Into His Keeping

by Faulkner, Gail

  “Oh honey!” Jill looked at her son pleadingly. “Please do that. I’ll be so worried if you don’t.”

  “Yeah, sure. Geez, Mom. It’s not like it’d be easy to grab me.” Drifter shifted in the big chair. “You really think it’s gonna be that big a deal?” he asked Holdin.

  “I think it’s important to have a game plan. This shit gets out of hand fast. You look just like me. No way they’re gonna miss that. It’ll create a whirlwind to begin with,” Holdin answered.

  “Don’t worry, no one is touching my only grandbaby,” Carol declared confidently. “You just rest easy, Jill.”

  “I ‘spect those paparazzi boys are gonna find themselves in danger shortly,” Charles added as he patted his wife on the butt. “They should be warned. It’s the humane thing to do.” The tension dissipated at Charles’ dry humor.

  “As I said,” Holdin continued. “It’d be best if there was a statement to give the press. Do either of you object?”

  “No.” Jill glanced at Drifter. “You?”

  “Naw. Might be fun.” Drifter shrugged again.

  “Course we have to supply proof for the legal documents. Since we’ll both be at the hospital I’d like to arrange the test. I want it out of the way fast. You good with that, son?”

  “Whatever. It’s just a cotton swab,” Drifter agreed.

  “Holdin, don’t make that statement time specific. I’d feel more comfortable if it was vague. Can you do that?” Jill asked quietly.

  “That’s what the statement is for. To defuse while it says almost nothing. Don’t worry, I’m not about to give the media facts they can research,” Holdin assured her with a smile.

  “Then it’s all right with me if we have to,” Jill agreed reluctantly.

  “Good.” Holdin got up to sit behind his desk and grab the phone.

  Jill started to sit up. “Whoa there, missy!” Carol exclaimed. “Where you goin’? I thought you weren’t supposed to move.”

  “Hey. Mom!” Drifter straightened in his chair. “Relax. What do ya need?”

  Jill realized everyone was frowning at her as she glanced around. “It’s lunchtime. I was just getting up to fix something,” she defended herself.

  “You just lay right back down. I’ll bring a tray in.” Carol stood up.

  “I’m not hungry.” Jill laughed as she slowly relaxed back. “It’s the food pit over there who’s going to start shrinking into himself soon.” She waved a hand at Drifter.

  Holdin released his breath and picked up the phone, trusting his family to handle the little mother.

  “Ahhh. I know how to handle one of those,” Carol assured Jill as she headed to the door. “You don’t think the other boy in the room got that big all on his own. Come on, Chuck. I’m gonna need a few things from the freezer in the garage. Half an hour, Drifter. Your butt better be in a kitchen chair.”

  Drifter grinned at his grandmother’s mild threat. “Yes, ma’am. You can depend on me.”

  Carol’s head whipped around to laugh back at him as she left. Jill watched the open, uncomplicated connection between her son and his grandparents and smiled. That relationship had been amazingly immediate. Carol and Charles were the key. She’d known they were wonderful people. She hadn’t known she could love the way they chose to show love.

  Carol addressed Drifter as her “grandbaby” and hugged him like a long-starved grandma the moment she saw him. Charles Powell had gruffly told Carol to “let the boy breathe, for God’s sake” and had promptly given Drifter a brief, manly hug that involved a lot of back pounding. They’d made it clear they were thrilled to have Drifter in the house. Then they proceeded to make her feel welcome. It had given her a few moments of nearly teary relief to begin with.

  As the two older Powells disappeared, Jill looked at her son. Behind her at his desk, Holdin was on the phone and Jill assumed it was with his publicist. Drifter looked back at her and raised a brow in question without bothering to voice it. He was asking her how she really was and he meant about the man speaking at the desk.

  Though his age was fourteen, Drifter had taken the job of being the man of the house seriously for some time now. It’d been disconcerting when she’d realized her baby didn’t think like a baby. His maturity and adult outlook had given her many sleepless nights. Had she somehow stolen his childhood from him by being a single parent? Was she communicating her craving for safety in some unspoken way she had no idea about?

  He wasn’t disrespectful. He’d simply taken to treating her as his responsibility. A job he often took so seriously as to put aside his own wants to see to her needs first. How did a person scold a boy for being mature and unselfish? He could become bossy and demanding sometimes and they’d clashed over it, but honestly, his motives were usually her safety or health. In the end, she’d spent a lot of time trying to get him to stop worrying and let her be the parent. That had worked for a bit but not long. Now as she looked at him, she could see the wheels turning in his head.

  Jill smiled. “Stop worrying,” she told him softly.

  “Not likely. You have a weird look. What’s up?” he asked her.

  “Is it a bad thing?” Jill pressed, still smiling.

  “I dunno. You tell me.”

  Jill closed her eyes and took a deep breath, shifting slightly to press her head and shoulders back on the comfortable pillow. “No, hon, it’s not a bad thing.”

  “It’s too damn fast a thing,” Drifter told her quietly.

