by Nora Roberts
She wasn’t that giddy—or perhaps she was just giddy enough. She shifted, tilting her face so that their lips met. Only for two heartbeats, two long, unsteady heartbeats.
She savored it, the taste of him, the firm, smooth texture of his mouth, and the quick, instinctive tightening of his hands on her shoulders.
Then she drew away, a bright, determined smile on her lips that gave no clue as to her own rocky pulse. “Good night, Nicholas.”
He didn’t move, not a single muscle, even after she shut the door in his face. It was the sound of his own breath whooshing out that broke the spell. He turned, walked slowly toward the elevators.
His cousin, he reminded himself. She was his cousin, not some sexy little number he could enjoy temporarily. He lifted a hand to push the button for the lobby, noticed it wasn’t quite steady, and cursed under his breath.
Cousins, he thought again. Who had a family history and a potential working relationship. No way he was going to forget that. No way in hell.
Chapter Three
“Hi, Rio.” Freddie balanced bag, purse and briefcase as she entered through the kitchen of Lower the Boom.
“Hey, little doll.” Busy with lunch preparations, Rio had both hands occupied himself. “What’s doing?”
“Nick and I are working together today,” she told him as she headed for the stairs.
“Be lucky if you don’t have to pull him out of bed by his hair.”
She only chuckled and kept going. “He said noon. It’s noon.” On the dot, she added to herself, maneuvering up the narrow, curved staircase. She gave the door at the top a sharp rap, waited. Tapped her foot. Shifted her bags. Okay, Nicholas, she thought, up and at ’em. After fighting the door open, she gave a warning shout.
In the silence that followed, she heard the faint sound of water running. In the shower, she decided, and, satisfied, carried her bundles into the kitchen.
She’d taken him seriously when he told her to bring food. Out of the bag she took deli cartons of potato salad, pasta salad, pickles and waxed-paper-wrapped sandwiches. After setting them out, she went on a search for cold drinks.
It didn’t take long for her to realize they had a choice between beer and flat seltzer. And that Nick’s kitchen was crying out for a large dose of industrial-strength cleaner.
When he came in a few minutes later, the sleeves of her sweater were pushed up and she was up to her elbows in steaming, soapy water.
“What’s going on?”
“This place is a disgrace,” she said without turning around. “You should be ashamed of yourself, living like this. I wrapped the medical experiments that were in the fridge in that plastic bag. I’d take them out and bury them if I were you.”
He grunted and headed for the coffeepot.
“When’s the last time you took a mop to this floor?”
“I think it was September 1990.” He yawned and, trying to adjust his eyes to morning, measured out coffee. “Did you bring food?”
“On the table.”
With a frown he studied the salads, the sandwiches. “Where’s breakfast?”
“It’s lunchtime,” she said between her teeth.
“Time’s relative, Fred.” Experimentally, he bit into a pickle.
With a clatter, Freddie set the last of the dishes she’d found crusted in the sink aside to drain. “The least you could do is go in and pick up some of the mess in the living room. I don’t know how you expect to work in this place.”
The tart taste of the pickle improved his spirits, so he took another bite. “I pick it up the third Sunday of every month, whether it needs it or not.”
She turned, fisted her hands on her hips. “Well, pick it up now. I’m not working in this pit, clothes everywhere, trash, dust an inch thick.”
Leaning back on the table, he grinned at her. Her hair was pulled back, in an attempt to tame it that failed beautifully. Her eyes were stormy, her mouth was set. She looked, he thought, like an insulted fairy.
“God, you’re cute, Fred.”
Now those stormy eyes narrowed. “You know I hate that.”
“Yeah.” His grin only widened.
With dignity, she ripped off a paper towel from a roll on the counter to dry her hands. “What are you staring at?”
“You. I’m waiting for you to pout. You’re even cuter when you pout.”
She would not, she promised herself, be amused. “You’re really pushing it, Nick.”
“It stopped you from ordering me around, the way you do with Brandon.”
