Stay...

by ALLISON LEIGH,

  “Maybe you should just get it over with,” Tristan said as he appeared quietly in the doorway. “Ain’t nothing you can say that’s going to outdo what my imagination is coming up with.”

  “Don’t be too sure.” Jefferson’s teeth clenched as he managed to pull his foot free from the high boot.

  “You ought to stick to bedroom slippers at that rate,” Tristan advised. “They’re a whole lot easier to get on and off.”

  Jefferson politely told his brother what he could do with the advice.

  Tristan watched Jefferson struggle with the other boot for a long minute. “Oh, for crying—” He bent down and pulled the boot off himself, dropping it to the marble-tiled floor with a heavy thud. Then he turned and flipped on all four faucets full blast. The Jacuzzi tub began to fill. He watched the water rise. “How long you been out?”

  Jefferson went still for a moment. “Out of where?” He slid open drawers until he found a disposable razor and a toothbrush still in the plastic package.

  “The hospital.”

  Relax. He ripped off the plastic wrapping and tossed it aside. “Long enough.”

  Tristan grunted and left the bathroom. He returned moments later, bearing a tube of toothpaste. “Here.”

  “Hope you give Em more privacy than you’re giving me,” Jefferson commented blackly as he squeezed toothpaste onto the new toothbrush.

  “I’m not likely to be overcome with lust at the sight of your bod, if that’s what’s bugging you,” Tristan assured dryly.

  “At least California hasn’t warped you completely.” Closing his eyes, Jefferson enjoyed the simple act of brushing his teeth. For too long he’d not had access to such simple things. And then when he did have access, he’d been unable to do it himself.

  Tristan flipped off the water as it neared the top of the tub. “What kind of gun makes a hole like that,” he wondered after a moment.

  Jefferson spat and rinsed his mouth. Slowly, he set the toothbrush on the side of the sink. He cupped cold water in his hands and doused his face with it, running his fingers through his hair and away from his face. He looked into the mirror and saw his brother watching him silently.

  “The same kind that I’m never gonna carry again,” Jefferson finally said.

  Tristan’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t comment on that. After a moment he nodded. “I’m glad you made it back,” he said simply.

  Jefferson eyed himself in the mirror. He looked every day of his thirty-six years. And then some. For the first time in more than a year, though, he could honestly say the words. “I’m glad, too.”

  The two brothers shared a look. Then abruptly Tristan nodded. “Well, holler if you need help crawling out of that swimming hole when you’re done.” He cupped the back of Jefferson’s neck in his big palm for a brief moment. “Then we’re gonna go have a beer. Maybe admire a few lovelies along the way,” he said gruffly. He dropped his hand. Nodded once. And left.

  Jefferson slowly shucked his pants and lowered himself into the tub, thinking how much Tristan had grown to be like their father. It was both a curse and a blessing.

  He groaned aloud when he flipped on the Jacuzzi jets and the water began churning. In that moment, the five-by-eight dirt-floored room in Lebanon, the hospital in Germany and the doctors in D.C. all seemed very far away.

  Eventually Jefferson, clean and muscles and joints loosened somewhat from the soothing water, climbed out unaided from the tub and dried himself. He ran a comb through his tangled hair, thinking it was high time he got a haircut. He rummaged through the drawers again, but gave up when he couldn’t find any rubber bands. Back in the bedroom he unzipped his bag and pulled out some clean clothes. His eyes were on the blue blanket as he tucked the long tails of his shirt into his jeans and buttoned up the fly. He leaned over and picked it up by the edge, his thumb and forefinger absently smoothing the fluffy softness.

  “You ready yet?” Tristan yelled from somewhere in the house. Jefferson took a last look at the blanket and dropped it back on the bed. He shoved his wallet in his pocket and grabbed a clean pair of socks before retrieving his boots from the bathroom.

  Tristan’s heavy feet pounded up the stairs. “Come on, Jeff. It’ll be dark at the rate you’re going—”

  Jefferson stepped into the hallway, ignoring his cane where it was propped next to the dresser. “I’m ready.” He waved his boots at his brother who thundered back down the stairs. He followed more quietly, then sank down on the last step to pull on his socks.

