Melt Into You (18 page)

He couldn’t take his eyes off Natasha. It was as if her whole body was suffused with love. It flowed from her in waves and wrapped everyone nearby her with joy and comfort.

How had he never felt that love before? Damon wondered in awe and surprise. Maybe all he had to do was get close enough. Maybe it would touch him, too. Maybe it would save him from—

“I think Milo has adopted you,” Natasha said, breaking into Damon’s thoughts. She smiled as she gestured at her son, who was currently rearranging his posture so that his foot was propped on the sofa cushion opposite him in clear mimicry of Damon. “If you’re not careful, he’ll rope you into a game of
Donkey Kong
.”

Milo’s eyes widened. He brightened. “Can we? Can we, Mom?”

Natasha bit her lip. Her gaze met Damon’s. “It’s okay with me, as long as Damon agrees. But if he says no, don’t push.”

At that, Milo turned into a more blatant con artist than Finn the dog. He adopted an expression of pure entreaty, clasped his hands together in an eager pose, then begged outright.

“Do you want to, Damon? Do you?
Puh-leeze
? It’ll be fun.”

“Sure.” Damon shrugged. “Let’s fire it up.”

As though blasted from a
Damon-said-yes
cannon, Milo jumped down from the coffee table, all thoughts of becoming a miniature Damon impersonator temporarily (and obviously) forgotten. The kid dropped to the floor beside the Nintendo console. He flipped through the abandoned video game cases with evident zeal.

“You’ll like
Donkey Kong
,” Milo promised Damon as he cracked open one of the cases. He extracted a game, then inserted it into the Wii. “It’s the newest one. Jason and Amy got it for me for Christmas. I’ll even let you be Diddy, even though you’re bigger, like DK. Diddy has all the coolest moves.”

Eagerly, Milo dumped a wireless controller into Damon’s lap. Damon watched the boy hunker down to set up the game, his little face a study in concentration, even in profile. From his busy hands to his powers of focus, he was a lot like Natasha.

Damon couldn’t help loving that about him. Adapting to the moment, Damon blinked. He wiggled into a more combative pose, preparing to make the most of “Diddy’s moves.” On the sofa beside him, Finn sneezed his displeasure. The dog groaned, then tried falling asleep while drooling as much as possible.

Natasha nudged Damon. “I’m sorry to surprise you this way,” she said in a hushed voice. “I try to keep my work life and my home life separate.” She glanced at her son with evident fondness as the TV screen flared to life, ready for gaming. “It hasn’t been easy. Like any mom, I want to brag about Milo. I want to show his pictures around the office and bring him in for Take Your Child to Work Day—”

“Milo would love that!” Damon said. “Spending the day at a chocolate shop? What kid wouldn’t go crazy for that?”

“Well ...” Natasha bit her lip. She seemed on the verge of commenting on that further, then didn’t. “But since I work—
worked
—for
you
, I didn’t have a typical workday. One day we’d be in the office brokering a partnership, and the next we’d be doing a ribbon cutting at a new international Torrance Chocolates Café. One week I’d be doing paperwork, and the next I’d be accompanying you to a commercial shoot in L.A. It was—”

“It was not an ideal job for a dedicated parent,” Damon understood then. Natasha must have struggled every time she’d had to leave Milo to go on a business trip, while Damon had never thought twice about a jaunt to Tokyo or Paris. “All that travel. All that uncertainty about what I’d be up to next.”

“That’s for sure!” Natasha laughed. “You’re not like Jimmy, spending all your time in the development kitchen dreaming up new chocolates. At least Debbie knows where he is all the time.”

“She knows he’s not with
her
spending their golden years together the way they’d planned,” Damon said, thinking of his mother’s ongoing displeasure over his dad’s workaholism—and Jimmy’s long-delayed retirement. His dad probably would have retired by now, Damon reasoned, if
he’d
stepped up to the plate in a creative (and not just business-networking) sense. “She has her book club and golf team and yoga classes, though.”

“That’s true,” Natasha mused. “Debbie stays busy. I’d probably be doing some of those same things, if not for Milo.”

