Father of Two

by Judith Arnold

  “A primordial what?” Gail asked, glad to hear her voice emerging normally. She pushed up to sit and plucked her soaked shirt away from her chest. Her skin felt crusty where the mud dried on it, but despite the grime caking her, she was definitely feeling more like her old self.

  She glanced up at Murphy, prepared to resent him for having hijacked her good sense. But he looked even better with his son clambering over his back than he’d looked when he’d been sprawled out on the soggy ground with her, when his body was cushioning her, when she’d felt the damp denim of his jeans against her bare legs and the supple wall of his chest beneath her fingertips. How could a man with a loud-mouth seven-year-old on his back look so damnably sexy?

  “Soup,” Sean told her. “You look like primordial soup. Or ooze. I forget. Gimme a ride, Daddy!”

  “Okay. One quick ride for the monkey on my back.” Murphy staggered to his feet and rearranged Sean so he was centered between Murphy’s shoulders. Then he winked at Gail and galloped away, accompanied by Sean’s raucous laughter.

  Gail remained seated in the puddle for a minute, regaining her composure. She was sodden and bedraggled. Her hair dripped down her back, her feet were filthy, her shirt was a wash-day nightmare and her neck itched where Murphy had plastered it with muck.

  And inside, she felt warmer than she’d ever felt before.

  Chapter Eight

  “I’M A MESS,” Gail groaned.

  “And I’m proud of you,” Molly said as she turned from the front door after waving off the last of the Daddy School students and their children. Some of them appeared even messier than Gail, their skin and clothing spattered with soil or paint, their hair matted, their shoes saturated—but all of them had been grinning when they’d flocked out of the building.

  Gail wasn’t grinning. When she called herself a mess, she wasn’t talking about mud and grass stains. She was talking about her soul.

  What was Murphy doing to her? What sort of strange power did he wield over her? Why did her body seem to sing whenever he touched her? He wasn’t touching her with love or affection, or even respect. He was touching her with mud.

  Not that love was ever going to enter into anything that occurred between her and Murphy. Right from her first meeting with him, she’d loathed him with a passion that wasn’t quite rational but was very real. The fact that he could kiss her with such sublime effectiveness while lying on a pile of paper under her desk, that his mud-enhanced caresses in the play yard of a preschool could scramble her nervous system, that he could look so utterly free and exuberant and confoundedly virile while giving his son a piggy-back ride...

  Gail was not an erotic person. Her experiences with sex ranged from mildly unpleasant to monstrously awful, and she was content to leave it at that. Or, at least, she had been content until...

  Until Murphy.

  She didn’t have to relive his kisses and touches to feel unsettled inside. All she had to do was recall the silver radiance in his eyes as he gazed at her, a glow that spoke of need and certainty and raw desire, and her body underwent a transformation. Parts of her anatomy pulled tight, and other parts went soft and pliant, as if her entire being had become elastic, stretching and bending and aching to wrap around something.

  For God’s sake, all she’d done was watch Murphy lug his kid around on his shoulders. And she’d kissed him the other day. And she’d felt his weight on her, and her weight on him, and a few other things.

  “I’m a mess,” she repeated as Molly scooted past her to her desk in the school’s entry. “Look at me.”

  Molly did. On her left ring finger, she wore a thick gold band and on her right wrist a simple charm bracelet, both tokens of her husband’s love for her and hers for him. Gail didn’t want love tokens. She didn’t want love. She didn’t even know why the concept of love kept invading her thoughts. She hoped her sister couldn’t read her mind, which was in a much messier state than her clothing.

  “You look kind of cute,” Molly teased. She, of course, was the picture of good grooming in her crisp camp shirt and spotless jeans.

  “I notice you weren’t rolling around in the muck,” Gail accused. “Neither was John. How come he’s not coming to Daddy School anymore?”

  “He graduated,” Molly said simply. “When necessary, I give him private tutorials at home.”

  “I’ll bet,” Gail muttered. She gazed down at her disheveled attire and groaned. “I can’t get into my car like this. I’ll ruin the upholstery.”