“I do not order my brother around.”
Nick scooted around her to get one of the coffee mugs she’d just washed. “Sure you do. Face it, kid, you’re bossy.”
“I certainly am not.”
“Bossy, spoiled, and cute as a little button.”
To prove her own control, she took one long, deep breath. “I’m going to hit you in a minute.”
“That’s a good one,” Nick acknowledged as he poured coffee. “Sticking your chin up. It’s almost as good as a pout.”
For lack of something better, she tossed the balled paper towel so that it bounced off his head. “I came here to work, not to be insulted. If this is the best you can do, I’ll just go.”
He was chuckling as she started to storm by him. For the first time since she’d come to New York, he felt their relationship was back on the level where it belonged. Big-brotherly cousin to pip-squeak. He was chuckling still as he grabbed her arm and whirled her around.
“Ah, come on, Fred, don’t go away mad.”
“I’m not mad,” she said, even as her elbow jabbed into his stomach.
His breath whooshed out on a laugh. “You can do better than that. You’ve got to put your body behind it, if you want results.”
Challenged, she attempted to, and the quick tussle threw them both off balance. He was laughing as they fought for balance, as she ended up with her back against the refrigerator, his hands at her hips, hers gripping his forearms.
Then he stopped laughing, when he realized he was pressed against her. And she was so soft and small. Her eyes fired up at him. And they were so wide and deep. Her mouth, pouting now, drew his gaze down. And it was so deliciously full.
She felt the change slowly, a melting of her body, a thrumming in her blood. This was what she had been waiting for, yearning for—the man-to-woman embrace, the awareness that was like light bursting in the head. Following instinct, she slid her hands up his arms to his shoulders.
He would have kissed her, he realized as he jerked back. And it would have had nothing to do with family affection. In another instant, he would have kissed her the way a hungry man kisses a willing woman—and broken more than a decade of trust.
“Nick.” She said it quietly, with the plea just a whisper in the word.
He’d scared her, he thought, berating himself, and lifted his hands, palms out. “Sorry. I shouldn’t have teased you like that.” More comfortable with distance, he backed up until he could reach the mug he’d set on the table.
“It’s all right.” She managed a smile as the warmth that had shuddered into her system drained out again. “I’m used to it. But I still want you to pick up that mess.”
His lips curved in response. It was going to be all right after all. “My place, my mess, my piano. You’ll have to get used to it.”
She debated a moment, then nodded. “Fine. And when I get my place, and my piano, we’ll work there.”
“Maybe.” He got a fork and began to eat potato salad out of the carton. “Why don’t you get some coffee, and we’ll talk about what I’m after with the score?”
“What we’re after,” she corrected. She plucked a mug out of the drain. “Partner.”
They sat in the kitchen for an hour, discussing, dissecting and debating the theme and heart of the score for First, Last and Always. The musical was to span ten years, taking the leads from a youthful infatuation into a hasty marriage and hastier divorce and ultimately to a ma
ture, fulfilled relationship.
Happy ever after, Freddie called it.
The perpetual rocky road, was Nick’s opinion.
They both agreed that the two viewpoints would add zest to the work, and punch to the music.
“She loves him,” Freddie said as they settled at the piano. “The first time she sees him.”
“She’s in love with love.” Nick set up the tape recorder. “They both are. They’re young and stupid. That’s one of the things that makes the characters appealing, funny and real.”
“Hmmm.”
“Listen.” He took his place on the piano bench beside her, hip to hip with her. “It opens with the crowd scene. Lots of movement, lights, speed. Everybody’s in a hurry.”
He flipped through his staff sheets and, with what Freddie decided was some sort of inner radar, unerringly chose the one he wanted.
“So I want to hit the audience with the confusion and rush.” He adjusted the synthesizer keyboard on the stand beside him. “And that energy of youth in the opening number.”
“When they run into each other, literally.”
“Right. Here.”
He started to play, a jarring opening note that would wake the senses. Freddie closed her eyes and let the music flood over her.
