April nodded, biting her lip worriedly as she backed away. “I—I’ll let her know, Professor Thorne.”
He gave a short nod, finished shoving lecture notes into his satchel, then headed from the classroom.
Shara caught up to him in the bustling corridor. “Hey there,” she greeted him above the noisy din of conversation and laughter. “I tried to reach you all weekend.”
“I was at the ranch,” he said somewhat distractedly. “How’s Devon doing?”
“Not so great. When I left home this morning, he was sleeping like a baby, poor thing. I’m going home to check on him after my next class.”
Caleb nodded, holding the door open for her, then following her from the building.
“When he’s feeling better,” Shara said, “I was thinking we could reschedule our evening plans. Are you free on Friday?”
Caleb inclined his head toward a student who called a greeting to him across the courtyard. “Let me check my schedule and get back to you,” he told Shara.
“All right,” she murmured, looking a little deflated.
When they reached the law faculty building, Caleb walked unerringly to his office and shut the door behind him. Dropping his satchel to the floor, he sank into the chair behind his desk and logged on to the computer.
His mouth was set in a grim line as he opened a file he’d been working on that morning. He had a lot of things to do, more than enough to keep his mind off beautiful, troublesome women who skipped class in order to play house with their boyfriends.
Daniela stepped from the steamy shower and wrapped her body in a thick cotton bath towel.
She’d spent the entire weekend in bed, alternately sleeping and tossing fitfully between the sheets. On Sunday, Noah had shown up to relieve Janie of duty. Heedless of his sister’s protests, he’d planted himself on the living room sofa and become immersed in mounds of paperwork while his “patient” slept in the next room. Pamela Roarke had called from Houston, and upon learning of Daniela’s illness, had promptly decided to cut her trip short. Daniela, not wanting to cheat her mother of spending time with her sister, had talked Pamela out of returning home by agreeing to let Sister Jenkins stop by the house and pray over her.
She’d been barely lucid as the sweet, diminutive churchwoman stood at her bedside, eyes squeezed shut, hands clasped tightly together while Noah hovered in the doorway, head bent in reverent silence, the ghost of a smile curving his lips.
What Magdalena Jenkins lacked in stature, she more than made up for in volume. As she prayed over Daniela, her deep voice resonated with authority, booming so loudly through the house that Daniela feared the neighbors would call the police to report a domestic disturbance. Once Sister Jenkins had finished petitioning God for His healing mercies, she smiled sweetly at Daniela and Noah, then left with barely a whisper.
Daniela fell asleep afterward, and didn’t awaken until five o’clock on Monday evening—eight hours later. As she climbed from bed and made her way to the bathroom to take a shower, she felt noticeably better than she had all weekend. Although she automatically attributed her improved condition to the long hours of rest she’d gotten, she couldn’t help but smile at the memory of Sister Jenkins’s morning visit and wonder if, indeed, her mother was right about the woman’s intercessory prayer gift.
Daniela towel-dried her freshly washed hair and dressed in a pair of high-cut cotton shorts and a matching tank top emblazoned with the famous quote Well-Behaved Women Rarely Make History.
She threw on her chenille robe, then made her way to the kitchen. Noah had checked her mail and stacked the letters neatly on the breakfast table before leaving for the office that morning.
While Daniela was listening to her phone messages and sorting through junk mail, the doorbell rang. Thinking it was Janie, who’d promised to stop by that evening to check on her, Daniela went to answer the door.
“What, you lost your key or some—”
The teasing admonition died on her lips when she saw who stood on her doorstep.
Not Janie, as she’d expected, but Caleb Thorne. Caleb. At her house.
Her eyes widened in shock. “W-What are you doing here?” she stammered.
Hands thrust into the pockets of low-slung Levi’s, he arched a dark brow at her. “Expecting someone else?”
“Well, yes, as a matter of fact, I was.” Self-conscious, she tugged the lapels of her robe together. “What are you doing here?”
“You missed my class,” Caleb said, deadpan.
“So I did.” Mouth curving, Daniela leaned in the doorway and crossed one ankle over the other, drawling, “Are you the truancy officer?”
