Fireside

by Cate Culpepper

  It would just be her and Abby tonight.

  Mac swallowed. And then decided she was being ridiculous. She lived with this woman. She worked with her every day. Fate would often decree they be alone together in the same room. She opened the door.

  Abby smiled up at Mac, looking pleased to see her and weary and achingly touchable. “Hey, Counselor.”

  “Hey, Doc.” Mac said. “How went the parenting class?”

  “Hah.” Abby sighed and tapped her thighs. “We desperately need a child advocate. I can talk about stages of development, but I’m hardly qualified to give mothering advice. Urging our moms to watch out for lactose intolerance has limited value, after a while.”

  “We’ll hit Vivian up for a child advocate right after Cleo lands us a housekeeper.” Mac slid her hands in her jeans pockets. “Cleo took off?”

  “Yes, this is her poker night with Vivian and Scratch. I believe they both owe Vivian a small fortune.” Abby sobered as the sleet clattered again against the dark window. “I hope they’ll send her home early, if it gets any nastier out there.”

  “You know they will.”

  “So. Do you feel up to helping me restore our main room to some order?”

  Mac’s back didn’t feel particularly up for chair stacking this evening, but her butch sensibilities could hardly allow Abby to do the heavy lifting alone. “Lead the way.”

  She followed Abby down into the spacious living room, lightly scented by the wood smoke from the still-crackling fireplace. A few chairs had been added to the furniture around the hearth to accommodate Abby’s class. Mac slipped her keys from her pocket and unlocked the storage closet near the stairway, then began gathering the chairs inside it.

  “Did Vivian tell you we switched plumbing contractors?” Abby said as she slid her hickory rocking chair back into place.

  “Sounds like a good idea.”

  “It is. We’d rather not have Samuel Sherrill on the premises again, for any reason.”

  Mac lifted another chair. “Is Vivian worried about this feud Sherrill seems to have with Cleo?”

  Abby was silent for a moment. “I doubt Mr. Sherrill can tell Vivian anything about Cleo that she doesn’t already know.”

  Mac was content to let that statement stand, vague as it was. She could share Abby’s trust that Cleo had been straight with Vivian about any problems in her past. Beyond that, her history was no one’s business. Still hefting the chair, Mac sidestepped a footstool, and regretted it instantly as an ominous twinge shot through her lower back.

  “Degale looked peaceful as she left,” Abby said from somewhere behind her. “She’s done so well, Mac. I’m so glad her housing will come through in the spring. Waymon will have a nice fenced yard to play in.”

  “Me too.” Mac got the words out through clenched teeth. She lowered the chair to the flagstone floor more abruptly than she intended, hoping against hope the damn spasm would ease before Abby noticed. She leaned on the chair and tried to stretch the locked muscle in her back.

  “And Inez’s daughter, Lena, and little Waymon have become great buddies,” Abby continued. “Their snow fort is a wonder to behold. Mac?”

  This was a wicked one, the worst in a long while. Mac grit her teeth again as the searing vise clamped down to the right of her lower spine. She caught a hint of cinnamon and knew Abby was beside her.

  “Hey.” Abby touched Mac’s shoulder, her voice low and calm. She studied Mac’s face, and her stance. “Muscle spasm?”

  “Yeah.” Mac smiled, but it was a strained effort. “It’ll pass.”

  Abby’s hand smoothed across Mac’s shoulders, over the soft fabric of her flannel shirt, and then coasted down, pausing to probe very carefully just above her belt. “That’s it, I think.”

  “You’d be right.” Mac stared straight ahead into the fire, feeling Abby’s nearness like cool moonlight on her skin. She gripped the back of the chair. “I just need to walk it off.”

  “I never should have let you lift those chairs, Mac.” Abby frowned up at her. “Look at you, you’ve gone pale.”

  Mac wasn’t surprised. She fully intended to faint soon, if Abby didn’t take her hand—

  “Here. Stretching isn’t doing it.” Abby took her arm. “Lie down, Mac.”