Quick, full, sometimes clashing notes. Oh, yes, she could see what he wanted. Impatience. Self-absorption. Hurry up, get out of my way. In part of her mind, she could see the stage, packed with dancers, convoluted choreography, the noise from traffic. Horns blaring.
“Needs more brass here,” Nick muttered. He’d all but forgotten Freddie’s presence as he stopped to make notes and fiddle with the synthesizer.
“‘Don’t Stop Now.’”
“I just want to punch up the brass.”
She only shook her head at him and placed her own hands on the piano keys. With her eyes narrowed on the notes he’d scribbled on the staff paper, she began, voice melding with music.
“‘Don’t stop now. I’ve got places to go, people to see. Don’t know how I’m supposed to put up with anybody but me.’”
Her voice was pure. Funny, he’d almost forgotten that. Low, smooth, easily confident. Surprisingly sexy.
“You’re quick,” he murmured.
“I’m good.” She continued to play while words and movement ran through her head. “It should be a chorus number, lots of voices, point and counterpoint, with an overlying duet between the principals. He’s going one way, she the other. The words should overlap and blend, overlap and blend.”
“Yeah.” He picked up the fill on the synthesizer, playing with her. “That’s the idea.”
She slanted him a look, a smug smile. “I know.”
It took them more than three hours and two pots of coffee to hammer out the basics of the opening. Not wanting to jar her system with any more of the caffeine Nick seemed to thrive on, Freddie insisted he go down to the bar and find her some club soda. Alone, she made a few minute changes to both words and music on the staff sheet. Even as she began to try them out, the phone interrupted her.
Humming the emerging song in her head, she rose to answer.
“Hello?”
“Why, hi. Is Nick around?”
The slow, sultry, southern female voice had Freddie lifting a brow. “He’ll be back in just a second. He had to run down to the bar.”
“Oh, well, I’ll just hang on then, if it’s all right with you. I’m Lorelie.”
I bet you are, Freddie thought grimly. “Hello, Lorelie, I’m Fred.”
“Not Nick’s little cousin Fred?”
“That’s me,” she said between her teeth. “Little cousin Fred.”
“Well, I’m just thrilled to talk to you, honey.” Warmed, honeyed molasses all but seeped through the phone line. “Nick told me he was visiting with you last night. I didn’t mind postponing our date, seeing as it was family.”
Damn it, she’d known it was a woman. “That’s very understanding of you, Lorelie.”
“Oh, now, a young girl like you, alone in New York, needs the men in her family to look out for her. I’ve been here myself five years, and I’m still not used to all the people. And everybody just moves so fast.”
“Some aren’t as fast as others,” Freddie muttered. “Where are you from, Lorelie?” she asked, politely, she hoped.
“Atlanta, honey. Born and bred. But up here with these Yankees is where the modeling and television work is.”
“You’re a model?” Didn’t it just figure?
“That’s right, but I’ve been doing a lot more television commercials these days. It just wipes you out, if you know what I mean.”
“I’m sure it does.”
“That’s how I met Nick. I just dropped into the bar one afternoon, after the longest shoot. I asked him to fix me a long cool something. And he said I looked like a long cool something to him.” Lorelie’s laugh was a silver tinkle that set Freddie’s teeth on edge. “Isn’t Nick the sweetest thing?”
Freddie glanced up as the sweetest thing came back in with an armload of soda bottles. “Oh, he certainly is. We’re always saying that about him.”
“Well, I think it’s just fine that Nick would tend to his little cousin on her first trip alone to the big city. You’re a southern girl, too, aren’t you, honey?”
“Well, south of the Mason-Dixon line, at least, Lorelie. We’re practically sisters. Here’s our sweet Nick now.”
Face dangerously bland, Freddie held out the receiver. “Your magnolia blossom’s on the phone.”
