Sighs Matter (11 page)

“And what are those men called?”

“Boys.” Sadie shook her head. “The goal in a relationship is mutual passion. You give, he takes. He gives, you take. When all’s said and done, it’s good for everybody, nobody feels cheated, everybody’s satisfied, and you’ve got yourself one hell of a sex life.”

A sad look entered her eyes, and her voice faltered a little. “Of course, that can’t be all there is. You’ve got to have love and compatibility going for you, too, as I had with my darling Phillip, brief though our marriage was. Essentially, until you’ve seen how a man treats you in bed, Claire, you don’t really know him at all.”

“I didn’t accept Adam’s proposal, Auntie. Our relationship is over.”

Sadie gave a sharp nod as if to say,
Perfect
! Then, she seemed to have an afterthought.

“And that other young man I met,” she said. “The studly dark-haired one?”

“Taylor.”

She looked into Claire’s eyes for a long time, then said, “You have slept with him, haven’t you.”

“Yes.”

Pursing her lips, she gave Claire a steady look. “Are you going to marry him?”

Claire felt her throat close up. Her cheeks warmed, and her eyes stung a little.

When she didn’t respond, Sadie reached up to tenderly stroke Claire’s cheek with her thumb, and whisper, “I see.”

With a watery smile, Claire choked, “Have I told you today how much I adore you, Aunt Sadie?”

The lady smiled. “Why yes, dear. I believe you have. I saw it, just there, in your eyes, when you came into the kitchen.”

Claire wrapped her arms around the delicate woman and gave her a squeeze.

“Thanks for everything you’ve done, all you gave up for Zach and me. I probably don’t say it enough—”

Sadie pushed herself to an arm’s length. “Pah! I gave up nothing. I’m basically a very selfish woman. I got what I wanted, you and your brother. What’s that compared to the adulation of millions of moviegoers?” Her eyes sparkled, and she winked.

The kitchen door creaked and slammed shut behind the little dynamo as she headed to her truck. A few moments later, the old green Ford ambled up the driveway and out of sight.

Claire let out a long, slow, deep, disturbed breath.

It was as though Aunt Sadie had snuck into her subconscious and discovered Claire’s most intimate thoughts about Taylor.

He had not used her like baggage. He had not taken from her and given nothing in return. And he hadn’t worshipped her, either. He had been sweet, and passionate, and tender, taking a little, giving more. He’d held her close and caressed her, whispering soft words in her ear, nuzzling her neck with his smile, making her want him all over again. Making her want him forever.

Men had satisfied her desires before Taylor, but none had become a part of her the way he had.

Surely, she could find that kind of connection with another man. It didn’t have to be Taylor, did it?

Turning to Hitch, she said, “You be a good boy. I’ve got to go work with the bees.”

“. . . wax on . . . wax off . . .”

“Yes, you’re a very smart bird. Now shut the hell up.”

With a shake of her head, Claire pushed open the kitchen door and went outside.

Though it was late August, September was making its presence known in the bite of the breeze as it tumbled a whirlwind of dry leaves across the yard. Soon the trees would begin changing, turning yellow and burnished orange and crimson. Already the apple orchard stood with outstretched branches heavily laden with ripening fruit, and the hive combs were filled with waxy amber honey. The evening air would cool and carry a subtle, smoky scent. Lazy summer days would become a memory, as long winter nights took their place.

As she crossed the yard to the barn, her muck boots crunched over the gravel, dirt, and leaves.

“Henrietta, Hermione, Hebsiba,” she said to the trio of brown leghorns as they chuckled and flapped and scurried out of her way. She made a mental note to gather eggs from the henhouse once she was finished at the hives.

In the barn, she tugged on her leather work gloves, pulled the ancient wheelbarrow from its place in the last stall, and pushed it into the yard.

Over the decades, trips out to the beehives had worn ruts in the dirt from the yard to the field, and though the wheelbarrow was heavy, it was worth the effort because it invariably reminded her of her visits to the farm when she was a little girl.

From the time she’d been a toddler, her grandfather, Sadie’s brother, had let her ride in the wheelbarrow. Claire had bounced and laughed as he purposely hit every bump in the trail, then pretended to lose control, threatening to dump her out into the tall grass that lined the pathway. When the wheelbarrow was filled with honey-heavy combs, he let her help push it back to the barn.

The hive bodies were a good hundred yards from the house, so by the time she arrived, she was panting from the exertion.

“Maybe I need to get one of those new, lightweight plastic jobbies,” she mumbled as she eyed Grandpa’s handmade version. The paint had long ago chipped off the enormous sheet metal bed, and the wooden handles had splintered in places, but she didn’t have the heart to replace the thing. After all, her fingers curled around the handles in the same place her grandfather’s had. When she touched them, she was touching him—and then she didn’t miss him quite so much.

Claire approached the hives and began looking for evidence of mice or other infestations. Around her, the bees hummed and hovered and generally ignored what she was doing.

“Hey, b-b-baby,” came a masculine voice from behind her.

Claire spun around, nearly losing her balance. He stood there, legs braced, hands on his hips, his mouth tilted in a cocky grin.

“You!” she snapped. “I can’t believe you have the nerve to show your face after last night. What a jerk!”

His eyes sparkled with mischief. “No I’m not.”

“Do you know every cheesy pickup line in the book?”

“Yes.” With a smug look, he said, “If I c-could rearrange the alphabet, I’d put U and I together.”

“Puh-leeze.”

“D-do you believe in love at first sight,” he stumbled, “or sh-should I walk by again?”

“You should walk in front of an oncoming train!”

