by Beth Andrews
Diane fixed Aidan with a look guaranteed to make most men feel as if they were ten years old again. “When I need you to help explain what I mean,” she said, her slight Southern accent thickening, “I’ll ask.”
Aidan stabbed a bean. “Just trying to help.”
Brady bit into his chicken, determined not to let the topic ruin his favorite meal.
“Your father always dreamt of having his sons work at the Diamond Dust with him,” Diane said.
And his food now tasted like sawdust.
“Don’t waste your time,” Aidan told their mother. “The only reason he’s working here in the first place is because I forced him into it.”
“I never pretended otherwise,” Brady said mildly.
“But it doesn’t have to be that way,” Diane said. “Won’t you at least consider it?”
He couldn’t. He’d already lost Liz and any chance he’d had of becoming a member of the Virginia State Police. If he stayed in Jewell, if he worked at the Diamond Dust, it’d be like admitting he accepted the way his life had turned out.
He wiped his fingers then his mouth on a cloth napkin. “I never planned on working here. Dad knew that.”
“Yes, and we fully supported your decision to join the military, but things are different now. You need to start thinking of your future.”
“I am,” he said. Or he would. Soon.
“Well, then, how are you going to support yourself? And what about Jane and the baby?”
“What about them?”
She seemed taken aback. “I thought you and she were…on friendlier terms.”
The memory of how J.C. had felt in his arms, of how she tasted, hit him with great force. “Nothing’s changed.”
Except that he continued to dream about her. Had kissed her.
Even after everything he’d done, she still let him sit at her kitchen table the other night while she worked on her chocolates. She’d kept up a steady stream of chatter and hadn’t seemed to mind when he’d lapsed into silence.
“Everyone in town’s talking about how you spent an entire day at the obstetrician’s office so you could see her,” Aidan said, laying his fork on his empty plate.
Brady rolled his shoulders. Damn small-town gossip, he thought for the nth time. “It wasn’t like that.”
His brother smirked. “What was it like, then?”
“I think it’s wonderful that you and Jane are working out your differences,” Diane said, pausing to eat a bite of mashed potatoes. “Especially as I’d like to have some sort of relationship with my first grandchild. You wouldn’t believe the horror stories I’ve heard about grandparents being refused the right to even visit with their grandchildren after a nasty divorce. In some cases where the parents were never married, the mothers disappear with the child. Can you imagine?”
Imagine? He’d been trying not to think about it ever since J.C.’s admission that she wasn’t sure she wanted to keep their son.
And he’d told her she had his full support because she’d been so upset, he’d wanted to let her know he didn’t judge her. And because… He swallowed the nausea rising in his throat. Because if she did decide to give the baby up for adoption, it’d let him off the hook.
She’d brought up their families and wondered how her decision would affect them. He hadn’t wanted to think about it. Hadn’t wanted to care.
“J.C. would never keep the baby away from you,” he said.
Diane set her water down. “When relationships go bad, some people change.”
“Not her.”
“I’m sure you’re right.” Diane cut her chicken into tiny pieces before setting her knife down. “After all, it was your idea to have her sell those chocolates in the gift store. Pam said J.C.’s sales yesterday were up fifteen percent from last week.”
Figuring they both needed some space after Friday night, he’d stayed far away from the gift shop yesterday. “Good.” He looked over to find Aidan regarding him steadily. “What?” Brady growled.
“I find it interesting how well you seem to have gotten to know Jane.”
“I was with her sister for twelve years,” he pointed out. “I’ve always known J.C.”
He tapped his fist against his thigh. Just because he’d dreamt of J.C., kissed her, and wanted to take her to bed, didn’t change what’d been in his heart since he was sixteen years old.
He would always love Liz.
J.C. WAS FINISHING UP with one of her favorite customers late Wednesday morning when Liz walked into the lobby of Hampton Bank and Trust Company.
“Going to do some Christmas shopping?” she asked Mr. Carns as Liz waited in line at the end of the roped-off area.
Mr. Carns, an elderly gentleman with thinning silver hair and an easy grin, slid his money into a bank envelope. “My wife handles all the gift buying. She leaves me in charge of making sure her wallet’s always full of money.” He winked.
J.C. smiled. “She’s a lucky woman.”
“That’s what I keep telling her.” Hitting the counter with the flat of his hand, he straightened. “If I don’t see you before, you have a merry Christmas.”
“You, too, Mr. Carns.”
As usual for the middle of the week, business was light. “Silver Bells” played in the background and in between each teller’s window hung a swag of evergreen boughs tied with a red velvet ribbon. Behind her, Mary Jo Hanold spoke to a customer using the drive-up window. Two windows down in the lobby, Shirley Dodge counted out a deposit from one of the local grocery stores.
“Hello, J.C.,” Liz said, stepping up to the window with obvious reluctance.
“It’s so good to see you. I’ve tried calling but—”
“I’d like to cash this.” She set down a personal check while seemingly engrossed in watching the hands of the large clock on the wall above the door turn. “Large bills are fine.”
J.C. narrowed her eyes. “Yes, ma’am.”
Other than the slight stiffening of her shoulders, Liz gave no indication she even heard J.C.
