The house was so quiet this time of the night. She heard him swallow, watched the muscles beneath his swarthy skin shudder. An image flashed in her head, unbidden—of her rising and sauntering over to him, taking the glass from his hand, running her tongue along the length of his throat.
The compulsion to taste Pierce’s flesh was so strong she could actually picture herself surrendering to it. Her heart skittered, her blood rushed. Thank heaven above she was weighed down with Benjamin in her arms to the point that she couldn’t easily stand. With a sigh she directed her gaze to the floor.
She heard him return the juice to the shelf and close the refrigerator door. His bare feet came into her line of view.
He knelt beside her, and when she didn’t immediately lift her gaze to his, he tipped up her chin with gentle fingers.
“This is an amazing thing, Amy. An amazing thing.”
His voice stroked her. Tugged at her. But she remained stubbornly silent, refusing to respond to his observation because she wasn’t sure what he was referring to. The desire pumping through her was amazing, but she hadn’t said a word, hadn’t uttered a sound, so how could he know?
When it became clear to him that she was determined not to respond to his remark, he whispered, “Thanks for caring about the boys. You’ve been there for them in a way I never could.”
Pierce reached up then and lightly touched the strand of hair that fell across her cheek, pushing it back from her face.
She couldn’t speak. Didn’t dare.
“Here,” he said to her, “I’ll take him.”
His hands and arms contacted her briefly as he scooped Benjamin against him and then stood. He walked to the kitchen doorway and then turned back to her, a smile curving his mouth.
“I think you should know,” he quipped softly, “you looked quite natural sitting there with Benjamin on your lap.”
Pleasure bolted though her like lightning, shocking and unexpected. Followed close on its heels was a walloping affront.
“Don’t sound so surprised.” She followed him from the room, toward the stairs. “Every woman has maternal instincts, you know.”
He ignored her, silently trudging up the steps.
Yes, every woman had it in her to comfort children who were sad. To protect children who were in trouble. Motherly instincts.
It just so happened that she’d discovered hers while living under Pierce’s roof. However, no matter how soft and mushy those maternal impulses caused her heart to become, she sure didn’t intend to cultivate them.
She had plans, damn it. She’d sacrificed plenty. Sacrificed in ways that Pierce didn’t even know about.
She fully intended to take her turn at life.
“So what was it like?” Pierce had been sitting next to her for a good ten minutes now, and he couldn’t stand the silence a moment longer.
He’d found Amy watching the boys play in the backyard. She’d dug out several old sheets, some heavy twine and a few old boxes, and Jeremiah and Benjamin were busy building a structure while she sat under the shade of the oak tree.
“What was what like?”
“Growing up without a mother,” he supplied.
She didn’t answer right away, only gazed at him with those rich nutmeg eyes of hers. Sudden anxiety welled. Was his question too probing? Too personal?
However, the slight unease he suffered didn’t stem his curiosity. He honestly wanted to know.
“I haven’t offended you, have I?” he asked.
She shook her head, but remained silent.
In the hopes of getting her to cast off her inhibitions of talking about her childhood, he offered, “My mother was such a huge part of my life when I was a boy. It’s hard for me to imagine growing up without her.”
One of her shoulders rose the merest fraction of an inch. “You don’t miss what you don’t know, Pierce.”
“You said your father provided you with some memories.”
This produced a smile on her lovely lips.
“He did,” she said. “He had pictures. Of their wedding. Of my birth. Of special occasions.” She paused, and when she continued, her tone took on a feathery quality. “Dad talked about Mom a lot. She was definitely the love of his life.”
“He never remarried?”
Her long hair fell over her shoulder when she shook her head in answer. “I never really gave it a thought.” One corner of her mouth twitched. “No little girl wants her daddy to remarry. But now that I’m older, I see that my dad never had a chance to even meet another woman. He worked so hard keeping the motel running.”
“I think you worked hard, too,” he pointed out.
“I did. But there’s nothing wrong with that, is there? Hard work keeps a kid out of trouble.”
He chuckled. “True. But there are other ways of that happening. Sports. Clubs. School. How did you like school? What were your favorite courses?”
“Benjamin!” She shifted in the lawn chair as she called out. “Don’t play too rough.”
The glance she tossed Pierce’s way barely skimmed his face before she looked back out at the boys.
“I asked them if they wanted my help,” she said. “But they said Knights of the Round Table didn’t need help building a castle.”
Pierce laughed. “Ah, boys of all ages love King Arthur.”
“Yes, we’ve been reading a children’s version of the story.” She grinned. “I fully expected them to ask me to play a princess in distress.”
“A princess you could pull off without a hitch,” he said. “But what will you do if they ask you to become a dragon?”
Now she chuckled, and Pierce liked the sound of it. Very much.
“Oh, if they caught me on the right day, I could manage that.”
He stretched out his legs in front of him. “I find that hard to believe. I’ve never seen you act the least bit dragonish.”
“Stick around. You’ll soon find out that I’m a woman of many moods.”
Pierce knew he wouldn’t mind witnessing each and every one of them.