  Damn. If it had been Cleo beside her, Mac well might have slung her arm over her shoulders and yelped like a pup. It hurt that much. Bleating in front of Abby was a little tougher. But Abby wasn’t allowing her any gallant stoicism. Her touch was firm as she guided Mac down onto the flagstone floor in front of the hearth.

  “Lie flat, please. Knees up.” Abby knelt beside her, and inserted her hand carefully under Mac’s back. Her fingers easily targeted the steel cable that had replaced her muscle, and began a gentle massage. “Just lie quietly a minute.”

  Mac’s breath shook as she tried to relax. It wasn’t even the pain of the spasm so much, as unexpectedly vicious as that was. It was the sudden, remembered pleasure of a woman’s physical nurturing that stunned her. It had been a long time since Mac had known this particular comfort.

  Abby was watching her carefully. She stroked Mac’s hair lightly with her free hand. “Is it starting to let go a bit?”

  “Yeah.” Mac closed her eyes in relief as the wretched tightness in her lower back began to loosen beneath Abby’s strong fingers. “Yes, better already.”

  “Was it an injury, Mac?”

  “Yes. Years ago.”

  “You’ve tightened up all over to compensate.” Abby slid her hand beneath Mac’s hair to feel her neck, and then sat back on her heels. “You’re going to be stiff as a board in the morning, I’m afraid, if we can’t work some of that tension out tonight. A good massage would help the soft tissue, at least.”

  Mac closed her eyes again, because that’s how one traditionally prepared for prayer, and she was in need of divine intervention. A hiccup of laughter almost bubbled out of her. What kind of merciful goddess would cast her prostrate in front of a roaring fireplace on a stormy night, subject to the tender ministrations of the straightest woman on the eastern seaboard?

  Mac sat up carefully, suppressing a moan. “Abby, I can just take a hot shower.”

  “Yes, you should do that later too.” And Abby took Mac’s chin in her hand, and waited until she met her eyes. “Let me help you, Mac. I think we can really spare you some pain, and I’d like to do that.”

  “All right,” Mac whispered. “Thanks.”

  Abby smiled. “I’ll be back. Take off your shirt and stretch out.” She got to her feet in one graceful movement and went to the side door that led to her infirmary.

  Mac fumbled with her belt buckle. She stared at the flames and shrugged off her flannel shirt, then the undershirt beneath it, ignoring the residual ache in her back and shoulders. She lay face down on the throw rug in front of the hearth, and waited.

  “Cleo swears this lavender oil can restore a sore muscle’s will to live.”

  Mac felt Abby kneel beside her again, and then heard her indrawn breath. Cool fingers touched the small of her bare back.

  “The surgeons did a decent job.” Mac rested her head on her crossed hands. “My spine’s in good shape.”

  Abby’s finger traced other scars across her left side.

  “I reckon I was lucky. It could have been worse.”

  “I gather it was bad enough.” Abby brushed the raised lines lightly, as if, Mac thought, she could erase them from her skin. “A fall, Mac?”

  “Yeah. I fell through a wooden banister and dropped several feet. Mostly soft tissue damage, but it took a few years to heal. I had help.”

  “Help healing?”

  “Help falling.”

  Abby was quiet. Mac heard her uncap a vial and then brush her hands together. “Tell me,” she said.

  Mac watched the flames and gathered her courage. “Hattie was smaller than me. About your height. Mean as a snake at times. She shoved me into the banister.”

  Abby’s hands rested briefly on
Mac’s shoulders, then spread the warm oil across her back in smooth strokes. Her touch on Mac’s lean sides was careful, as if she were exploring new territory and wanted to learn it well.

  “We’d been together two years,” Mac said. “She’d gone off on me before. Hattie hit hard, but I was big enough to hold her off, for the most part. Then the ‘fall.’ I let my folks believe I got bucked off a horse.” She smiled into the flames without humor. “That might be the only important lie I’ve ever told them.”

  “She was your first partner? This Hattie?”

  “My first anything. There’s been no one since.”

  Abby’s hands were gentle but insistent, kneading warm tracks from Mac’s neck to her waist, then back again. Her touch conveyed an offer of comfort more tangibly than any words, a caring connection to Mac’s pain as eloquent as Degale’s silence.

