A Date on Cloud Nine

by Jenna McKnight

  “Sure.” He cocked his head, eyes twinkling as merrily as if she’d just offered to strip down right there. He held his hand out to her. “Dance?”

  His warm smile and soothing voice tugged her closer, but she prolonged the moment.

  “Come on, you can’t resist.”

  “And why’s that?”

  “According to what I read, today’s a lucky number day and I’ll get whatever I go after. If you don’t dance with me, I can only conclude that the principles behind numerology are bogus.”

  “Nice try”—she didn’t even try to hide her amusement— “but you’re too scientific to base a conclusion on one test.”

  He shook his head slowly, mocking how the weight of the world might rest on this one decision. “Sure doesn’t bode well for numerology.”

  Then, with a devastating grin, he turned his hand palm up and crooked his fingers, beckoning her. Lilly shivered, knowing well what those fingers could do.

  She felt the draw, the strong magnetic pull Jake had whenever he gazed at her as if she were the only woman in existence. She had no doubt a thousand naked women could walk by right then, and he wouldn’t even notice.

  That alone might have been enough to draw her slowly into his arms for the next dance, but when the first notes of “I Will Always Love You” began, Lilly rushed to their haven. Jake had no way of knowing how appropriate those lyrics were. He probably wouldn’t even make the connection after she’d gone.

  But Lilly knew. She didn’t want him to see the tears that slipped free and ran down her cheeks, so she melted against his body, rested her head on his chest, and followed him in a slow dance by the trickling fountain.

  She wanted more of this. She wanted to throw things and cuss and demand a heavenly hearing, but nothing would come of it. Why ruin what little time she had to spend with Jake? She wanted him to remember her as happy and glowing with love.

  They danced slowly, covering little ground, totally absorbed in each other.

  In a crazy way—and Jake wasn’t sure he’d ever admit this to anyone else because it was so antiguy—he had had fun all week with the no-sex aspect of being romantic. Looking on the whole thing as a game, he’d given it his all. He’d expanded on Susannah’s ideas, built on them, developed his own, and fine-tuned each one with Lilly in mind.

  He’d given her time to grieve, to sulk, to come to terms with life as it was. To realize that just because Brady and Mooch had left her suddenly, it didn’t mean he would. To understand that just because she’d had a couple brushes with death herself, it didn’t mean she should withdraw and prepare for the worst.

  It was never far from his mind that they had an anniversary coming up. Lots of couples celebrated the day they met. His parents did, as well as his sisters and their husbands. Somehow, in his family anyway, meeting your mate held more significance than the day you got hitched. It came first, made the second possible, and therefore was more important. A true landmark, a turning point in two lives that then proceeded as one.

  He was very cognizant of the fact that Lilly’s and his anniversary was also Lilly’s and Brady’s wedding anniversary. One was inextricably woven with the other.

  How could he celebrate the most important day of their lives without reminding her of Brady and death and separation?

  He had better odds concentrating on romance.

  He had to hand it to Susannah. If not for her counsel, he would’ve thought he’d already reached his goal many times this week. He would’ve stripped Lilly naked and kissed her all over until she begged for more. Surprised her in the shower and taken her up against the wall. Spread her on the table and shown her just how alive she was. He’d given her all the time he could bear.

  He wined and dined and slow danced her at the Linnean House until well after ten o’clock. Thanks to a timer delay and remote control, he took dozens of photos of them together, which he’d print tonight and leave around for Lilly to find in the days to come, while he was out of town, working toward a future that would be so much richer just for having her in it.

  He kissed her senseless every fifteen minutes, giving her a preview of the night ahead.

  “Guess we’d better go,” he said finally, before he forgot himself and unsnapped her jeans.

  He locked up and tossed the keys back inside the gate for Ron to pick up in the morning, and the gardens were left as pristine as they’d found them.

  The ride home was punctuated with long, quiet pauses while he traced lazy circles on the back of her hand, anticipating where he’d be tracing more, in less than an hour. She sighed contentedly, and he kissed her fingers.