Sunlight filtered down through the lush greenery overhead, dappling her tanned and shapely legs. He let his eyes travel down the full length of them.
A couple of minutes passed and he realized she hadn’t answered his question.
“So, you never said,” he began, “how you liked school. Did you find all the subjects a breeze? Or were you more like me? Did you struggle with certain classes?”
“Everyone struggles,” she said. “Don’t you think?”
Then it seemed as if an errant thought popped into her head. She darted a quick look at her watch and blurted, “What are you doing out here, anyway? Shouldn’t you be in your lab? Or in the greenhouse?”
He should. He had plenty of work to keep him busy. Plants that needed tending. Data that needed recording. But something kept pulling at him.
Something, hell. He knew what was tugging at his thoughts.
Amy. She was an extraordinary woman. And he wanted to spend time with her, experiments or no experiments.
The chuckle emanating from him sounded self-conscious. “You’re not getting off that easy,” he said in a valiant attempt to place the focus squarely on her and off himself. “So you found school a struggle, too, huh? Tell me what you remember.”
She wrinkled her nose, and he thought the sight was cute. When she nibbled her bottom lip he got the strange notion that she was suddenly feeling nervous.
“I was pretty lucky—”
Once she started talking, she seemed to relax, and the idea that she was anxious faded from his mind.
“—where school was concerned.” She shifted in her chair. “When my mother died, the whole town rallied around us. My father was approached by a group of Oblate Sisters who ran a primary parochial school. They offered me a free education, and my father gladly accepted. I attended preschool through eighth grade at the school. And it was a wonderful experience.”
The memory made her radiate.
> “That was such a nice thing for the nuns to do.”
She nodded. “It was. Those selfless women made such an impact on my life.”
“Oh?”
Her smile was warm. “They made me read. A lot. The books they put in my hands let me know that there was a huge world out there just waiting to be explored.”
“I see. The sisters influenced your dreams to travel. At a very basic level.”
“Yes, they did. And they continued to encourage me for…years.”
The air took on a prickliness, and it seemed as if Amy couldn’t decide what to focus on as her eyes darted like a butterfly flitting from flower to flower.
“As you can guess,” she said, “my favorite subjects were literature and languages. The French language, to be exact. It’s so lyrical. Lucky for me, the sisters trained in France, so French was a required subject. I suppose your favorite subject was science.”
“Yeah.” He was surprised by the ire in his tone. “For all the good it did me.”
Her expression was proof that his aside surprised her as much as it did him.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked.
He didn’t know how to answer. He couldn’t even say what had spurred the statement, let alone what it might imply.
“Pierce, you didn’t want to become a scientist?” Then it looked as if a light bulb went off in her pretty head. “You’re in the field of plant research because of your father.”
The statement hadn’t contained one iota of accusation, so why did he feel as if she were pointing a finger at him?
Maybe his own self-conscious feelings were doing the pointing.
“You are, aren’t you?” She leaned toward him, resting her elbow on the arm of the lawn chair. Her voice was whispery as she continued, “You were trying to gain his attention.”
Pierce felt as if his face was a bull’s-eye and she’d just jabbed him square in the nose.
He didn’t have to confirm her suspicion. She knew the truth for what it was without his having to utter a single word. Her dark eyes were shadowed with sincere empathy.
“Oh, Pierce, isn’t it amazing?” She sighed. She reclined against the chair back. “The adults from our childhood have such an influence on each of us. The sisters had me vowing to get out of Lebo at any cost in order to see the world they presented to me in books. And your dad influenced your career choice. And it’s quite possible that none of them even knew how they were affecting us.” Her head wobbled slowly from side to side. “I don’t believe the nuns realized a thing.”
“My father never suspected how he influenced me.” Again he marveled at how easy it was to confess his secrets to Amy. How easy it was to express his feelings. “He took no notice of my intellectual interests.”
The sympathy she felt deepened significantly. Her compassion warmed the air between them.
“It’s so upsetting to hear the anger in your voice,” she told him. “Are you so sure your father wasn’t interested? Could it be that he was busy trying to make a living? To provide you and your sister and your mother with all that he could?”
“Oh, he was a great provider, all right. He provided for himself. For his work. He built the original lab. The original greenhouse. But the home he provided for his family was a disgrace. My mother slept in a bedroom that was ten feet square for the full duration of her marriage. My father had a bankful of money, yet he couldn’t part with a penny to give her a home she could be proud of. Hell, he couldn’t see clear to fix the damned leaky roof. He didn’t care, Amy. He just didn’t care about us.”
Dark emotions swirled in his gut. He’d made a mistake in opening this can of worms. But there was something about this beautiful woman sitting next to him under the great white oak…something that loosened a man’s lips. Lowered his guard.
“What bothers me more than anything,” he continued, “was that I actually tried to cultivate a relationship with him.”
“You did?”
“I studied his work. Planned my entire education around his ideas, his ambitions. And just when I’d earned my doctorate, just when I was ready to return home and join my father’s business, what did he do?”
She studied him pensively.