  “Want to borrow some shoes?”

  Jefferson tucked his tongue in his cheek as he glanced over at the huge white high-tops Tristan wore. “I’ll wear my boots. Thanks.” Lips tight, he shoved his foot into the worn-soft leather and tugged. Thank God they were easier to put on than take off.

  He pulled himself up by the banister and stomped once. Once a pair of boots were broken in, they were more comfortable than any other kind of footwear. He’d believed it since he’d been eleven years old.

  The corner of Tristan’s lips curled slightly and he turned for the door. “Gonna die with them things on, aren’t you.”

  “Yup.”

  Jefferson waited while Tristan set the security system and securely locked the door. In minutes, they were hurtling down the freeway in Tristan’s battered half-ton pickup. Jefferson edged a stack of books out from beneath his boot. They started to slide and he bent over to shove them away so his feet had somewhere to go. He sat up again, and hunched his shoulder so as not to knock over the computer that occupied the middle portion of the seat. Atop me computer was a beaten-up leather deck shoe with half the sole missing. “You know,” he pointed out as he pulled the leather lacing from the shoe. “We could’ve driven the rental.” He reached up and pulled the annoying hair away from his face and tied it into a ponytail with the lace.

  Tristan looked at the conglomeration of stuff as if for the first time. “Push it behind the seat if it’s bugging you.”

  Jefferson’s chuckle was rusty. Then he watched in amazement as a tiny little compact car sped around them and pulled right in front of them. slowing down abruptly. He caught the computer just as it began to slide when Tristan hit the brakes, swearing. In seconds everything was back to normal, and Jefferson shook his head. The traffic heading the opposite direction was already heavy. “Driving in this would do me in,” he muttered.

  Tristan grunted, switched lanes, slowed down and switched lanes again. “You get used to it. I couldn’t do what Em does though.” He maneuvered around a lumbering panel truck and headed for the exit. “She drives about forty miles round-trip every day.”

  “Does she like her job?”

  Tristan pulled up at a stoplight. He checked the traffic, then turned right and right again, coming to a halt in a nearly deserted parking lot. The beach was merely yards away, a jumble of umbrellas and kids and kites. “She’s as happy there as she’s going to be anywhere, I’d guess.” He climbed out of the truck.

  Jefferson got out too, eyeing Tristan over the dusty roof of the cab. “Meaning?”

  Tristan turned, his eyes squinting in the late afternoon sun. After a brief moment, he shrugged. “Meaning nothing.” He rounded the truck and headed for the weather-beaten wooden building. “Come on. Beer’s getting warm while we’re sitting here yakking.”

  Jefferson tucked his fingers in his pockets and followed his brother into the dimly lit bar. He’d been in a hundred similar establishments in a hundred different cities.

  Tristan held up two fingers as he passed the bartender. “Hey, Joe. How’s it hanging?”

  The bartender slid two foaming glasses of beer toward Tristan. “Can’t complain.”

  Tristan tossed a couple of bills on the bar. “Say in to my big brother,” he told the other man.

  Joe nodded and held out his beefy hand. Jefferson reached over and shook it. “Joe Pastorini,” he introduced himself. “Your brother here’s a good man. Helped my daughter out of a jam a while back.” He pushed the m
oney back toward Tristan. “That’s no good here, boy.”

  Silently, Jefferson watched Tristan grab up a few peanuts from a brown bowl and pop them into his mouth. He noticed that Tristan didn’t take back the money.

  “How’s little Emily doing? Haven’t seen her in here for a while.”

  Tristan picked up one of the glasses and handed it to Jefferson. “She’s fine.” He grinned. “I think that CPA she’s dating from the firm frequents the finer establishments.”

  Jefferson zeroed in on that. CPA?

  “No finer place than this,” Joe was defending.

  “That’s why I come here, Joe,” Tristan assured dryly. He waved and headed toward the back of the room where a pool table sat. He placed his glass on the wide edge of the table. “Rack ’em up, Jeff.”

  Jefferson hadn’t played pool in years. But he easily recognized the good-natured challenge in Tristan’s eyes. Pushing aside thoughts of Emily and her CPA, he racked them.

