“He has history with Danny… where you’re just now getting to know him. That’s the only reason things went so smoothly for Mr. Hot and Moody. You will learn to get along with Danny too… it just takes a while. Don’t give up so quickly and try not to let what Rusty said upset you,” Renee soothed. “Besides, it’s not a popularity contest… Danny’s your brother… that means you automatically win his affection, regardless.”
“Oh stop… you sound like my mom!” Amy said angrily and then immediately felt bad. Renee was only trying to help, as was her mother. “Besides, I’m not so sure I can win anything where Danny is concerned.”
“No. You stop. Enough of this… swallow your damn pride and go visit him! It’s Tuesday evening and he’ll be expecting you whether he’s at Mr. Hawkins’ house or at the home,” Renee admonished. “Go… I’ve got this.”
She allowed Renee to push her out the door of her own business. The drive to Beavercreek was uncomfortable to say the least. Amy kept imagining things like her brother and Rusty not even being there when she did arrive. Perhaps, Rusty had taken him fishing again or some other equally fun activity. The library possibly. And maybe she hadn’t even crossed Danny’s mind.
Would her brother even realize that it was Tuesday and time for their visit? Somehow Amy knew that if Danny didn’t remember, it would hurt. Regardless of the fact that it might simply be because of Rusty’s distraction, the idea still set Amy’s nerves on edge.
When she pulled in the driveway of a small but cozy looking ranch style house and caught sight of Danny standing just inside the house with the front door open wide, waiting for her, she felt tears of relief prick her eyes.
“I told you she would remember, Rusty!” Danny yelled excitedly as she got out of the car.
She was surprised that when she made it up the front walk to the door, Danny actually stepped outside and hugged her. It was awkward as she hadn’t been expecting the onslaught of affection from her brother, but it brought back the same prick of tears behind her eyes. He’d missed her too. She found herself hugging him back.
“Don’t worry, Amy. Sometimes people cry when they’re happy. Not just when they’re sad. I won’t be upset if you cry from being happy. I don’t want you to cry if you’re sad though,” Danny said after releasing her.
She was dumbfounded. How had Danny known how close to tears she’d been just now? She took a minute to just look at him. He seemed to be doing the same and even reached out and touched her cheek, smiling sweetly before turning away. His ready smile returned again as he held the door to Rusty’s house open for her.
Danny looked so much like their father sometimes, even despite his unusual facial features. He had many of the classic characteristics of Down Syndrome… upward slanted eyes, a small nose and a thicker tongue than most people.
Amy felt tears of sadness at the reminder of her father that Danny had generated, which mixed in with the relief from him remembering their visit. Once again she realized just how perceptive Danny really was about how she felt. Much more than most people who knew her. A small bit of her wondered if that was part of her issues with him… his ability to read her like few people could.
“Rusty owns this house now, Amy. Come and see my room here,” Danny said, grabbing her hand and pulling her down a hallway.
Her quick glance around at the rooms they passed on their hurried route to Danny’s temporary bedroom told her that much like Danny, Rusty Hawkins was also a neat freak. Great. It was just one more positive to add to Rusty’s wonderful characteristics that directly contradicted the list of negatives that Amy had to offer Danny.
Stopping in the doorway to the small bedroom she noticed two things immediately. One was that the room was larger than the one at the group home but not nearly as nice. The second thing was that it was organized almost exactly like his old room at Sylvia’s home.
She remembered the setup from when they had moved Danny out of his old house. The bed was in the same position as far from the window as possible, the chest of drawers along the opposite side of the room as the bed. His record player arranged on the top of it with his albums neatly lined up between two bookends.
The biggest difference between this room and his bedroom at the group home was that here the chair was a rocking chair, not a straight back one. Some mental picture or memory went through her mind of a much younger version of Danny. He was sitting in a similarly organized room in a similar style rocking chair while she’d stood in the doorway. She must have been about four, maybe.
Danny quickly went over, pulled out a vinyl record and gently put it on the player before turning it on. She watched as he then went and sat in the chair. Looking at where she stood, he smiled.
“You’re too big and too old to sit on my lap now, Amy. You’ll have to sit on the bed or the floor this time,” he said. “I’m not sixteen anymore. Rusty says we’re old men now.”
She found herself holding on to the doorframe for support as she again realized that Danny was remembering the same thing that had flickered through her mind. The song she’d heard in Rusty’s car the first night of the festival played through the small speakers on top of the chest of drawers where the record player resided. Hippie music.
“Hippie music,” she said quietly. Danny’s smile grew bigger at that.
“He’s done this for as long as I can remember,” Rusty said quietly from right behind her.
“I’m not sure how I know that,” she replied. “But I do…”
“My mom should have let me stay at your house sometimes too, Amy,” Danny said. “She let me stay with Rusty. But she told my dad that I wasn’t allowed to stay overnight at your house. She lied. She was a liar sometimes. But I still love her.”
“Oh wow… no way,” she heard Rusty say. Then she felt him walk away, leaving her alone with Danny once more.
