by James Lavene
Nick was tall and straight standing beside Mr. Foster's rather stooped appearance. His thick, dark hair held the light from the stage. His deep voice was audible as he spoke with the teacher.
She recalled suddenly what he'd smelled like, and felt like, that night in the car. His hands had been strong and gentle. His touch had excited her.
His sweetness with the baby and his patience with Adam made her feel that tug of attraction even deeper within her, but she was terrified.
You're too smart to be taken in by another good looking man, she reminded herself, still staring up at the stage. Even if he seems to be a good hearted too. Stick with the plan. You’re after Amber, not Nick.
Nick felt that familiar prickling of sensation and turned to find her eyes burning on him. Her lips parted as their gazes locked and held. Suddenly, whatever the teacher and Adam were saying made no sense whatever to him. The tension between them seemed to fill the auditorium as the music from the band concert had earlier that evening.
Emilie shivered with the longing that filled her. It swamped her senses and kept her rooted to the spot in the aisle, not able to look away.
Nick drew a ragged breath while heat suffused his body, making a jumble of all his good thoughts and intentions. Was it possible to feel, to desire someone from across a crowded auditorium?
Emilie turned away and the link was broken abruptly. She felt weak and weightless, as though she'd been fighting to swim a strong riptide that was threatening to swallow her.
Nick focused back on what Mr. Foster was saying about Adam. His body began to calm down. A glance from her and his blood was racing. He was glad that he hadn't taken her up on her offer to stay at her house over Christmas. He wasn’t sure what would happen between them if he saw her every day.
He shifted the baby more comfortably in his arms and willed his body to ignore the excitement it felt whenever Emilie was around. He didn't want to be involved with her, he repeated to himself. He didn't feel anything unusual when she walked into a room—or when she looked at him. No one could be so attracted to another person that they could be aroused just seeing her.
Nick told himself those things in a rational, unemotional statement. His heart whispered that he lied.
Chapter Seven
Emilie was sitting at her desk writing checks and answering letters. It was well past midnight. The wind howled around the eaves of the big house.
She hadn't been able to sleep. She didn't know if it was the wind coming down from the mountain or that she was too busy thinking about Nick, Adam and Amber.
She knew she was obsessing over them. She couldn't stop herself. For better or worse, she felt linked to them. When the children were gone and Nick was a person she wrote a check to every month, maybe then she’d be able to sleep at night without seeing their faces.
Sighing, she picked up the invoice from the garage for his work on her car. In bold letters at the top was his name, Nick's Service and Towing. She looked at the amount of the invoice and wrote a check to cover it.
Aunt Joda had consumed a little too much elderberry wine and fallen asleep in front of the fireplace in the sitting room that evening. When Emilie had returned home from the concert, she'd covered her with a blanket and turned off the light.
The frail old lady hadn't moved. Emilie studied her face in the firelight, wondering if she would look like her when she grew older. She wondered if there would be anyone to share her life, even as haphazardly as the two of them, when she was Joda’s age.
It was a daunting prospect, growing old alone and unloved. She pulled her robe closer around her and went up the stairs to her room.
Trying to decide what, if anything, she wanted to do about Christmas that year, Emilie heard a banging sound from the front of the house. It was probably a few shingles that had blown loose in the gusty wind. It would wait until morning when she could contact someone from town to take care of it. The house was old and in constant need of attention.
The banging came again. This time she realized that it was too steady, too rhythmic, to be shingles or shutters blowing in the breeze.
She got up from her desk and went downstairs. Joda met her at the bottom of the stairs.
"Someone's at the door," her aunt remarked casually, walking past Emilie towards the second floor.
"Where are you going?" Emilie wondered.
"To bed," Joda replied. "Where else?"
"I thought you might like to stay downstairs until I answer the door," Emilie answered. "You know, to find out if I'm raped and murdered when I open the door for some stranger in the middle of the night?!"
Joda yawned and kept going up the stairs. "It's not some stranger, mon petite. Are you answering your prayers or not?"
Emilie shook her head. Sometimes, she wondered if Aunt Joda really was really crazy or simply eccentric, as her parents had claimed with great dignity. It was difficult to tell the difference.
She walked to the door and opened it wide, wishing they had some type of intercom or even a small peek hole in the heavy wood door. She could at least see who was on the step.
"Miss Ferrier?"
She looked down into Adam's upturned face and heard Amber catch her breath to start crying again. Her little eyes were red in the dim porch light.
"Is that offer still open?" Nick asked hesitantly. His dark eyes were intent on her face.
Amber had her breath by that time and she let out with a lusty wail that rivaled the strong wind moaning through the night around them.
"Come in!" Emilie ushered them quickly out of the frigid night, closing the door behind them. She looked up the stairs into Joda's beaming face.
"I'll get something for the baby," her aunt said as Nick tried to quiet the screaming child.
"Wow! This place is huge!" Adam enthused, looking around the front entrance hall with wide eyes and hands that touched the six-foot tall statues of snarling lions that guarded the door.
"Don't touch those, Adam," Nick cautioned wearily while Amber continued to sob and cry.