  Four games and two beers later, Jefferson placed the cue on the wall rack. “Enough.”

  Tristan sipped at his diet cola. He’d switched after the first beer. “Can’t take the heat?”

  “What heat,” Jefferson asked lazily. He perched against the high stool he’d dragged over to the table from the bar after the first game and stretched his long legs. “I’ve won the last two.”

  Tristan seemed to consider that. He walked over to the wall rack and placed his cue there, also. “You know,” he said, absently watching a young blond woman enter the bar, “Squire was the only one who could ever beat us hands down.”

  “Except for Daniel.”

  Tristan chuckled soundlessly. “Dan spends all his free time in the pool halls. He’s practically a pro.” He waved his nearly empty glass. “So he doesn’t count.”

  Jefferson drained his glass and plunked it on the side of the pool table. It felt good. Not the beers, necessarily. But the easygoing company of his brother. Talking about their other brothers. His head was buzzing ever so slightly. “Who’s the CPA?”

  “Huh?”

  “Emily’s CPA.”

  Tristan stood up. “Come on. Let’s go home.”

  Jefferson waited.

  Tristan’s lips compressed. He noticed the curvy blonde was staring at them. He lifted his chin in her direction. “Why don’t you go say hello. She’s interested.”

  Jefferson couldn’t care less. The woman could have paraded around the pool table naked, and he wouldn’t have cared. “Is it serious?”

  “I’d say so, considering the way she’s licking her chops over there.” Tristan smiled faintly.

  Jefferson waited.

  Tristan returned Jefferson’s stare with one just as silent. Just as long.

  It was the blonde who finally interrupted. “Excuse me—” she glided to a stop next to Tristan, her green eyes sharp and her painted mouth smiling “—aren’t you that cyberspy guy?”

  Tristan raised his eyebrows. “Cyberspy?” He shot Jefferson a confused look, the picture of a befuddled male. “What’s that? Some new kind of deodorant?”

  The woman’s eyes narrowed faintly. “You are,” she insisted. “Your picture was in the New York Times a few weeks ago.”

  Tristan hooted. “New York? Geez, baby,” he leered down at her, giving a good impression of a rather sun-baked beach-boy. “I stick to the Pacific side of the states. Better babes. Too uptight over there, I’d bet.”

  The avaricious interest in the woman’s eyes waned slightly. But she wasn’t ready to give up just yet. She turned to Jefferson. “I bet you’re brothers,” she said. “Am I right?”

  Jefferson shrugged, amused at the way his brother was sidling away from the blonde.

  “So, tell me,” she ran a long red fingernail along the arm of the bar stool where Jefferson leaned. “Are you into computers, too?”

  “Not lately.”

  She looked over her shoulder at Tristan. “He is that guy,” she insisted. “I hear he’s loaded. Pity he doesn’t want to…play.” She turned back to Jefferson and leaned forward, encasing him in a cloud of her spicy perfume. “But I can see that you—” she flashed him a long look “—are more experienced.” She moistened her lips and cocked her hip, bending forward just enough that he could have looked straight down her loose shirt, had he been interested.

  He wasn’t. “This boy doesn’t want to…play. Either,” he assured her politely.

  She straightened. Flipping her hair over one shoulder, she shrugged and wandered over to a man sitting alone in one of the booths.

  Tristan pretended to shiver. “Scary,” he muttered, and headed for the door, sketching a wave toward Joe as they left.

  This time Jefferson shoved some of the books behind the seat before climbing into the truck. “Why’d you throw her off the scent?”

  His brother coaxed the engine to life and headed them home. “You kidding? Even if I ever touched her, she’d be crying palimony, or abuse or some kind of garbage like that inside of two weeks. Just until she got a nice fat check.” His lips twisted. “Amazing how money brings ’em out. Like worms after a rain.”

  Jefferson shook his head. He thought about telling his brother that he was too young to sound so jaded. But he saved his breath. “So who is the CPA?”

  Tristan just shook his head.

  When they let themselves into the house a while later, Tristan still wasn’t answering. And Jefferson had quit asking. For now.

