She liked the steady beat of his heart beneath her cheek. She slid her arm across his waist, and at his urging, tucked one leg between his.
“Better?”
“Much. Is this a good thinking-it-through position for you?”
“Best one to date. Though I’m open to improvements.” He toyed with the ends of her hair and lightly stroked her back.
She smiled against his chest. “Okay, so we’re laying here, thinking caps on…what part can you tell me? I’m assuming, if it has to do with both our families, the common thread is Arlen.” She tipped up her chin. “One blink for yes, two for no. Then you won’t have technically tattled.”
He chuckled and wrapped her closer to him. “I know this seems really unfair and frustrating to you, and it is, but it’s not a place I’ve ever been before. I wouldn’t let anything bad happen. To you or Ruby Jean. So don’t think, if push came to shove—”
“That you’d put your only sister above the woman you’ve only known for less than a week, or that I would put you before, I’m guessing, my mother in this case, as she’s the only real family I have.” She lifted her head slightly. “Or did you mean Arlen when you said both of our families, because, seriously, if you think you need to protect him because of our relationship, please don’t go to any great—”
“Arlen is in the middle of this, and no, he’s the last one I’m worried about and I know you share that sentiment.”
“Okay. Good.” She settled her head back on his chest, and he resumed playing with the ends of her hair, which felt ridiculously good, while they both thought things through in silence for a few minutes.
He spoke first. “Can you tell me what you and your mom talked about today? I mean, specifically? Did you tell her about your job?”
“Yes, but she already knew.”
“She did? How? News from someone back home?”
“No, news from her new husband.”
Jake lifted his head and looked down at her. “Arlen told her? How did he know?”
She lifted a shoulder in a half shrug. “I have no idea. And don’t worry, I know you didn’t tell him.”
“No, I didn’t, but I appreciate the trust.” He kissed her hair. “Truly.”
“I knew you wouldn’t do that. Charlene says he keeps up with news in Washington, apparently somewhat avidly, so she assumed he heard about it that way.”
“How long has he known? For that matter, how long has she known? When we were there for the barbecue, I can’t believe she could have known something like that and let him go on about your working for Fordham like he did, and not ment—”
“She didn’t know then. When I didn’t say anything to her about it that night, and Arlen heard we were getting together today for some private mother-daughter time, he made the decision to tell her. This morning. At breakfast.”
“Why?”
“My mom, of course, thinks he was telling her so she’d be able to talk to me about it if I didn’t bring it up. According to her, Arlen said he was telling her to help with our reconciliation, in case I was afraid to tell her. He was helping us.”
“And, from the slight edge I hear there, I’m assuming you don’t assign the same benevolent attributes to his revelation.”
“I’m fully aware I’m still heavily biased against him, despite having a really good, very frank talk about their relationship—or lack of obvious one—with my mother today. So I get that my perspective is warped, but, well, no, I guess I don’t. That’s just not the vibe I get from him. When we were at the house, Arlen and I had a little…conversation.”
“You mean right before I came to get you for dessert?”
“Yep.”
“We didn’t get the chance to talk about that, but I’m assuming that whatever was said didn’t alter your opinion of him any.”
“Hardly.”
“Can I ask why?”
She sighed. “Yes, and I wish I could give you a more specific answer than I just didn’t like the way he was looking at me.”
Jake leaned back a little and tilted her head back so he could see her face. “And how was that?”
“Don’t worry, it wasn’t anything creepy or lascivious, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
“No, I didn’t get that particular vibe from him. At all. But, I noticed him watching you at various points in the evening, too.”
“Did you? I did, too. When we were alone in his office, I didn’t feel threatened in any way, but it was still…I don’t know. Creepy, just in a different way. Cold, I guess. Calculating. I caught him a few other times, too, after that, watching me. That’s the best way I can describe it, too. Not looking at me, but watching me. It feels different.”
“Like he was, I don’t know, studying you or something, trying to figure you out.”
“Exactly. You pegged it. Did it seem like he was a bit too…intense about it? Not bad, not good…just really focused?”
“That’s as good a way of describing it as I can think of.”
“So, I think it was that, and the fact that I don’t see him and my mother acting very…well, newlyweddish, that is keeping me from changing my initial instincts about him.”
“You talked to your mom about that part?”
“At length, yes.”
“And?”
Lauren reviewed the high points of the conversation she’d had with her mom as Jake listened, explaining about Arlen treating her differently than other men, challenging her opinions, being open to debating them with her, no kid gloves. “I had no idea she felt so sheltered or taken care of, although I know that’s exactly how men do behave around her. I always thought it was sweet, but from her perspective, I can see how patronizing it must have felt, to be so respected for what she did so well, but never assumed that there was an avid brain behind the beauty and elegance. So I guess I can see the attraction, purely from that standpoint, but…I just don’t like the guy. I can’t help it. Actually, the whole topic came up because she was talking about us.”
“What did she have to say about us?”
“All good, trust me. She likes you a great deal and is happy to see me happy. So I said that it was the very thing she was seeing between us that I wasn’t seeing between her and Arlen.”
