by Jane Toombs
“And I’m finally home, too,” Nathan announced, entering the room.
“We found the cowboy book,” she said.
“Jade said it was mine,” Tim told him.
“She’s right, as usual.”
“You gave me my hat, too. And Freddie.”
“I did. And it’s because you’re my friend.”
The boy’s dark eyes examined him a long moment before he smiled. “Danny’s my friend, too. And Yasmin.”
“How about Jade?” Nathan asked.
Tim frowned. “She’s more like...something else.”
Nathan, touched, figured the word Tim wanted to use but couldn’t bring himself to do so was “mother.”
“Danny says the shots don’t hurt,” Tim said. “But Yasmin says they do a little bit.”
Nathan believed in being honest with kids. “Yasmin’s closer to being right. A little bit.”
Tim swallowed. “Okay.”
“Want to get it over with before we cook the hot dogs?”
“Maybe.”
“Sometimes a maybe is a no, sometimes a yes. I’ll take yours for a yes.”
Jade had hoped they could leave after the shot, but she didn’t have the heart to disappoint Tim, especially not after he’d practically called her mother. His stumbling words had brought tears to her eyes.
Downstairs in the clinic, Nathan asked her to stand Tim on the scales, weigh him and measure his height. While she was doing this, with Tim distracted, he readied the immunization shot. After she finished, he had the needle in and out of Tim so quickly the boy barely winced.
“Now that you know what to expect, the next one won’t be so bad,” he told Tim. “Time to get those hot dogs grilling.”
While the cooking was going on, Tim went to explore the yard, leaving Jade alone with Nathan on the screened porch.
“He’s acting more like a normal boy every day,” she said.
“Kids are resilient, thank God.”
More because she wanted to keep the conversation away from what had happened between them than for any other reason, she told him how Tim kept worrying that Laura might want the frog back. “He saw her picture and even though he didn’t know the photo was of her, he said ‘that lady looks sad,’” she finished.
“Laura...” he began, then stopped and sighed. “You can reassure Tim that Freddie will remain his. I don’t think my sister wants any reminders around of her childhood.”
Jade waited, her curiosity aroused, but he didn’t go on. Whatever Laura’s problem was, he didn’t intend to share it with her. Which was fine. The fewer confidences they exchanged, the better. Tim was their link, their only link.
Not quite. There was the damn chemistry. He wasn’t that close to her, not touching her at all, but she could feel it just the same. She’d been conscious of it from the moment he’d come upstairs.
“Are you going to continue living over the clinic?” she asked, trying to distract herself with words.
“For now. Maybe later I’ll change my mind. The apartment’s handy to the clinic, that’s for sure.”
“If you got married, though—”
“I don’t intend to make that mistake again!” He all but threw the words at her.
So he’d been married before. Unhappily, it seemed. “I didn’t mean to hit a nerve,” she said.
“You’re pretty good at it, though.” Anger simmered in his voice.
Jade took offense. Her remark about getting married had been totally innocent. She opened her mouth to say so, but didn’t get the chance.
“You can have whatever opinion of me you wish,” he snapped. “But why in hell you have to share it with the whole damn world is beyond me.”
Jade winced inwardly. He meant the barbecue night. Since she had no possible defense, she said nothing. But irrational as it was, guilt always wound up making her irked at the person who’d caused her to feel guilty, and he was no exception. She tried to tamp down her irritation, but it kept bubbling up.
“Eavesdroppers never hear good of themselves,” she muttered.
“I wasn’t eavesdropping and you know it.”
Knowing he spoke the truth just made her more annoyed with him. She glanced toward the yard, hoping Tim was about to interrupt. But he’d found a ball somewhere and was playing with it at the far end of the yard.
“I prefer not to get into a discussion,” she told him. “Let it die a natural death.”
He left the grill to tower over her. “In my position, would you?”
She stared at the muscle twitching in his jaw, wondering how soon he’d explode. When it happened, she needed to be on her feet, not scrunched down in a chair. Rising as casually as she could, she told him the truth. “I suppose not.” Then, right or wrong, she lost her hold on her temper and boiled over.
