“No, Mom. That’s not the reason Drake was acting strange. Drake doesn’t know about the lump yet. I don’t know how to tell him—for the reason you just mentioned. Actually, I’m worried about how he’ll react when I do.”
“What do you mean Drake doesn’t know? Brooke…you’re sleeping with the man. You have to tell him.”
“Yes, I am sleeping with him…as often as possible…which is precisely why Drake’s having trouble talking to you. He feels guilty.”
“For what?”
Brooke laughed at the confusion wrinkling her mother’s forehead. It felt good to laugh. Her mother’s cluelessness about male sensibilities remained entertaining.
“Maybe Drake is ashamed of deflowering your virginal daughter so thoroughly.”
“Brooke, if you don’t want to tell me why Drake’s so embarrassed, you don’t have to. Just say so…there’s no need to make anything up,” Jessica declared.
Her mother’s disbelief made her laugh more. “Mom…what I’m telling you is the real reason. Drake is way more private than you seem to want to think he is. Even though he’s an artist who paints naked women, he doesn’t like the world knowing what he does with those same women…or doesn’t do.”
Jessica shook her hair. “Honey, you announced what you two do at breakfast. What are you talking about? We all knew you and Drake were sleeping together. It’s obvious from the way the man looks at you like you’re a meal and he’s starving.”
“But it’s polite to pretend not to notice such things—not that you or any Larson I know would ever honor such a social nicety,” Brooke insisted, choking on her laughter when her mother gave her a chastising look. “Oh my God, will you just let it go? You’re the only mother in the world who wants to hear details about her daughter’s sex life.”
“I’m sure that’s not true. And I’m not asking for details…I just want to know he’s a decent lover and that my daughter is happy with him.”
It was on the tip of her tongue to tell her mother about Drake’s Tantric sex offer, but she knew that would prompt further discussion. Her mother was discreet, but that revelation wasn’t the kind of thing she wanted to risk. He hadn’t made good on it yet anyway. Brooke snorted as she sought the right words to appease her nosy mother.
“Drake is poetic and thoughtful and…okay…the man is just as seasoned as you predicted. I like his style in bed. There now…is that enough to satisfy your inappropriate curiosity?”
She laughed again when her mother nodded solemnly. Then her hand got squeezed hard.
“Okay…that’s enough about Drake. Are you scared about the surgery…about what they’ll find?”
Brooke looked out into the yard, checking inside herself. The truth was there, but for once she didn’t want to know it. She looked back at her mother.
“No. I’m not really scared yet. I’m pretty sure I’m in denial because I try my best not to think about it. However, I have done everything the doctor wants me to do, including scheduling the surgery to remove the lump. My mind refuses to believe it might really be cancer. The lump isn’t growing…the doctor said that was a good sign. I’m checking it every day on her orders. There are also no other lumps. I figure that’s a good sign too.”
Jessica nodded, bit her lip. “Okay. You probably need to know that I’m scared enough for the both of us. That’s honest. I don’t think I can handle losing you to cancer. You’re so young. If anyone should have cancer, it should be me. I’m older and not nearly as healthy as you are.”
“Mom…diseases like cancer don’t care about coulds and shoulds and woulds. I refuse to spend my time worrying until I know there is a reason…which was also my doctor’s advice. Maybe I do keep hoping to wake up one morning and find the lump either gone or getting smaller, but it’s not happening this time. I found the lump early, and it’s small. Both are good things in my favor. I’m doing all I can right now.”
“Of course you are…of course you are,” Jessica said. She reached out and wrapped her daughter in her arms. “I’ll be brave when you need me to be brave…I promise.”
“I know you will and I hope you don’t have to be. I love you, Mom.”
“I love you too. Please say I can tell Will about this.”
Brooke pulled back and looked into her mother’s troubled gaze. If the news was bad, her mother was going to need comforting as much as she would. “I’m not intending to keep this a secret. I was just waiting until I could find a way and a time to tell you first. Of course you can tell Will, and Will can tell Shane and Michael.”
