"Really." His face was expressionless.
Out of the corner of her eye, Marian saw Isaiah stroll out of the barn and across the yard toward them.
She rushed into speech. "I'm sorry, I should have warned you, but I just didn't think. My wire pen at home has a top, so she couldn't get out, but mostly she's like a dog. I mean, she'll follow you around..." Her speech trailed off. "I'm sorry," she repeated. "I can't expect you to build a special pen. I'll make some other arrangement for her."
"Don't be ridiculous," John said. "If I can't figure out how to keep one little goat..."
"You mean, one overweight, bad-tempered..."
"But not useless." John's rare grin was devastatingly wicked. "Remember those blackberries. Maybe we can keep her occupied."
Marian glanced toward Isaiah, who had stopped one step down, but towered over her anyway. She still couldn't tell what he was thinking, but he reached out an enormous hand and scratched the wiry top of Esmerelda's head.
"I don't mind goats," he said.
The traces of that grin still lingered on John's face. "I told you," he murmured. "If it has four feet…”
"Thank you," Marian said helplessly, looking from one man to the other. "Thank you both."
"No problem," John said. "Just promise you'll come and visit her often."
She knew in her heart how dangerous too many visits here would be. But what else could she do?
"I promise."
"Good," he said, very softly, for her ears alone, before adding in a normal voice, "And now, how about if you help me get this damn goat in the barn?"
CHAPTER 6
Bad news always came by a phone call. Numb, Marian slowly hung up the receiver and looked around at her living room, bare but for the furniture. Bookshelves were empty, even lamps packed carefully in boxes.
All dressed up and nowhere to go, she thought, verging on hysteria. All dressed up and she had to go.
Oh, God, what was she going to do?
From her bedroom she could hear thumps. The twins were jumping on her mattress, which lay on the floor. She didn't care. Anything to keep them content.
What could she do? Go to a motel? She'd be broke in a week. And what about her furniture, the mountains of boxes? What about the animals?
Panic rose in her throat like bile, choking her. She seemed to see through a haze, as though her body fought to distance her from unbearable reality.
She wanted to cry or scream or faint, but the sound of Anna's giggle anchored her. What was she going to do?
Dear Lord, she thought suddenly. John McRae. He was coming to help her move! She had to stop him. With astonishment she saw that her hand was shaking when she dialed the telephone. It rang, once, twice, five times. At last she hung up. She had barely done so when she heard the growl of an engine in the driveway.
The twins tore past her. "Emma's here, Emma's here!" they chanted. In front of the door they bounced like eager puppies until Marian opened it for them. Emma was already bounding up the steps, while John was just climbing out of his pickup, which pulled a big, four-horse trailer. Isaiah, Marian saw with surprise, was just slamming the passenger-side door.
"Wow, is your house all empty?" Emma demanded.
Marian didn't answer. She just stood on the porch and watched John come toward her across the grass with those long strides of his. Emma wasn't quite real, just a small face turned up to her, a voice that she couldn't quite decipher. She was frozen, that sickening terror holding her in a vise.
What was she going to do?
Since the day Mark had walked out the front door with his suitcase, she had lived on the edge, always knowing disaster was hungrily waiting in the wings. If her old car broke down, her washing machine gave up the ghost, one of the children became seriously ill... Anything. Anything at all could bring her fragile world down. She had nowhere to turn, no reserves. If only Mark had contributed something in child support!
But for three years now she had managed, and become overconfident. The worst was past, she'd told herself, the kids would be in school in only a couple of years and then she could find a job. Only at night, when the house had fallen silent, did her confidence falter. Nearly every night her last thought before sleeping was a prayer: Let me hold on until then. Please, let me hold on. This time, for whatever cruel reason, her prayer had not been granted.
"Marian?" John stood before her, his expression puzzled and anxious. She wondered if he had been talking for a long time. Had she tuned him out, too? She was distantly aware of the children who looked anxiously at her, and of huge, stolid Isaiah, who waited at the bottom of the porch steps.