  The house was quiet, and Jefferson knew instinctively that Emily wasn’t home. Tristan headed for his office almost immediately, and Jefferson went to the kitchen. He drank down a narrow bottle of fancy water from the fridge and tossed the empty container into the sink. Frowning, he paused next to the counter, his palm flat on the white tile. He closed his eyes and imagined her.

  Emily.

  Moving around the kitchen. Cooking. Loading the dishwasher.

  Laughing with Tristan over one of his stupid jokes.

  His fingers pressed into the cold tile.

  When the phone rang right beside his hand, he nearly jumped out of his skin. He bit back a violent curse. He hadn’t quite been able to lick it yet. The unexpected attack of nerves. The jumps.

  Maybe he’d never be able to.

  The thought of which was almost more than he could bear. Swearing again, he flipped on the water and bent over the sink, throwing water over his face with hands that weren’t quite steady.

  “Jefferson?”

  He froze, still hunched over the sink. He lowered his forehead in his hands. He hadn’t even heard her come in, much less walk up behind him. Damn.

  Emily slowly reached around him and shut off the gushing water. She settled her weight against the counter and leaned to the side until she was at his level. “What is it, Jefferson? What’s wrong?”

  Her scent. So cool. So clean. It matched her voice. Gentle. Soft.

  Without looking, he knew her long brown hair would be pooling on the stark white tile. That her large eyes would be velvety brown and filled with emotion. He straightened abruptly, raking back the hair that had fallen loose from the shoelace tie.

  He watched her straighten, also. The severely tailored dress that covered her from neck to knee shouldn’t have been flattering on her slender figure. But it was. The black color suited her. As did the narrow lines that followed each curve and valley. His fingers curled.

  “I shouldn’t have come here.”

  She flinched. As if he’d physically struck her. It took her a moment before her expression smoothed out. “Then why did you?” Her voice was steady. “Never mind. I know why,” she continued when he said nothing. “You came to see Tristan. So go ahead and tell him what it is that’s eating you up inside.” She blinked her long lashes and aimed her glance somewhere around his shoulder. “Then maybe you’ll get some peace.”

  “There’s no peace left anymore,” he said, the words dredged up. “Not for me.”

  He could hear her breath hissing between her teeth when she d
rew it in. Suddenly her palm, cool and smooth, cupped his cheek. Her brown eyes captured his gaze in their liquid depths. “Yes, there is,” she promised him. Her thumb gently stroked his jaw. “It’s just hiding from you right now,” she spoke softly. “But it’s there, Jefferson. You’ll find peace again.”

  Her hand started to slide away, and he caught it with his own. “Where?” His gut hurt. “Where is it hiding, Emily?” He shook his head once. “Nowhere. That’s where.”

  “You’re wrong.” She paused. “You know you’re wrong. That’s why you came here in the first place. To get rid of this—” she shook her head, unable to put a word to whatever this was. “Because you and…and Tristan are connected.”

  He released her fingers and put his hand to her shoulder to nudge her away. But his palm closed over the curve instead. “You’re a dreamer, Emily,” he didn’t mean the words unkindly. It was just that he didn’t have any dreams left. Only nightmares.

  His hand slid down, cupping the upper curve of her arm through the black fabric of her dress. She bit her lip. “Maybe I am,” she agreed sadly. She shifted and his hand dropped away. She caught it between her own and looked down. “You’ll find peace,” she assured him again. “It’s hiding underneath the pain. The tears.”

  He gently touched her head. Silky. “I don’t have any tears left, Emily.”

  She lifted her chin and looked him full in the face. A tiny droplet slipped from her eye, leaving a silvery trail in its wake. “I have tears,” her words were barely audible. “I’ll give you my tears.” Her gaze skittered away from his, then returned. Another drop slid past her long lashes.

  His jaw ached. With his thumb, he caught the next tear before it fell to her cheek. Then his hand slid behind her neck and he hauled her into his arms. Her hands slipped behind his shoulders, holding him tightly. Securely.

  Her face turned into his neck and he could feel her tears. Groaning, he lowered his head to her shoulder and held her as she wept.