Home To You (9 page)

“Why?”

“Because I promised, and I swear, if you tell, I’ll cut your balls off with a rusty nail clipper, Jaime Rouchard.”

He winced at the thought—knowing Addie, she’d figure out a way to do it. “Then don’t tell me. Far be it from me to force you to divulge a secret. I’m not that interested.” Besides, he already knew what she was going to say.

“I need to. I need help.”

“Now, that’s interesting. What kind of help, and why me?”

“It’s a logistics thing. Besides, as much as I dislike you, you’re the only one in town I can trust.”

“Damn, Addie, you certainly have a way of sweet-talking me into doing your bidding.”

“Look, if you help me out, I’ll owe you one. Okay?”

“And just what do you think I need from you? You’re a kindergarten teacher. I already know my numbers and letters, thanks.”

“I can help in the office.”

“Not interested.”

“I can clean the place up a little.”

“Next.”

“What do you want?”

Yeah, he wasn’t even going there. It wouldn’t be at all gentlemanly, and there was no way she’d ever agree to it.

“Come on, Jaime. It’s for your own good. Aren’t you still best buds with Jax?”

“Yeah. What does he have to do with anything?”

“I can’t tell you unless you promise me.”

“Fine. I don’t have time for this, Addie. Just tell me what it is and what you need.”

“You promise not to breathe a word to a soul?”

“What the hell do you want, Addie—a blood oath?”

She mumbled something under her breath about all men being bastards. “David dumped Kendall, ran off to San Francisco, and left her flat on the same day she lost her job. So she came home, but she doesn’t want anyone in town to know, so she’s been hiding out at the Sullivans’ hunting cabin for the past week.”

“And you’re telling me because?”

“Because your place is close by. You can check on her and make sure she’s not doing something stupid.”

“Like what?”

“OD’ing on Ben and Jerry’s, crying into her wineglass—I don’t know what she’s going to do. She’s never had her heart broken before.”

“Sure she has. Don’t you remember what she was like when she was—what?” He thought back. “Twelve years
old, when Jax and Rocki were sent away? She moped for months.”

“She missed Rocki.”

“Oh no, she missed Jax. She followed him like stink on a skunked dog. I should know—Jax and I spent half the summer trying to lose her.”

“That’s horrible.”

“What the hell do you expect? We were sixteen. What teenage boys would want a twelve-year-old following them around, ratting them out about every last thing they did?”

“Kendall doesn’t want her folks to find out because she knows if they did, they’d run home and ruin their cruise.”

“So, you want me to spy on her?”

“Not in a creepy, Peeping Tom kind of way. You can just stop by, say you saw the smoke from the chimney.”

“Fine. And you think she’s going to invite me in and tell me what’s going on in her life?”

“I don’t know. Still, at least you’ll know if she’s alive. Her cell doesn’t work, and neither does the landline, since they never rent the place out.”

“If I promise to stop by and make sure she’s alive, will you leave me in peace?”

“It would be my pleasure.”

He heard her stomping across the cement floor toward the door. “Oh, and, Addie, don’t forget that you owe me one.” A big one. “I’ll be collecting someday soon.”

She let out a rumble worthy of the new Dodge Charger SRT Hellcat. And, despite his best intentions, he just wondered how she purred when she was happy.

K
endall woke up from a dream to a banging noise, and realized that she was breathing heavy and Jack’s face was the last thing she saw before . . . Oh, God, she’d never had a dream like that before. She rolled over in bed, almost surprised to find herself alone—it had seemed so real. Sinking farther into the mattress, she tried to get her breathing under control. Her heart raced, her skin felt three sizes too small for her body, and no amount of deep breathing stopped the ache. Every bang brought back the dream vision of Jack over her. She pulled the pillow over her head and moaned, “Stop the banging.”

If the earsplitting, body-shaking volume was any indication, the hammering was coming from the roof directly over her bed. The pillow was not only an exceptional noise blocker, but it also brought to mind those
NCIS
episodes where Ducky talked about what good weapons pillows make for suffocation.

Between the lack of air, the noise, and the dream that had brought her to the brink of orgasm, any prayer of sleep and wallowing in peace was summarily dashed.

She sat slowly, her head throbbing in time with the incessant hammering. Too much wine and not enough
dinner had not only fed her erotic imagination, but it had also led to the morning’s cotton-mouthed, whopping, mother of all hangovers. She was an exceptional candidate for the next Excedrin Extra Strength commercial or a session with a battery-operated boyfriend—maybe both. God, she needed the hair of the dog or, at the very least, a toothbrush.

Jack obviously didn’t have the same problem, since he was the one on the roof, making that ungodly racket. He’d eaten so much the night before, he probably could have topped it off with a fifth of whiskey and still have passed a sobriety test.

When it came to drinking, Kendall had always been a lightweight. David used to say she could get drunk toasting at a wedding.

