by Nora Roberts
“Confident enough. How’s yours?”
The thrill of challenge made her smile. “I’ll match you, Brian—and more, I’ll make sure we live through it.” Her eyes laughed at his over the rim of her glass. “After all, I’m a doctor.”
“Well, then.” He set his glass aside. She squealed when he nipped her around the waist—then yelped when her butt hit the Formica. “Hey, it’s cold.”
“So’s this.” Brian dipped a finger into his wine, then let it drip onto her nipple. He bent forward, licked it delicately away. “We’ll just have to warm things up.”
FIFTEEN
SAM supposed it was a bad sign when a man had to pump up his courage just to speak to his own son. And it was worse when you’d worked yourself up to it, then couldn’t find the boy.
The kitchen was empty, with no sign of coffee on the brew or biscuits on the rise. Sam stood there a moment, feeling outsized and awkward, as he always did in what he persisted in thinking of as a woman’s area.
He knew Brian habitually took a walk in the morning, but he also knew Brian just as habitually started the coffee and the biscuit or fancy bread dough first. In any case, Brian was usually back by this time. Another half hour, forty minutes, people would be wandering into the dining room and wanting their grits.
Just because Sam didn’t spend much time around the house, and as little as possible around the guests, didn’t mean he didn’t know what went on there.
Sam ran his cap around in his hands, hating the fact that worry was beginning to stir in his gut. He’d woken up on another morning and found a member of his family gone. No preparation then, either. No warning. Just no coffee brewing in the pot and no biscuit dough rising in the big blue bowl under a thick white cloth.
Had he driven the boy off? And would he have more years now to wonder if he was responsible for pushing another out of Sanctuary and away from himself?
He closed his eyes a moment until he could tuck that ugly guilt away. Damned if he’d hang himself for it. Brian was a full-grown man just as Annabelle had been a full-grown woman. The decisions they made were their own. He tugged his cap onto his head, started toward the door.
And felt twin trickles of relief and anxiety when he heard the whistling heading down the garden path.
Brian stopped whistling—and stopped walking—when he saw his father step through the door on the screened porch. He resented having his mood shoved so abruptly from light to dismal, resented having his last few moments of solitude interrupted.
Brian nodded briefly, then moved past Sam into the kitchen. Sam stood where he was for a minute, debating. It wasn’t hard for one man to spot when another had spent the night rolling around with a woman on hot, tangled sheets. Seeing that relaxed, satisfied look on his son’s face had made him feel foolish—and envious. And he thought of how much easier it would be all around for him to keep walking and just leave things where they lay.
With a grunt, he pulled off his cap again and went back inside.
“Need to have a word with you.”
Brian glanced over. He’d already donned a butcher’s apron and was pouring coffee beans into the grinder. “I’m busy here.”
Sam planted his feet. “I need a word with you just the same.”
“Then you’ll have to talk while I work.” Brian flicked the switch on the grinder and filled the kitchen with noise and scent. “I’m running a little behind this morning.”
“Uh-huh.” Sam twisted his cap in his hands and decided to wait until the grinder was finished rather than trying to talk over it. He watched Brian measure out coffee, measure out water, then set the big Bunn Omatic on to brew. “I, ah, was surprised you weren’t already in here at this.”
Brian took out a large bowl and began to gather the basics for his biscuits. “I don’t punch a time clock for anybody but myself.”
“No, no, you don’t.” He hadn’t meant it that way, and wished to God he knew how to talk to a man wearing an apron and scooping into flour and lard. “What I wanted to say was about yesterday—last night.”
Brian poured milk, eyeballing the amount. “I said all I had to say, and I don’t see the point in rehashing it.”
“So, you figure you can say your piece, but I’m not entitled to say mine.”
Brian snatched up a wooden spoon, cradled the bowl in his arm out of habit and began to beat. The dreamy afterglow of all-night sex had dulled to lead. “What I figure is you’ve had a lifetime to say yours, and I’ve got work to do.”