  Jill’s eyes opened to regard the young man who should still be a boy. “Perhaps. Remember, we’re not strangers. You’re living proof of that.”

  Drifter grimaced and glanced away from her for a moment. “He is to me.”

  “I know. Give him a chance,” Jill requested softly.

  “He can’t keep his hands off you. What do you expect me to think? You’re my mom.”

  “Are you disappointed? Is that why you’re attacking him?”

  Drifter shrugged, again his eyes moving back to Holdin at his desk for a second. “I don’t know. I knew he’d have some interest in me. I guess I didn’t expect him to want you.”

  Jill’s heart lurched as he said that. Her mother’s heart heard the child’s fear in it. “I didn’t bring you here to give you away,” Jill exclaimed in low tones.

  “Really? Sorta felt like that.” Drifter’s sprawled body shifted uncomfortably.

  “No! Never. Oh baby, how could you think that?”

  “Relax, Mom,” Drifter quickly reassured her. “It’s not like I thought you wanted to get rid of me. It’s just, if anything happened to you, that was the point.”

  “I see.” Jill sighed as she suddenly got the rest of his statement. “What you weren’t expecting was for me to want this trip for my own reasons as well?”

  “Yeah, I guess. I didn’t come here to give you away.” Drifter scowled and glanced at Holdin. “There’s no reason to rush into anything, Mom.”

  “Honey, it’s complicated,” Jill started, but behind her she heard Holdin end his call and put down the phone. She paused to see if he’d make another call. He did and Jill continued. “I never chose to leave him. He didn’t break up with me. It’s just not over for either of us, I guess. We have issues.”

  “You can’t still be going steady. Isn’t there some age deal on that? I mean, damn, if no one ever wants to card ya, it’s too late.”

  Jill’s laughter swept into the room as Holdin put down the phone a second time. The private conversation between Jill and Drifter hadn’t struck him as funny up to this point. The two of them had been talking soft and seriously. A heavy cloud dissipated with the music of her humor. He hadn’t heard her really laugh yet, he realized. Not this relaxed, natural way.

  Moving around the desk, Holdin strolled over to the couch and casually leaned against the arm at her head. His hand stroked down her cheek as he smiled at her then looked at Drifter.

  “What’s the joke?”

  Jill’s eyes danced with amusement as she looke
d into his. “Since we technically never broke up are we still going steady? Drifter thinks there’s got to be an age limitation on that and we can’t be.”

  Holdin scowled and went back to the other end of the couch to sit with her feet in his lap again. Shaking his head in pretend dismay as he answered, “See, that’s the problem. Going steady has no limitations without an official breakup. It’s not like just dating a girl.” Holdin grinned at Drifter who was again eyeing the way Holdin gathered her feet into his hands and started gently rubbing the soles. “She’s still my girl,” he ended on a more serious note as his son frowned for real.

  “You’re all over her like a rash. It’s not cool, man. She’s my mother. Have a little respect.”

  “Asking my intentions, son?” Holdin responded.

  “I guess. Seems a bit early to even be doin’ that. You don’t know her or me. It looks as if you jump anything that moves.”

  Jill opened her mouth to speak and Holdin gently squeezed her feet while glancing at her. He wanted to handle this man to man without mom refereeing. If Jill had to mother every conversation he had with the boy, it’d never get anywhere.

  “I respect your protective instincts, Drifter. You’re a credit to the Powell men, but this time you’re jumping to conclusions. It’s you who doesn’t know me. Your mother does. The relationship you see now is one that started a long time ago. It’s not the same relationship, I’ll grant you that, but it is the same two souls. My intentions have never changed where your mother is concerned. I planned on marrying her then and I still do.”

  “You do?” Drifter jerked in surprise.

  “I thought that was a private conversation,” Jill injected quickly.

  “You two have already talked about it?” Drifter’s eyes widened at his mother’s comment as he glanced between them.

  “Yeah. I asked her.” To Jill, Holden added, “I wasn’t planning on discussing it. He has a right to know though. It puts us in perspective.”

  “You asked already?” Drifter’s voice squeaked in shock and he quickly cleared his throat. “Seriously?”

  “Seriously,” Holdin confirmed.

  “Mom?” Drifter looked at her with both eyebrows raised.

  Jill frowned at both of them. “This isn’t something we need to rush into. Weren’t you just saying that, brat? Right now the whole hospital thing is a big enough worry. I can’t answer the question before getting through that. And just so you both know, I don’t need the stress. Can you try to relax, Drifter? Try to get to know your father without making snap judgments. And you, football boy, stop adding pressure to the situation.” Jill closed her eyes in frustration.

  Holdin lifted a delicate little foot and softly kissed it just where the cute toes met the top of her foot. “Sorry, baby. I thought it’d make things easier if our son knew how I felt about his mother.”

  Jill’s eyes snapped open and even though she tried, she couldn’t glare at the man who’d just kissed her foot in apology. Kissing her foot should have been way over the top. Laughable even. When Holdin did it, it wasn’t. Instead of being a humble submission, it was a declaration of possession. He had a right to kiss her anywhere he wanted. It was a promise of seduction. An erotic secret.