He frowned slightly. “I came to see if you were all right.”
“How sweet. I’m touched, Professor Thorne.” She slid him a look beneath the dense sweep of her lashes. “Do you extend this courtesy to all of your absentee students, or just the ones you kiss?”
A muscle ticked in his jaw. He held her gaze for a long moment, then turned abruptly and started away.
“Wait!” Daniela called, realizing she’d unintentionally pushed him too far. She hurried onto the porch after him in her bare feet. “I was only teasing you! Thank you for being concerned about me. I really do appreciate it.”
“Good night, Miss Moreau,” he said over his shoulder.
She reached out, grabbing his arm before he could take another step. Hard muscles bunched and flexed beneath her fingers, sending heat pulsing through her veins. He stopped, but didn’t turn around.
“I didn’t blow off your class,” Daniela said softly. “I have the flu. I’ve been sick all weekend.”
He turned then, dark, assessing eyes roaming across her face. “Now that you mention it,” he murmured, “you have looked better.”
Daniela grinned. “Touché. You should have seen me on Saturday, when my head wasn’t in the toilet.”
His mouth twitched. “Have a good evening, Miss Moreau,” he said quietly. “I hope you feel better.”
“Would you like to come inside for a cup of coffee?”
His gaze darkened, and Daniela knew he was remembering their coffeehouse excursion. A slow flush crawled up her neck. “Or, um, I could make you tea instead?”
When he hesitated, she warned half-seriously, “The longer we stand out here, the better the odds that old Mrs. Flores across the street will call the police to report you as an intruder. She’s ninety-eight years old and somewhat senile. Last year she called the cops on the mailman. The year before that it was the garbageman. Don’t look now—she’s staring out the window at us.”
Caleb scowled, but without any real rancor. Daniela tugged gently on his arm, and after another moment he followed her into the house.
Daniela swept a quick look around the living room, searching for anything that might betray her identity. Thankfully, P.I. for Dummies was not among the rows of assorted books lining the built-in cypress bookshelves, nor was her monogrammed leather briefcase anywhere in sight. Even if she could justify an interest in learning about private investigators, she’d have a hard time explaining to Caleb the reason she owned a briefcase stamped with the initials D.R.
“I was about to brave my first meal in two days,” she told him, closing and locking the door behind him. “Do you like tortilla soup?”
“Sure,” Caleb answered, dipping his hands into his jeans pockets as he glanced around the living room with its overstuffed sofa and chairs, and lush canvas oil paintings on walls papered in gold leaf. “You have a very nice home.”
And you, sir, have a very nice tush, Daniela thought naughtily. Aloud she said, “You like my shabby chic look? See, I knew you were a man of discerning taste.”
He sent her a bemused look over his shoulder. “My judgment can be flawed on occasion,” he said in a tone that suggested he wasn’t just talking about her decorating skills.
Daniela gave him a guileless smile. “I’ll try not to hold it against you,” she quipped, brushing past him to head into the ki
tchen. She waved him into a chair at the breakfast table, then lunged for the stack of mail she’d been sorting through when he rang the doorbell—mail addressed to Daniela Roarke.
He raised a puzzled brow at her, but said nothing as she hastily tucked the letters inside one of the cabinet drawers. Close call, she thought.
“Do you live here alone?” he asked as Daniela busied herself with dinner preparations, which consisted of heating up the tortilla soup and uncorking a bottle of Pinot Grigio.
She shook her head, filling two long-stemmed wineglasses. “My mother lives with me. She’s in Houston visiting her sister for the week.”
“Thanks,” Caleb murmured, accepting a glass from her. He took a sip, watching her over the rim. “You two must be close. You and your mother, I mean.”
“We are.” As Daniela walked over to the stove to check the simmering tortilla soup, she grinned ruefully. “I must confess to being somewhat of a mama’s girl. When I bought this house three years ago, I had to convince my mom to move in with me, offering the explanations that I wanted to help look after her, and that it made economic sense to combine our two households and save money on rent and utilities. While both of those reasons are true, the simple fact of the matter is that I wanted her around. I enjoy her company.” She glanced over her shoulder at Caleb. “Does that make me a loser?”