“But she said she was content.”
“Well, she didn’t use that word, no, but that’s when she told me what it was about him that had initially attracted her. I did talk to her about the passionate and tempestuous parts that I didn’t see them having, and she more or less said she was okay with the status quo, then tried to sell me on what you’d been saying might be the case, which is that she didn’t need the passion and excitement at her age.”
“Well…?”
“I called her on it, because, Jake, I know my mother, and I don’t care if she’s in her nineties instead of her sixties, she’s not someone to settle. For anything. She’s just…not.”
Jake pulled her closer and rubbed a comforting hand up and down her arm. “Maybe she’s not settling.”
Lauren looked up at him. “What do you mean?”
“I mean that maybe the fulfillment is coming from those other things. She might not be having it all, in the broadest sense, but maybe she’s not settling as much as you think. She does seem very happy.”
Lauren sighed. “I know. I guess it’s just I know her pretty well, and this doesn’t seem to fit with the woman I know.”
“You’re learning there’s a whole lot more to her, too,” he said gently.
“I am. I know. And I feel horrible that I never saw that part of her in there, dying to get out.”
“How could you when she apparently didn’t, either?”
Lauren paused, then smiled and looked up at him. “You know, you really are good at the ‘saying the right thing’ stuff.”
“Just keep track; I’m sure I’ll screw up.”
She hugged him again. “I already did tonight and I’m still sorry.”
He rubbed his hand over her arm. “I
t’s water under the bridge now. So, how did you leave things with your mom?”
“That I’d stop badgering about it, and do my best to be supportive, and assured her I was completely supportive of her happiness.”
“And Arlen, how did you leave that topic?”
“Well, I didn’t sugarcoat it, she knows how I feel, and that while I support her, and her new life in general, that he’s not someone I feel entirely comfortable with.”
“Entirely?”
“Okay, not even marginally. But she knows my feelings about it haven’t changed, just that I’m trying to maintain a new perspective on the matter that will help me see things her way a bit more. I think we both felt like we’d made as much progress as we could with just talking about it and that the rest will simply have to come over time. I told her I’d do my best to look for positives…and she accepted that I’d try.”
He hugged Lauren closer and she wrapped her arm more tightly around him, amazed at how much better a sounding board he made than thinking things through in her own head. The snuggling while talking definitely earned two thumbs up from her, too. Which reminded her. “Oh, and I didn’t get to tell you about the oddest thing that happened today. Well, maybe not the oddest, but it was kind of strange.”
“Was it about Arlen?”
“No, it was about the bike. And tonight, there was something else.”
“Hold that thought, for just a second, okay? There was another thread of what we were talking about that I wanted to follow up on before we change topics.”
“Okay.”
“You said you told your mom about quitting your job?”
“Yes, and that she already knew about it.”
“Right. Arlen told her. She felt he’d told her to help the two of you mend fences, but you didn’t think that was his motive.”
“I didn’t tell her that part. I kept that to myself.”
“She didn’t say how he found out?”
“No, she didn’t, but she wasn’t at all surprised. Like I said, he apparently follows Washington news very closely. He’s a resort town mayor, but he still has his San Francisco big-city roots, I guess. She didn’t think it was out of the ordinary.” Lauren lifted her head so she could see Jake’s face. “Why?”
“So, he wasn’t mad that you hadn’t told her?”
“I’m guessing, from what she said, that he was more disappointed, because he felt that meant I wasn’t completely on board with them as a couple, that we hadn’t fully made up. He knew how close we were and that in other circumstances I’d have told her the minute I’d made the decision.”
“Charlene said all that?”
“Not in so many words, but that’s my take on her thoughts about it.” She lifted up more and braced herself on his chest so she could hold his gaze more directly. “Why are you so interested in this part of our conversation? Does it have to do with what you can’t tell me?” She smiled, wanting to keep things okay between them this go around. “I’m a lawyer, remember; you can’t distract me with miscellaneous details.”
He smiled back, but there was still a renewed tension between them, which she already hated but didn’t know how to resolve. She vowed not to jump to conclusions this time.
“They’re not miscellaneous details; it’s your life, and your relationship with your mother, that I am interested in.”
Her smile grew. “You sound almost surprised by that.”
“Trust me, I am. Like I told you in one of our earlier conversations, I never ingratiated myself into anyone else’s personal business unless absolutely necessary. But I care about you, so I want you to be happy, and that means mending fences with your mom. And figuring out where you stand with Arlen, or her marriage to him.”
“Or both.”
“Or both, yes. And so I was just curious if that whole revelation changed the tone between you and your mom. Both that you didn’t tell her, and that you quit your job.”
Lauren laughed, which clearly surprised him. “Actually, she was more interested in whether or not me quitting my job might mean I’ll pursue my burgeoning relationship with you, and if my not having any immediate plans for my future, if things progress with us—”
“That she’ll have her daughter living in the same town.”
“She was certainly invested in the potential, yes.”
