“You’d have to do it,” she said. “I can’t write worth a damn.”
“Neither can I,” Patrick lamented. “Oh, well, it was just an idea.”
Molly sighed. “I could sure use a drink.”
“You’re entitled,” he said.
“Which is why I won’t have one,” she said. “It would be too easy to use liquor to numb the pain. And in the end, what does that accomplish?”
Patrick was hit with a sudden flash of insight. “Which is why Alice is out there poking through your liquor stock, isn’t it?”
She nodded. “I started doing the inventory, but the temptation was too great. When Alice offered to help out, I grabbed at the chance to turn the chore over to her.”
“Good for you. Seeing you upset worries her. She needs to be doing something to help.”
“I know, but I can’t explain it to her,” Molly said. “You’d better get back out there before she starts to wonder what we’re up to in here. Alice has never been one to ignore her curiosity for long. She’s been pestering me about Daniel all afternoon, but I refuse to discuss him.”
Patrick studied Molly’s face. Her tears had dried, but there was still unbearable sadness in her eyes, and his brother had put it there. He felt partly responsible for that. He should have done a better job of protecting her, but no one had been able to get through to Molly once she’d fallen under Daniel’s spell.
“You sure you’re going to be okay?” he asked.
“I’m not sure of much,” she said, “but I am sure of that. You and me, we’re survivors, Patrick, you in spite of being a Devaney, me because of one.”
“Don’t ever forget that, Molly, not even for a second.”
She gave him a forced smile. “Get on out of here—the potatoes are going cold. I’ll have to reheat them in the microwave, and you know how that goes against my grain. I’ll bring your dinners out in a minute. I imagine you both want the special.”
“The special and a smile on your face.”
“I can promise one but not the other. I’ll do my best, though.”
He gave her a long, lingering look, then finally nodded, satisfied with what he saw. “Five minutes more of hiding out and not a second longer,” he warned. “You don’t want me back in here.”
“You’re right about that,” she said. “You get in the way.”
He left her with some regret and went in search of Alice, who’d poured them each a beer and found a booth where the light was dim.
“That took a while,” she said, searching his face. “Is Molly okay?”
“She’s fine.”
Alice looked skeptical. “She’s not fine, Patrick.”
“She will be,” he insisted.
“Can’t you tell me what happened? She’s my friend, too. I want to help.”
“She’ll tell you what she wants you to know. It’s enough that she understands you care,” he said, then reached for her hand and pressed a kiss against her knuckles. “Let’s talk about this inventory we’re going to do at my place tonight.”
“You know, if you keep secrets from me, there’s a good chance we won’t be at your place,” she told him tartly. “Not tonight. Not ever.”
He pulled away from her and sat back, feeling his defenses slip into place the way they always did when a woman tried to back him into a corner, however innocently. It didn’t seem to matter that the argument was over Molly’s secrets and not his own.
“Your choice,” he said.
Hurt flashed in her eyes. “Would it be that easy for you to stop this, Patrick?” she asked. “Could you let me turn my back and walk away?”
He deliberately shrugged. “Like I said, it’s your choice.”
She kept her gaze steady on him, then sighed. “In that case, I think I’d better do just that and go home,” she said, slipping out of the booth. “Tell Molly I’m sorry about dinner. Not that either of you will apparently give a damn whether I’m here or not. It’s nice that you have each other’s shoulders to cry on.”
The implication that they had deliberately shut her out of something important cut through him. Patrick wanted to reach out and stop her. One heartfelt word of apology was all it would have taken, one touch. But he couldn’t make himself do it. Instead, he watched her leave and told himself the ache in his heart had nothing at all to do with her going. He almost believed it, too. After all, over the years he’d gotten damn good at lying to himself.
Alice glanced up from the notes she was making for end-of-the-year report cards and saw Patrick coming across the school yard, a bouquet of lilacs in hand. It had been four days, four endless days, since she’d last laid eyes on him. Her heart did an automatic flip even though she’d vowed at least a hundred times to steel herself against the effect he had on her. She’d almost convinced herself that Molly was right, there was nothing to be gained by clinging to a false hope that Patrick would change.
Walking out of Jess’s, waiting as she crossed the room for Patrick to give even the tiniest sign that he didn’t want her to go, had almost killed her. She’d seen it as evidence that Patrick might enjoy sleeping with her, might even have feelings for her on some level, but he wasn’t letting her into his heart, not really, not if he could let her go so easily. It saddened her that Molly knew him better than she did. And she was just the teensiest bit jealous that the two of them had a history she knew nothing about.
Outside the window, he had disappeared from view, which could only mean he was in the building. She listened for the sound of his footsteps in the silent hallway, trying to brace herself against the impact he always had on her. She needed to be cool and distant and unapproachable. Unfortunately, she didn’t have the vaguest idea how she was going to pull off such a lie.
Suddenly he was there, without a whisper of sound to announce him, only the faint scent of lilacs to capture her attention. He filled the doorway, looking oddly uncertain as he waited for her to give some indication of whether he was welcome. She said nothing. She couldn’t gather the words or her thoughts. None of the heated words she’d mentally flung at him over the past few days were coming to her now. She was too darned glad to see him.