A gentle smile curved his mouth. “Not at all. I think it’s very sweet, actually.”
Smiling, Daniela picked up her glass and took a sip of wine, though she knew it wasn’t wise to drink alcohol on an empty—and as yet unstable—stomach. “What about you and your father?” she casually probed. “Are you two close?”
Just as she’d expected, Caleb’s expression grew shuttered. “Not as close as you and your mother,” he answered abstractedly. He nodded toward the stove. “Soup smells great.”
“Wait till you taste it. It’s my sister-in-law’s mother’s secret recipe.” Daniela ladled tortilla soup into two ceramic bowls, then carried them over to the table. “Don’t worry about catching my germs,” she joked as she served Caleb. “I didn’t cough or breathe into the pot.”
He chuckled. “I’ll take my chances.”
She settled into a chair beside him. It wasn’t exactly a romantic candlelight dinner at Le Rêve, but it was as good a start as any.
“What did I miss in class today?” she asked as they began eating.
“Get the notes from April,” Caleb told her. “I don’t do encore lectures.”
“Not even for the sick and shut-in?”
“Nah.” Dark eyes glinting with amusement, he gave her a long, considering look. “Come to think of it, you don’t look all that bad for someone three days into the flu.”
She laughed. “That’s not what you said when we were standing on the porch.”
“What I mean is, when I had the flu, I was laid up for a week.”
“That’s surprising. You don’t strike me as the type of person who gets sick very often.”
“I don’t. The last time I had the flu was in tenth grade.”
She grinned. “In that case, you should be totally immune to me.”
He bent his head over his bowl. “Not quite,” he said, his voice pitched so low she couldn’t be sure she’d heard right.
Except she knew she had.
Hiding a private smile, she swallowed another mouthful of soup. “I have Sister Jenkins to thank for my speedy recovery,” she informed Caleb.
“Yeah?” He eyed her curiously. “Who’s Sister Jenkins?”
“A woman who attends my mother’s church. She’s this tiny, demure, soft-spoken lady—until she opens her mouth to pray. And then it’s like she’s calling down the heavens in this loud, hellfire-and-brimstone, Southern Baptist preacher voice. It’s a little scary, I tell you.”
Caleb chuckled. “Sounds more comical than scary.”
“That’s what my brother Noah said. The whole time Sister Jenkins was praying over me, he could hardly contain his laughter.”
“Your brother was here with you?”
Daniela nodded, wondering if she’d only imagined the note of relief in Caleb’s voice. “He came over yesterday to take care of me. It was just like old times,” she said with a reminiscent smile.
Caleb sipped his wine, watching her with a quiet, focused absorption that made Daniela feel as if they were the only two people in the world. No other man had ever made her feel that way, as if every word she spoke was of paramount interest to him.
“How many siblings do you have?” he asked.
“Two older brothers.”
“They must be mighty protective over you.”
She shrugged, idly toying with the crystal stem of her wineglass. “Sometimes. But they know I can take care of myself.”
Humor lifted one corner of Caleb’s mouth. “I can only imagine,” he murmured.
Her eyes narrowed on his face. “What’s that supposed to mean? How am I supposed to take that?”
“Any way you like, Miss Moreau,” he said with a slow, lazy grin that made her pulse accelerate. “Thanks for dinner. I think that was the best tortilla soup I’ve ever had.”
“Janie’s mother will be thrilled to hear that,” Daniela said, rising from the table with their empty bowls. “Janie is my sister-in-law, by the way. Would you like seconds?”
“No, thanks. I’m good.”
“How about coffee, and some dessert? My mom made her award-winning peach cobbler before she left for Houston. Unless Noah devoured it all while he was here, there should be some left.”
Caleb glanced at his watch. “I really should be going.”
“Are you sure? Not many people can turn down my mother’s famous cobbler, baked with the sweetest, juiciest peaches she handpicks from the orchard herself.”
He hesitated. “Award-winning, huh?”