David
. She’d really thought he had been her other half, her partner in life, her soul mate—she’d been so clueless. She’d never seen that sometime between her eighth-grade homecoming dance and now, all the dreams he’d espoused had turned into lies.

How many years had he been using her, just waiting for a convenient time to move on?

Another sound broke through the constant banging, and she swore it was coming from Jack’s room—which was odd, because she was pretty sure he was up on the roof causing the racket. She rolled out of bed and heard it again on her way to investigate.

When Kendall stepped through the door, a hunk of plaster the size of a half-dollar fell and hit the floor before crumbling further. Damn, spiderweb cracks were spreading across the ceiling at an alarming rate. She hightailed it out, holding her aching head. If she didn’t stop Jack soon, his bedroom ceiling would end up on the
floor, and, last she checked, the floor wasn’t where ceilings belonged.

She ran through the cabin, groaning with each step, and threw open the front door. “Jack, stop!”

The cold stabbed her bare feet. The sound of something—or make that someone—sliding down the roof toward her, preceded by a shower of snow, had her instinctively reeling back against the rough-hewn siding of the cabin. The cold seeped through her thin satin nightgown. She’d been plenty warm with the woodstove, heaters, and four quilts and blankets—not to mention the dream. Standing outside without so much as a robe was a different story.

A head popped down from the porch roof sporting the same smile she’d seen in her dream. “Good morning, Sleeping Beauty.”

“It might have been, except for the banging, the wine hangover, and the little problem of plaster raining down in your room.”

“What?”

His head disappeared from the edge of the roof. He must have stood, because she heard a step, and then his body flew into her line of vision, hanging from a branch of a nearby tree. And then, with the grace of a gymnast, he dropped to the ground.

“My, that was impressive.” She looked around the porch and wondered where his ladder was.

Jack wiped his gloved hands on the thighs of his jeans and took a step toward her. “Did you just say what I think you said?”

“Did your accident affect your hearing?”

“No, not that I’ve noticed.”

“Then I’m guessing you heard me correctly. The
ceiling above your bed is falling down.” Falling down, falling down. The ceiling above your bed is falling down, my fair lady . . . God, she really was losing it.

“Shit.” He ripped off his gloves and hat and then raked his fingers through his too-long blond hair. “That’s really not good.”

“I take it replastering the ceiling was not part of the scope of the job.”

“It is now, or your father will kill me.” He looked at her again and turned away. “You’d better get back inside—you’re freezing.” It wasn’t a question.

She looked down and saw that the goose bumps on her arms weren’t the only noticeable reaction to the cold. She wrapped her arms over her breasts, turned, and retreated to the cabin, trying to remember the color panties she wore—they were probably clearly visible through the thin, champagne-colored fabric of her nightgown. God, she hoped she wore panties. She’d had so much wine, she didn’t remember getting dressed for bed last night.

Jack was right behind her; she could feel the cold radiating off his coat. She stepped into the hallway just as something crashed; then a plume of dust flew through the open door of his bedroom. She stopped short.

Jack ran into her from behind and wrapped his arms around her to keep them both from falling. “Fuck. Um . . . sorry.”

“Are you apologizing for your language, running into me, or causing the ceiling to cave in?”

“Both the language and for running into you. The cave-in is in my room, so no apology necessary there.”

“Oh, really? Do you think you’re the only one the cave-in is going to affect?”

His hand, big and warm and callused, spread over her
stomach, where it snagged on the delicate fabric of her gown. The tip of his thumb slid beneath her breast, but the pressure of his hand dragging her from the doorway took away any question of an intentional boob graze. He wasn’t copping a feel; he was going all he-man and protective. She didn’t know which would have made her angrier—probably the he-man thing. She let out a derisive growl.

He poked his head into her room. “Let’s just hope it stops at the bearing wall, shall we?”

Seriously? “You think the ceiling in my room could cave in too?”

“Anything’s possible. I don’t know how long that roof was leaking, but it certainly compromised the integrity of the plaster in my room. Water has a way of traveling.”

“It does?”

“So it seems. The major leak was over the mudroom, so I suggest you hurry up and grab some clothes while I check it out, unless you don’t mind meeting Jaime Rouchard in your nightgown.” The frown on his face told her he didn’t like that scenario at all.

“Jaime’s coming here?”

“Eventually. How else am I going to get my hands on drywall, tape, and mud? I might ask him to go to the Home Depot in Concord, just to be safe.”

“You think Ernie at the hardware store is going to rat you out to my dad?”

“Don’t you?”

“Probably, unless Jaime can come up with a damn good story as to why he needs drywall.”

Jack blew out a breath and rocked back on the heels of his work boots. “I’m going to hike down to Jaime’s and tell him what I need, just as soon as I take a few
measurements—or you take a few measurements. If you wouldn’t mind, that is . . . I think all I need are the room dimensions, and Jaime can probably take it from there.”