“Want me to leave?” he asked eventually.
“What I want and what I should want are two different things,” she told him candidly, then threw his own words back at him. “I guess that makes it your choice.”
“Then I’ll stay,” he said, stepping into the room. “That’s what you should have done at Jess’s, Alice. You should have stayed.”
“Why, when it was plain you didn’t care which I did?” She frowned at him. “Don’t try making what happened my fault, Patrick.”
“I cared,” he said. “I’m just lousy at saying it. I’m even worse at looking ahead more than a minute or two.”
She sighed then, noting that he’d opted to ignore the fact that their fight had to do with Molly’s secrets. Since he was focusing on his own mistakes, she would, too.
“Do you think that will ever change?” she asked.
“I doubt it.”
“I see. So where does that leave us?”
“Can you try to hear what I’m not saying as well as what comes out of my mouth? Can you take here and now?” he asked plaintively. “Can you not worry about the future?”
How could she, when she wanted a future with this man so desperately? But he wasn’t offering one, not yet anyway. Once again he was giving her the choice of taking him as he was…or not. She had a feeling what she said and did in the next few minutes would make or break any chance they had.
She blinked away the tears that threatened and faced him. “Are those lilacs for me?”
He nodded.
“I suppose I should put them in some water.” She got to her feet, found an old vase in a cupboard, filled it with water, then took the flowers, burying her face in them before setting them on a corner of her desk.
“Is there an answer in there I’m missing?” he asked eventually, regarding her warily.
She turned slowly, lifted her gaze to meet his. “The classroom is a little inappropriate for my answer. How about your place?”
Relief spread across his face, and she took heart at the sight of it.
“How fast can you gather up those papers?” he asked.
“I may as well leave them here,” she said, grabbing only her purse. “Something tells me I won’t be getting to them any time over the weekend.”
He grinned. “Not if I have my way.”
It wasn’t just about the fabulous sex, Patrick told himself a thousand times over the weekend, as he and Alice shut themselves away on his boat. He wasn’t using her. He would never do that to her.
But he couldn’t bring himself to define what it was about. He’d never let a woman get this close, never felt so needy and out of sorts when she was away. The four days before he’d swallowed his pride and gone after Alice had been the most miserable he’d spent since the early days after he’d left home.
“You know,” she said, staring at him across his tiny kitchen table. “I really should go home and get a change of clothes.”
“Why, when I’d only make you take them off?” he teased.
She grinned. “Maybe that’s why. I’m thinking something with lots and lots of tiny buttons, so you can fumble and be adorable as you try to undo them.”
“You think I have the patience for that? I’m more likely to rip them apart.”
“That could be interesting, too. I’ll make it something old with tiny buttons.”
“Forget it. I like the way you look in my shirt. I had no idea that an old T-shirt could look that sexy on someone.”
“If it’s that enticing, why am I still dressed in it?”
“Sometimes anticipation is every bit as important as the sex,” he said, realizing it was true. He liked the slow buildup of heat. He liked knowing where it would lead, knowing how her body would respond. He liked the teasing, the exchange of smoldering looks and lingering caresses.
But even as he thought of his own amazing level of contentment, Alice’s grin faltered.
“Patrick, are you sure you’re not getting tired of having me underfoot?”
He stared at her in shock. “Do I act as if I’m bored?”
“No, but it’s not as if you’re used to sharing these quarters with another person.”
He studied her with a narrowed gaze. “What are you really saying, Alice? Is being shut up here on the boat with me getting on your nerves?”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
Relief washed over him. He hadn’t realized how desperately he’d begun to want this to work. If she’d said she wanted to go home, he wasn’t sure how he would have reacted.
“Okay, then,” he said.
“But I will need to get back to my place tonight,” she told him.
Immediately he tensed. “Why?”
“I have school tomorrow. There’s no way I can put that off, and I can’t very well wear the same thing I had on on Friday.”
As reasonable as the explanation was, it made his stomach tighten. He was the one who wanted things to be temporary, but hearing her making plans to take off upset him in ways he couldn’t explain.
“Patrick?”
“What?”
“You do know I can’t just stay here forever, right? It’s not as if we’ve sailed away to some idyllic island. We both have responsibilities.”
There was that word again—forever. He seized on it and nothing else. Over the past couple of days, the word and its implications had lost some of their power to terrify him. “Of course I know that.”
“You could come to my place,” she suggested casually. “It would make it easier during the week. That is, if you wanted to.”
“I don’t know,” he said, the cautious words coming out before he could consider them. It was an automatic, knee-jerk response. His turf was one thing, hers was something else. He thought of that cozy little cottage, and it made his palms sweat. Being there had made him want things that he’d learned couldn’t be trusted—a home, a family.
“Think about it,” she said. “And school will be out soon. I could stay here then, if you’d prefer it. I could even go out fishing with you.”