Daniela grinned. “Six years in a row at the annual church bake-off.”
“In that case,” Caleb drawled, “how can I refuse?”
He should have refused. Really, he should have. But refusing Daniela Moreau was fast becoming a foreign concept to him.
So he agreed to a slice of peach cobbler, and when Daniela asked innocently, “À la mode?” he shook his head, and forced his body not to react to the memory of the last time she’d offered him ice cream.
He polished off the cobbler in three bites, not because he was in a hurry to leave—as should have been the case—but because it was so damn good. When he’d finished eating, a laughing Daniela poured him a cup of coffee and led him into the living room. He couldn’t help but admire the sensual, hypnotic sway of her hips as she walked, and his mouth watered at the way the plush fabric of her robe molded the delectable roundness of her bottom.
When Daniela joined him on the sofa, he realized, too late, that he should have sat in one of the armchairs. When she leaned forward to slide a coaster beneath his coffee cup, her robe gaped open, tempting him with an eyeful of lush cleavage.
He swallowed hard, feeling like a horny teenager on his first date.
He didn’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed when she moved back, settling against the overstuffed cushions and tucking her long legs beneath her. She gave him a smile of relaxed contentment. “So you live in the Towers, huh? Pretty swanky.”
He shrugged. “Believe it or not, my reasons for moving there had nothing to do with seeking a prestigious address.”
“Ah, yes, you had sentimental reasons,” Daniela murmured. “Your parents used to take you to see shows at the Majestic.”
“That’s right.” A soft, nostalgic smile touched his mouth. “I saw The Wiz for the first time there. I’ll never forget how excited I was to see an all-black cast in a live performance. It’s all I talked about for weeks afterward.”
Daniela chuckled. “I felt the same way when I watched The Wiz for the first time. I won’t even tell you how long I pretended to be Dorothy. My brothers were ready to put me out of the house.”
“My pa
rents probably wanted to do the same to me,” Caleb admitted wryly.
They exchanged teasing grins.
“What a little prince you must have been,” Daniela ribbed, poking him playfully on the arm. “As the only child, I bet you were spoiled rotten.”
“Think again. In fact, my father went out of his way not to spoil me, and he made damned sure my mother didn’t, either. He said he didn’t want to raise a soft, pampered rich boy, and I applaud him for that.”
“You do?”
Caleb nodded, vaguely amused by her surprised tone. “One of the best things Crandall Thorne ever did for me was to make me work hard for everything I ever wanted. Whether it was money to attend football camp or to buy my first car, I had to earn it. I took nothing for granted, ever. And that’s the way it should be.”
“You’re pretty adamant about this,” Daniela observed. “Do you plan to raise your own children with the same tough love?”
“If I ever have children,” Caleb drawled, “then, yes, I see nothing wrong with teaching them the value of a work ethic. I’ve watched too many of my childhood friends crap out because they never learned to fend for themselves.”
“That’s a shame.” Dark, exotically tilted eyes studied him in silence for a moment. “How did your mother die, Caleb?”
He stiffened, his jaw hardening.
Seeing his reaction, Daniela hastened to say, “I’m sorry, that was too personal. You don’t have to answer if—”
“She died of complications from lupus. I was fourteen.”
“Oh, Caleb,” Daniela murmured gently. “I’m so sorry.”
“It was a long time ago,” he said gruffly, suddenly awash with memories of his mother, a quiet, unassuming woman who’d struck him as a tragic figure long before her death. He remembered, as a child, wondering about the sadness in her eyes, the smiles she sometimes forced when Crandall spoke to her. Although his parents had never argued in front of him, Caleb had known that their marriage was unstable, fraught with a tension he hadn’t understood until he was much older. That was when he’d learned about his father’s extramarital affair with a woman he’d loved since childhood, a woman who grew up to become the wife of Crandall’s worst enemy—Hoyt Philbin. Crandall’s affair with Tessa Philbin had hastened his wife’s descent into depression, making her more susceptible to the disease that eventually claimed her life. Because to this day, Caleb knew that what had killed his mother couldn’t have been cured with medicine. She’d died of a broken heart.
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