“You’re a hard man, Brian.”
“I learned by example.”
It was a neat and well-aimed little dart. Sam acknowledged it, accepted it. Then, weary of playing the supplicant, he tossed his cap aside. “You’ll listen to what I have to say, then we’ll be done with it.”
“Say it, then.” He dumped the dough on a floured board and plunged his hands into it to knead violently. “And let’s be done with it.”
“You were right.” Sam felt the click in his throat and swallowed it. “Everything you said was right, and true.”
Wrist-deep in biscuit dough, Brian turned his head and stared. “What?”
“And I respect you for having the courage to say it.”
“What?”
“You got flour in your ears?” Sam said impatiently. “I said you were right, and you were right to say it. How long does it take that goddamn contraption to make a goddamn cup of coffee?” he muttered, staring accusingly at the machine.
Slowly, Brian began to knead again, but he kept his eyes on Sam. “You could squeeze off a cup if you need one.”
“Well, I do.” He opened a cupboard door, then scowled at the glasses and stemware.
“Coffee cups and mugs haven’t been kept there for eight years,” Brian said mildly. “Two cupboards down to the left—right over the coffee beverage area.”
“Coffee beverage area,” Sam murmured. “Fancy names for fancy drinks when all a man wants is a cup of black coffee.”
“Our cappuccino and lattes are very popular.”
Sam knew what cappuccino was, right enough—or was mostly sure. But lattes baffled him. He grunted, then carefully slid the glass carafe out to pour coffee into his mug. He sipped, felt a little better, and sipped again. “It’s good coffee.”
“It’s all in the beans.”
“I guess grinding them fresh makes some difference.”
“All the difference in the world.” Brian dropped the dough in the bowl, covered it, then walked to the sink to wash up. “Now, I believe we have what could pass as an actual conversation for the first time in, oh, most of my life.”
“I haven’t done right by you.” Sam stared down into the rich black liquid in his mug. “I’m sorry.”
Brian stopped drying his hands and gaped. “What?”
“Damned if I’m going to keep repeating myself.” Sam jerked his head up, and his eyes were filled with frustration. “I’m giving you an apology, and you ought to be big enough to take it.”
Brian held up a hand before it all descended into an argument again. “You caught me off guard. Knocked me flat,” Brian corrected, and went to the refrigerator for breakfast meats and eggs. “Maybe I could accept it if I knew what you were apologizing for.”
“For not being there when you were twelve and getting pounded on. When you were fifteen and sicking up your first beer. When you were seventeen and too stupid to know how to make love to a girl without becoming a father.”
More than a little shaky, Brian took out a skillet. “Kate took me over to Savannah and bought me condoms.”
“She did not.” If the boy had slapped him over the head with the sausage meat, he’d have been less shocked. “Kate bought you rubbers?”
“She did.” Brian found himself smiling over the memory as he heated the skillet. “Lectured me up one side and down the other about responsibility and restraint, abstinence. Then she bought me a pack of Trojans and told me if I couldn’t control the urge, I’d do a damn sig
ht better to wear protection.”
“Sweet Jesus.” The chuckle escaped as Sam leaned back on the counter. “I just can’t picture it.” Then he straightened, cleared his throat. “It should have been me telling you.”
“Yes, it should have been you.” As if the arrangement were vital, Brian set sausages in the skillet. “Why wasn’t it?”
“I didn’t have your mother telling me that I’d better go talk to that boy, something was on his mind. Or that Lexy had new dress shoes and wanted to show them off. I saw those things for myself, but I got used to her prodding me on them. Then when I didn’t have her, I let it all go.” He set the coffee down, shot his hands in his pockets. “I’m not used to explaining myself. I don’t like it.”
Brian took out another bowl, broke the first egg for pancake batter. “Your choice.”
“I loved her.” It seared his throat, and Sam was grateful that Brian continued to focus on his work. “It’s not easy for me to say that. Maybe I didn’t tell her enough—the feeling came a lot easier than the words. I needed her. Serious Sam, she’d call me, and wouldn’t let me stay that way for long. She loved being around new people, talking about everything under the sun. She loved this house, this island. And for a while, she loved me.”