“What the hell do you want from me?” she demanded, face-to-face with him. “Hear this and hear it well. I don’t grovel.”
Glaring down at her, with great difficulty Nathan suppressed an overwhelming urge to grab her shoulders and shake her till she rattled. Violence had no place here. Besides, if he touched her, he might go completely berserk in another way. Never in his life had he been so physically aware of a woman.
What he really wanted to do was fling her onto the floor and take her right here on this damn porch—not an acceptable alternative. He forced himself to step back and take a few deep breaths. The odor of charred meat filled his head.
“I think the hot dogs are done,” Jade said, her. tone dripping with honeyed sarcasm.
The screen door opened, then slammed shut behind Tim. “Time to eat?” he asked.
As they sat around the table munching on hot dogs and deli potato salad, Tim kept talking between bites. Just as well, Nathan thought. Whether or not his verbosity came from being exposed to other kids, the result was that someone kept the conversation going.
“How come you ain’t got a pool, Doc?” he asked. “You got lots of room in your yard. Jade’s got a pool inside her house, but we forgot to get a swimsuit for me, so I don’t get to swim in it yet.”
“I’m not sure I’m going to live above the clinic. very long,” Nathan said, “so I’ll hold off on a pool.”
“You mean you’re gonna move away?” Tim’s obvious distress disturbed Nathan. Was it a good thing for the boy to get attached to him? Sooner or later Tim would have to go back to those he belonged to. But not the abuser—never!
“One of these days I might buy or build a house somewhere around here,” he told the boy. “But I’m not leaving Nevada. This is my home.”
Tim’s relief made him suppress a sigh. He didn’t like to think of the boy leaving, either.
“Maybe you can come and swim in Jade’s pool till you get one of your own.” Tim glanced at Jade for approval.
Nathan knew Jade’s smile was forced. “Dr. Walker’s busy. He doesn’t have very much time to get away.”
“He came to Zed’s barbecue.”
Nathan watched Jade, wondering how she was going to field that one.
“We don’t know that he likes to swim or that he’d want to drive all the way up to Incline Village.”
She was quick on her feet, all right. “I haven’t had a chance to go swimming since I got here,” he said, enjoying the byplay. “Unlike you, Tim, I did bring my swimsuit with me, though. If an invitation was extended, who knows, I might decide to try out Ms. Adams’s pool.”
Ball’s in your court, lady, he thought smugly.
She raised her chin and looked down her nose at him. “Consider the invitation extended.”
The lady had a wicked backhand. Okay, she asked for it. “Tomorrow’s Sunday,” he said. “Give me until noon to take care of any emergencies and I’d be delighted to accept.”
To his satisfaction, Jade blinked. Before she could say anything, Tim, who’d been looking from one to the other of them, asked, “Does that mean you’re coming? You guys talk so funny I can’t tell.”
Nathan nodded. �
�So you’d better locate a swimsuit.”
“Yeah,” Tim said, grinning.
On the way home, Jade stopped in Gardnerville to buy a swimsuit for Tim. Damn the man, anyway. The last thing she’d ever intended to do was see him socially again, much less invite him to her house. Yet once Tim got them involved in all this pool nonsense, she’d had no choice.
To refuse to invite Nathan would have confused and upset Tim, and there was no way she was going to let that happen. If she was generous, she might believe Nathan’s motives were as honorable as hers, but she suspected he’d agreed merely to annoy her. Which he had.
On the way out of the store, a white two-piece suit caught her eye. She paused to check it out. Not as revealing as a bikini but a long way from modest. She liked the cut. “You need a swimsuit, too?” Tim asked.
Not exactly. On the other hand, the pool chlorine had badly faded her favorite one-piece. “Yes, I do,” she said decisively.
Back in the truck with the two swimsuits, Jade told herself firmly that buying the two-piece had nothing to do with Nathan. Summer would bring pool-party invitations by the ton, and it would do Northern Nevada Drilling no good for her to appear in a faded suit. Businesswomen had to take care to look prosperous.