Some weird bit of reminiscence that she couldn’t really piece together or understand filled her and she found herself sitting down on his neatly made bed and listening to the entire first side of the record. When Danny stood up to turn the record over she realized how comfortable he was here in this room… even with Rusty nearby. So much so that he put her at ease as well.
This was why he didn’t belong in the group home. It had nothing to do with it not being a nice enough place or the fact that he was ‘high functioning,’ whatever that meant. This environment was what he knew. Just like he knew where all the libraries were in the Dayton area, what busses ran to Miamisburg and the name of any song that came on the radio along with who sang it.
Rusty Hawkins had known this about her brother where she did not. She hadn’t even known how to ask Danny why he hated the home.
Tears stung her eyes yet again as this man who favored her father so much simply started the other side of the record playing and then sat back down in the rocking chair. He was the most familiar stranger she’d ever known.
It hurt that an extremely nice looking but equally rigid man had been able to step in and fix her brother’s world where she’d struggled just to get through an hour long visit with him three to four times a week.
Standing up she approached her brother and laid her hand on his shoulder gently. He placed his hand over hers briefly. It had been the best visit they’d ever had. No fighting, no arguing. However, the feeling that she was the worst sibling ever was nearly overwhelming now. She quietly left his room and closed the door behind her. She nearly made it to the end of the hallway before the tears blinded her.
Upon seeing Rusty approach her, she managed to skirt around him and was out the door and halfway down the street before the tears finally spilled over onto her cheeks. Why hadn’t Rusty just helped her do that for Danny? Instead he’d come in like some kind of savior for her brother, providing him a private sanctuary that was obviously one of the most important things to him.
Her mother was right that only she could build a relationship with Danny. Yet Rusty Hawkins had effectively taken over and provided everything Danny
had needed since Sylvia’s death, leaving nothing for Amy to do. What did Amy have to offer him now that Rusty hadn’t already provided for him? What did Danny need her for?
Not wanting to go home and get an additional dose of what she couldn’t provide for her brother, she instead ended up at the bakery. She whipped up a batch of sugar and spice cookies and stuck them in the oven and was starting on a batch of cupcakes when she heard banging on the door to the shop.
Her instincts told her that it was Rusty. She ignored the knocking. The fact that he’d chased her down made her really mad, since he’d already won. What more did he want? He could in fact take better care of her brother than she could… so why wasn’t he at his house doing so right now? Was it really that important to make his point or rub it in? In fact, if he wasn’t at his house taking care of Danny… then who was?
Sighing in equal parts frustration and anxiety, she had just started toward the double doors leading to the shop when she heard knocking at the back bakery door.
“Ms. Carlton… I know you’re in there. Your car’s here. I also know that you can hear me knocking. So stop this and let me in so we can talk like adults,” Rusty’s voice filtered through the door.
She walked over to the back door and stopped. She debated continuing to ignore him but reason won out. Flipping the lock she tugged the door open and said, “Did you drag Danny out with you this late at night?”
“No. Of course not,” he replied with a frown while stepping inside.
“So you just left him alone… at night?” she asked incredulously.
“No… a friend of mine’s daughter is at the house until I can get back there,” he replied, closing and relocking the door. “Besides, he doesn’t need a babysitter… he’s a grown man. I just didn’t want to chance him waking up and not know where I went.”
When he turned back to her their gazes locked and neither said anything for several moments until the timer for the cookies dinged. Before she could move, Rusty grabbed one of the big oven mitts off the bakery table and headed over to the oven. She began filling the cupcake pan with liners while watching Rusty take the cookies out of the oven from the corner of her eye. They worked in silence for a few moments.
“He used to tell Greg and I all the time that one day he was going to spend the night at Amy’s house. It never made sense to us and because we were young, we just agreed with him but never really questioned it. Then hearing him say that about his mom… it all made sense,” Rusty said while scooping the cookies off the pan and onto a cooling rack.
“Why are you here, Rusty? Do you feel guilty now for proving your point about being able to take better care of him? Is that it?” she asked. Then, hearing the childishness of her statements ringing in her ears, she took a deep breath. “You were right… he’s happier with you than in the home. I told you before if I’d had any other options, I wouldn’t have made him stay there.”
“Bullshit, Ms. Carlton. You have a two bedroom apartment… that’s just an excuse and you know it,” he replied.
“Let’s get this finished up… you need to see with your eyes why I can’t keep him at the apartment with me,” she said angrily.
She tried not to stew in her anger while they finished up the cookies and cupcakes and stored them away for the following day. Once that was done, she made sure the oven was off, the lights turned down and the doors locked. Then, without so much as looking at Rusty, she got in her car and headed to the apartment. Once he got a look at the second bedroom he’d understand.
***
Rusty didn’t understand Amy at all. It was obvious that something was bothering her with regards to Danny, so why didn’t she just spit it out. He’d learned a long time ago from Lauren not to assume that he understood what was going on in a woman’s mind.