“And Pacey.”

A baffled glance. Then, “Oh. Right. Paul.”

Why couldn’t Damon remember her husband’s name
? “Anyway,” Natasha said, “that’s why I didn’t tell you. I figured it was better to keep things separate. Especially because, well, like you always say, I’m
me
, and you’re
you
—”

“And I’m not exactly the best influence on an eight-year-old.” Damon frowned down at his Wii controller. Just the way he held the thing proved it: he hadn’t even employed the built-in safety strap. It hadn’t occurred to him. Defiantly, he didn’t use it now, either. Screw safety. “I get it. I’ll try not to take Milo out boozing and cruising for chicks while I’m here.”

Natasha looked upset. “That’s not what I meant.”

“But it’s true, all the same.” Feeling painfully aware of that fact, Damon glanced at the boy. “Ready, sport? Let’s go.”

For a long moment, Natasha just watched Damon. He began to feel sure she was going to tell him to leave before he accidentally corrupted her son. After all, they both knew Damon couldn’t help being himself. What was that she’d said earlier?

You’re you. I can hardly expect you not to screw up
, Natasha had told him nonchalantly.
That would be like expecting the sun to feel cold or the ocean to stop making waves
.

Who did he think he was kidding? He couldn’t cope with this. He couldn’t behave. He was a globe-trotting playboy with a penchant for supermodels, a taste for tequila, and a love of fast cars. He didn’t belong here in suburbia. He didn’t belong with Natasha. But if Damon was ever going to get his mojo back ...

He would just have to try to blend in. Somehow.

The video game blared to life, blasting gorilla sounds and jungle drums. Milo clicked himself and Damon into action.

Just like that, Damon was on his way.

“I’d better hunt down some dinner,” Natasha finally said. She stood, then checked on Damon’s frozen peas as if making sure they were still properly healing his ankle. “Who’s hungry?”

“Me!” Milo hollered. “I am. I’m hungry.”

Damon didn’t answer. He was too busying trying to keep from rolling his video game character off a cliff. He was more of an
NBA Jam
kind of guy, he realized as he crazily tipped the controller this way and that to move Diddy, and less of a scrolling jungle adventure game guy. This kids’ stuff was hard.

Damon was also distracted by wondering ... would any of the supermodels he’d dated have taken care of his injured ankle as carefully as Natasha was doing? Would any of his fair-weather friends have put off their party plans to keep Damon company while he recuperated from his sprained ankle, like Milo was doing? Would Wes’s rare prized python have cuddled, like Finn?

Already knowing the disappointing answers to those questions and more, Damon sighed. He tried to rally. Then he realized that his Diddy character wasn’t moving onscreen because Milo had momentarily paused the
Donkey Kong
game.

The boy glanced cheerfully over his shoulder at Damon. “You have to say you’re hungry,” he advised in a knowing tone. “Otherwise my mom gets cranky about making dinner.”

“I do not get cranky!” Natasha protested ... crankily. Damon winked at her. “Everybody likes feeling appreciated,” he told Milo. “When you act interested in the dinner your mom’s going to make, you’re paying attention to her—and appreciating everything she’s doing for you. That’s lesson number one.”

Natasha raised her eyebrows. “
You’re
giving lessons?”

“Just that one,” Damon promised as he patted Finn. “Unless something else pertinent and necessary occurs to me later.”

“God help us,” Natasha said with a grin.

“Everybody likes feeling appreciated!” Milo repeated with gusto. “I can remember that. What else, Damon?”

Before Damon could reply, Natasha touched his shoulder.

“I’ll be in the kitchen if you need me,” she said. “Have fun with the game.” She paused. “Use the two button. It helps.”

Then, unbelievably, she left Damon alone to deliver potential life lessons to her son. What kind of crazy, upside-down world was this, anyway? Damon wondered.
He
was no sage.

On the other hand ... “Me! I’m hungry!” Damon yelled.

He might not be wise, he decided, but he
could
be taught.