In a swimsuit? Come on, an inner voice whispered, but she cut it off.
“You’re sure you know how to swim?” she asked Tim. Although he’d insisted more than once he did, she knew kids tended to exaggerate.
“She called me her little frog,” Tim said unexpectedly, “’cause I could swim just like one.”
Jade examined his words for clues. She again. The same she he used to ride behind on a motorbike? Choosing her words carefully, Jade asked, “You don’t mean Alice, do you?”
“Naw,” he said. “Alice wasn’t back there.” Before she could ask where that was, something outside caught his attention and he pointed to the right. “Look, there’s a red-tailed hawk. Zed’s got lots of them near the ranch. Danny says hawks catch mice and eat ’em.”
“Hot Shot catches a mouse once in a while,” she said, “But he doesn’t eat them—he likes what I feed him better.”
“Do you think Doc’ll like Hot Shot?”
“Hot Shot won’t care one way or the other. In fact, he might not take to Nathan—he doesn’t like men. Cats are picky.”
“I bet he likes Doc.”
Jade hoped the cat would totally ignore him. Too bad Hot Shot wasn’t a dog who might nip at Nathan. Or at least growl to show him he was unwelcome.
“Is Doc gonna eat with us tomorrow? Maybe we could have pizza?”
She certainly didn’t intend to cook for the man. If she had to feed him, take-out pizza would be the entire menu. And if he had any notion she intended to be an entrée, she’d take great pleasure in showing him exactly how wrong he was.
Chapter Five
The next morning after breakfast, Jade clicked the TV to a Reno station for the news. She loaded the dishwasher, decided it looked pretty full and turned it on, not watching the screen or paying close attention to what she was hearing until Tim said excitedly, “They’re talking about Alice on the TV.”
Thinking he’d merely heard the name Alice, she looked and saw a local newscaster standing in front of Washoe Med.
“...no additional information has been obtained by the authorities about the injured and still-unconscious woman,” she was saying. “Alice has no last name. I’ve been told by a reliable source there was also a small boy in the wrecked van—he apparently escaped injury. My source believes he was placed temporarily in a foster home.
“We’re working with the police to obtain a photo of Alice in the hope someone may see her picture on this program and be able to identify her.”
“Do they mean me?” Tim asked.
Jade clicked off the TV. “Yes.”
“Is my picture gonna be on TV like Alice’s?”
She caught back her impulsive I hope not and said, “I don’t know.”
Tim picked up the frog and hugged him, saying, “Freddie doesn’t want me to be on TV.”
That meant he didn’t want to be—making three of them, if she counted Freddie. It wasn’t that she didn’t wish Tim could be reunited with loving parents. Unfortunately what she’d learned about him so far made her doubt that whoever had been looking after him was loving.
He was quiet for the rest of the morning, retreating once again into the safety of silence. Some time later she heard him whispering to Freddie in his other language and decided she’d check out some Asian language books and tapes at the Reno library on Monday. If she could identify what language it was, she’d know what the country “back there” might be.
She had to admit she was now glad Nathan had accepted her reluctant invitation to go swimming. His presence would distract Tim from his brooding and give her someone to share the TV-news invasion with.
When he arrived shortly after one, she greeted him cordially, smiling to herself at his wary expression. What had he expected—a snarling cougar? Tim flung himself at Nathan, hugging his legs.
“Hey, cowboy, I’m glad to see you, too,” Nathan said, hunkering down to give him a hug in return. “Got something you want to tell me?”
Was Nathan’s sensitivity to nuances something he’d learned practicing medicine? she wondered. Most men she knew, including her brothers, didn’t have it.
“Alice was on TV,” Tim told him.
Nathan looked at Jade for clarification and she briefed him on the newscast. “Tim’s worried his picture might get on TV,” she finished.
“Might not happen,” Nathan assured the boy. “If it does, we’ll just have to deal with what comes up. You’re not alone—Jade and I are on your side.”
“Don’t want him to find me,” Tim muttered.
“Who do you mean?” Nathan asked. “Who is he?”