“What do you want from me?” J.C. asked as she processed the transaction on her computer. “Blood?”
“All I want is to cash a check.”
“Fine,” J.C. said. She was so very tired of being the only one trying to make things right between them.
She quickly counted out the cash, recounted it out loud for her sister’s benefit and then tapped it into a neat pile. “Next time,” she said, sliding the money across the counter, “try one of our convenient ATM locations.”
Liz put the money into her wallet. “Grandma Rose mentioned Brady spent quite a bit of time at your apartment Friday night.”
“Grandma Rose,” J.C. said vehemently, “has a big mouth.”
“So it’s true?”
J.C. straightened a stack of withdrawal slips. “He stopped by.”
“Are you…are you two…together?”
Heat washed over her as she remembered how he’d kissed her, as if he could never get enough of her. Held her breast, his voice scraping along her nerve endings when he’d said he wanted her. How…relieved he’d been when she’d told him he could stay through the worst of the storms.
“No.” She picked up the withdrawal slips and fanned herself. “Of course not.”
When Liz didn’t respond, J.C. glanced up, shocked to see her sister fighting tears. Liz must be close to her breaking point to show that much weakness in the middle of the bank lobby.
J.C. set up her Next Window Please sign.
“Don’t move,” she ordered and then told Mary Jo she was taking a five-minute break.
By the time J.C. had walked out from behind the teller station, Liz’s eyes were dry. But she still let J.C. lead her through the lobby to the corner office they used to open new accounts.
J.C. flipped on the light and shut the door. “What is it?” she asked, taking Liz’s hand. “What’s wrong?”
Liz linked her fingers with J.C.’s. “Carter and I…” She cleared her throat. “We’re having
some…problems.”
“What do you mean by problems?”
“He thinks I have…feelings…repressed feelings…for Brady.”
Her mouth went dry. “Do you?”
“If you mean do I still care about Brady, about what happens to him, then yes.” She tugged her hand free and began to pace. “After all our time together, how could I not? But Carter refuses to believe it’s not more than that. He wants us to go to marriage counseling,” Liz said, as if her husband had suggested they join a wife-swapping club.
The idea of admitting her marriage was in trouble must be devastating.
“Maybe counseling’s not such a bad idea,” J.C. offered.
“It’s a horrible idea. We don’t need it. Where would we attend sessions anyway? I could never face our colleagues after discussing our most intimate issues with one of them.” Crossing her arms, Liz shook her head. “No. We don’t need therapy. We’ll get through this on our own. But I need you to do something for me.”
The hair at the back of her neck stood on end. “I’ll do whatever I can—”
“Stay away from Brady.”
She licked her lips. Clasped her hands in front of her. “I told you, we’re not together.”
“But you’ve been spending time with him and I…I miss you.” Liz’s expression softened. “So much. But things can’t go back to the way they were between us if…if Brady’s in your life. And you said yourself that he didn’t want any part of the baby, right?”
She remembered Brady’s expression when he’d seen the baby’s ultrasound—small part wonder, huge part fear. “Right, but—”
“I’m not just asking this for me. I’m asking for Carter, so he doesn’t have to risk coming face-to-face with my ex when we see you. And I’m asking for you, too.”
“Me?”
“You may not believe this, but I don’t want to see you get hurt.”
Brady’s not the right guy for you. You deserve someone who’ll put you first.
Someone who hadn’t loved her sister first.
“Okay,” J.C. managed to say through the tightness of her throat. “I won’t see him anymore.”
Liz shut her eyes briefly. “Thank you.”
And as her sister enveloped her in a warm hug, J.C. assured herself she’d made the right decision. She’d give Brady up.
As soon as she figured out how to give up a man who was never really hers in the first place.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“BRADY,” J.C. SAID, when she opened the door Friday evening. “What do you want?”
He raised his eyebrows and she forced herself not to wince. Well, he couldn’t show up at her doorstep out of the blue whenever he liked. It wasn’t fair to her. And having him standing on her doorstep, clean shaven with his recently cut hair ruffling in the breeze, didn’t make keeping her promise to her sister any easier.
“There’s a ten-foot Scotch pine strapped to the roof of your car,” he said.
She widened her eyes. “It must’ve fallen onto my car when I drove home from work. Funny how I never noticed.”
His eyes narrowed to slits. “How did you think you were going to get it off the car, let alone up the stairs, by yourself?”
“I didn’t plan that far ahead.” Stopping by the Christmas tree lot on the way home had been an impulse. It had seemed like such a good idea, spending Friday night decorating her tree. With her luck, it’d still be on her car Monday morning. “Is that why you stopped by? To tell me about my own Christmas tree?”
He studied her in that intense way of his that made her blush. “Did I do something between last week and today to piss you off?”
“You haven’t even spoken to me since then. What could you have done?”
That sounded as if she’d expected him to call. She grimaced.
“So there’s no reason for you to not invite me in,” he said.
She lightly hit the dangling silver earring in her left ear with her fingertip, set it swinging. “Actually, there is. A reason.”
“Should I guess?” he asked when she remained silent.
“I…” She swallowed. “I just got home,” she said on a rush. “I haven’t even changed yet.”
