Knock Me for a Loop (15 page)

That was reason enough for him to be buying the drinks tonight.

Even though their glasses were still full, the pitcher wasn’t, and he signaled the waitress to bring them another.

“I’m still not real sure how she feels about me, but I think it’s safe to say she’s no longer burning me in effigy.”

“I don’t think she ever did that,” Dylan assured him.

“But she did have a voodoo doll,” Gage remarked.

Zack’s lips twisted in self-deprecation. “I guess that explains the knee and my shitty performance leading up to it.”

“Did you get a lot of stabbing pains in weird areas after the two of you broke up?” Dylan wanted to know.

“Or just the usual itching around your crotch and burning when you pee?”

Gage’s face remained impassive, his delivery of the question as flat and serious as if he were pulling over a speeder and asking for the driver’s license and registration.

“You’re a laugh riot,” Zack told him without a hint of actual amusement. “You should take your show on the road.”

Along with a fresh pitcher of beer, the waitress brought bowls of pretzels and peanuts. Gage grabbed a handful of the nuts, popped them in his mouth, and said, “That’s the plan.”

Right. Putting Gage on stage as a comedian would be sort of like putting a couple of Cleveland Browns linebackers in tights and tutus and asking them to dance
Swan Lake.

Zack took a couple of pretzels for himself, biting into them and chewing slowly, then washing down the salty snack with a swallow of beer.

“If it were just a matter of seducing her,” he said, getting back to the matter at hand, “I think I’d be okay. I could just grab her up, kiss her stupid, and carry her off to bed.”

“Yeah, if you can keep from putting any weight on that knee,” Dylan quipped, rubbing Zack’s nose in his earlier admission of blowing things with Grace by forgetting that he was half crippled and couldn’t exactly cart anyone off to bed. At least not without the aid of a wheelchair or little red wagon.

“You know, maybe it wasn’t my knee that’s kept me from hanging out with you two the past couple of months. Maybe it’s because you’re shitty friends and I’m sick of you.”

The other men exchanged glances, made funny faces, then turned back to him, lips twitching.

“We’re so sorry,” Dylan apologized—not meaning a single word of it, Zack was sure. “Please go on. We’ll try not to interrupt you again, since you’ve always been so kind and sympathetic with us when we were going through hard times.”

At the reminder, Zack cringed. Okay, so maybe he deserved a bit of ribbing, considering some of the things he’d said to each of them in the past.

He recalled referring to Ronnie as “The Ice Queen” when Dylan had first begun showing an interest in her, and remarking that he’d likely need the Jaws of Life to pry her legs apart.

When Gage and Jenna had started trying to work things out after their divorce, he definitely hadn’t said anything so crass—mostly because he was afraid of what his teeth would taste like after Gage rammed them down his throat. But when they’d first broken up, and his friend had been suffering the pains and resentments of freshly signed divorce papers, he’d done what any good friend would—called the ex a bitch, claimed Gage was better off without her, and offered to buy him a few hours with the call girl or stripper of his choice.

“Time for some payback, huh?” he asked, knowing he deserved it.

Dylan shrugged, raising his glass for a sip. “Just a little.”

“We’ll be gentle, though,” Gage told him. “We wouldn’t want to make you cry.”

Lip curling, Zack flipped them off.

They shared another brief laugh before Zack admitted, “The attraction is still there, but I don’t think she’ll ever let herself trust me again until she’s absolutely sure I didn’t cheat on her. And how the hell am I supposed to prove that?”

“Time machine?” Dylan suggested
ever
so helpfully.

“Yeah, or a lie detector test,” Zack scoffed, remembering Grace’s comment. “Like I can just run to Wal-Mart and pick one up the next time I run out of milk or need a pair of eight-dollar shoes at three in the morning.”

Seconds ticked by with only the sounds of the bar around them filling the silence at their table. A hockey game on one of the large-screen TVs—thankfully not a Rockets game or Zack seriously thought he might have wept with homesickness—and some random sports show on another. The clink of glasses, the hum of voices, the occasional shout of victory or hiss of disapproval as somebody’s favorite team either scored a point or didn’t.

Normally he’d have had one eye glued to the game himself, but he just wasn’t into it tonight. He had other things, more important things, possibly life-altering things on his mind.

And then Dylan chimed in, breaking his train of thought.

“You definitely can’t pick up a polygraph machine at Wal-Mart,” his friend said slowly, turning his glass back and forth on the table, creating wet rings of condensation. “But maybe if you knew somebody with access to one …”

He let the words trail off, and Zack almost piped up with, “Gee, thanks for the insight, Sherlock Holmes.”