  “One of our phones is blinking.” She flipped open the one with the red light.

  “Yours or mine?”

  “That’s odd. It’s a 9-1-1 from your house.”

  Every outside light was on when Jake barreled into the driveway, both on his house and next door. Susannah met them as they flew out of the Mercedes.

  “It’s Mooch,” she said.

  He’s back! Jake thought, in spite of Susannah’s tone being brisk, urgent, and not at all reassuring. At least Mooch was home.

  “I know he’s here, sugar, but he won’t come to me. I think he might be hurt.”

  “Okay.” He squeezed Lilly’s hand, sharing the moment for good or bad. “Then we all need to calm down and be reassuring.”

  Susannah wrung her hands. “I can’t. So I’ll just go inside. Call me.”

  “Turn off your spotlights.”

  “I’ll get yours,” Lilly said.

  She left the yellow light on by the back door, something Mooch would be familiar with. Hoping he’d be lured by the sound of dry food pouring into his bowl, she filled it with a great deal of noise, then sat on the porch steps and waited.

  Jake strolled the backyard, calling softly.

  “Maybe he’s afraid of the Mercedes,” Lilly said, and he backed the unfamiliar car out to the curb.

  As Jake strolled back up the drive, he heard a quiet, tentative meow from behind the holly bushes. There were way too many sharp leaves to go in after the cat, so he sat on the driveway and waited.

  “Come on, big guy,” he crooned. “I’ve been missing you. Lilly’s here, too.” He didn’t think about what he said, just kept throwing out soft, reassuring verbiage.

  Mooch finally ventured out in a low, wary crouch, glancing this way and that, evaluating whether this was a good move. Eventually he decided it was, because he climbed onto Jake’s waiting lap and found himself engulfed in a firm hug that no amount of claws discouraged.

  “I’ve got him!” he called to Lilly, who ran around the corner.

  “Is he okay?”

  “It looked like he might be limping, and there’s something on my fingers.”

  “Blood?”

  “I think a better question is his or mine? Let’s get him inside.”

  Side by side, they checked him out on the floor of the laundry room, where they could close the door and not have to chase him through the house if he wiggled free. He kept up a long, drawn-out yowl, just in case they had any question as to how undignified this was for him.

  “He’s lost weight,” Jake said. “I can feel his ribs too much.”

  “There’s blood caked on his right paw.”

  “See a cut?”

  “No, not yet.”

  “Let’s give him a bath.”

  “You can’t bathe a cat.”

  “Sure you can. Though”—he winked—”it might take both of us.”

  “And a set of steel gloves.”

  “Nah. Fill the sink with water.”

  “Yeah, what’ve you got to lose? Your arms are already clawed up.”

  “You never considered nursing school, did you?”

  She sniffed. “I know something about first aid.”

  “Yeah, what?”

  “You need peroxide and Polysporin.”

  “Wow, bill me in the morning.”

  A slow smile spread across her fac
e, warming him to the core. “Nah, advice is free, as long as you take it.”

  “And if I don’t?”

  She rose first. “Then you pay the price.”

  He was willing to find out what the price was. Later. “Mind filling the sink now?”

  “Oh. Sure.” She activated the sensor.

  “You have time to change into a white T-shirt.”

  “Very funny.”

  “Okay, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  He rose beside her and had all he could do to hold on to Mooch, who probably was wondering why the hell he’d come home for this. “Check the temperature on the inside of your wrist.”

  “That’s for baby formula.”

  “Huh. Then what do you do for a baby’s bath?”

  Strange how Lilly’s face fell as she stuck her elbow in the rising water, as if she were sad. Who could be sad with Mooch back? But when Jake got no more sass from her, he knew she was. They both turned quiet and thoughtful, until the water started flying. Besides, who could listen to Mooch’s moaning and not laugh?

  Twenty minutes later, they were all soaked to the skin.

