and stored away inside a cupboard. He pulled the edge of it up over her slender shoulder, resisting the urge to touch her in any other way. The television was turned to an old black and white movie with the volume low, and he left it undisturbed and went into the kitchen.

  Either his mother had come bearing a helluva lot more than lunch, or Shea had made dinner. A big bowl of plastic-wrapped spaghetti was sitting on the counter, and when he touched the side of it, it was still warm. He pulled open the package wrapped in foil that sat beside it, letting out the mouthwatering scent of bread and garlic. He tugged off a piece and shoved it in his mouth.

  “I didn’t hear you come in.”

  He looked over and saw Shea with the blue throw draped around her shoulders. The only light in the kitchen came from the small bulb turned on over the stove. In the dimness, she looked sleepy-eyed and soft, and he felt such a stab of longing that he almost choked on the bread.

  He snatched open the fridge and grabbed a bottle of beer he didn’t really want, except as an excuse to keep his hands safely occupied. “You were sleeping. I see the cat’s found a safe spot on top of the bookcase.” He pushed the refrigerator door closed and twisted open the bottle top.

  She made a soft sound. “Sorry about that. She made a beeline there the second I took her out of her crate. So far, she’s totally ignoring her own cat tree. I put it in the extra room.”

  He stifled a sigh. “You don’t have to be sorry. She’ll get used to Hooch in time.”

  “I suppose.” She took a hesitant step into the kitchen.

  “The food your doing?”

  “I had so much left over from your shopping spree last week. I just packed it all up and brought it here.”

  “You didn’t leave the dishes.” Her brows pulled together and he gestured toward the empty sink with the bottle. “You said if you cooked, I cleaned up,” he reminded and tried not to think too much about what had preceded that particular conversation.

  Her lashes lowered as she walked the rest of the way into the room. Her cheeks were red. “I figured I owed you one,” she murmured. She reached out and fiddled with the plastic wrap covering the pasta. “You’re the reason the elevator is working.”

  He didn’t have to work hard to realize what she meant. “I see my sister still talks a lot.”

  She pressed her hands around the sides of the bowl, smoothing the plastic back in place. “It was very nice of you.”

  He waited a beat. “But unnecessary?”

  “Only if you did it to benefit me. Since I’m...here. But the hundred or so other people still living there are pretty happy.” She finally looked at him. “But you needn’t have sent your sister to make sure I actually got here.”

  “I asked Bea to go over because I didn’t like leaving you to deal with moving on your own.” Forestalling any possible argument, he added, “Not because I didn’t think you could. Or that I was worried you’d decide not to come.”

  Her jaw canted. “You really had a client meeting?”

  “Three, actually. Sundays aren’t usually so busy.” He tugged his tie loose and pulled a fork from the drawer. Then he slid the bowl away from her lax fingers and sat down on one of the barstools before peeling back the plastic wrap and sticking his fork in.

  She made a sound. “Ever heard of a plate?” She opened an overhead cupboard and pulled out one of his white plates. She set it pointedly in front of him. “Don’t worry,” she said dryly. “I’ll wash it.”

  He grinned and dumped a healthy portion onto the plate.

  “Does it need warming?”

  He shook his head and dug his fork back into the noodles. “Too much time. I’m starving.” Better to feed his growling stomach than the other hunger plaguing him.

  She took the cheesy garlic bread and sliced off a hunk, nudging it onto the side of his plate. Then she filled a glass with water and sipped at it as she leaned back against the sink. The city lights glittered through the big window behind her.

  He dragged his eyes away from her and focused on the food. “Bread’s good. You get it at that little bakery on the corner?”

  “I made it.” Her gaze skittered over his and then away. “I saw the bread maker you had in the pantry when I was putting things away. I stuck my cookbooks in there, too. I...hope you don’t mind.”

  “Didn’t even know I had a bread maker.” He picked up his be
er again, his brain tripping along a path paved with homemade bread and other wonders. “Probably my mother’s doing. Who knows what else is lurking in the cupboards that she’s decided I have to have.”

  “Your mother?” Her voice dripped skepticism and his happy little trip screeched to a standstill.