But then Dylan’s statement registered. It wasn’t much of a statement, after all, he realized. It was a hint, a suggestion, a verbal elbow to the ribs, nudge-nudge.

His head snapped up and he stopped chewing the pretzel he’d just tossed in his mouth. Swallowing quickly, he gave a small cough and directed his gaze at Gage.

“That’s right. All I need is someone with
access
to a lie detector test to help me out. You know anybody like that…Gage?”

It took as long for Gage to catch his meaning as it had for him to put two and two together on what Dylan was saying. When he did, he sat back with a jerk, eyes going wide.

“What? No way.”

“Come on, man,” Dylan cajoled. “You’re a cop. The only one we know. You can’t tell us the department doesn’t have a polygraph machine and an operator on the payroll.”

“Well, of course they do,” he shot back, “but it’s not a toy. It’s used on murder suspects and pedophiles to bolster the DA’s cases, not to settle marital disputes or help you get out of the doghouse with your ex.”

“It’s more than that and you know it,” Zack said quietly.

Their gazes met and held, neither saying anything for several long minutes. Gage’s lips flattened and his jaw worked as though he were clenching it in indecision. Zack simply gripped the edge of the table, knuckles going white, while he held his breath waiting.

“We’d do it for you,” Dylan put in barely above a whisper.

But it seemed to be what Gage needed to hear and what pushed him over the line from by-the-book cop to bend-the-rules buddy.

“Dammit,” he muttered. And then, “All right, fine. No promises, and I’m not losing my job over this, but I’ll see what I can do.”

The air left Zack’s lungs in a rush. “That’s all I ask. Thank you.”

If Gage could get him access to a lie detector and someone to run the test, then maybe he could convince Grace once and for all that he hadn’t done anything with that puck bunny who broke into his hotel room.

He raised his glass to his mouth and took a long, quenching swallow, lips curved in anticipation.

Oh, yeah. Things were looking up already.

Row 14

Even before she walked into The Yarn Barn for her weekly meeting with the other Knit Wits—a cutesy name created by Jenna’s aunt Charlotte for their small group of knitters—Grace braced herself for a modern-day Spanish Inquisition from her friends.

She’d spoken with them on and off during her stay with Zack, but very briefly. And since he’d been within earshot most of those times, she hadn’t been able to tell them anything good or important or juicy.

Of course, up until this morning, she hadn’t had anything particularly juicy to report.

Now, she did.
If she
could bring herself to tell them about the kiss in Zack’s kitchen.

Her cheeks flared at the memory, heat washing over the rest of her body by slow degrees.

She should be furious with him. Their relationship was definitely not a touchy-feely one…not anymore. And she wasn’t there to get cozy or shack up. She was there to nurse and take care of him, help him get back on his feet.

So the fact that he’d grabbed her that way, kissed her, run his hands along her waist and breasts and back…She should have slapped him, or at least stepped away before things got carried away.

Unfortunately, the second his lips had touched hers, she’d gone boneless and breathless and brainless. The three Bs of the lonely, horny female.

Those were the only reasons she could think of for why she’d capitulated so easily. She’d been spending too much time alone lately, not dating, not going out, only going to work, knitting meetings, and for Girls’ Night Out with Ronnie and Jenna once a week.

Not that she didn’t have plenty to keep her busy. Between walking, entertaining, and knitting a whole new wardrobe for Muffin—whoops, it was back to Bruiser now—and reviewing her notes and scripts for upcoming shows, she was never bored, never sat around feeling sorry for herself.

But maybe, without even realizing it, she’d been missing a bit of
male
companionship. Lord knew her apartment had been almost cemetery quiet since she’d broken up with Zack. Even though they’d split their time between their two places when they were together, no matter which apartment they were in at any given moment, the television had almost always been turned to a sports channel, filling the rooms with too-loud arena or stadium noises and commentaries.

She still had her television, of course, and could put it on any channel she liked, but it wasn’t quite the same. There was no six-foot-four blond Adonis sitting on her sofa yelling back at the screen or calling for her to bring him a beer, even though he knew darn well her response would most likely be, “What, are your legs broken? Get it yourself.”

Then there were the times when she’d bring him a drink willingly and sit down to watch a game with him. Or when she was able to convince him to snuggle through a movie or show of her choosing.

And the bedroom…oh, the bedroom was the worst. It had taken her months to get used to sleeping alone,
knowing
she wouldn’t soon be sleeping with Zack at her side. To fall asleep on her own, without resorting to a late-night cocktail, over-the-counter sleep aid, or simply crying herself into exhaustion.

So perhaps Zack had just caught her at a weak moment. Maybe he’d been studying her and noticed her vulnerability, then picked the best time to strike.