"Come this way." Emilie led them toward the warmth and comfort of the sitting room that Joda had recently vacated.
Nick glanced around at the heavy, wine colored velvet drapes pulled closed against the night. Solid velvet chairs fronted the huge hearth where some coals still burned. The ceilings were easily twenty feet high. Books lined the walls in sturdy shelves while sculptures and paintings waited in the shadows.
He'd heard the stories about the house that Jacque de Ferrier had built for his family. The reality was much more impressive.
What the hell am I doing there?
Emilie threw some light kindling on the embers in the fireplace while Nick told Adam to sit down on one of the big chairs. He sat Amber next to her brother, wedged between the wide arms where they both looked at him with big eyes that gleamed in the light from the fire.
"Let me get that," Nick offered when he saw Emilie start to lift a larger log. He picked up the wood and added it to the small fire, poking it until the flames were reaching higher in the hearth.
Emilie had already picked up the baby and put her into her lap, talking gibberish to her and smoothing back her dark curls. Adam got up from the chair and climbed beside her, asking her questions about the house and the statues in the hall.
"Here!" Joda entered the room and walked up to the baby. "Give her some of this."
Nick looked between Emilie and the older woman whose white hair flowed down past her hips. "What is that?"
Joda turned to look at him, as though noticing him for the first time. "It's for the teething. It'll help her rest and ease her pain."
Nick wasn’t happy with that answer. "Okay. What is it?"
Joda glared at him. "You're going to have to learn to trust." She touched a gnarled hand to his face. "You are very handsome, but cynical, I think. That will not do here."
Emilie sniffed the concoction in the cup and smiled at Nick to reassure him. "It's only a little chamomile. It won't hurt
her and it will help settle her down."
Her aunt grinned and slapped Nick's cheek lightly. "There! You understand now! You have no faith!"
"Joda" Emilie warned quietly, willing her aunt to remember the plan for adopting Amber.
"Bah!" Her aunt waved a hand at them both. "I'm going to bed. Goodnight!"
When the older woman had left the room, Emilie looked at Nick. "I won't let her drink the tea if you don't want her to. My aunt can be a little overwhelming when she knows that she's right, which is most of the time, at least about herbs and such."
Nick sat down on the edge of one of the big chairs, refusing to allow himself the comfort of sitting back in the plush depths. "If it'll help," he allowed with a shrug. "And if she'll drink it."
Emilie put the cup to Amber's lips and she drank the concoction without any hesitation. She settled back against Emilie and smiled at her uncle in the firelight.
"I know Aunt Joda’s ways may seem . . . odd," Emilie tried to explain. "She’s an herbalist. She’s spent most of her life studying plants and medicines. She's helped a lot of people in town."
"Amber seems to be one of them." Nick watched his niece relax.
"What happened?" Emilie wondered.
"We got thrown out of the motel!" Adam piped in.
Nick raked his hands through his hair in frustration. "Amber wouldn't stop crying. The people in the room next to us complained. I was going to take her to the emergency room to see what they could do for her, but there was a big accident on the Interstate, dozens of people hurt. They wouldn't have been able to see her for hours."
"So, you got thrown out of the motel," Emilie simplified back down to Adam's explanation.
"Yeah, I guess we did."
"And we didn't have any place else to go," Adam continued. "So we came here."
He bounced a little on the thick chair beneath him then grinned up at Emilie.
"I didn't know what else to do," Nick admitted slowly.
"I know that must be true or I'm sure you wouldn't be here," Emilie replied.
"I—"
"Never mind," she said with a wave of her hand, very much like her aunt. "Let's go into the kitchen and have some hot chocolate, shall we?"
"Yes!" Adam agreed readily. "Can I ride the lions?"
"After hot chocolate," Emilie told him, picking up the baby, and starting towards the kitchen. She glanced at Nick's dark face. "If your uncle says it's okay."
By the time Adam had explored the kitchen and drank his hot chocolate, though, he was visibly drooping. His little head was nodding and his eyes were barely open.
Amber had finally fallen asleep on Nick's shoulder as Emilie made the hot chocolate. The relief he felt at the little girl resting made Aunt Joda seem more like a saint and less like a witch.
"Whatever that stuff is," Nick acknowledged quietly. "I want a prescription."
"I'm sure she'll be pleased to hear it," Emilie lied, knowing her aunt would probably ignore any attempt he made to thank her. "She loves to convert the unbelievers!"
"So I've heard," Nick admitted
A screen came down over Emilie's bright eyes. "I'm sure," she answered briefly. "There are rooms ready for the children upstairs." They both looked at Adam, who'd fallen asleep with his head on his knees. "I could bring Amber if you can bring Adam."
Nick looked at her when he handed her the baby. "I'm sorry, Emilie, I didn't mean—"
"Never mind," she whispered, pressing the baby's head against her chest. "Follow me."
They went slowly up the long stairs with their precious burdens. Emilie was glad that she'd aired out the two rooms on the off chance that he might accept her offer. She laid Amber down in the beautiful crib with the brass fittings and the lacy comforter. When Emilie was sure that she was still asleep, she took Nick to the adjoining room where he laid Adam down in the big bed.