  Mooch, the lucky one, got a quick blow-dry. Every time the cat moaned his disgust with the whole procedure, Jake felt bad for him, so after he was dry, he tried his best to cuddle the fur ball. At the same time, Lilly was applying Polysporin to the worst of his claw marks.

  “Ow.”

  “Baby.”

  “Not you. He just clawed my thigh.”

  “Watch how I’m doing this then, because you’re doing your own thigh.”

  After that, they piled into Jake’s bed and curled up together, the cat snuggled between them. He purred.

  Jake sighed contentedly.

  So did Lilly.

  Then Mooch wanted the hell out of there and squirmed free, though he dug in the blanket and nested near their feet.

  Lilly scooted closer to Jake, curling up against him where Mooch had been, fitting her head beneath his chin.

  Jake’s heart leaped into his throat as Lilly came to him. This was so much better than snuggling the cat.

  “He’s dumber’n I thought,” she murmured, her breath tickling his neck.

  Did making love to Lilly require ousting the cat?

  Jake pulled her on top of him. Didn’t hurt to remind her how strong he was, how thoroughly he could love her.

  She sighed deeply against his chest then. Her whole body went lax.

  It was going to be long time until morning.

  20

  First thing in the morning, nothing to eat, nothing to drink. Swish, swish, swish. Get a saliva sample. The procedure had become so routine for Lilly that she barely gave it any thought. It was just another step before washing her face.

  “You look awful.” The mirror covered the whole area above the double-bowled vanity, so it was impossible to ignore her image. “Really awful.”

  Last night had been blissful, with her head pillowed somewhere on Jake’s body—his shoulder, his chest, sometimes his arm, depending on how she’d moved about, because she hadn’t slept restfully.

  But the dreams! As a natural method for a person to work things out in her mind while she was asleep, it wasn’t working. It was normal to relive a traumatic experience in dreams, but surely not for that experience to morph so much that, as she woke up each day, she wasn’t a hundred percent sure where she’d be. She’d resorted to testing her senses before she opened her eyes, concentrating first on touch to make sure she was in a bed, not on a parking lot. Then hearing, grateful for Jake’s deep breathing, not a crackling building and sirens. Then smelling, always reassured when smoke didn’t burn her nose. Only then did she open her eyes.

  Dreams of being poor came less often, of being pregnant more often, but that was only normal, given how the focus of her life had shifted.

  The last thing Lilly did before leaving the bathroom neat as a pin was check the predictor for the telltale fern pattern she was supposed to see as her estrogen level increased. Instead of throwing it in the drawer and slamming it, she stared at it.

  Was that —?

  Could that be what the manufacturer called a fern?

  She yanked open every drawer in the room, searching for the instruction sheet with the side-by-side diagrams that she needed for comparison, and finally found it in the box in the first drawer she’d already searched three times.

  She took a deep breath. Could it finally be time? Would she get the full nine months? Hands shaking, she held the slide next to the diagrams.

  “Lights, on!” she ordered, afraid to look away.

  So many emotions ran through her simultaneously that she couldn’t function. Her mouth was open, but she didn’t yell. Maybe she squeaked her euphoric “Yes!”

  Her muscles quivered, yet she couldn’t move, couldn’t ran to Jake’s bedroom and jump in bed with him. Her knees shook, and she had to lean against the wall.

  As for breathing, forget that until she grew lightheaded and finally gasped for air.

  Heart pounding, she caught her reflection in the mirror again. Quick!—finger comb hair, massage that one crease on her cheek. Maybe it’d go away before she jumped in bed looking like a scarfaced Halloween ghoul and scared Jake out of the mood. Brush teeth. Strip off her T-shirt.

  Not bad. But she had a slinky teddy that’d be better. Having him unsnap the crotch was half the fun.

  As her heart soared with delight, her very soul swelled with a hearty dose of peace and satisfaction. It was about to happen. She was about to get pregnant. She’d get her extra months with Jake. In that time, she’d find a way to prepare him for what was to come. She’d badger him until he believed in something, anything, until she knew he’d accepted it, so she’d know he’d be okay after she left. There was so much good he could do, he and their son.