  “You’ve been alone a long time, then.”

  Mac closed her eyes. She thought Abby might understand the kind of bone-deep loneliness that swept her at times. She was all right alone, mostly. But there had been times in Mac’s life when the ghostly footsteps that followed her were her only constant friend—entire months when she’d trimmed her own hair because she knew if a woman touched her face she would weep. The length of her body relaxed against the floor, the skillful massage melting away the last of her tension.

  Abby’s fingers were light on her now, her nails gliding across Mac’s bare shoulders, tracing liquid spirals down the length of her back. Mac felt a drop of warmth fall between her shoulder blades, and she opened her eyes.

  “Doc?”

  Mac sat up carefully and turned to Abby, her face only inches away. Her throat tightened. Abby’s delicate features reflected a dozen fleeting emotions—compassion, sorrow, and a kind of lonely wistfulness. Another tear slid down Abby’s face, and she smiled, unashamed.

  It was that moment, Abby’s look of simple sweetness, as far from carnal desire as a look could possibly be, that did Mac in at last.

  Disengaged from her mind’s command, Mac’s hand rose to cradle Abby’s face. The velvet softness of her cheek filled her palm.

  Abby stared at her, motionless. Her gaze fell to Mac’s lips, and it was Abby who moved first, leaning closer in stages, lifting her face to receive Mac’s kiss.

  The blending of their lips felt like something lost but essential sliding into place, a natural connection Mac had never known clicking home at last. She explored Abby’s mouth tentatively at first, almost chastely, with the lightest brushing of lips and tongue. Abby lifted her hand to slide beneath Mac’s hair, her fingers suddenly cold on the back of her neck, but holding her, pressing her closer.

  Mac inhaled Abby’s breath and returned it, a tender exchange, but now a stealthy heat began rising in her that swiftly banished any thought of chastity. It occurred to Mac that she was kissing this highly desirable woman while shirtless and bare-breasted, her nipples tightening hard against the soft fabric of Abby’s sweater.

  She could feel her hand tremble against Abby’s face. She gave her lips a last feathering brush with her own, and then made herself lift her head.

  Abby’s eyes were closed. They remained that way. High color had filled her cheeks.

  Dismay was making swift inroads into Mac’s lust. “Abby.”

  Abby’s shoulders lifted and fell with her breathy sigh. “My goodness.”

  Mac grinned.

  Abby’s eyes finally opened, and they were tearless and clear. Her hand slid from beneath Mac’s hair and rested in her lap. Mac waited, but she didn’t speak.

  “There are so many reasons,” Mac said at last, “I should apologize to you. Abby, I—”

  “I’ve never felt anything like that in my life.” Abby blinked, as if in wonder that she’d spoken aloud.

  Mac swallowed. “I’m sorry?”

  “Don’t be. I’m not. I’ve never felt anything like that in my life.” Abby seemed to think about it, and then she bent her head, the gold firelight flickering over her face. “My goodness.”

  She sounded bewildered, and Mac had to touch her. She lifted Abby’s hand onto her knee and covered it with her own. “Listen, it was pretty intense for me too. Are you…how are you?”

  And with the worst timing of the new millennium, a knock sounded at the door. Their heads whipped around in such sudden alarm it would have been funny on any other night.

  Mac blew out a long breath.

  Abby cleared her throat. “I don’t know what to say to you, Mac. But I’ll think of something.”

  “You’re okay?”

  The knock came again, a patient tap, not urgent.

  Abby smiled at last. “I am, yes. But I’d rather not chat with a resident just now. Would you mind?”

  “Not a problem.” Mac patted Abby’s hand and climbed carefully to her feet. “Stay here. I’ll be right back.”

  “Macawai?” The twinkle had returned to Abby’s eyes. “It might be cold out there.”

  Mac glanced down at herself. “Oh, shite.” She accepted the shirt Abby handed her and put it on over her shoulders. “Thanks, Doc.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  Mac couldn’t move as long as Abby held her gaze, but finally she was able to make her way to the entry and the front door. With any luck, opening it would blast her with cold air and clear her mind a little.

