by Eileen Wilks
Even tinier than Gwen was herself. "That he does," she said, delighted. Her father used to say she was no bigger than a minute. On that scale, this woman was forty seconds, max. "I'm Gwen Van Allen."
"Naomi Bradshaw. I couldn't help noticing that you're trying to get some work done."
"'Trying' is the operative word. Yes, honey, what is it?" she said in response to Zach's urgent tugs on her sweater.
"I gotta go."
"Do you want me to go with you?" At his vehement denial, she bent to undo the top button on his jeans. He could usually manage it when he had time. From the way he was hopping around now, though, time was of the essence. Good thing there was a half-bath just off the kitchen. He'd never make it upstairs.
The second she undid the snap he took off like a bullet for the back door. Gwen glanced at her new acquaintance, slightly wary. She had no idea what, if anything, Ben had told people about her and Zach.
The woman's eyes were bright with curiosity, but she didn't ask any questions. "Maybe you'd like to send your boy over here sometime. Heaven knows I'm set up for kids." She waved at an elaborate jungle gym behind her.
There was a sandbox, too, Gwen saw as she walked up to the chain-link fence. And a swing hanging from the broad limb of one tree. "You sure are. Grandkids?"
"Oh, I've got plenty of them, Lord knows, though only two are here in town. But the equipment's been around longer than they have. Over the years, I've probably baby-sat for half the families in this town." Her eyes twinkled behind the glasses. "I charge for it, I'm afraid. I wasn't offering just because I love kids, though I do."
"Do you keep any other children Zach's age? He's used to spending his mornings at a day care, where he has lots of kids to play with."
"The Murray twins will be here in less than an hour. They're five."
"We may have a deal, then. At the rate I'm going I'll never finish the first title search, much less the rest of the work I'd planned to finish while I'm here."
"Title search? Are you in real estate?"
"A real-estate attorney, for my sins. I hope you don't mind if I ask for references?"
"Not a bit. Simplest would probably be to ask Duncan. I used to watch him and Charlie and little Annie sometimes. Though it's been a while." She grinned. "Scamps, every one of them, but good kids."
Gwen couldn't resist probing for more. "Scamps, huh? What about Ben?"
"He was a handful, too, but I never baby-sat him, which is why I didn't suggest him as a reference. He was too old to need a sitter by the time Johnny and me moved here."
"Is Johnny your husband?"
"He was. He's gone now."
"Oh, I … I'm sorry."
Mrs. Bradshaw chuckled. "Gone, honey, not dead. That man always did have itchy feet. Couldn't see a road without wanting to travel it. That's why I started babysitting – had to do something when he took off. Johnny sent money when he could, but he wasn't what you could call reliable."
"That must have been hard."
"Water under the bridge now. Some folks do seem to be born to wander. Take Ben's and Duncan's father. You couldn't have kept that man in one spot if you'd tied him down. Just like my Johnny, though he did take his wife with him when he could." She chuckled. "That part wasn't like my Johnny."
Gwen hunted for a sensitive response, but all she came up with was a nod and a smile.
Naomi Bradshaw didn't seem to need much encouragement. "I don't want to drag up that whole nature-versus-nurture argument, but I swear wandering is born in some people."
"Well, if there is such a gene, it must have missed me. Except for college, I've lived in the same city all my life."
"A homebody, are you? That would suit Ben."
"Ah—" Gwen felt her cheeks warm "—I don't know that I'm a homebody, exactly. I suppose you're curious about why I'm here. About Zach."
"About to burst with it, but that isn't your problem. Though I'd be much obliged if you'd tell me which of 'em you're here for – Ben or Duncan."
"I'm here for Zach. He's Ben's son."
Her eyebrows shot up. "Is he? Well, now I am surprised, though I suppose I shouldn't be. Ben's as human as any of us, even if he did get a double helping when the good Lord was handing out 'responsible.'"
That he had. Ben was the sort of man she'd always dreamed of finding one day – stable, strong, dependable. It was no wonder it had taken her so long to forgive him for dumping her – something he never had apologized for, had he?
And maybe she hadn't truly forgiven him, either.