That would be just like a man. And even more like Zack.

Besides, believing she’d been needy and he’d been a cad was a far sight better than admitting that she’d enjoyed the kiss because it had been Zack, and because she still had feelings for him. She wasn’t sure
that
was a road she wanted to traverse just yet.

Setting her knitting tote on the seat of an empty chair, she shrugged out of her long ivory wool coat and draped it over the back of her seat.

“Hi, everybody,” she greeted those who were already there.

They smiled and said hello while digging out their own knitting projects or getting a drink from the small refreshment area the craft store provided for meetings just like theirs. Because it was so cold outside, most of the ladies opted for hot coffee or tea, but there were also bottles of water and soda for those who were courageous enough to brave the chill.

A plate of homemade banana bread sat in the center of a small, round coffee table at the center of their circle of mismatched armchairs, and though she shouldn’t have, Grace sneaked a slice.

“Mmm, this is delicious,” she moaned, practically inhaling the dessert and reaching for a second slice.

Geez, what was wrong with her tonight? She’d eaten dinner before changing into nice clothes and leaving for the meeting, so she shouldn’t be hungry. Not that anyone would believe her, given her stomach’s sudden growling and hunger pangs.

Maybe she was PMSing. Or maybe she was stressed to the max by that kiss and all the questions that were now flooding her brain about what it meant, how she felt about it, what
Zack
was thinking about it. And her hormones had apparently decided that if she stuffed herself with enough banana bread, those questions might be answered…or at the very least, she’d be too fat and too nauseated to worry about them any longer.

“I’m glad you like it, dear,” the mop-headed Charlotte beamed from a chair directly across from Grace. She had her knitting out already, size-ten needles clicking and crossing as she added stitches to the sleeve of the navy blue cardigan she was working on, no doubt with yarn spun out of fibers from her very own herd of alpacas.

“I should have known you were the one to bring treats,” Grace said. “You’re so good to us, Charlotte.”

If possible, Charlotte’s smile stretched even wider. Her bright orange beehive was particularly high and fluffy tonight, making Grace wonder just how much hairspray the woman went through in a month. And if she measured the coiffure with a ruler, striving each time to get it taller than the last.

Her short, squat body was squeezed into clothes one size too small—black polyester slacks and a long-sleeved turtleneck covered in a dizzying black, yellow, red, and green floral pattern. She was wearing a truly hideous pair of purple fake Ugg boots, but had already taken off her coat—a lime-green monstrosity that made her look like a crazed leprechaun.

Despite Charlotte’s terrible fashion sense, she was one of the sweetest people Grace had ever met, and everybody in the group loved her. She was Jenna’s aunt by blood, but treated every single one of them like a beloved niece or daughter, bringing them homemade goodies and homespun skeins of yarn.

“You know how much I love to bake,” Charlotte said, “and I certainly don’t need all those calories calling to me at home.”

Finishing off a final bite, Grace reached for a napkin to wipe her hands, and then stood, crossing to the tiny kitchenette for a Constant Comment teabag and mug of hot water. She would fill up on liquids rather than fattening desserts, and then, if she was still feeling guilty on the way home, maybe she would also stop off for a case of Slim-Fast and stick with that as sustenance for the next ten or fifteen days.

Returning to her seat, she left her tea to steep on the table in front of her while she dug around in her bag for needles and yarn. There were a couple different choices in her tote this week, and she couldn’t quite decide what she wanted to work on. Glancing around the circle and tuning in to the different conversations taking place with half an ear, she noticed the others were knitting scarves, boas, slipper socks…Melanie was even trying her hand at a complete layette set in the lightest of pastel baby colors for a friend who was expecting her first child.

“So tell me, dear,” Charlotte said to her from the other side of the circle. “What did you think of that yarn I gave you? Have you made anything wonderful with it yet?”

Uh-oh. Grace paused with her hand on an olive-green vestlike sweater she’d begun, then lost interest in.

She’d forgotten all about the skein of bright pink yarn Charlotte had given her after their meeting …gosh, it had been months ago now. Not so surprising, considering all that had happened since then—Zack’s accident, Grace’s moving in with him, the Insides Out offer…

But Charlotte was such a sweetheart, and she tended to take the appreciation and use of her yarns seriously. Grace remembered when she’d given Ronnie and Jenna each balls of “very special” yarn—skeins Charlotte had apparently been quite fond of for some reason. Charlotte had hounded them for weeks to find out how they liked it, if they’d started knitting with it yet, what they were making …

If she discovered that Grace had forgotten all about the skein she’d given her, Grace was worried Charlotte would be both hurt and offended, and she would never want to make the woman feel either of those things.