"I'm sorry," she said, her voice amazingly calm. "I tried to call you."
"Call me? Marian, what's wrong?"
"My new landlady phoned to tell me that the people who've been living in the house I rented haven't moved out. They're months late with their rent. She says she's going to evict them, but it will take..." With horror, Marian wasn't sure she could finish. In a rush, she did, "take weeks, or even months. I don't have anywhere to move to." With that, humiliatingly, she burst into tears.
John didn't even hesitate. His long arms wrapped around her and pulled her tightly against him. Marian laid her head on his chest and cried with great wracking sobs. She cried out of today's fear and yesterday's loneliness. She cried for all the weeks and years she hadn't let herself. She cried until John's shirt was sodden and her cheeks burned and her chest hurt. And then she tried to pull away.
He didn't let her go. Instead, he produced a tissue from heaven knows where and let her blow her nose. When she was done, he bent his head to kiss her wet cheek and then her mouth with tenderness so all-encompassing she wanted to cry again, except that she had no tears left. But this time when she stiffened, he released her.
"Did that help?" he said softly. "Are you ready to think about what we're going to do?"
We? Did he intend to repeat his offer? With a surge of renewed panic, Marian wondered what she would do if he didn't. But if he did, was her independence all she had to lose? Or was she part of the price?
Drained, she said, "I...I don't know. I'm going to wash my face."
She gave the twins a quick, reassuring hug on the way, then hurried into the house. Safely locked in the bathroom, Marian stared at herself in the small mirror over the sink. Incredibly, she wanted to laugh. Or maybe cry again.
Sexual desire had to have been the last thing on John's mind. A face to launch a thousand ships, or even a dream or two, this was not. It was splotched, puffy, wet. Her eyelashes stuck together in clumps and her eyes were red. Wisps of hair had pulled loose from her braid and clung to her forehead and cheeks.
The dreams were hers, not his. Thank God he couldn't have guessed them.
Marian slowly brushed her hair and rebraided it, then splashed cold water on her cheeks. Face buried in a towel, she wondered. Would taking what he offered be so bad?
Wasn't it logical, sensible? She would be a housekeeper and mother in return for a taste of security and comfort. A better life for her children in return for a small piece of her heart.
No promises this time. Just common sense.
Mark had made promises. He had told her he loved her, but his love had meant nothing. Love, the real thing, was what she felt for Jesse and Anna: tenderness, impatience, fierce protectiveness, laughs, kisses, grumpiness, and the secret knowledge that she would die for either of her children. That was love. What men and women promised each other had more to do with passion and loneliness than it did with forever. When the passion wore out, so did forever. An empty closet and savings account and a note on the kitchen table. No, Marian wanted nothing to do with that kind of love.
She hadn't wanted anything less, either, but was afraid that this time she had no choice. Paler, composed, she reluctantly left her sanctuary.
Isaiah was nowhere to be seen. Nowhere near as tactful, John was in the kitchen, a solid, relentless presence that humiliated her even as she was grate
ful for it. Emma was stuck up against him, a limpet to her father's strength. The instant Marian appeared, the twins rushed to her, returning her embrace with all the fervor of children who hadn't known their mother could cry.
Marian didn't meet John's eyes. "Emma," she said, "would you take Anna and Jesse into the bedroom to play? I need to talk to your father."
"But there's no toys."
"My mattress is on the floor. You can jump on it if you want."
"Hey, cool." Emma immediately became animated. "I take gymnastics," she announced. "I can even do a somersault. You want me to teach you?"
Jesse tried to cling, but Marian gently disengaged him and gave his small bottom a push. At last all three disappeared. When Marian made herself look at John, he smiled ruefully.
"I would have liked to make you a cup of tea, but..." His shrug was a stark reminder of the empty kitchen.
"That's okay. I'm fine. Really." She took a deep breath. "John, I'm..."
"Sorry. I know." He wasn't smiling anymore. "Damn it, Marian, if you apologize to me one more time..."