Brian didn’t think he’d ever heard a longer speech from Sam Hathaway. Not wanting to break the flow, he poured the butter he’d melted into the bowl and said nothing.
“We had our problems. I’m not going to pretend we didn’t. But we always got through them. The night you were born ... Jesus, I was scared. Piss-yourself scared, but Belle wasn’t. It was all a big adventure to her. And when it was over and she had you cuddled right up in her arms and nursing, she laid back against the pillows, smiling. ‘Look what a beautiful baby we made ourselves, Sam. We’ll have to make lots more.’ A man’s got to love a woman like that,” Sam murmured. “He doesn’t even have a choice.”
“I didn’t think you did. Love her.”
“I did.” Sam picked up his coffee again. All the talk had dried out his throat. “It took me a lot of years of being without her to stop loving her. Maybe I did push her away, but I don’t know how. The not knowing ate at me bad for a lot of years.”
“I’m sorry.” He saw the flicker of surprise in his father’s eyes. “I didn’t think it mattered to you. I didn’t think any of it really mattered.”
“It mattered. But after a while you learn to live with what you’ve got.”
“And you had the island.”
“It was what I could depend on, what I could tend to. And it kept me from losing my mind.” He took a deep breath. “But a better man would have been around to hold his son’s head when he puked up too much Budweiser.”
“Löwenbräu.”
“Christ, an import? No wonder I don’t understand you.”
Sam sighed and took a long look at the man his son had become. A man who wore an apron to work and baked pies. A man, he corrected, with cool and steady eyes, and shoulders strong and broad enough to carry more than his own load.
“We’ve both had our say, and I don’t know as it’ll make any difference. But I’m glad we said it.” Sam held out a hand and hoped it was the right thing.
Jo walked in on the surprising tableau of her father and brother shaking hands in front of the stove. They both looked at her, identical flickers of embarrassment on their faces. Just then she was too damn tired and irritable to analyze it.
“Lex isn’t feeling well. I’ll be taking her breakfast shift.”
Brian grabbed a kitchen fork and hurriedly scooted the sausage around before it burned. “You’re going to wait tables?”
“That’s what I said.” She grabbed a short apron from a peg and tied it on.
“When’s the last time you waited tables?” Brian demanded.
“The last time I was here and you were short-staffed.”
“You’re a lousy waitress.”
“Well, I’m all you’ve got, pal. Lexy’s got a crying jag headache, and Kate’s heading over to the campground to straighten out the mess there. So live with it.”
Sam picked up his cap and edged toward the door. Dealing with his son was one thing, and that had been hard enough. He wasn’t about to take on a daughter in the same day. “I’ve got things to do,” he muttered and nearly winced when Jo shot him a killing look.
“Well, so do I, but I’m waiting tables because the two of you decided to go at each other and Kate and I had to spend half the damn night listening to Lexy cry and carry on. Now the two of you, I see, have shaken hands like real men, so everything’s fine and dandy. Where are the damn order pads?”
“Top drawer, under the cash register.” Out of the corner of his eye, Brian saw his father slip out the door. Typical, he thought grimly, and drained the sausage. “The computer’s new,” he told Jo. “You ever work a cash register computer?”
“Why the hell would I? I’m not a sales clerk, I’m not a waitress. I’m a goddamn photographer.”
Brian rubbed the back of his neck. It was going to be a long morning. “Go up and pour some aspirin down Lexy’s throat and get her down here.”
“You want her, you get her. I’ve had more than my fill of Lexy and her drama queen routine. She was wallowing in it.” Jo slapped the pad down on the counter and stalked to the coffeepot. “Center of attention, as always.”
“She was upset.”