“Jaime’s very nice to drive all the way to Concord to avoid Ernie’s questions.”

“True, but I pay well. Or at least I think I do.”

She didn’t bother hiding her laugh. “You do realize that Dad’s going to take one look at the cabin and know you’ve replaced the ceiling.” When she looked back, she found him staring at her, and the expression she glimpsed on his face the nanosecond before it disappeared brought to mind what she was wearing, which wasn’t much. But at least it seemed as if he liked what he saw.

Jack looked away quickly, and his face turned the beet red that only redheads or true blonds suffered. “Yes, but, really, with the water damage, the ceiling needed to be replaced long before my hammering caused it to crumble.” His voice sounded strained—a dark grumble that raked against her every nerve ending, the way the rough skin of his hands had snagged on her nightgown. His hands were fisted at his sides, his cheekbones looked as if they were chiseled out of granite, and his golden stubble shone in the morning light pouring through the window.

Kendall might have been with only one man in her entire life, but she knew what it felt like to be wanted in a purely sexual way. It was simple biology, really, or maybe chemistry. Pheromones or hormones—she wasn’t sure what exactly caused it, but she knew physical attraction when she saw it. It didn’t seem to matter that she knew it was a natural human instinct to ensure the survival of the species. There was nothing more to it than that. Jack was a healthy male adult, and as much as they
say humans are not animals, when it comes to sex . . . well, the lines definitely blurred—something she would be smart to remember. Sexual attraction did not a relationship make—not that she was looking for a relationship. She needed time to figure out where she went wrong with the last one before she contemplated even dating again.

Dating. Just the thought of it sent a spear of dread through her. She’d never really dated, and wasn’t looking forward to starting to do it now. She rummaged through the dresser she’d stashed her clothes in, grabbed a few things, and took a deep breath before facing him once again. She didn’t look at him, though—she wasn’t a coward, but she wasn’t that courageous either. “I’ll just get dressed, and if you could find a tape measure, I’ll get those room dimensions written down for Jaime.” She waited until she heard his footsteps retreating, and hesitated a moment longer before softly closing her door with a click.

*

Jax waited until he heard the snick of Kendall’s door down the hall before he sat on his plaster-strewn bed, held his head in his hands, and groaned. The woman was a menace to the entire celibate male population.

Celibacy was not his natural state—well, at least not until the accident. It hadn’t bothered him before, but having Kendall here for the past week was definitely making his monklike status a real trial.

He reminded himself that celibacy was his choice, after all—he had the phone numbers of several of the nurses he’d met at the hospital stuffed into his wallet to prove it. Hell, they’d even offered to drive, since they
knew he wouldn’t be cleared to handle heavy machinery until after his next MRI. It wasn’t as if he could call them—at least not without help—and the last thing he wanted to do was have Jaime or, God forbid, Kendall dial the phone for what he knew would be nothing more than a booty call. He didn’t know what he wanted, but dinner and a game of mattress tag wasn’t it.

Jax was far from a saint, but even he had a moral compass. He’d never had sex with one woman when he was jonesing for another, and he’d never imagined being with anyone other than the woman he was with at the time. He’d spent the past week considering it but couldn’t talk himself into being with someone when the only woman he wanted was Kendall, which left him in his current predicament: waking up from erotic dreams of her, hard and hot and breathing heavy.

He scrubbed his hands over the rough stubble of his face. It was too bad he couldn’t control his subconscious as well as he could his conscious mind. Sitting there with the ceiling falling down around his head and Kendall’s scent still wafting over the musty aromas of dust and wet plaster, he wondered if he truly had control of either.

The feel of Kendall’s body tight against his was indelibly imprinted on his psyche. For a brief moment during their conversation, it had been all he could do not to wrap his arms around her and pull her to him. Face-to-face. Breasts to chest. Mouth to mouth. For a brief moment, he let himself imagine what it would be like to kiss her, to take her mouth, to taste her and lose himself in Kendall. Then he allowed his imagination to go well beyond a kiss, straight to the animalistic urge to possess her, to make love to her in every way humanly possible, and then keep her close and protect her. For a brief
moment, he wanted to know her in a way more intimate than he’d ever known any other: mind, body, and soul. He’d never had the urge to take care of anyone before—not in any way except sexually. It wasn’t as if the thought of sex with Kendall wasn’t blinking like a huge, flashing fluorescent neon light in the forefront of his mind, but what he felt for Kendall was so much more complicated, so much stronger, and a great deal more confusing than anything he’d felt for a woman before. He was trapped right in the middle of dangerous territory, but no matter how many times he told himself not to go there, he couldn’t stop himself from doing just that.

Another piece of plaster fell from the ceiling and landed next to him on the bed. He tried to focus on it, but all he saw was Kendall in that sinfully sexy nightgown, looking like the Venus de Milo probably did to the ancient Greeks when she still had all her parts.