  He studied her for a moment. “Who else do you think would be equipping me with kitchen appliances? One of those legions of women you seem to think I’ve had?”

  She lifted one hand peaceably. “I shouldn’t have said anything.”

  “I have never once brought another woman here who hasn’t been a relation,” he said evenly. “Until you.”

  She made an impatient sound and set aside her water glass. “You don’t have to spin fairytales for me, Pax. It’s none of my business who you’ve...entertained here. It doesn’t matter—”

  “The hell it doesn’t.” He set the bottle down again with a careful clink. “Why do you find it so flippin’ difficult to believe anything I say?”

  She pressed her fingertip to the bridge of her nose for a moment. “This is silly.” She dropped her hand. “If I’m actually going to live here, we probably should agree to just be honest. I don’t need anything sugarcoated—”

  “You are living here,” he corrected flatly. “There’s no way I’ll ever be able to deny that I’ve enjoyed the company of plenty of women over the years. But not once have I ever told you something that wasn’t truthful. I told you I haven’t brought another woman here and—”

  “I saw you!” she burst out. She pulled the throw off her shoulders and draped it over the back of the barstool tucked under the end of the counter, visibly gathering herself. “I saw you,” she repeated more calmly. “On your last birthday. You were at the club right across the street from this very building.”

  “Koala’s.” He remembered his birthday perfectly well, including the fact that he had not had a date with him. Something that had earned him plenty of ribbing from his sister and cousins who’d celebrated with him.

  “We ran the photo in the Tub,” Shea added.

  “I’ve been accused of possessing a healthy ego,” he drawled, “but I don’t recall my birthday being such hot news that it’d make a local paper.”

  Her lips tightened. “We were doing Harvey’s annual list of favorite hotspots around the city. Koala’s was number one.”

  “Yeah, they’ve been number one for years. So what?”

  She looked even more annoyed. “So I was the one sitting outside nearly all night to get a photo of someone newsworthy coming in or out.” She waved her hand. “And you and your three dates fit the bill to a tee,” she finished flatly. “Unless you’re going to claim they all coincidentally live in this building, too, I saw them come in with you.”

  “You and that pain-in-the-ass Harvey,” he muttered and stomped out of the kitchen. He went into his study and grabbed a box off the top shelf and carried it back into the kitchen. He slapped the light switch, flooding the room with bright light.

  Shea was still standing there looking uneasy. “Honestly, Pax. I told you it doesn’t matter to me who you’ve had here in the past.”

  “Big of you.” He dumped the box on the counter next to his plate and flipped off the lid. He rummaged through the newspaper clippings jumbled inside, found the one he wanted and slapped it on the counter between them. “That the one you’re talking about?”

  She warily stepped closer and glanced at it. “Yes.” But she seemed more interested in the shoe box and slowly reached inside, pulling out another clipping. Then another. She held them in her hands. “These are all mine,” she said slowly. “You’ve been saving—”

  “No way, sweetheart. Don’t change the subject.” He planted his finger on the photograph she was damning him for and pushed it in front of her again. “Take another look, Shea.”

  “Oh, for Pete’s—” She broke off and exhaled. “Fine.” She looked at the clipping.

  “Who do you see?”

  “You, obviously,” she said tightly. “And count ’em. One, two, three blondes.”

  “You never went in the club that night, did you?”

  She gave him a look. “The owner doesn’t like his patrons’ privacy disturbed. I couldn’t even get past the bouncer.”

  “So you just took your little pictures and assumed the worst.” He snatched up the clipping. “Take another look at the faces, Shea, before you go accusing me of lying again.”

  Shea tugged the clipping he was waving in front of her face out of his fingers.

  Maybe Pax didn’t think it was a big deal that he kept a shoe box containing the pieces she’d done at the Tub, but she was certainly distracted by it. The box was nearly full.

  But it was easier to look at the clipping than it was to look at the storm brewing on his face, so she did. She took in the small, grainy newsprint photo. His head was thrown back in laughter, while his long arms were looped over his companions’ shoulders. Beneath the photo, Harvey’s top-10 list was printed.

  She started to set the clipping back on the counter, but something made her stop. She moved her thumb away from the face of one of his dates and felt her stomach drop away.