She turned her back on him, staring out the window at the old rusting swing set that would go under the bulldozer with her house. "I hate needing help," she said, almost inaudibly.
"Why?"
She hardly knew the answer. It had to do with a distant relationship with her father, with never having had anybody to lean on, except Mark. It had to do with...
Marian finished her thought aloud. "After my husband walked out, I swore I'd make it without him. I swore I'd do it myself."
"But you don't have to." John was just behind her. She could feel the force of his personality, hear the determination in his voice. "My offer is still open. You and the kids are coming home with us. If you don't want to stay, that's up to you. But today I won't take no for an answer."
She didn't turn to look at him. Instead, she continued to gaze out the window, seeing past and present together; empty swing set, laughing children, a square of sand with a ruined castle, patient Snowball gone, fat, useless Esmerelda, late-season apples she wouldn't be here to pick, even a trace of Mark's presence. They had made love once out there in the grass, smelling the lilac and the apple blossoms.
But her bitterness was locked away. She sounded only a little sad when she said, "I couldn't say no even if I wanted to, could I?"
*****
"Would you pass the jam?"
Marian passed it. Just as she had imagined he would, John tilted his glasses down and smiled at her over them. Smiled with unmistakable...satisfaction. That was it. He'd gotten his way. She was in his bailiwick, his turf, his... How did the sports page always describe it? Marian saw it like a headline. John had the home field advantage. She knew it, he knew it, and it scared her.
That was the precise moment when she was sure she couldn't stay. It might be the logical, sensible thing to do, but... She didn't feel logical and sensible. She only knew that she couldn't bear sitting here, morning after morning, passing the jam, sipping coffee with him, listening as he commented over the newspaper.
He had started breakfast more formally than that, and Marian had sat on the other side of the table feeling like the guest she was.
Most of her possessions had been unloaded in John's garage, where they sat forlornly. She and the twins were ensconced in the two side-by-side guest bedrooms, though Anna and Jesse had actually slept in the queen-size bed with Marian. Emotionally exhausted, she had gone to bed early and slept like the dead, waking to find sunlight streaming across the gleaming wood floor and the twins gone. A distant giggle reassured her and a shower resuscitated her enough to shuffle downstairs in search of her children, following the smell of bacon and eggs. When she stepped into the kitchen, her first realization was that the twins were happily playing with Emma; her next was that John, thank God, wasn't wearing a bathrobe. She didn't think she could handle that. Though she couldn't help wondering how muscular his long legs were, whether they were hairy or sleek. And then there were the scars on his knees...
But he wore jeans, a sloppy sweatshirt, and brown slippers. Her gaze shied away from the slippers. She'd only seen two men in her entire life wearing slippers. They were cozy, homey, comfortable. She didn't feel comfortable with John McRae.
Emma chattered at the breakfast table, filling the silence. Anna and Jesse each sat on piles of books, since the booster seats were heaven only knew where. They ate shyly, whispering small responses to Emma's enthusiasm.
John listened to his daughter, interjected an occasional remark, dished up more scrambled eggs for Anna, and smiled at Marian, who realized guiltily that she should be cooking breakfast.
Finally she burst out, "Don't feel like you have to entertain us. I mean, if you like to read the newspaper or something like that..."
He tilted an eyebrow. "Was I entertaining you?"
"I just don't want to get in your way..."
John regarded her for a long, thoughtful moment, his clear gray eyes disconcertingly perceptive. Then he said, "I do usually read the paper over breakfast. Do you want the comics first?"
"Uh…sure. Why not?"
John stood. "You done, hon?" he asked his daughter. "How about you, Jesse?"
"Can we go play?" Emma asked.
"Anna hasn't quite finished. Besides, kiddo, you have to hop on the school bus in exactly..." He glanced at his watch, "Ten minutes."
"Can't I stay home?" she pleaded as he carried dirty dishes over to the kitchen sink.