"I'd been wondering if the boy was Duncan's," Mrs. Bradshaw confided. "He's in the army, after all."
Amusement eased the frown from Gwen's face. "Those army men are a wild bunch," she agreed.
"It comes of hanging out with no one but other men. They get their priorities mixed up. Not that I mean to say anything against Duncan. He's a good boy, always has been, and a genuine hero, too."
"What do you mean?"
"Haven't they told you anything about it? Well, if that isn't just like a couple of men, keeping all the good stories to themselves! He'll be getting a Purple Heart, I'm sure." Mrs. Bradshaw nodded firmly. "The poor boy was shot all up on his last mission. Very hush-hush stuff, I hear."
"Good God. That's how he was hurt? I knew he was on medical leave, but no one said anything about him having been shot."
"Oh, yes. Not that he or Ben have said one word about it to me, in spite of us being neighbors. Trisha Rayburn told me about it. I watch her son sometimes now that she and Harold have split up. She's been taking night courses, but she'll have to go to Denver soon to finish up."
"Mm," Gwen said, unsure how to respond. She'd wondered what Duncan did all day, other than work out and go to target practice – he was very fond of that big rifle of his. She'd seen him cleaning it in the kitchen. How annoying that the obvious answer hadn't crossed her mind. If he was seeing someone who worked nights, of course he'd be gone a lot during the day. "I guess Trisha and Duncan are good friends."
"I don't know about that. Her daughter, Layla – Layla keeps her little brother most of the time when her mother's in school – she's been seeing Jeff Parker, and Jeff's an old friend of Duncan's. Trisha said Duncan had to have a lot of surgery on his arm. The bone and muscles were all chewed up. They have to give him a Purple Heart for that, don't they? Being wounded in the line of duty."
"I'm not sure how it works. You know, I really think I'd better check on Zach. He's taking a long time."
"Sure thing, honey. Just let me know if you want to bring him over."
Gwen hurried for the house, alarmed by her reaction to learning about Duncan's injury. She felt shaky. It was absurd. She knew Duncan was okay – he went running all the time, didn't he? So he must be recovering just fine. Yet it made her sick to think of him having been shot, his bones and muscles "all chewed up" by bullets. What kind of action had he been in? Was Mrs. Bradshaw right about it being some sort of hush-hush work, or was that embellishment? "Zach?" she said, letting the back door close behind her.
The bathroom door was closed. Automatically she went there first, turned the knob and opened it.
Duncan stood at the toilet. Not, thank God, using it – he had one foot on the closed lid and was rubbing something smelly into his thigh.
His bare, muscular, hairy thigh. He was wearing boxers. And nothing else.
She gaped at him. There was no other word for it. Sweat gleamed on the muscles of his neck and shoulders and chest, and she stood there and gaped at him as if he'd stripped on stage and invited her to stare at his body.
Lord help her, what a body he had. The long, red welt of a scar on his biceps didn't lessen the impact one bit.
"I'm sorry," she gasped much too late. "I didn't think, I was looking for Zach. You might try vitamin E for the scar," she added as her face went hot. Then she fled, leaving the door standing open behind her.
* * *
"I'm not sure this was a good idea," Duncan said from the doorway
two hours later. "Zach's having a great time, but I think he and the twins are planning a military coup in Mrs. Bradshaw's kitchen."
Gwen glanced up from her laptop, her eyes wide and wary as a startled doe's. Her smile didn't enter those worried eyes one bit. "Thanks for taking him over there."
"I figured I'd better. I hadn't been to visit Mrs. Bradshaw since the nurses persuaded the doctors I should make my brother's life miserable while I'm recovering, instead of theirs. She had a lot of probing to do."
Humor broke through her guard in a chuckle. "I take it you're a lousy patient. Zach seemed to be enjoying himself when you left?"
"Judging by the decibel level, he and the twins were having a blast. If it was anyone but Mrs. Bradshaw keeping tabs on those three, I'd be worried."
"She seems like a very nice woman. If you'll excuse me," she said, closing her laptop, "I need to go get—"
"Uh-uh." Duncan shook his head. "I warn you. If you leap up from that couch and run out of the room on yet another made-up errand, I'm coming after you."