  She had to stoop to see through the small oval glass in the door, but saw nothing through its curved surface except the empty front deck, illuminated faintly by a high lamp. Snow was swirling in tight bursts of wind, scattering over the porch. Mac thought of keying the intercom, but changed her mind. No one should be out in this mess.

  She slid the bolt back and pulled the door open, swept as promised by a chill gust as she stepped out onto the porch. “Hello?” she called.

  “Oh. Hi.” A slender figure stood wrapped in a blanket at the far side of the deck, too deep in shadows to see clearly, but it was a woman’s voice. Or a girl’s. She sounded young. She shuffled forward. “Is Cleo Lassiter home?”

  “Cleo?” Mac squinted, trying to see the young woman’s face. “No, afraid not. Why don’t you come in, though? You’ve got to be freezing out here. My name is Mac.”

  “Cleo said if I came here, you guys would let me in.” The girl lifted her face, and Mac’s stomach did a nasty lurch.

  “You’re bleeding,” she stammered.

  “I know,” the girl said politely. “I’m Danny Sherrill. Do you know when Cleo might—”

  But Mac was already moving because the kid’s knees started to buckle, and only a neat lunge caught her before she crumpled to the deck. Mac lifted the girl, adrenaline drowning any trace of her backache. She stared at the blood caked around a gash near her hairline and the bruises emerging on her flushed cheeks. She was out like a light.

  Mac spun with the girl in her arms, kicked the door wide, and yelled for Abby.

  Chapter Eight

  “Lie still, honey, we’re almost done.”

  Abby’s stitches were neat and even, all but invisible against the girl’s hairline. The lidocaine was working well, she noted. Danny was awake, but her brow was smooth and she hadn’t flinched since the needle’s first touch.

  Abby drew the last stitch and tied it off, then snipped the thread and laid her forceps aside. “That’s the worst of it, Danny. Well done.”

  Danny lay still under two thermal blankets in the small infirmary adjoining Abby’s office, her pale features illuminated by the bright light at the head of the raised bed. Mac sat across from Abby, holding Danny’s hand.

  Abby checked Danny’s pulse at the throat again, then adjusted the neck of her gown to examine the thundercloud bruise emerging over the girl’s collarbone. A familiar fury rose in her, directed toward the creature who inflicted these injuries, and an equally fierce compassion for Danny that was almost painful.

  But Abby felt an old sense of peace too as she tended her patient. She knew what to do here, in this clean, healing space. She understood
how to help. Abby trusted her training and the skills she had honed for years, and her hands moved over Danny with ease and confidence.

  She feared her assurance would disappear like a snowflake on hot coals if she looked at Mac.

  Danny shifted beneath the blankets, and Mac adjusted them around her slender shoulders. “You warm enough now?” Mac’s rich alto sent a light shiver through Abby.

  “Almost.” Danny’s voice was still faint, but her color was better. She was beginning to lose that frightening pallor. Abby had given her a mild analgesic earlier. That and simple exhaustion made her sluggish and sleepy.

  Considering her small frame, Abby would have placed this teenager closer to fifteen than seventeen. Danny didn’t seem malnourished, or unhealthy in any other way before this beating, but there was a general air of fragility about her. Spiky blond hair feathered across her forehead, and there was a tired wariness in her brown eyes.

  “Did you guys carry me in here?” Danny’s words were a little slurred.

  “Just me, ma’am.” The dimple appeared in Mac’s cheek again, but Abby saw her taking in every nuance of Danny’s expression. “You went down pretty fast out there.”

  “God,” Danny sighed. “I’m sorry. This is so embarrassing.”

  “Miss Sherrill.” Abby folded the blood pressure cuff and placed it in a drawer. “You walked here, over two miles in a near blizzard, wearing a sweatshirt and jeans and a blanket, and you’re embarrassed that you fainted? Mac here would be comatose.”

  Mac flicked her a smile, and Abby almost melted into a puddle of maple syrup on the spotless tile floor. She finished taping a neat bandage over the cut on Danny’s forehead. “We’ve called Cleo, Danny. She’ll be here soon.”

  “Ah, shi—ah, man.” Danny closed her eyes. “She’ll be pissed at me.”