"Nope." Back at the table, he bent to kiss the top of her head. "They'll still be here when you get home."
Her lower lip stuck out. "Oh, pooh!"
John grinned, unfolded the paper and handed half of it to Marian, who was staring down at her eggs and bacon and wondering how much she would have to eat before she could gracefully excuse herself.
Excuse herself to do what? a little voice whispered. Go upstairs and sit on her bed? Volunteer to muck out stalls? Grocery shop? Mow the lawn? What was she going to do? Play housekeeper even though she had no intention of staying?
How could she not? She had to repay him somehow. The least she could do was be useful. After she politely ate the breakfast he had cooked.
She pretended interest she didn't feel in the comics, then opened the classified page. The columns of rentals didn't take long to peruse, because there were only a couple of new listings. One a four-bedroom house with a hot tub for twelve hundred a month, and the other a one-bedroom fixer with a low rent in exchange for carpentry skills. One extreme to another.
Marian was frowning down at the page when John said, "Still looking for a rental?"
She flushed like a kid caught with Mom's lipstick on, feeling inexplicably guilty. Would he think she was ungrateful?
"I'm sorry, I just..."
He sliced a finger across his throat. "Watch it."
Her brow crinkled. "Watch it?"
"No more apologies. Okay?"
It was harder than she'd expected to meet his eyes, but Marian bit her lip and kept her gaze steady. "Okay. Yes, I am still looking for a place of my own. I really think that's best. But while I'm here, I intend to be useful. I don't want you to think I don't appreciate..."
"Are you trying to apologize again?"
She opened her mouth, closed it, then chuckled. "Probably. See? That's why being dependent is bad for me. I feel like I should shuffle my feet and bow out of the room."
John frowned a little as he looked at her, but the twist of his mouth was rueful. "Yeah, I do see," he admitted at last. "I'd probably feel the same—"
"Mommy, I want down," Anna interrupted.
"Me, too," Jesse said.
"A budding yes man," John murmured.
"Wait until you see one of his temper tantrums," Marian said under her breath.
"I want to play with Emma's toys," her daughter demanded, sounding like the autocrat she was.
"Me, too," Jesse agreed.
Stifling her amusement, Marian glanced at Emma, who said grac
iously, "It's okay if they play with my toys."
"Then I don't see why not," Marian said. She helped the twins down from their perches and wiped their faces while John handed Emma her lunch box and herded her out the front door, watching from the window as she climbed on the school bus. When he sat back down with his coffee in the now peaceful kitchen, Marian hesitated, then joined him.
"Can I thank you again?" she asked softly. "Or is that verboden, too?"
"Definitely off limits." He grinned with that rakish charm she found so hard to resist. "Want to talk about the weather?"
"No," she straightforwardly said. "What I'd like to talk about is what my duties should be while I'm here."
"If you're not going to take the job, you don't have any duties," he said calmly before sipping his coffee.
"Then I can't stay," she said with equal firmness.
Their gazes clashed. At last John shook his head, a glint of humor in his gray eyes. "Stubborn, aren't you?"
She smiled. "Gee, I think we've had this discussion before."
He shook his head again, laughing. "You win! What do you want your duties to be?"
"I guess whatever your last housekeeper did."
His expression became oddly sheepish. "Would you believe me if I told you I don't know the half of it?"
"You mean, you don't know what she did?" Marian asked.
"I hired her right after my wife died. She...well, sort of took over. Dinner was on the table, clean clothes in the drawers, the bathrooms were clean..." He shrugged. "Now that I'm on my own, I keep discovering things I should have been doing. In about two weeks the house started falling apart around my ears. At least I have a cleaning service coming now. But... Oh, for example, I discovered the other day that Emma was bringing stuff home from school that I should have been reading, but it seems Helen knew enough to go look in Emma's bookpack. I didn't. I found a wad of papers an inch thick. I've missed a couple of things at school that I should have gone to. And then there's packing school lunches. That's been an adventure."
"Hot lunches?" Marian ventured.
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