A part of him liked the idea of sharing his life with her that way. Another part was terrified. All this talk about tomorrow and the day after tomorrow and beyond was treading on turf he normally avoided like the plague. He didn’t do plans. He didn’t look into the future. Forever might not be as frightening as it had once been, but it was still off-limits. He wasn’t ready to toss all of his rules and common sense out the window, just because the mere thought of them no longer panicked him.
“Let me know when you’re ready to go and I’ll take you home,” he said tightly, ignoring all of her bright and cheerful plans for the summer.
There was no mistaking the quick rise of hurt in Alice’s eyes. That, of course, was the problem. He was going to hurt her eventually. There was no question about it. He’d been deluding himself when he’d tried to pretend that they could take things one day at a time. Alice was a forever woman. She had every right to expect permanence and commitment, but he didn’t believe in either one.
“Whenever you want me to go, just say the word,” she said stiffly.
“I don’t want you to go,” he retorted, more exasperated with himself than with her. He was the one who wasn’t making any sense. “I just think it’s for the best.”
“Because you’re scared,” she guessed.
“Because I’m smart,” he corrected.
“And if I disagree about what’s smart?”
“You’re entitled to your opinion.”
She stood up in that oversize T-shirt of his that skimmed her thighs and managed to emphasize her curves. He expected her to flounce from the room, but instead she rounded the table to sit in his lap. She draped an arm loosely around his neck and skimmed a finger along his stubbled cheek.
“It is my opinion,” she said, “that we’re doing entirely too much talking all of a sudden. It always gets us into trouble. You get that worried frown on your forehead.” She pressed a kiss to the place in question. “And lines right here,” she added, kissing the down-turned corners of his mouth.
“We can’t go through life making love whenever we butt heads,” he said, trying to maintain his grip on reason even as she tried to torment him with sneaky little kisses.
“Can you think of a better way to remind ourselves of what’s really important?” She looked him in the eye. “I love you, Patrick. All the rest of it—” she waved her hand dismissively “—we’ll work it out.”
“Alice,” he began, but the protest died on his lips when she covered his mouth with hers.
He sighed and gave himself up to the desire instantly slamming through him. Maybe she did know what was important, after all. He could wrestle with his doubts when she wasn’t around to torment him.
“This thing between you and Alice, is it serious?” Molly asked Patrick several days after Alice had gone back to her place.
He frowned at the question. “What thing?” he asked, being deliberately obtuse. This was not a conversation he intended to pursue, not with Molly. He thought he’d made that clear to her.
Molly scowled at him. “Oh, please. Half the town knows the two of you never left your boat all weekend. Only an idiot would assume she was helping you work on the engine or clean the galley for that long.”
Patrick bit back a curse. He’d forgotten what small towns were like when people got hold of a juicy piece of gossip. He didn’t give a damn for himself, but it couldn’t be good for Alice to have people talking about the two of them. Maybe if he’d put an engagement ring on her finger, it would dispel the talk, but that was out of the question.
“Sweetheart, you know nothing I do is ever serious,” he told Molly, adopting his devil-may-care tone of old.
Her gaze narrowed. “Does Alice understand that?”
“Of course,” he said
at once.
“Does she really?” Molly persisted. “Because if you hurt her, Patrick Devaney, I swear I’ll come out on that pitiful dock of yours and set fire to it and your boat.”
She would do it, too. He didn’t have any doubts about that. Molly had a mile-wide protective streak when it came to her friends, and a built-in aversion to the way Devaney men treated women. He’d always been glad to count himself among the friends, despite his last name. Obviously, though, she considered Alice to be the friend most in need of protection now…from him.
“Look, I’ll talk to her, okay? I’ll make sure we’re both on the same page,” he said. He recalled how the last time he’d tried to have that conversation with Alice it hadn’t gone so well. She’d seemed to hear only what she wanted to hear, dismissing everything else.
“When?” Molly pressed.
“Tonight,” he promised.
“What’s wrong with now?”
“She’s at school.”
Molly clearly wasn’t satisfied with his response. Hands on hips, she asked, “Why put it off, Patrick? The kids are only there a half day today. The teachers are all alone in their classrooms grading papers and stuff in the afternoon. Knowing Alice, she had all that done days ago and is sitting there bored to tears and staring at the walls.”
“Molly, you can’t actually expect me to have a conversation like this with her in her classroom. It’s totally inappropriate,” he said. Besides, if he kept showing up in Alice’s classroom, that was going to set off its own round of speculation. He’d run into Loretta Dowd on his last visit, and she’d given him an approving grin that had completely rattled him.
“It’s not an ideal situation, no, but if you put it off, you’ll just think of some other excuse. I know you, Patrick. You’d rather run than stick around and settle things. Isn’t that what you did with your folks?”
“Leave my folks out of this,” he retorted heatedly. “I’ll talk to Alice. I’ll spell things out for her one more time, but I’ll decide when and where. This is none of your business.”
“I’m making it my business. I like her, Patrick. And she’s in way over her head with you. She’s in love with you.”
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