  Watching them, Drifter laughed at the comical expression on her face. “He does know how to handle you, Mom. You can never keep a good mad going if I kiss ya.”

  Jill blinked and looked at Drifter in surprise a second. He’d just admitted to kissing his mother. In front of a male. “Yeah, that’s because you never do. It’s a shock tactic with you. And now I’m on to your game. That one will never work again.”

  “I think it’s time I was in the kitchen. You guys coming?” Drifter stood and stretched.

  “Not hungry.” Jill smiled at the lanky boy. “You two go on. I’d like a catnap.”

  Holdin regarded her seriously for a moment. She was sending them off together and claiming she needed a rest. Probably true, but he didn’t want to leave her alone. What if something happened like a seizure? Or she passed out. Who knew with brain injuries? On the other hand, he needed to spend some time with Drifter. Seriously needed too.

  Lifting her other foot to his lips, Holdin dropped a soft kiss on her instep. “I’ll be back in a few minutes. Don’t do anything scary like have a seizure.”

  “No problem. I’ll be the chick sleeping on the couch,” Jill promised in as cheerful a tone as she could manage while she watched him stand. The beast needed to stop kissing her feet. She’d realized they were an erogenous zone during the long massage she’d just gotten. That instep lick had been wicked.

  Holdin smiled his slow, bone-melting grin at her then turned to join Drifter at the door. Jill watched them disappear. He knew it. He knew the little flick of his tongue on the sensitive instep of her foot had affected her. Another thing some brilliant female had taught him no doubt.

  Alone at last, Jill half sat up and glanced around. The study had been decorated in “manly” to within an inch of its life. She knew there was a bathroom attached. She spied a discreet door at the end of the bookshelves lining the far wall. Had to be it.

  Sitting up slowly she tried not to hurry. There was no way she’d have admitted this need to a room full of people, but now it was urgent. As she got to her feet, a wave of dizziness accompanied stabbing pain in the right side of her head. It felt like someone had just jammed an ice pick in her ear.

  Oh God. No! She was not going to pass out and make a puddle in this damn room! Very slowly she swayed across the room, clutching furniture as she passed for balance. She could feel the blood rushing through the veins in her head. It pounded at her. Nothing had felt like this before. She made it to the door and shoved it open. Just as she’d suspected, a spectacular bathroom opened before her. Or at least she thought it was. Things were getting a little fuzzy.

  Jill gritted her teeth. No passing out before taking care of business!

  Once done, she’d made it back out of the bathroom and was halfway to the couch when Holdin strolled into the office.

  “Hey!” Jill was in the middle of taking another swaying, hesitant step before she knew he was there. “Jill! What’s wrong?” Holdin was suddenly wrapping his arms around her, supporting her.

  “I think tomorrow might be a bit late,” Jill whispered, her face turned up to his but her eyes didn’t focus on him.

  “Jesus! Damn! You can’t see me, can you?” One hand cradled the back of her head as it started to loll back even farther.

  “Not so much,” Jill admitted in the breathy gasp. She was breathing in short pants. A fine sheen of sweat covered her pale skin.

  The staggering pain of this moment couldn’t be dealt with. Holdin ignored it. Carefully he scoped her up into his arms. “Put your head on my shoulder and stay with me, Jilly-girl,” he directed firmly. “Pass out and I’ll spank your ass so hard you won’t be able to sit for a week.”

  “Promise?” Jill teased weakly as he strode to the door. Holdin noted her surprising response and shoved it to the back of his mind for examination later. They’d both slipped into a very adult level of teasing they’d never discussed before.

  “Dad!” Holdin bellowed down the hall at the kitchen as he strode toward it. A chair crashed to the floor and Charles Powell regarded them from the doorway.

  One look at them coming toward him was all he needed. “I’ll get the chopper.” Charles turned to exit through the kitchen at a run.

  Drifter stood frozen by the table, his face pale as Holdin entered with Jill.

  Holdin knew exactly what he was feeling. Giving the boy something to do was the only way he’d make it through this. Just as he needed to focus on getting what needed done to remain sane. “Drifter, run up and get your mother’s purse. Any papers she’ll need to be admitted. Don’t bother about anything else. You know what she needs, right?”

  “Mom?” Drifter breathed the words that were half a plea, half a prayer.

  “Right here, hon,” Jill managed. “Thank
you for helping.”

  Drifter bolted from the room.

  “I’ll bring the Navigator to the back door,” Carol stated briskly. “Stay there.” She grabbed keys off the row of hooks by the door and hurried out. As the door closed behind her, they heard the high-pitched scream then muffled roar of a helicopter engine starting.

  “Convenient to have a pilot on hand,” Jill murmured. She could feel his big body tremble every couple seconds. It wasn’t because of her weight or it’d be constant. The attempt to distract him was all she could do for her hero.

  “Stay with me, baby girl. I mean it,” he commanded in a low growl. “Nothing takes you from me this time. Nothing.”