“Maybe she was, until she began to enjoy the role, but it wasn’t my fault. And I’m the one who was stuck with her. It was after two before Kate and I got her calmed down and out of my room. Now she’s the one who claims to have a headache.” Jo rubbed hard at the center of her forehead. “Any aspirin down here?”
Brian took a bottle from a cupboard and set it on the counter. “Take the pot in and make the first rounds. Blueberry pancakes are the special. If you have to scowl, scowl in here. Out there you smile. Tell the customers your name and pretend you can be personable. It should offset the slow service.”
“Kiss my ass,” she snarled but grabbed the pot and the pad and swung through the door.
It didn’t get any better.
Brian was slicing a grapefruit and grinding his teeth at the two orders that had been sitting under the warming light for a full five minutes. Another two, he thought, and he’d have to dump them and start again.
Where the hell was Jo?
“Busy morning.” Nathan breezed in the back door. “I got a glimpse of the dining room through the windows. Looks like a pretty full house.”
“Sunday morning.” Brian flipped what he thought must have been the millionth pancake of the day. “People like a big breakfast on Sundays.”
“Me, too.” Nathan grinned at the grill. “Blueberry pancakes sound perfect.”
“Get in line. Goddamn it, what’s she doing out there, building the pyramids? You know computers?”
“I’m the proud owner of three. Why?”
“You’re now manning the cash register.” Brian jerked a thumb behind him. “Go over there and figure it out. I can’t keep stopping what I’m doing to fix it every time she fucks up a bill.”
“You want me to work the cash register?”
“You want to eat?”
“Why don’t I work the cash register?” Nathan decided, and walked over to study it.
Jo rushed in, her face pink and harassed, her arms loaded down with dishes. “She had to know. She had to know what it would be like today. I’m going to kill her if I live through this. What the hell are you doing here?” she shot at Nathan.
“Apparently I’ve been put on the payroll.” He eyed her as she dumped the dishes in the sink and grabbed the waiting orders. “You look real cute today, Jo Ellen.”
“Bite me,” she muttered and shouldered out the door.
“I imagine she’s been just that pleasant to the customers.”
“Don’t spoil my fantasy,” Nathan told him. “I like to believe she saves those ass kicks just for me.”
“Going to
push her in the river again?”
“She slipped. And I’ve got something ... else in mind for me and Jo.”
Brian scrubbed a hand over his face. “I don’t want to hear about it. I don’t want that particular image in my head either.”
“I just figured you should know what direction I’m planning to take.” To illustrate, Nathan grabbed her when she swung back through the door. Hauling her against him, he kissed her scowling and surprised mouth.
“Are you crazy?” She shoved an elbow in his gut to free herself, then pushed orders and cash and credit cards into his hands. “Here, figure it out.” She darted over to snag a fresh pot of coffee and tossed scribbled orders on the counter. “Two specials, eggs, scrambled, side of bacon, whole wheat toast. One I don’t remember, but it’s written down there, and we’re running low on biscuits and cream. And if that monster kid at table three spills his juice one more time, I’m going to strangle him and his idiot parents.”
Nathan grinned as she stalked out again. “Bri, I think it could be love.”
“More likely insanity. Now keep your hands off my sister and ring up those orders or I’m not feeding you.”
AT ten-thirty, Jo staggered into her room and fell facedown on the bed. Everything hurt. Her back, her feet, her head, her shoulders. Nobody, she thought, nobody who hadn’t been there could possibly know how hard waitressing was. She’d hiked up mountains, waded through rivers, spent sweltering days in the desert—and would do so again for the right shot.
But she would slit her wrists with a smile on her face if she ever had to wait another table.
And she hated having to admit that Lexy not only wasn’t a lazy malingerer, but she made the job look easy.
Still, if it hadn’t been for Lexy, Jo wouldn’t have missed that glorious, watery, after-the-rain light that morning. She wouldn’t be gritty-eyed from three hours’ sleep. And her feet wouldn’t be screaming.
She set her teeth when she felt the mattress give under someone’s weight. “Get out, Lexy, or I might find the energy to kill you.”