Jake smiled. “Which I’m taking as a good sign.”
Lauren gave him a wary look. “I haven’t made up my mind about anything. Yet. And don’t get hurt or wounded, I’m just saying that—”
“I’m not asking. Yet,” he said, still smiling, but there was a definite added gleam in his eye on that last word. “I’m just happy that things are heading in the direction they are. There, is that nonthreatening enough?”
Now she laughed, albeit a bit ruefully. “If you team up with my mother, I don’t stand a chance.”
His grin was downright devilish. “Good to know.”
“I walked into that one.”
“You did.” Jake rolled her to her back. “Now, how can I walk you out of your clothes and under the covers of this bed?”
“You can tell me why you were mostly interested in the discussion with my mother as it pertained to Arlen.”
“You already supposed he was the common thread.”
“And that tells me exactly nothing.”
“Okay, let me ask you one last thing.”
“Promise?”
“No,” he said, “but yes, for the moment, anyway. Then I plan on focusing all of my mad interrogation skills on getting you naked.”
“Oh sure, keep secrets and don’t tell me what’s going on, but still expect me to go to bed with you? Good luck with that.” Her retort would have carried a lot more weight if she wasn’t grinning while issuing it.
“I’m feeling pretty lucky today.”
She pushed at him, and he slid his hands into her hair, bracing his elbows on the bed as he leaned down and kissed her. But rather than a heated, claiming, “make her mind go numb” kiss, it was tender, and slow, and…almost poignantly sweet. When he finally lifted his head and stared intently into her eyes, all signs of that mischievous smile gone…she really didn’t know how to feel or what to say. Just when she thought she had him pegged, he’d always go and do something like that. It had been like that since she’d pegged him as some kind of plane jockey and he started talking about the power of the mountains and his place in the universe.
She really had to stop pigeon-holing him…and perhaps, in doing so, underestimating him.
“What?” she finally asked, as he continued looking into her eyes as if he could keep doing so for hours. She couldn’t help wonder what it was he was finding there.
“It’s not because I don’t want to,” he said, and she didn’t have to ask what he was referring to. “And the moment I have this all sorted out, and I will, you’ll be the first person I talk to. I’m going to ask that you trust me, and trust that I have your best interests in my heart at all times. Just as I have Ruby Jean’s.”
“I do,” she said, and realized she meant it. “But if there’s a conflict of interest—”
“Then all bets are off. Meaning if I can’t take care of both of you my own way, then I bring both of you into the loop and we try and figure it out together.”
“I guess what I don’t understand is why we aren’t doing that now?”
“It’s—”
“Complicated. Rrrrr,” she fake-growled.
“I know.” He stroked the hair from her forehead, then toyed with the ends, sending the most delicious shiver up her spine. “But this way I can keep from putting either one of you in situations that you’d be a lot more at peace with not being in. I know that doesn’t make any sense—”
“Actually, it does. So…you’re protecting me, then?”
“Trying to.”
“From myself? Because that’s a little patronizing, don’t you th—”
“You’re not used to anyone stepping in to do that
, I get that. But I’m stepping. And you’re going to have to adjust a little, because while you are someone I look at as an equal partner, I’m also going to want to take care of you. Sometimes, you’re just going to have to let me, in my own clumsy male way, do that. Trust me, it will never be because I don’t think you can handle it. But because you simply don’t need to. You have enough…I’ll deal with this.”
She held his gaze for the longest time, and saw—knew—there was no condescension in his attitude. Still, it wasn’t easy to capitulate. It wasn’t something she’d ever willingly done, because getting ahead in her career precluded that, on every level, every step of the way. “It’s not easy, what you’re asking. You need to know that about me. I might always push, and fight you on things like this.”
He smiled, and it was such an easy smile and so full of honest affection, any possible grudge she could hope to nurse against him was simply impossible to sustain.
“And you need to know that I’m going to push anyway, and stomp around on your heretofore list of things that you would never let someone else help you with.”
“You’re not helping; you’re superseding my help and circumventing me being a part of any of this. I don’t even know what it is you’re helping me avoid having to deal with.”
He kissed her nose. “Exactly.”
“I should be so frustrated with you right now.”
“And you’re not?”
She tugged him down and kissed him hard and fast, and then more slowly, and deeply, until they were both breathless again. “No,” she said roughly, when she finally pushed him back slightly.
“Could have fooled me.”
“I trust that you won’t let anything bad happen to me without telling me…so I guess I can afford to sit back and see how this goes. Then, next time you pull this kind of thing, I’ll know better just how frustrated I should be.” Now she smiled. “And how, exactly, I’ll fight you on it.”
He grinned right back. “At least you’re already conceding there will be a next time…and that you’ll still be around to handle it.”
“We’ll see.”
Even that pseudo-warning didn’t seem to phase him.
“Yes…we will.” He slid his weight more fully on top of her. “Now, what do you say we get ready for bed. We have an early flight in the morning and I have to get my pilot’s beauty sleep.”
A Great Kisser Page 29