“Hey,” he said, shrugging. “You made up the rules when you told Dr. Doodledick about my so-called medical history.”

“You left that door wide open when you barged in on my dinner date.” She marched over to the first hive body and removed the lid.

“Can I help?”

“No.”

His blue eyes locked with hers, and she felt her skin warm. “How did you know I was out here, anyway? You can’t see the hives from the yard because of the apple trees.”

He gestured to the wheelbarrow. “I just followed the noise-mobile there. I figured it was either you or somebody torturing the Tin Man.”

Indignant that he would insult a treasured family heirloom, she huffed, “It used to belong to my grandfather.”

“Looks like it used to belong to Noah.”

He smiled at her then, a warm, sort of sleepy look that sent ripples of awareness all the way down to her toes.

You don’t know a man until you’ve been at his mercy, flat on your back, with his hands on you.

She swallowed past the wad of cotton suddenly stuck in her throat.

Glancing at the beehives, he said, “I didn’t realize you had bees.”

“One does not
have
bees,” she managed. “One
keeps
bees.” Rubbing her chin, she said, “I learned how from my grandfather. It’s a pleasant, gentle hobby.”

“I don’t know a thing about them,” he said, widening his incredibly blue eyes like a little boy who’d been overlooked for dodgeball. “Maybe I can help you and you can teach me—”

“About the birds and the bees?” She scoffed and tugged at her gloves. “I have a feeling you wrote the book.”

Smiling down at her, he said, “Are you going to collect some honey?”

With a sigh of reluctance, she said, “I’m not getting rid of you until you’re ready to be gotten rid of, am I?”

“I’m such a pest. It’s a curse, really.”

“Seems to me you have more than your share. Don’t you have any detecting to do?”

“I got off shift at five.”

She shifted her weight to one leg. “Well, in answer to your question, yes, I’m collecting honey. If you want to stay and watch, I guess I can’t stop you, but you’ll be bored, and with any luck at all, your manly pheromones will piss off the bees and they’ll all sting you.”

“You make it sound so appealing, this
gentle
hobby of yours.”

Ignoring him—or trying to—she turned away again. A moment later, she felt him directly behind her, the intimate waft of his breath on the back of her neck.

“Stand over there,” she ordered in a desperate attempt to keep him at a distance.

He moved to where she had indicated. “Why here?”

“Because you were in the bees’s approach to the hive. They have flight patterns. If you stay out of their way, you’re less likely to get stung. Are you allergic to bee stings?”

“Nope.”

“Okay. Here.” She carefully removed a comb from the first hive, and handed it over to him. Several dozen bees swarmed to it and began crawling over the wax cells. Taylor didn’t flinch.

“How long do these guys live?” he said as he placed it in the wheelbarrow.

“Those guys are all girls,” she corrected. She stopped what she was doing and smiled up at him. “In the world of bees, the males are good for one thing and one thing only.”

He blinked innocently. “Bees can change flat tires?

“Once their duty has been done,” she continued, unaffected by his meager attempts at humor, “those males who survived the mating flight are not allowed back inside the hive. They’re a liability since they can’t create honey or support the hive. They are
useless
.”

She eyed him meaningfully.

“
If
they survived the mating flight?”

As she pulled another comb from the hive body, she said, “When a queen matures, she leaves the hive and mates in the air with whatever drones can get to her. All the sperm she will ever need to lay eggs for the rest of her life are collected at that time. When each male is through,” she said slowly, arching a brow, “she kicks him away, disemboweling him and leaving his testicles and mating gear inside her. Of course, he dies.”

Taylor turned a little green. She was certain if he could have cupped his hands protectively around his crotch, he would have.

“Just where does the
gentle
part come in again?” he said with a sly grin.

She carefully set the lid back on top of the hive body. “Time to earn your keep.”

He gave her a mock salute, gripped the handles of the wheelbarrow, and began effortlessly pushing it back to the barn. He was wearing jeans and a jacket, and as Claire walked along behind him, she watched his backside in tormented appreciation.

Inside the barn, the air was cool, the light dim, as though someone had draped a dark cloth over the sun.

He set the wheelbarrow down, turned to her, and smiled. “I like honey.”

“Imagine that,” she drawled. “Okay. If I give you some honey, will you go away?”

“Probably not, but I’ll take the honey anyway.”

Before she could react, his hands spanned her waist and he tugged her into his arms, his open mouth claiming hers. He moaned, deep in the back of his throat like a hungry animal finally settling down to feed.

Slowly easing out of the kiss, he gazed into her eyes. “Thought you hated me.”

“I don’t hate you,” she breathed.

“That why you kissed me back?”

“You caught me by surprise. Kissing you back was a reflexive action having nothing to do with—”

He lowered his head and kissed her again. This time, she moaned. Oh, God, oh,
no
.

Ending the kiss, she quickly stepped away from Taylor, out of arm’s reach. “We’re not doing this,” she snapped.

“We just did. And what’s more,” he said lightly, “we liked it. Why are you so mad? It was just a kiss.”

Maybe to you . . .

Engine noises, tires crunching over gravel, a car radio blasting an old swing tune—the arrival of Aunt Sadie’s truck intruded before Claire said or did something truly stupid. She was having enough trouble controlling her breathing as it was.

Taylor rubbed his chin with his knuckles. “If that’s your aunt, I need to talk to you both about a police matter.”

A police matter?
“A police matter?”

He gently grasped her wrists and tugged off her gloves. Taking her hand, he began walking her toward the barn door. “Yes,” he said. “It seems your Aunt Sadie’s former fiancé has been a very bad boy.”