  “A little mud won’t ruin it,” Molly argued. “But if you want, there’s a shower upstairs. You could wash up and...” She stepped into a small storage room off the entry. “I’m sure I’ve got a change of clothes here somewhere, if you want to borrow it. It won’t be too bad a fit.” She pulled a fresh T-shirt and a denim skirt out of a cabinet. “The shirt should fit you fine. The skirt might be a bit short, but that’s no big deal.”

  “Thanks.” A shower was exactly what Gail wanted—scalding water, soap, more scalding water and then fresh, dry clothing. She needed to scrub herself until she’d washed away not just the dirt and grass but the disturbing sensations Murphy had churned inside her. She wanted to feel clean and pure.

  Molly locked the supply cabinet, then pulled a key from her key ring. “I can’t stick around. John and I promised Michael we’d take him to the toddler flick at the library this afternoon. They’re showing the original 101 Dalmatians. Would you mind locking up?” She handed the key to Gail.

  “No problem. What do you want me to do with the key?”

  “It’s a spare, so you can drop it off whenever. If you want to run it by the house later and we aren’t home, leave it on the molding above the back door. Can you reach that?”

  “I think so.” Gail smiled at her baby sister, who stood two inches shorter than her, a height differential she used to tease Molly about when they were younger and things like height seemed terribly important to them. “Can you reach it?”

  Molly smiled back, serene. “Of course not. That’s what I’ve got John for.”

  “Ah.” Gail nodded. “I figured there had to be some reason you married the guy.”

  Molly gave Gail a playful poke in the shoulder, then rummaged in her purse for her sunglasses. “I’ve got to run. There are towels on the shelf next to the shower.” She gave Gail’s cheek a breezy kiss, then swept through the door and outside, obviously eager to race home to the man she loved.

  Gail gazed through the glass door, wondering about the bounce in her sister’s step, the glossy shine of her hair, the joy that seemed to hum inside her. Molly had always been bubbly and cheerful, even as a child. Gail had been the serious, earnest Saunders sister, while Molly had loved frolicking, being creative, climbing trees and designing paper-doll clothes. When they’d played make-believe, Molly had always been the one to come up with the setting and the roles: “Let’s pretend we’re pirates and we’ve been kidnapped by an army of crocodiles. And they’re hiding us on a chocolate plantation. We’ve got to escape and save the chocolate!” Gail would eagerly play along, a little envious of her sister’s imagination but thrilled to be a part of her fantasy.

  But then, Gail had always assumed it was Molly’s job to save the make-believe chocolate from the crocodiles, and her own job to save the world. With such an important mission in life, Gail couldn’t be given to flights of fancy the way her sister could. And then, one night, Gail had discovered that she was a part of the world that needed saving. She’d managed to save herself, but...

  But she couldn’t imagine having the bounce in her own step that came so naturally to Molly. She couldn’t imagine herself suffused with Molly’s joy, imbued with her cozy contentment. She couldn’t imagine marrying a man, whether for his ability to reach the top of the door frame or his love, for stability or security. She couldn’t imagine it at all.

  Why was she even thinking about it?

  Murphy.

  Vexed that that insufferable fat-cat lawyer had stolen back into h
er thoughts, she stormed up the stairs, determined to scour every last trace of him off her skin and out of her soul.

  ***

  SHE WASN’T HOME.

  He should have expected as much. After showering himself, power-washing the kids, and arranging hasty play-dates for them, he’d driven to the address he’d found listed next to Gail’s name in the Arlington phone directory, parked in the driveway, and rung the bell. He’d heard it echo inside the house, but she didn’t answer. He’d rung it two more times, then cupped his hands around his eyes to cut the glare and peeked in through the window beside the door.

  The place looked empty. It was a nice, well-maintained ranch-style dwelling, with dark-red shingles and white shutters framing the windows. The house was small. Living alone, she didn’t require anything bigger.