She froze halfway to her feet, then eased back down. "Not going to let me wallow in embarrassment, are you."
"Nope." Duncan sauntered into the living room, showing her with every relaxed inch of his body that they were going to treat this lightly. "Look, it was more my fault than yours. I should have locked the door. I'm out of the habit, but that's no excuse. I had a muscle cramp after my run and went straight for the medicine cabinet without stopping to think."
"I really was expecting to find Zach."
"So you've mentioned." Three times now – just before she bolted, obliquely when he and she and Zach sat down to lunch and again just now. "I believe you. Otherwise I'd suspect you desperately wanted a peek at my body. In which case, I'd have to assume you were disappointed, judging by the way you raced off. And my ego refuses to buy that."
"Well." Her smile flickered and her cheeks turned pink. "To think I'd be grateful for the male ego. I didn't want you to think he scar upset me. I've been worrying about that," she admitted, "after the way I blurted out advice about vitamin E."
He knew why she was upset, but neither of them was going to mention that. He could only be grateful for the way his leg had hidden his reaction to having her gaze travel over him so intently. "Did you use vitamin E after your surgery?" he asked, coming over to sit casually beside her. See, we can both handle this.
"Yes, I did." She looked faintly surprised. "I think it helped, too. Of course the scar from a surgical incision is likely to be a lot neater than one from a … a bullet wound."
"I've got both – a scar from the original damage done by the bullet, and the one the surgeon made when she went in to fix things."
She ducked her head. "I don't like to think about you being shot."
"Neither do I." That was the understatement of the decade. He didn't like thinking about the reason for her scar, either. But he had a feeling she needed to talk about it, and people were usually comfortable giving advice. "So how much vitamin E should I take?"
"Oh, you don't take it. Not for this. You apply it topically, right on the incision."
She told him about vitamin E and how you shouldn't worry about how the scars looked now – they would fade in time. She talked about keeping his skin supple, and the possibility of keloid scars, the tendency to which was an inherited trait.
He listened. And he watched her.
Looking was all he could do, but there was pleasure in it. She darkened her eyebrows and lashes – not obviously, but they must be as pale as her hair naturally. He wondered what she looked like when she awoke in the morning with her eyes all naked and sleepy.
And yanked his thoughts back before his imagination could seize that image.
Her mouth was untinted and generous. The smooth, dense cream of her skin curved over cheeks soft and round as a child's – one reason it was easy to misjudge her age. Not that he knew what that was, exactly. Ben hadn't been sure. But the fine lines around her eyes made him think she must be in her late twenties.
Smile lines. She smiled easily and often, but her smiles weren't all equal. The one she flashed him now was self-conscious. "I'm blithering on, aren't I? I'm sure your doctor told you how to take care of the incision."
"She told me to keep it clean and dry. I suspect army doctors aren't that concerned about scarring."
"Probably because you rough, tough soldiers don't worry about scars. Yours is a sort of badge of honor, isn't it?"
God, no. He couldn't keep from stiffening. "A scar speaks of survival. If that makes it a badge of honor, yours certainly qualifies."
"That's how I ought to look at it, I guess. But let's face it – people consider a scar on a man interesting, not disfiguring. You can still take your shirt off at the beach and women will flock around."
If she took her shirt off anytime, anywhere, men would definitely flock around. He didn't dare point that out when he was trying so hard not to think about her with her shirt off. "Is it 'people' who consider your scar disfiguring, or is it you?"
She sighed. "Me, I suppose, since no one else has seen it, except for my doctor. Uh-oh." She rolled her eyes. "That's more information than you needed."
His laugh surprised him, rolling right up from his belly before he knew it was coming. Gwen turned beet-red, then giggled.
* * *
Chapter 7
«^»
The first thing Ben heard when he walked in the door was Duncan's laugh. He stopped. It had been way too long since he'd heard his brother laugh out loud that way.