His gaze skimmed over her black pants. Lingered on her shiny burgundy top before meeting her eyes. “I don’t mind.”
Her mouth dried and she stepped behind the door, closing it slightly, showing only her face through the small opening.
“Since I’m not going to see the other side of your door any time soon, you might as well take this now,” he said, holding out a plastic shopping bag.
She eyed it suspiciously. “What is it?”
He pulled a large, plain cardboard box out of the bag. “Do you want it or not?”
She took it, flipped it over then back again. Letting go of the door, she lifted the lid. And blinked down at a pair of purple and white polka-dot flip-flops.
The tips of Brady’s ears were red. “They were out of pink,” he said almost defiantly.
“That’s okay,” she whispered. “I love purple.”
He scowled. “I wasn’t sure of your size.”
“They’re fine. They’re perfect,” she said. “Thank you.”
He inclined his head, the barest of nods. “Good night.”
“Wait.” She stepped onto the landing, pulling the door closed in case Daisy made a run for it. “Don’t you want to come in?”
“Do you want me to come in?” he asked cautiously.
She clutched the box, holding it over her racing heart. “Yeah, I do.”
He gestured for her to go ahead of him and she hurried inside. Before she changed her mind.
She kicked off her shoes. “Do you want a soda?” she asked, setting the box on top of her coffee table before making her way toward the kitchen. “I think I have regular—”
“How are you going to get the tree up here?”
She placed a hand over the fluttering in her stomach. “I’ll call my dad tomorrow.”
He glared at the sheet and tree stand under the window. “I can’t bring the tree up.”
“I didn’t ask you to.” And then she realized what he meant. What bothered him. “Is this about your knee? Because even if I wasn’t pregnant, I couldn’t drag that tree up all those stairs, either.”
He tossed his jacket onto the sofa. “That’s different.”
“If that isn’t one of the finest examples of the male ego at work, I don’t know what is.”
“It’s not ego. Not all ego. More like I hate not being able to do all the things I used to.”
“So you can’t haul a large evergreen up a flight of stairs. At least you can still climb them,” she said, sick to death of him focusing on what he couldn’t do. What he didn’t have, such as Liz. “You’re able to get out of bed by yourself. You can work at a job—even if it’s not the one you’d always planned on. You’re surrounded by people who care about you. Who are more than willing to give you a hand when you need one. And if all of those reasons weren’t enough for you to thank God each and every day,” she said, her face hot, her voice breaking, “I’d think the fact that you’re alive would be.”
The room seemed too quiet after her outburst. All she could hear was the sound of her own ragged breathing. Her pulse kicked up as Brady closed the distance between them, the surprise on his face giving way to admiration.
He stopped a few inches from her. Close enough she could feel his body heat, smell the fresh winter air clinging to his clothes. “You’re right. Those things weren’t enough for me. I’m not sure they’ll ever be.” He tucked one of her stray curls behind her ear, his fingertip grazing her neck. “But you’re wrong, too. Because right now, I can honestly say I’m very grateful to be alive.”
“DID YOU FIND SOMETHING to drink?” J.C. asked as she came back out into the living room ten minutes later. After her impassioned speech and his own admission, she’d bolted with the excuse of changing out of her work clothes.
Sitting on the s
ofa, her cat curled up next to him, Brady held up his can of soda. He watched as J.C. walked past him. She’d pulled her hair back and had on the same clinging black pants she’d worn last week when she fell on the steps and a loose T-shirt the color of peaches.
As she disappeared into the kitchen, his fingers tightened on the can. He took a long swallow. “You hungry?” he called.
She came back into the room eating from a bag of pretzels. “What’d you say?”
He grinned. “I asked if you were hungry.”
She sat on the other end of the couch. “Nowadays that’s pretty much a yes no matter when you ask me.”
“We could order some dinner,” he said casually. “Maybe get some Chinese?”
“Sure,” she said after a long moment, as if having takeout with him was some sort of momentous decision. “That’d be nice.” Handing him the bag of pretzels, she stood. “Let me grab the take-out menu for The Golden Dragon.”
“I don’t need it. I’ll have a number three and a number fifteen.”
“You have the menu for the Chinese restaurant memorized?”
The cat stood and stretched, stepped onto Brady’s lap and lay down again. “Just the dishes I like.”
She rubbed the side of her stomach. “I take it you don’t cook.”
“Not if I can help it.”
“Me, either. Between my parents, Grandma Rose and Liz and Carter, I—” She blushed, acting as guilty as if she’d admitted to hiding Al-Qaeda operatives under her bed. “I’ll go order dinner,” she said before rushing out of the room. Again.
He didn’t call her back. Not when he had no idea what to say to her. He knew what he should say—that J.C. could go ahead and talk about her sister all she wanted. That Liz was a part of her life and as such, she shouldn’t worry about bringing her up in an innocent conversation.
Leaning his head back against the couch, he stared at the ceiling. Yeah, he should say all of that. But he’d be lying. He didn’t want to hear anything about Liz. Didn’t want to be reminded of her existence. Not when he’d gotten to the point where he could go all day without once thinking about her.