"Your room is through here," she told him quietly.
"We have to talk, Emilie." Nick stopped her.
"All right. We'll go back down to the sitting room."
"We could stay up here," he offered. "It wouldn't matter and you wouldn't have to walk back down the stairs. I know your leg hurts you."
Emilie's head came up on the sound of pity in his voice, however well-meaning. She stared hard at him in the dim stillness. The wind threw itself against the hundred-year-old house around them.
Nick knew they said in town that old Jacque de Ferrier had made a deal with the devil to find the gold that had established the family there on the mountain. Looking into the angry gaze of Jacque's great-granddaughter, it was easy to understand where they'd got the idea. Surely the devil had put that emerald fire in her eyes.
She didn't say a word to him, though. Just turned around and walked back down the long stairway, her hand following the wide, wood rail that led to the floor.
Nick had no choice but to follow her. He couldn't find the right words when he talked to her. Maybe that was why he constantly found himself apologizing. It was awkward and irritating.
When he was with her, he felt as though he hovered somewhere between being a jerk and an idiot. He couldn't believe he'd asked her out on a date! What a fiasco that would have been! He was glad that she had turned him down.
Emilie walked woodenly toward the kitchen where the light still burned. Fury, embarrassment, and fear made her back as straight as a rail and kept her gaze locked in front of her.
How dare he suggest that she couldn't get up and down her own stairs as often as she wanted or needed? Was she limping unduly? Did she seem weak or unable to be a mother?
Had fate put him and the children back in her life, given her another chance, only to laugh in her face?
Nick sat down in the chair he'd vacated at the wood table when they’d reached the kitchen. He thought she was going to do the same. Instead, she picked up a few of the hot chocolate cups and walked with them to the sink.
"Emilie," he began then stopped. "Can I help?"
"I can do this by myself," she retorted angrily. "I'm not a cripple!"
"I didn't suggest that you were," he tried to explain. "I meant—"
"I know what you meant." She picked up the rest of the cups and the hot chocolate pot. "Do you think you're the first one to look at me and see that I limp across a room?"
Nick rubbed his hand over his face. It had been a long, hard day. He was exhausted and close to being out of patience for the rest of the year. He would have liked to have taken the kids and walked out of the house. The truth was that they'd either have to spend the night in the car or in the hospital emergency room if he did that.
If it had only been him, he would have done it. With Amber and Adam, it was different.
"Look, I didn't mean to sound like you couldn't walk up and down the stairs."
"Thank you!" She slammed the hot chocolate pot into the sink and ran water into it.
"You don't have to be so touchy about it!"
"Touchy?" She stalked back to where he sat at the table. "Are you saying that I'm overly sensitive about my disability?"
He frowned, looking up at her. "I’m sorry, Emilie!"
She started to speak then turned around and stormed back across the room, furiously washing the cups and spoons. When she was finished, she scrubbed vigorously at the pot.
"Emilie!" He walked over to the sink and stood behind her. "Will you . . . will you please sit down a minute and talk to me?"
"I think we've said enough for one night."
"We haven't said anything," he reminded her. "We need to talk about this!"
"There's nothing else to say.”
"If you want I’ll get the kids and leave."
She turned around, surprised to find him close to her. "I didn't say that!"
He shrugged. "If we can't sort through this mess and I've only been here an hour, how will you put up with us for two weeks?"
"I'm sorry." She looked down at her wet hands. "I don't like people to imply that I can't do things."
&nb
sp; "I'm sorry, too. I wouldn't like people to imply that about me either. Can we start again?"
"Please." She held out her hand to him.
He looked down into her face, scrubbed clean of the make up she'd been wearing earlier that evening. She was wearing a plain white robe with a little lacy collar that framed her face. Her hair was held back from her face with a white headband.
Emilie had a fey quality about her that made her seem unreal, yet tantalizing. She was out of reach, at least out of his reach.
He took her warm hand in his and squeezed a little, mindful of the frail strength that lay in that clasp. "Thank you."
They sat at the table across from each other. She watched his face while he explained what had happened, and about how long it would take to finish their house.
Emilie felt foolish that she had allowed his words to bother her. Certainly people had said much worse. The difference was that she cared what this man thought about her.
It was only because it was his decision about who could adopt Amber, she told herself. She had to show him that she was strong and self-reliant. She didn’t need a man in her life to be a good mother.
She leaned on her hand and listened to him talk about asbestos and the children, looking at his dark eyes, tracing the dark shadow that had grown along his jaw line with her eyes. She loved his voice.
Recalling those few strange, exciting moments when their gazes had locked at the auditorium, she pulled herself upright and clasped her hands tightly before her on the table.
Had it only been her? Had he noticed that compelling tension between them? Or had it simply been her imagination?
Nick felt her withdrawal. It was like a splash of cold water, reminding him that he had to watch his step with her. It would be too easy to let those dark feelings he had for her surface and ruin everything for the kids.
"I don't know if you celebrate Christmas," he said finally. "If not, the kids and I can make ourselves scarce over the holiday. I imagine you have people here anyway." He glanced around the huge, dimly-lit kitchen. "Family, or someone."