He heard Gwen giggle and he smiled, pleased. Ben was pretty sure Duncan had been avoiding her, and he knew why. Duncan was hung up on the fact that his big brother had had a one-night stand, and he wasn't giving Gwen a fair shake. It wasn't like him to be judgmental, but a lot of things about Ben's little brother weren't normal right now.
Sounded as if they were moving in the right direction now, though. Ben shifted the shopping bag to his other hand and headed for the living room.
Gwen's face was a bright, embarrassed red, and her eyes were lit with mirth. Duncan sat beside her on the couch, half-turned so that he faced her, not the doorway.
"Is this reprobate giving you a hard time?" Ben demanded, delighted.
Duncan turned. His face was strangely blank, as if he hadn't decided what to put there. Gwen smiled, her color fading to a pretty glow. "I managed to put my foot in my mouth all by myself. And no, I'm not going to tell you what I said. I've embarrassed myself sufficiently for one day."
"I wasn't expecting you for a couple hours," Duncan said. "You were heading out to the Morrow site, weren't you?"
"The siding hadn't been delivered, so I spent some time in the office instead, tracking down the problem. Where's Zach?" he asked, glancing around. In only five days he'd gotten spoiled. The boy usually made straight for him the moment he came home. "Don't tell me he ran out of energy and is taking a nap."
"No, he's playing next door. Is that for him?" She nodded at the bag in his hand.
Since the bag had the logo of a popular toy store on it, he knew what she was really asking. She'd warned him not to spend the entire two weeks buying things for Zach. "It's just a puzzle. You said he liked puzzles."
"He'll be tickled." Gwen closed her laptop, which was sitting on the arm of the couch, and stood. "I'll go get him, although I warn you – you're in for some stiff competition. Mrs. Bradshaw has five-year-old twin boys at her place."
Ben lost his smile. "What's he doing at Mrs. Bradshaw's?"
"Having a blast, from what Duncan tells me."
"I don't see why you took him over there."
Duncan raised his eyebrows. "So he could play with the twins and Gwen could get some work done. What's bugging you, Ben?"
Ben scowled at his brother, who ought to know enough to stay out of this. "Maybe she has to use sitters when she's in Florida, but not here. If you had to work," he said, switching back to Gwen, "Duncan could have kept an eye on Zach
until I got here."
"Duncan isn't at your disposal. More to the point, he isn't four or five years old. Zach needs time with kids his age."
"I don't want him staying with a sitter while he's here."
"You don't want?" She tossed her hands in the air. "Sure. Okay. I don't know how we limped along without you making these decisions for us until now. If that's how you want things, be home by noon every day to take over so I can get some work done, too. And be sure to explain to Zach why he can't play with the twins anymore."
"I've cleared as much time as I can. I can't just dump everything and take off."
"You think I can? You think practicing law is a hobby for me?"
"I don't know why you're practicing law at all! You don't need to work. With your money—"
"Is that the only reason you work? For the money you can make?" She stepped closer, her face tight with anger. "If you think Zach needs a stay-at-home parent full-time, sell your business and move to Florida. I'll give you my money – the money I inherited, at least, which is the part that sticks in your craw, isn't it? Then you can afford to take care of Zach while I play at being an attorney."
He was so mad he could barely pull words together. "It will be a cold day in hell before I live off a woman!"
"Ben." Duncan stood. "You might want to shut up now."
He rounded on his brother. "And you might want to butt out."
"You aren't angry because Gwen left Zach with a sitter. You're angry because he's with Mrs. Bradshaw – who is going to tell everyone about the son you didn't know you had."
"That's bullshit. I'm proud of Zach."
"That's right. It isn't Zach you're ashamed of."
Ben opened his mouth to rip apart his brother's stupid ideas – and shut it again as a sick feeling welled up inside him. He took a few steps away, running his hand over his hair. Was it getting thinner on top? "I've never cared what people think."
And that was true, dammit. So why did he feel so rotten?
Duncan nodded. "True. You've always known what was right and lived your life accordingly, and to hell with what anyone else thought. I don't know what went wrong with you and Gwen, but I know you. I'll bet that when you decided not to see her again, you were sure it was the right thing to do." He paused, letting a brief silence weight his next words. "You're not sure anymore. That's what's eating you."