He set the bottles down in the most convenient place, on the floor, then took the phone. “Lorelie?” With one wary eye on Freddie, he listened. “Yeah, she is. No, it’s West Virginia. Yeah, close enough. Ah, listen…” He turned his back, lowering his voice as Freddie began to noodle softly at the piano. “I’m working right now. No, no, tonight’s fine. Come by the bar about seven.” He cleared his throat, wondering why he felt so uncomfortable. “I’m looking forward to that, too. Oh, really?” He glanced cautiously over his shoulder at Freddie. “That sounds…interesting. See you tonight.”
After he hung up, he bent down to retrieve one of the bottles. As he unscrewed the top and took it to Freddie, he wondered why it should feel like a pathetic peace offering. “It’s cold.”
“Thanks.”
And so, he noted, was her voice. Ice-cold.
She took the bottle, tipped it back for a long sip. “Should I apologize for taking you away from Lorelie last night?”
“No. We’re not— She’s just— No.”
“It’s so flattering that you told her all about your little lost cousin from West Virginia.” Freddie set the bottle down and let her fingers flow over the keys. Better there than curled around Nick’s throat. “I can’t believe she bought such a pathetic cliché.”
“I just told her the truth.” He stood, scowling and feeling very put-upon.
“That I needed to be looked after?”
“I didn’t say that, exactly. Look, what’s the big deal? You wanted to have dinner, and I rearranged my plans.”
“Next time, just tell me you have a date, Nick. I won’t have any trouble making plans of my own.” Incensed, she pushed away from the piano and began stuffing her papers into her briefcase. “And I am not your little cousin, and I don’t need to be looked after or tended to. Anybody but a total jerk could see that I’m a grown woman, well able to take care of herself.”
“I never said you weren’t—”
“You say it every time you look at me.” She kicked a pile of clothes away as she stormed across the room for her purse. “It so happens that there are a few men around who would be more than happy to have dinner with me without considering it a duty.”
“Hold on.”
“I will not hold on.” She whirled back, curls flying around her face. “You’d better take a good look, Nicholas LeBeck. I am not little Freddie anymore, and I won’t be treated like some family pet who needs a pat on the head.”
Baffled, he dragged his hands through his hair. “What the hell’s gotten into you?”
“Nothing!” She shouted it, frustrated beyond control. “Nothing, you idiot. Go cuddle up with your southern comfort.”
When she slammed the door, Nick leaned down to open a club soda for himself. He could only shake his head. To think, he mused, she’d been such a sweet-tempered kid.
Freddie worked off a great deal of her anger with a long walk. When she felt she was calm enough to speak without spewing broken glass, she stopped at a phone booth and checked in with Sydney. The conversation did quite a bit to lift her spirits.
Afterward, armed with an address, she rushed off to view a vacant one-bedroom apartment three blocks from Nick’s.
It was perfect. While Freddie wandered from room to room, she envisioned the furnishings she’d place here, the rugs she’d place there. Her own home, she thought, with room enough for a piano under the window, space enough for a pullout sofa so that her brother or sister could come and stay for visits.
And best of all, close enough that she could keep an eye on Nick.
How do you like that, Nicholas? she wondered as she grinned at her view of Manhattan. I’m going to be looking out for you. I love you so much, you stupid jerk.
Sighing, she turned away from the window and walked into the kitchen. It was small and needed some paint to perk it up, but she would see to that. She’d enjoy choosing the right cookware, the pots and pans and kitchen implements. She loved to cook, and even as a child had loved the big kitchen in her home in West Virginia, the wonderfully crowded kitchen at her grandmother’s in Brooklyn.
She’d cook for Nick here, she thought, running a finger over the smooth butcher-block countertop, if he played his cards right. No. She smiled at herself, and at her own impatience. It was she who had to play the cards, and play them right.
She’d been too hard on him, even if he had been a jerk. She’d spent more than half her life in love with him, but he spent that same amount of time thinking of her as a little cousin—if not by blood, then by circumstance. It was going to take more than one romantic dinner and one afternoon as colleagues to change that.