  Through the window to the left of the door he could see a rectangular living room featuring a hardwood floor partly covered by a pale area rug, a boxy sofa that would probably be more comfortable for someone her size than his, and a fireplace flanked by built-in shelves adorned with ceramic pieces. He strolled around to the back for a different view; through a rear window he saw a kitchen, clean but lived-in, with a pot standing on one of the burners and a book open face-down on the table. The drapes were shut at the other windows, so he couldn’t peek into her bedroom, which was probably just as well. He had plenty enough to fantasize about without visualizing her in her bed.

  He’d rather visualize her sprawled out beside him on the damp, loamy, spring-scented earth. He’d rather visualize her with her shirt so wet he could see the outlines of her bra, her nipples swollen against the fabric, her hair tangled and her bottom soaked. Oh, yes, her bottom, damp...from the recent rain, or from the mega-force attraction that zapped between him and her.

  He shouldn’t have come here. Not because he felt obligated to court her in some old-fashioned way—he was sure they were already well past that—but because he’d dumped his kids on other people, meaning that now he owed those people an afternoon of watching their kids, and for nothing. She wasn’t home. The last window he came to looked in on her garage, which was vacant.

  He was acting like a randy adolescent, cruising to her house on an impulse. He was worse than a randy adolescent, actually. As a randy adolescent, he had never chased a girl unless he was absolutely convinced he was in love with her. That he could fall in and out of love in the blink of an eye had never bothered him. He would set his sights on Lisa Davis, for instance...Lisa Davis, with the red hair and the C-cups. He’d figure out where Lisa was going to be and make sure he was there before she arrived—the gym, the deli down the street from the school, the food court at the mall. He’d avoid saying hello to her until after she said hello to him, and then he’d smile nonchalantly, as if he didn’t care, and they’d go through this mating dance a few times at the deli or the mall...and then, no more than a few weeks later, he’d be in the back seat of his ancient Pontiac with her, becoming intimately acquainted with those C-cups. Or Alexis Bartley, the homecoming queen who would always call on him when she was having trouble with her boyfriend, and she’d weep on his shoulder and ask him just to hold her, hold her until she felt better... But while he was busy holding her and making her feel better, he was positive he loved her, at least as much as he had loved Lisa Davis just weeks before.

  Well, he didn’t love Gail Saunders. And she didn’t have C-cups, and she’d never asked him to hold her, hold her until she felt better. She was a thorn in his side, a pebble in his shoe, a lawyer pressing a nuisance suit—and she didn’t like children.

  So what the hell was he doing at her house?

  He was thinking that bra sizes no longer seemed particularly significant to him. He was thinking that even though she’d never asked him to, his holding her had made them both feel better. He was thinking that, after watching her build a sand castle with his daughter, laboring over the details, fussing to make it perfect for Erin, he no longer believed her when she swore she didn’t like children.

  He turned to survey her back yard, which was modest and tidy, about half of it consumed by a slate patio beneath a roof extension which offered shade to a pair of lounge chairs, a gas grill, a redwood table and assorted planters filled with flowering vines. Honeysuckle hedges bordered the property, and a hose lay in a neat coil near the door leading into the garage. No signs of whimsy marred the area—no plastic frog-shaped planters, no pink flamingos, and naturally no toys. He wondered whether she spent much time enjoying her patio.

  How could she? She worked in that austere little back room at the P.D.’s office, defending murderers, being tough. She didn’t have time to enjoy anything.

  He circled back to the front of the house in time to spot her Volvo sedan coasting to a halt at the foot of her driveway. His car was occupied the driveway, blocking her access to the garage.

  She pulled to the curb and climbed out of her car. He swallowed a groan as she stalked around the vehicle and into view. Her hair hung loose, sunshine clean and glossy around her face, and her body was scantily covered by a white T-shirt and a skimpy denim skirt. She carried a handled plastic bag filled with something lumpy—probably the wet, soiled clothes she’d been wearing at the Daddy School. His gaze traced the incredible length of her slender legs down to her bare feet and then back up again, and up, and up.

  Admiring her legs in that too-short skirt made him feel even more like a randy adolescent. Before he could make a fool of himself—before his body could make an obvious fool of him—he forced his eyes higher, back over her hips, up across the cotton shirt to her face. She was scowling vividly.