Chapter 14

By the time her special-order delivery pizza arrived, Natasha had paced the length of her kitchen six times, deliberated changing clothes and putting on some more lip gloss four times, and called Amy for moral support twice. The first time they’d talked, her friend had expressed surprise and encouragement for Natasha’s decision to let Damon stay with her for a while.

The second time, Amy had been a little less circumspect.

“Just don’t sleep with him!” she’d said bluntly. “You know you’ll want to—anyone would—but you can’t. You just can’t. It would be a disaster. Right? He’d be all, ‘But Tasha, I
need
you, baby,’ and you’d be like, ‘Bring it on, you big stud!’” Amy mimed, panting for extra emphasis, over the phone. “Before you knew it, you’d both be smacked against the refrigerator, ripping off each other’s clothes, breathless and squirming and screaming with abandon. ‘Yes! Yes!’”

“Umm ... Amy?” Natasha tried to interrupt without success.

“Then Damon would shove everything off the kitchen table with one mighty sweep of his arm—have you ever noticed his
amazing
biceps?—and you’d both drop right there on the table, all hot and sweaty and desperate for each other—”

“Amy, you’ve been watching too many Lifetime TV movies.”

“—and you’d do it, like, three times in a row, at
least
,” Amy continued eagerly, “and when you were done you would have a huge plate of sashimi, a glass of wine, and a nap—on your belly, the way you
like
to sleep,
without
the baby monitor on—”

“Amy, this has segued into
your
pregnant-lady fantasy, I think.” Natasha gripped the phone, helpless to hold back a smile. “Not that I’m not intrigued by all the extra-hot tabletop action, but I don’t like raw fish. And I’m more of a stout girl than a wine aficionado. And I’m sorry you have to sleep on your side all the time. Sometimes being pregnant sucks, right?”

“You’re telling me, sister. What I wouldn’t give for some pinot noir.” Amy laughed, apparently having snapped herself out of her X-rated fantasy. “So ... what’s Damon wearing right now?”

Or maybe she
hadn’t
snapped out of it yet. Willing to humor her friend, Natasha peeked around the kitchen corner. “A suit.”

Amy sighed. “
Damn
, that man can wear a suit. Can’t he?”

“Did you forget you’re married?”

“No.” Amy gave a strangled, frustrated sound. “It’s just that I’m so
horny
all the time! And even though we’ve been through this before with Isobel and Manny, Jason is still leery about having sex. It
is
a little tricky finding positions that work when you’re eight months pregnant, I’ll grant him that. But I’m desperate for a little action! This morning, Jason bent over to put something in the recycling bin, and I almost jumped him.”

Still gazing into the living room, where Damon was playing
Donkey Kong
with Milo—and laughing uproariously while he did—Natasha sighed. “I can relate. I don’t know how I’m going to survive the next few days with Damon—or however long it takes for me to figure out how to help him get on his feet again.”

“That’s just like you, wanting to help,” Amy said. “I still can’t believe
Damon
is struggling. That’s so
unlike
him.”

“I know,” Natasha agreed. “But the weird thing is, I really believe he’s trying to change. He seems humbled by all the bad luck he’s had. It’s almost as if he believes he deserves it.”

They both lapsed into silence, thinking about that.

Then ... “Maybe he does deserve it,” Damon said.

Openmouthed, Natasha turned. Damon stood in the doorway, leaning on it for support, obviously having overheard what she’d said. “I’ve gotta go, Amy,” Natasha said into the phone. “Bye.”

She hastily ended her call, then looked at Damon. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean for you to hear that.”

“But it’s true. You still meant it.” Seeming a bit steadier on his feet than before, Damon came forward. He angled his head toward the living room behind him. “We reached a new level in the game. Milo went to look up something in the hint guide.”

“Right. He pores over those hint guides. I’m pretty sure the
Pokémon
version taught him how to read.” Natasha gave a self-conscious laugh. She went to the kitchen table, fleetingly considered shoving everything off it—Amy’s fantasy-scenario style—then opened the pizza box instead. “Hungry?”