“Tell Drake…before anyone else does,” Jessica advised.
“Okay. I’ll tell him tonight,” Brooke said softly. “Tell Will not to say anything to my meddling stepbrothers until tomorrow. Michael is a blabbermouth to Drake and Shane will show up on my doorstep to give me counseling.”
“They like you, Brooke.”
Brooke sighed and laughed. “I know…but I’m not used to having people all up in my business…except for my mother.”
“I’m glad you told me. Now I can pray about it. I love you…no matter what you find out…and I’ll be here.”
“I know you will, Mom. I love you too.”
Her mother’s hair brushed against her face as she nodded against her cheek. Brooke hugged tighter, grateful for her mother’s strength of character. It had always been the two of them against the world. Now they had the entire Larson clan to lean on.
The prospect of so many people knowing about her problems didn’t appeal to her, but if the outcome of her surgery wasn’t positive, at least she was glad her mother would never be alone after she was gone.
Chapter 13
“Drake, before I fall more in love with you…”
“Wow…wait. Just like that, you announce you’re falling in love with me? A few days ago you didn’t want anything to do with me because of the nude model in my art class. Now we’ve jumped from I’m slime to you’re falling in love with me? I can’t keep up.”
Brooke giggled, more at his tightening grip on her while he was teasing.
“We’ve had makeup sex at least six times since the naked model shock. I know you were there for all of them. Truthfully, I don’t know if I’m falling in love with you or not. I’m just assuming…I’ve never been in love before. However, I am starting to fantasize about dragging you and Brandon to all future pancake breakfasts at Mom and Will’s. I figure wanting you present to observe my bi-monthly torture must mean I’m getting serious.”
“Those feelings are not love, Dr. Daniels. Those are your sadistic tendencies manifesting. Definitely not helping your falling in love argument.”
Brooke giggled again. Drake was very funny when he was relaxed. “I thought you were willing to step in front of zombies for me?’
“Zombies—yes. An annoying Larson male? I don’t know…I’ll have to think about that one. First, I have to learn to look your mother in the eye. I don’t know how to get past my guilt. I’m just a few years younger than Jessica. I don’t know why the age thing bothers me, but it does.”
Brooke snorted against her pillow. “So you’re afraid of the Larsons and my mother? Maybe I’m just being delusional. There’s no way I could be falling in love with such a wimpy guy.”
Drake reached out and ran his fingers over her smile. “I swear I can be brave when I have to be.”
Brooke sobered, glad to finally have an opening to talk seriously. “I believe you. In fact…I think you were really brave about your wife.”
They were both lying on their sides, enjoying the afterglow of yet another satisfying lovemaking session. She hated to interrupt their quiet enjoyment.
To soften her curiosity about the woman who had once occupied the place she did now, Brooke raked her fingers through Drake’s hair. “I realize bringing up your dead wife is terrible pillow talk. By now you should have learned though that I’m the kind of person who requires a lot of honest communication to get comfortable. At the moment, I’m just speaking w
hat’s on my mind and in my heart, and I hope you can hear it that way. I’ve often thought about how hard it must have been for you to watch someone you love go through what your wife did.”
Drake sighed and nodded. “Yes. Watching the cancer take Tracy’s life was the hardest thing I’ve ever endured.”
“What kind of cancer did she have?”
“Initially, it was a lump in her breast…then it spread to many other areas. She tried the typical treatments. They didn’t work and sometimes even made things worse. Eventually she quit treatments and just took pain meds. It wasn’t just the cancer that affected Tracy…all three of us changed as we had to deal with it. Brandon gave up sports to spend his after school time with her. He never returned to them after Tracy was gone, and I never forced him to. It was yet another piece of counseling advice I ignored about my son.”
Brooke swallowed hard. “What happened to you? How did you change?”