Pasting an overly bright smile on her face, Grace said, “Oh, yes, it’s wonderful.”

She dug around in her bag, trying not to draw too much attention to her actions while she frantically searched for the yarn in question.

Please let it be in here
, she thought.
It has to be in here. This is the same bag I bring to every meeting, and I don’t
think
I took it out.

From the corner of her eye, she spotted a flash of pink and sent a prayer of thanks heavenward. Next up, she needed a story that would sound logical, as well as appeasing and pleasing to Jenna’s aunt.

“I’ve actually been saving it because I wanted to make something really special with it, and I wanted to have all of my other projects out of the way first.”

She drew the yarn out of her bag and set it on her lap while she rooted around for two needles in the same size she thought would do for the project she was thinking about starting on the fly.

Charlotte frowned. “Oh,” she said, disappointment clear in her tone. “I expected you to have used it already.”

Crap. She was a terrible friend.

“I’m going to,” she assured the woman. “Right now. I told you, I’ve been saving it. I’m very excited about making it into a new sweater for Muf—”
Hmph. “
Bruiser.”

Zack would shit a brick when he found out she was knitting yet another girly pink outfit for his “boy dog” instead of something dark and manly and dirt-colored, but what could she do? Charlotte was staring at her with such a sad but hopeful expression, and she’d made so many doggie sweaters over the past months, it was the one pattern she knew best and by heart at the moment.

“Did I just hear you call your dog Bruiser?” Ronnie asked, breaking off from a conversation she was having with the spiky-haired young woman to her left and leaning to her right instead, toward Grace. Grace glanced from Ronnie to Jenna, who was sitting on her other side, before lowering her gaze and hoping they wouldn’t notice the flush of embarrassment she was sure stained her cheeks.

“Oh, my God,” Ronnie exclaimed. “He actually got you to change the dog’s name back.”

This was going to get rough, she could tell. Grace was not one to back down once she’d made up her mind, to lose once she’d set her cap for something, or to not get what she wanted in any given situation. Her friends had probably expected to see her go goth before they would have expected her to ever give in to something her “cheating bastard” ex-fiancé wanted.

With a sigh, she unwound a good bit of Charlotte’s fluffy-soft pink yarn and began casting on, loop after loop after loop. In the back of her head, she was counting, but her frontal lobe was busy deciding what to say, how to respond, how much to tell her friends, and how much to tell her best friends in front of the others, who were more acquaintance-friends than deepest-darkest-secrets friends.

Everyone in the circle knew about her engagement and subsequent breakup with Zack. How could they not? It had been such a public spectacle, she wouldn’t be surprised if monks in Budapest who had taken vows of silence and didn’t have running water, let alone electricity or cable, knew about the split.

But not all of them knew that she’d moved back in with Zack to help him while he recuperated from his injury. Briefly, she filled them in on that, and then explained about the Insides Out offer.

Ronnie and Jenna knew the truth—that I.O.U. had been interested in doing a major campaign with both her and Zack while they were together, but had then withdrawn the offer when they were no longer a couple. The others didn’t, however, so she let them believe it was something new.

Fudging a bit on the details—which she would clear up later for Ronnie and Jenna only—she told them that she and Zack were back on speaking terms…not romantically involved, not even close friends, but getting along well enough that they had mutually accepted the I.O.U. offer.

“And letting him change Muffin’s name back to Bruiser was part of the deal we worked out about driving to New York for the photo and commercial shoots instead of flying,” she finished with a halfhearted shoulder shrug.

“Wow. The things I miss when I don’t come every week,” Melanie, one of the gals who’d been attending the Knit Wits meetings since their inception, said. She was young, in her early thirties, and married with two small children, so she didn’t make it as often or religiously as some of the others. “I’ve really got to find a more reliable babysitter.”

Because there wasn’t much more to tell that she wanted the whole world to know, Grace did her best to change the subject, asking about the others’ weeks and following up on some of the things she knew were going on in their lives. Thankfully, everyone took the hint and filled the rest of the hour with easy banter and the
clickety-clack
of needles putting together an assortment of interesting items.

As the meeting wrapped up, and they all stood to put away their knitting and shrug into their coats and gloves, Grace asked Ronnie and Jenna if they were heading to The Penalty Box straight from The Yarn Barn.

For the three of them, going for drinks after their knitting meetings was almost a given. But after she’d left Zack, the practice had become a bit hinky, because the Box also happened to be the guys’ favorite hangout. Which meant that either Grace had to take great pains never to be there at the same time as her cheating scumbag ex or she and her friends had to hole up in a far-far corner booth, as far away from the men as possible.