The female species as a whole thought with every square inch of their brains. Where men often just saw what was in front of them at the moment and dealt accordingly. Waiting for Amy to chew him out or tell him what was wrong was taking much longer than he cared to admit though.
He knew she was angry but at the same time she also seemed kind of resigned, as though she didn’t know where to go from here. However, he didn’t know what her current situation was because she wouldn’t tell him, so he couldn’t really help.
In most cases he could both understand and respect not wanting other people to know your business. He also didn’t like to share his issues with other people. Was that why she wasn’t sharing with him? Rusty remembered Courtney telling him not that long ago that if you never talked to people about what was really going on inside of you… then chances were good that they wouldn’t tell you things either.
The problem with that theory was that he had a dark side that wasn’t fit to think about… let alone talk about with other people. Just because he was forced to think about his problems daily… sometimes hourly… didn’t mean she needed to be faced with that level of ugly.
What he had to share would make Ms. Carlton curl into a ball and try to cover her ears to block out the nightmare of thoughts and emotions that he swam in every day of his miserable life. Somehow whatever was going on with her and Danny would probably pale in comparison to his issues.
He wasn’t about to try sharing his dreadful life with her, though, just to get an emotional confession out of her in return. She didn’t need to deal with his crazy ass on top of her own problems. And quite honestly, he didn’t have it in him to try and share little bits of himself with anyone.
Taking the lid off that bottle wasn’t a good idea anyway. He feared that if he poured a little bit out, he might not be able to cap off the rest of it.
He followed her up the front steps to her porch, not missing how she purposely swayed her tight little ass making sure to garner his notice. Looking back at him she smiled seductively at him and regardless of the icing he noticed on the side of her neck, he felt the breath leave his body.
She was a sexy little thing and she knew it… icing smear or not. She unlocked the door, stepped inside and disappeared into the dark interior. He followed close behind. Amy assured Grudge that it was just her and after a couple more yaps, he stopped barking.
Stepping through the doorway into the small pitch-black room, he turned to his right and took a step only to hit his shin against a low lying table. The pain shot up his leg and he heard himself whisper, “Dammit, Ms. Carlton, what the hell is this? And why is it in front of the window?”
She closed the door behind Rusty. Then running one of her hands leisurely up his back and across his shoulder, she then reached past him and blinded him by turning on the light. She really needed to stop caressing him like that.
Calling him Rusty like his name was a sexy word was bad enough. Touching was more temptation than any man could handle, including him. Glancing down at the offending piece of furniture he realized it was a bench style seat rather than a table.
“It’s my own personal spanking bench… what does it look like, Rusty? I like to look out the window while I’m being paddled. Want to try it out?” she asked saucily as she moved past him, catching and holding his gaze in that seductive way of hers that made him absolutely crazy.
He was unable to control his sharp intake of breath at her brazen words. Just as she had probably intended, his mind immediately conjured up something similar in nature to her description, against his better judgment.
God help him, his body was reacting to nothing but her words and the scene now playing out in his head. The woman was going to make him completely come unglued before this was over. He forced himself to follow her as she headed down a hallway.
“That is more information than I need, Ms. Carlton. A real lady has no business thinking those kinds of things, let alone saying them out loud. And again… it’s Sir, Sergeant or Mr. Hawkins,” he managed to say, trying to sound normal regardless of the effect her comment had on him.
Stopping, she turned back to him and said, “No… Sir. More information than you need would be fo
r me to tell you that whenever you act all stern and condescending or look all moody and pissed off at me, like you’re doing right now, it doesn’t scare me one little bit. In fact it kind of makes my panties wet and then I start imagining all sorts of wicked things that a girl like me has no business thinking about or saying.”
He was done with taking her crap and it was well past time that he showed her what happened when he was pushed too far. Grabbing her by the shoulders, he pushed her none too gently up against the wall and then leaned in close. He realized too late that the hitch in her breathing wasn’t from fear, anger or intimidation.
That sweet mouth of hers opened slowly in a gesture so erotic that he was completely at a loss. He closed his eyes for a moment… trying unsuccessfully to fight back against the raw emotions she brought out in him with her games.
“You’re only doing this because I’m right about Danny. I know your brother better than you do and that upsets you and I can understand and respect that. He doesn’t need near the kind of help you think he does. And that makes you mad at me. You see me as someone else to keep you from him. You think that if you can keep him locked up in that… home… then he’ll always be there waiting on you at the end of the day… like Grudge. Always happy to see you when you can steal away for a visit… that’s what you want isn’t it? He’s not a damn pet! He’s a full grown man who disagrees with you! For good reason! And I won’t allow you to push him around anymore than I let you push me around and that makes you absolutely crazy doesn’t it? So you try to get back at me the only way you can… by talking dirty and shaking that sweet little ass of yours in an effort to tempt and tease me because you think I won’t do anything about it. Let’s be honest… you’re the one that needs help, Ms. Carlton,” he ground out against her cheek while pressing himself against those curves of hers that had been torturing him for days now.
Maid to Order (Man Maid Book 4) Page 10