Drake shifted his head on the pillow, looking for the words.
“Looking back now, I held myself together pretty well while it was actually happening. After Tracy was gone, I imploded. I drew inside myself and stayed away from people all I could. Taking care of Brandon was the only reason I pulled out of it. He needed me to create a normal life for him. Eventually I did. It took me a couple years.”
Brooke dropped her hand. Her fingertips drifted through the hair on his chest. She bit her lip. His wife had found a lump too. How was she supposed to tell him about her situation? The thought of doing so made her want to run far away from him. She didn’t want to deal with his reaction any more than she did anyone else’s. The idea of emotionally hurting him made her ill.
“Hey…” Drake said, lifting her chin with a finger. “Why the sad look? That part of my life is over. You don’t have to feel sad for me or Brandon. We’re okay now.”
Brooke let him tip her face to his. “I know…but I’m like one of those zombie apocalypse preppers. Maybe it’s because I’m a philosopher, but contingency planning is as necessary to me as breathing. I have to think through all the possibilities of any thought that looms large in my mind. I care about what happens to you and Brandon. What if we fell in love and something bad happened to me? Your son wouldn’t necessarily be around to pull you out.”
Drake snorted. “Brooke, why are you awfulizing? You’re talking about things that will probably never happen.”
“Awfulizing? Is that really a word, Dr. Barrymore?”
Drake rolled to his back and dragged her on top on him until her head was on his chest. He wrapped her in his arms as she buried her face there.
“Stop thinking the worst. You’re young…healthy…I’m sure you have a long life ahead of you.”
“Drake…when we went to breakfast at my family’s the other morning…all I could think was that I want what they have. Michael and Shane drive me crazy sometimes, but I’m also envious of their spouses and families. I want that life for myself and can’t help hoping I get to have it. Don’t you think that’s reasonable?”
Drake sighed beneath her cheek. “Of course. It’s only natural you would want children, especially since you don’t have any yet. Because of us sleeping together, I’ve been asking myself if I could handle being a father again. The answer is I don’t know. I just know I want you to have what you want out of life, so I guess we’d figure it out. I’d want to get married before you got pregnant. Call me old-fashioned, but I like making it legal.”
Brooke smiled against his chest. “You’re not old-fashioned. You’re chivalrous. That term goes much better with my description of you as poetic and passionate.”
“Chivalrous…very medieval term. It makes me sound like a knight.”
“Well, you and your son do have heroic tendencies. I think it fits.”
Drake sighed and tightened his hold. “Brooke…I’m falling in love with you too.”
Brooke sighed against his chest. “If that’s true, then I want you to promise me something.”
“Does it involve the Larsons?”
Brooke laughed. “Don’t make me take back my hero analogy. No…it does not involve the Larsons.”
“Okay then…what kind of promise do you want?”
Brooke raised her head and met his gaze. “If anything ever happens to me, I want you to remember only the good times we had together. And I want you to let yourself fall in love again…like you are doing with me now. You’re one of the good guys, Drake. Men like you should never be without a woman warming their bed…I mean that.”
Drake laughed, but wrinkled his forehead. “What the hell brought that on? You’re the woman I want warming my bed. It took forever to get you here. I’m not capable of thinking about a next woman. You take all my energy…and we haven’t even gotten to the good stuff yet.”
Brooke shrugged, unable to shatter their growing intimacy with her medical truth.
“You make me a better person, Drake. I don’t want to be selfish about you. I don’t want to ever be a reason you change.”
“The woman is eerily beautiful…but also incredibly strange.”
Brooke snorted. “Fine. Keep joking. You’ll be calling me a clever tongued sorceress in a few minutes,” she declared, moving down her groaning lover’s body.
The distraction of pleasuring him kept her from focusing on how much of an emotional coward she was being.
***
The next morning, Drake left early so he could swing by his house before heading to a department meeting. After he left, Brooke retrieved her cell phone and called her mother.