  “Jennifer,” she realized aloud. The mother of the little blonde girl with lopsided pigtails. And Pax’s cousin.

  The other two women, their faces less clear than Jennifer’s, were familiar, too.

  “Beatrice used to be blond?” She looked up at him. She didn’t remember the third woman’s name, but she was the one who’d claimed pickle juice was just the ticket for morning sickness.

  Shea felt plenty sick, but she was certain no amount of juice was going to help right now.

  Pax’s eyes didn’t waver from her face. “I don’t lie,” he said flatly.

  She pressed her lips together. “I’m sorry. I just—”

  “Thought the worst, as usual.”

  She dropped the clipping back into the box. It settled lightly on top of the others. “It was back in August. Long before we—” She swallowed hard and reached into the box, grabbed a handful of the newspaper clippings and dumped them on the counter. “How many other times are you seen with one woman or another?” She dashed her hand over the pieces, spreading them out. “Nine times out of ten you’ve had a date with you!” She held up an example before tossing it back into the box. “Don’t blame me for not realizing the night of your birthday was any different!”

  He exhaled. “I don’t blame you for thinking it,” he said tiredly. “I blame you for thinking I’m lying about it now.”

  “I’m sorry!”

  “Yeah. You’re sorry. And what happens the next time?” His eyes probed hers. “You have to start trusting me, Shea. I said you’re the only woman I’ve ever brought here. You’re the only one who has ever been pregnant with my child. You’re the only one I—” He broke off and his teeth closed together like he was grinding them. “Forget it.” He pushed away from the counter and headed out of the room.

  She instinctively followed. “Pax, wait.”

  He was wearing a perfectly tailored gray suit. She could easily see the way his shoulders stiffened. But he stopped. Made a quarter turn and looked back at her.

  “I’m sorry,” she said again.

  His lips twisted.

  “Well, I am!” She rubbed her palms down the sides of her jeans. “This is new for me, all right? I’ve lived on my own since I was seventeen. I’m sorry if I’m doing everything wrong here!”

  “It’s new for me, too.”

  So she was realizing. She chewed the inside of her lip and watched him. “I don’t know what to expect. What you expect.”

  “I expect you to start trusting me.”

  “I mean with this.” She spread her hands, taking in the kitchen around them. “Living together. I know you said we’d figu
re things out along the way, but—” She broke off and tucked her hair behind her ears. Nobody but Pax had ever made her feel so nervous. “But there’s no point in us pretending that you’d want me here if I weren’t pregnant,” she finished abruptly.

  A muscle ticked in his jaw. “Really? I asked you to marry me the other night.”

  “That wasn’t a proposal! It was a discussion. Again, only because of the baby.”

  Wasn’t it?

  She folded her arms tightly, as if she could strangle the question back out of her head.

  “You’ve just admitted you don’t bring women here,” she continued doggedly. “The only thing different about me is that I’m pregnant. And...and you feel some sort of old-fashioned responsibility in taking care of me because of it.

  “It’s not old-fashioned in my book.”

  She moistened her lips. “Anyway, I just think everything would be easier if we, I don’t know, if we didn’t rely so much on figuring—” she unwound her arms to sketch quotation marks in the air “—things out along the way and agreed to some ground rules.”

  He raked his hands down his face. She wasn’t sure if he was wiping away frustration or anger. When he suddenly turned back into the kitchen and stepped toward her, she jumped.

  But all he did was reach around her for his beer.

  “Besides the embargo on our unmentionables comingling in the washing machine, you mean?” His gaze slid over her face. “You’ve already broken the whole cooking-slash-dishes thing. So far, you’re not hitting it out of the park when it comes to your ability to follow your own rules.”

  She flushed.

  He lifted the bottle and took a slow drink, but his eyes never veered from her face. “Fine. You want rules. Here are mine. Graciela comes in a couple times a week to clean and do the laundry and she’ll do yours as well as mine.” His gaze bored into hers. “Take the extra bedroom or not. Right now I actually don’t care. You want to pretend this is just some roommate situation, go right ahead. But when you come to my bed, and you will, come knowing that’s where you intend to stay.”