  “Hi,” he said in a chipper voice.

  She moved across the front lawn in resolute steps, as if to establish dominance on her home turf. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  Good question. The honest answer—that he had come to convince her that something was going on between them, something hot and luscious that he wanted to explore further—would not do. Her forbidding expression all but proclaimed that she wasn’t in the mood for a sexual overture.

  He resorted to a safer invitation. “I wanted to see if you were interested in going to Erin’s soccer game.”

  “Why would I want to go to Erin’s soccer game?” she asked, still approaching.

  He couldn’t help it—he had to check out her legs again. He had to observe the way her calf muscles flexed with each step, the way her knees bent, the way her thighs stretched sleek and firm. The skirt was ridiculously short, and each step made it ride up a little higher. As long as she was wearing such a tantalizing skirt, he could forget that she hated children.

  “She has a late game today. Four o’clock. She’s a dynamo on the field, and I thought, maybe...” Her stony stare silenced him.

  “How did you find my house?” She drew closer, still frowning.

  “It was a miracle,” he deadpanned. “A total miracle. I opened the Arlington phone book, and there, next to Saunders, G., this address was printed.”

  The sun streaked her hair with platinum and painted her cheeks pink. She reached the front porch and planted her hands on her hips. His brain clicked into overdrive; he had to find the right way to get this discussion moving in his direction. He was a lawyer. He could do it.

  “The truth is, I came to apologize,” he said.

  Her frown faltered the tiniest bit.

  “I didn’t know your sister was going to make us wallow in the mud. It was really...” He shrugged, hoping she would supply the right word.

  “Messy,” she suggested.

  “Really messy.” He grinned. “It occurred to me that you’re doing this Daddy School thing because I goaded you into it, and thanks to me, you’ve probably ruined the clothes you were wearing this morning.” He glanced down at the plastic bag she was holding, and then at the clean outfit she had on. He noted the way the cotton of the shirt draped over her bosom, the way her trim hips shaped that damned skirt with its abbreviated hem—and he jerked his gaze back up to
her face once more. “I’ll pay for the cleaning costs.”

  “Cleaning costs?”

  “For all the crud you got on your clothes this morning.”

  Her frown faded considerably. She held up the bag, then tossed it onto the porch and shrugged. “It’s just some old shorts and a T-shirt. Nothing that needs dry cleaning.”

  “Are you sure? I mean—I feel responsible.”

  She smiled. He searched her face for signs of doubt, but saw none. It was a lovely, genuine smile. “That’s very generous of you. But it isn’t necessary. I can just throw the clothes in my washing machine.”

  “You sure you don’t mind?”

  For the first time he noticed that she had a dimple, a shy, delectable dot at the corner of her mouth. “Oh, I like this,” she said, her voice as smooth and sweet as warm honey. “Murphy the hot-shot lawyer wants to do my laundry.”

  “I don’t want to,” he said, returning her smile. “I’m just offering because I’m such a nice guy.”

  At that she laughed. Her laughter aroused him more than the sight of her legs, her bare feet, her sleek shoulders and womanly curves. More than her beauty, more than her intellect, more than her sharp wit. Her laughter was a drug, an aphrodisiac, and it spilled from her without restraint. Her eyes were laughing. Her fingers, free of their plastic bag, were laughing. Her damp, shiny hair was laughing. Her cheeks, her chin, her breasts.

  He was bewitched by her laughter. Enthralled by it. He needed to capture it, devour it, absorb it.

  Before she had a chance to stop laughing, he bowed and covered her mouth with his. He tasted her laughter on his lips.

  “Murphy,” she whispered. It was a statement, not a protest. She leaned back slightly, tilting her head so she could peer up at him. Her eyes weren’t laughing anymore, but they were glittering.

  “Gail,” he whispered back, then brought his arms around her. Still she didn’t resist. When he flattened his hands on her back, one down by her waist and the other just below the nape of her neck, she didn’t object. When he drew her to himself, she didn’t fight him. When he slid his hand under her cool, damp hair, cupped the back of her head and angled it to receive another kiss, she closed her eyes and parted her lips, offering herself.