“Larson residence.”
“Mom? Tell Will not to tell Michael and Shane yet. I couldn’t tell Drake last night. I just…I couldn’t tell him. I’ll try again later.”
“Honey…”
“Mom—please. No lectures this morning. I can’t debate my cowardice when I haven’t had coffee yet. Just tell Will not to say anything for a little bit longer.”
“Of course I will…but Brooke…don’t put it off too long. It will be harder for Drake to hear it from other people. He’ll feel betrayed on top of everything else.”
Brooke nodded, then realized her mother wasn’t seeing her. Her mind was scrambled. “I know, Mom. I’ll tell him today. I just…I couldn’t do it last night.”
She hung up and sank to the hard, uncomfortable couch. Her mind had played out endless possible scenarios of telling him. None of the potential outcomes were anything she could handle without breaking down herself.
Weary of all the dread, she put her head in her hands.
“This has to be love. It’s the only emotion I know of that makes people this miserable. Damn you, Drake. I never really gave a damn what a man thought before you came along.”
She headed to the shower with a heavy heart knowing she was going to have to go see him at his work. It was probably better to do it someone place neutral anyway. If it didn’t go well, they’d each need to retreat to their respective houses.
***
Brooke glanced into Drake’s office and smiled at the picture he made, sitting behind his desk. He had his reading glasses on and his hair restrained. Her heartbeat picked up and a smile lit her face anticipating the moment he would see her.
She should have come to see him at work here instead of his classroom. They would have been lovers long before she found out about the naked model and gotten jealous…not that she was ever going to admit to Drake what she’d finally come to terms with herself.
Then she remembered why she actually was here and her smile faded. It was to confess, but fortunately not that particular sin.
Sighing, Brooke lifted a hand and stepped forward to knock on Drake’s partially opened door.
The smile he gave her when he saw who it was made her belly flutter. His effect on her libido was as potent as ever. Better still, she’d found a lot to like in the man who could turn her on with just a look.
She was definitely falling for Drake if just the sight of him made her so happy. The rest of the
tumble would likely be as short as her mother’s had been with Will. It all depended on how the next few minutes went.
“Hello, Dr. Barrymore. Got a few minutes for a visit?”
“Why yes I do. Come in, Dr. Daniels. Close the door behind you so we can speak privately.”
Snickering at what his gaze promised could happen with such privacy, she did as ordered. She wanted nothing more than to put off their discussion and collect on it. But she couldn’t—not this time. He had to know before everyone else found out.
“Drake—I actually came by because we need to talk about something. I…I meant to talk to you about it last night, but I couldn’t bring myself to interrupt our evening.”
“No need to apologize. A clever tongued sorceress should have the freedom to use that tongue any way she wishes,” Drake teased, instantly recalling how she had used it on him. He smiled at her while thinking his wicked thoughts until she broke.
Brooke giggled at the lust in his gaze and couldn’t help it. “Please. Stop that. I can’t laugh and tell you what I need to tell you. I’ve already put it off too long. I have to get through this. You are not helping me.”
“Fine.” Drake waved to the chairs facing the front of his desk. “Have a seat and talk to me about something serious.”
Sighing with dread, she walked to the closest one and sat. She blinked and stared at him.
Drake’s eyebrows rose as he waited. He removed his reading glasses. “You really do seem nervous.”
Brooke nodded. “I am. Remember last night…all the questions I asked about your wife?”
“Yes. I remember every conservation we’ve ever had—except the one where I’d had too much cognac.”
Brooke nodded and dropped her gaze to her hands. “Well, last night, I was trying to figure out how you’d react to my news before I told it to you. You see—several weeks ago—I found a lump in my breast. I didn’t know how you would react the news.”
Drake put a hand to his chest. His heart beat too hard and then felt like it stopped. He rubbed to ease the pressure. “A lump. Is it cancer?”
Covered In Paint: Book Five of the Art Of Love Series Page 13