Tim shut down.
Time for a switch. “The pool’s ready and waiting,” Jade said. “The question is, are we?”
Tim brightened and ran off to his bedroom to don his suit, with her calling after him to wait until she got there before going near the pool. She pointed out a bathroom where Nathan could change, then went to put on her two-piece.
The suit fit as well as she remembered from trying it on in the store, but as she examined herself in the mirror, a question surfaced. Just who had she bought the suit for—herself or Nathan? In case the answer was Nathan, she felt tempted to strip it off and go with the old faded one, instead. There was absolutely no reason to try to impress the man, none at all.
Dithering was not her style, so she shook her head and stalked from her room in the white two-piece. What did it matter, after all?
Nathan, with an impatient Tim, waited inside the domed pool enclosure. When Jade appeared, he decided the wait was well worthwhile. The white suit she wore—what there was of it—set off her golden skin, as well as other eye-catching attributes, to perfection.
To rid himself of his instinctive reaction, he made a shallow dive off the side of the pool into the water, heated to a tolerable temperature. When he surfaced, he saw that Tim had jumped in after him and was paddling vigorously over to the other side.
After watching Tim for a bit, Jade walked down the steps into the water and set off in a crawl toward the deep end. Spotting a large orange ball on a lounge chair, Nathan levered himself out and tossed the ball to Tim before leaping back in.
Soon the three of them were flipping the ball back and forth. “Any rules?” Jade called.
“Nope,” he said. “None. Orange balls don’t like rules, do they, cowboy?”
Tim, grinning, shook his head.
After a time, Nathan noticed a large black-and-white cat perched on a plant table well back from the edge of the pool. From the animal’s supercilious gaze it was clear he thought humans were out of their minds to splash around in that nasty wet stuff.
“Who’s that?” he asked Tim, pointing.
“He’s my friend Hot Shot. He’s real smart.�
��
“Picky, too,” Jade said. “He likes very few people.”
Taking her words as a challenge, Nathan climbed out of the pool, grabbed a towel and eased into a chair near the plant table, careful to pay no attention to the cat. It wasn’t long before curiosity drove Hot Shot off the table and over to check out the stranger.
Nathan casually let his hand dangle down within the cat’s reach. Cautiously Hot Shot eased closer and sniffed at his fingers. Once the cat was satisfied, Nathan rose slowly and made his way back to the pool. Contact had been established. Now it was up to Hot Shot.
Before he dove back in, a chime sounded.
“The doorbell,” Jade muttered.
“I can get it if you like,” Nathan offered.
She shrugged, which he took as an affirmative and, towel draped over his shoulders, made his way to the front door. Through the small windows on one side, he saw a uniformed officer on the step and opened the door.
“Deputy Haines,” the officer said. “I’m looking for a Ms. Jade Adams. Is she in?”
“In the pool, at the moment,” Nathan told him. “Why don’t you come in and wait while I tell her you’re here.”
By the time he reached the pool enclosure, Jade was toweling herself off. “Who was it?” she asked.
“Deputy Sheriff Haines to see you. He’s waiting in the living room.”
Jade frowned. “Watch Tim, will you?” she said as she shrugged on a terry-cloth robe.
When she left, Nathan motioned to Tim to get out of the pool. “We’ll get dressed,” he said. “If things go okay, maybe we can have another swim later.”
Tim made a face but let himself be ushered from the pool area into the main house where he disappeared into a bedroom. In the bathroom assigned to him, Nathan found the cat sitting on the T-shirt he’d left on the counter.
“Guard cat, are you?” he asked as he shucked his suit and hastily threw on his clothes. In view of that newscast, he wanted to get out there and back up Jade. The cop might be there on another matter entirely, but he didn’t think so.
When he reached for the T-shirt, Hot Shot jumped down and Nathan opened the bathroom door to let him out. On the way to the living room, he detoured to Tim’s room, finding the cat had gotten there ahead of him. “Stay in here with Hot Shot, okay?” he told Tim. “I’ll come back and get you in a little bit.”