“He suffered a stroke in the lab. He died, Amy. He died and made it impossible for me to ever—” The rest of his thought refused to come as bleak emotions bombarded him, fusing into an ugly conglomeration that overwhelmed him.
Her fingertips slid over his forearm, like warm silk gliding lusciously across his flesh.
“I’m sorry, Pierce.”
He basked in the nearness of her, the solace of her presence. He sighed, his shoulders rounding as his tension eased. He hadn’t realized how uptight he’d become.
She gave his arm a gentle squeeze. “I’m just so sorry. I hate the thought that you spent so many years studying and you end up unhappy with your choice of—”
“No, no,” he interrupted. “I’m not unhappy with my career. I love my work. I’ve always been fascinated with biology. With nature sciences. Plant genetics. It’s just that…well, that…” Confusion had him pausing.
“If you’re satisfied with the way your life turned out,” she murmured, “then I’m afraid I don’t quite understand why you’re so angry with your father.”
“Oh, Amy, I apologize. I never meant to dump this complicated mess on you.”
“It’s okay. Dump away.”
Her small smile was encouraging, and he offered her one in return.
Trolling through his memories, he paused a moment. Making her understand the situation—his mind-set—all those years ago seemed terribly important.
“I was always,” he began tentatively, “very troubled by my father’s indifference.”
She winced, but he knew the description fit in every sense of the word.
“As a kid, I couldn’t help wondering if there was something wrong with me. Some reason that he might feel embarrassed by me. But that conclusion didn’t last long. You see, my father was just as indifferent to my sister and my mother. His work was all that ever mattered to him.”
He inhaled deeply, then released the sigh with force. “I decided that the only way I’d ever reach him was to force him to relate to me. To make him sit up and take notice.”
Chagrin sent heat suffusing his face and neck. When he heard his past verbalized, it made him come off looking…desperate.
“And you did that,” Amy supplied, “by becoming an expert in his field.”
“Why does it sound so wretchedly pathetic?”
“Pierce, there’s nothing wrong with your wanting to connect with your father. Absolutely nothing.”
“Well, those years of keeping my nose to the academic grindstone were all for nothing,” he said. “The moment I was ready to join forces with him—to formulate some kind of relationship with him—he up and died on me.”
“Don’t say it was for nothing. There are so many people in this world who would love the chance t-to—” her voice hitched “—to educate themselves as you have.”
Something snapped and sparked, causing his very skin to bristle. Amy’s passion suddenly consumed her.
“You said you like what you do,” she pointed out.
“I love what I do.”
“So it wasn’t for nothing. It wasn’t.”
He nodded. His larynx felt swollen and sore as he admitted, “You’re right.” When he swallowed, his throat undulated jerkily as suppressed emotion gathered there.
She studied his face. Finally she said, “Could it be, Pierce, that you’re not really angry with your dad? That you’re more, well, sad that things didn’t turn out between the two of you as you’d planned?”
Glancing down at where her hand still rested on his arm, he studied her smooth skin, the tiny hills of her knuckles, the tapered length of her fingers.
Without looking up, he said, “I am sad. I feel as if something in me is missing. A hole, that can never be filled. But I’m angry, too, Amy.
I’m damned livid.” He lifted his gaze to her. “My father had the ability to fill that hole. But he chose not to.”
Moisture glistened in her beautiful brown eyes, and she tightened her grip in silent support. She didn’t speak. Sometimes words simply weren’t necessary.
They sat in the sunshine and watched the boys galloping on imaginary horses around the ragtag castle they had built.
New emotions mingled with the dark ones tumbling inside him. He felt encouraged. Validated. But most of all he felt shored up by Amy. By her compassion and her understanding.
Yes, there was something about this woman, Pierce decided. Something spectacular.
Chapter Eight
Amy came down the stairs after having settled the boys into bed. They’d had a long, full day. She was looking forward to an hour or so of quiet before she called it a night herself.
She entered the kitchen and stopped dead.
Pierce stood by the table, his face tight.
“What is it? What’s wrong?”
“This arrived at the lab late this afternoon by courier.” He held up a sheet of paper. “It’s a letter from the perfumery, and someone neglected to have it translated for me.”
He was upset. She didn’t have to ask if this was a problem for him.
“They know full well that—” he lifted his free hand, palm up “—I don’t speak French.”
Hoping to lighten his mood, she quipped, “The important question is, do you read French?”
The tension reflected in his green eyes eased and he smiled. “That is the important question. And the answer is no. I neither speak nor read French.”
“As your nephews might say, that sure sucks for you.”
“Amy!” Mirth laced his admonishment, clear proof that her audacity both shocked and amused him. “We’ve scolded the boys for using that word.”
Her naughtiness had them both laughing.
“Just how big is this bump in the road?” she asked after a moment.
“Not a huge one. The routine has been that I’m sent an English translation of all correspondence. Guess this one just got by them. I’m sure someone from the head office can fax a translation to me, but I couldn’t get an answer when I called. They’ve evidently gone home for the day, so it’ll have to wait until tomorrow.” He shrugged. “I am curious about the contents of the letter, though. I’ve been waiting for some word from them about the flower scent I’ve been working on.”
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