  “Oh my God, I can’t believe this!” she whispered for herself alone. And hugged herself, blissfully alive, ready for the next level. A quick scan of the information sheet said that to get pregnant, sex was advised within the next thirty-six hours.

  Well, okay!

  Finally, all systems go, cleared for take off. Lilly ran down the hall to her room and yanked a teddy—red, of course—out of the dresser. She was all thumbs and clumsy feet and nearly fell on her butt getting into it, but she managed. The silk skimmed her skin, all smooth and sexy and begging to be torn off. What else could she do to make this a morning to remember?

  Hey, the vibrator had been his idea. It was her turn. She raced down to the basement, where Jake had stored the undamaged stock from Cloud Nine. The first item she grabbed happened to be a tiny spray bottle.

  “To enhance pleasure, spray one time on tongue prior to oral activity,” she read off the label, laughing at how it was worded, as if not saying oral sex cleaned it up for marketing. “Guaranteed to give your man ecstasy. He’ll think he’s on fire.”

  “Yeah, we’ll see.” Of course, it was one of the items Jake had salvaged from the store, so it must be pretty good. “Well, here goes.”

  She uncapped it, spritzed once on her way upstairs, thought it was too light to be effective—since it was new, it wasn’t primed properly—and spritzed again. Yeah, definitely more mist on the second go-round. Kind of warm and tangy. No time to read what was in it. She was uncertain how this was going to enhance Jake’s pleasure, but discovery would be fun.

  “Oh Ja-ake,” she sang out in the hall.

  No, too perky.

  She lowered her voice, trying for smoky and sexy, slipped one red strap off her shoulder and slinked into his room. “Ohhh, Jake.”

  Not only was he no longer sprawled across the mattress on his back, it got worse. Right smack on the neatly made bed sat a dark blue carry-on suitcase. Open. Half-full. Jake—already dressed, except for a shirt, the rat— was sorting through a dresser drawer. When he noticed her, he did a double take, and clean socks drifted from his hands to the floor.

  His stunned reaction did wonders for Lilly’s confidenc
e. She strutted her stuff across the room and leaned back against a bedpost. Tipping her head back, she ran her fingers slowly down her neck, then her chest, until they settled in the V between her breasts. She cocked one knee just so and hoped to heaven she projected sexy, not stupid.

  From the sensuous gleam in Jake’s eyes, she figured she was on the right track, getting him hot. Beads of sweat actually popped out on his bare chest.

  Which is why it was so totally unexpected when he stared at her with longing in those beautiful bedroom eyes, and said, “Now? But I’ve got a flight to catch.”

  Jake yearned to pluck Lilly right off that bedpost, toss her on her back, and show her how excited he was. He had a lot to show.

  Instead, what rushed out of his mouth before he could get his words right was, “I overslept. I have to leave, like, ten minutes ago.” He had a meeting, damn it, one crucial to wiping out his family’s debt.

  “Oh,” Lilly said, but she didn’t look dissuaded.

  In fact, just the opposite. She slowly slid her hands up the bedpost, stretching her arms overhead. Red silk inched up her thigh, tightening where it was anchored between her legs, which just threatened to anchor his gaze there, too, except that he wanted to see all of her. If she started stripping, he was in big trouble.

  “I, uh—” He had to clear his throat so he didn’t sound like a puberty-struck teenager. “I don’t know if I can get a later flight.”

  Okay, he saw something flicker across her face. He liked to think it was acknowledgment that today was very important, not just to him, but to several people.

  “How long will you be gone?” Smoky and sensual, her words seduced every cell of his body.

  He shrugged; not eloquent, maybe, but words were damned near impossible right now. “Three days, maybe four. No, three. I’ll keep it to three.”

  “I don’t think I can wait that long.” As she arched her back, her breasts thrust toward him, begging for his hands to touch her. Just one touch.

  “Go throw some clothes on.”

  “W-what?”

  “I’ll help you pack. If we get pulled over for speeding, you pay the ticket.”

  “But—”