Simply Irresistible (19 page)

“I have a kite,” she told him.

Her dark brown hair fell in curls from beneath a denim hat with a big sunflower sewn on it. “Oh? That’s good,” he uttered, wondering what in the hell was the matter with him. He signed trading cards for kids all the time. Some of his team members brought their children to practices, and he’d never had any trouble talking to them. But for some reason, he couldn’t think of anything to say to his own child.

“Well, it’s a lovely day for a picnic,” Georgeanne said, and Lexie turned away. “We’ve put together a little lunch. I hope you gentlemen are hungry.”

“I’m starved,” Hugh confessed.

“What about you, John?”

As Lexie walked toward her mother, John noticed grass stains on the back of her denim dress. “What about me?” he asked, and looked up.

Georgeanne walk around to the opposite side of the table and looked over at him. “Are you hungry?”

“No.”

“Would you like a glass of iced tea?”

“No. No tea.”

“Fine,” Georgeanne said, her smile faltering. “Lexie, will you hand Mae and Hugh a plate while I pour the tea?”

His answer obviously irritated Georgeanne, but he didn’t particularly care. He felt the same as when he had pregame jitters. Lexie scared the holy shit right out of him and he didn’t know why.

In his life, he’d faced some of the toughest enforcers the NHL had thrown at him. He’d had his wrist and ankle broken, his clavicle snapped like a twig twice, and he’d had five stitches in his left eyebrow, six on the right side of his head, and fourteen to the inside of his mouth. And those were just the injuries he could recall at the moment. After recovering from each incident, he’d grabbed his stick and had skated back out onto the ice, unafraid.

“Mr. Wall, would you like a juice box?” Lexie asked as she climbed onto the bench.

He looked at the backs of her skinny legs and knees, and he felt as if someone had elbowed him in the gut. “What kind of juice?”

“Blueberry or strawberry.”

“Blueberry,” he answered. Lexie jumped down and ran around the table to a cooler.

“Hey, Wall, you should try these salmon asparagus things,” Hugh advised, stuffing his face as he moved to stand across from John and next to Georgeanne.

“I’m so glad you like them.” Georgeanne turned toward Hugh and smiled, and not the phony smile she’d given John either. “I wasn’t sure I’d sliced the salmon thin enough. Oh, and be sure that you try the baby back ribs. The plum barbecue sauce is just to die for.” She glanced at her friend who stood by her other side. “Don’t you think so, Mae?”

The short blonde with the bad attitude shrugged. “Yeah, sure.”

Georgeanne’s eyes widened as she stared at her friend. Then she turned back to Hugh. “Why don’t you try the pate while I carve you some chicken?” She didn’t wait for an answer before she grabbed a large knife. “While I do this, why don’t y’all look around the table. If you look real close, you will see a variety of little animals in their picnic attire.”

John folded his arms across his chest and stared at a Chia Pig wearing sunglasses and a scarf. A funny tingle started at the base of his skull.

“Lexie and I thought today would be a perfect opportunity for her to unveil her summer collection of animal couture.”

“Oh, I get it now,” Mae said as she reached for a crab cake.

“Animal couture?” Hugh sounded as incredulous as John felt.

“Yes. Lexie likes to make clothes for all the little glass and porcelain animals in our house. I know it may sound strange,” Georgeanne continued as she sliced, “but she comes by it honestly. Her great-grandmother Chandler, that’s on my grandfather’s side of the family, used to design clothes for pullets. Being northerners, you may not know this, but a pullet is a young hen. Young because they don’t get to be very old before...” She paused and raised the knife about five inches from her throat and made choking sounds. “Well, you know.” She shrugged and lowered the knife once more. “And hens because it goes without saying that it would be a colossal waste of time and talent to make clothing for roosters, being that they are predisposed to nasty temperaments. Anyway, Great-grandmother used to make little capes with matching hoods for the family’s pullets. Lexie has inherited her great-grandmother’s eye for fashion and is carrying on a time-honored family tradition.”

“Are you serious?” Hugh asked as Georgeanne slid slices of chicken onto his plate.

She raised her right hand. “My lips to God’s ears.”

The tingle in John’s skull shot to his brain as deja vu enveloped him. “Oh, God.”

Georgeanne glanced across the table at him, and he saw her as she’d been seven years ago, a beautiful young woman who had rambled on about Jell-O and foot-washing Baptists. He saw her killer green eyes and sexy mouth. He saw her come-to-papa body all wrapped up in his black silk robe. She’d driven him crazy with her teasing glances and honey-coated voice. And as much as he hated to admit it, he wasn’t immune to her.

“Mr. Wall.”

John felt a tug on the belt loop of his pants, and he looked down at Lexie.

“Here’s your juice box, Mr. Wall.”

“Thank you,” he said, and took the little blue carton from her.

“I put the straw in it already.”

“Yes, I see.” He raised the box to his mouth and sucked the blue juice through the straw.

“Good, huh?”

“Mmm,” he said, trying not to grimace.

“I brung you this, too.”

She shoved a paper napkin at him, and he grabbed it with his free hand. It was folded into a shape he didn’t readily recognize.

“It’s a rabbit.”

“Yes. I see that,” he lied.

“I have a kite.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, but it won’t fly. My mommy wears a real big bra, but she still can’t run.” She shook her head sadly. “And Mae can’t run either ‘cause she doesn’t wear a bra at all.”

Silence fell on the picnic like a curtain of doom. John raised his gaze to the two women on the other side of the table. They stood as if freeze-dried. Mae gripped a black olive positioned before her mouth, while Georgeanne held the big knife in midair with a piece of chicken stuck on the end. Their eyes were huge, and bright red stained their cheeks.

John coughed into his rabbit napkin to hide his laughter, but no one said a word.

Except Hugh. He leaned forward, looked past Georgeanne to her shorter friend. “Is that right, sweetheart?” he asked with a big grin.

Both women lowered their hands at the same time. Georgeanne got real busy cutting and straightening while Mae turned to frown at Hugh.

Hugh either didn’t notice Mae’s scowl or he didn’t care. Knowing his friend, John would bet the latter was the case. “I’ve always been partial to a liberated woman,” he continued. “In fact, I’ve been thinking of becoming a member of NOW.”

“Men can’t belong to NOW,” Mae informed him tersely.

“That’s where you’re wrong. I believe Phil Donahue is a member.”

“That’s not true,” Mae argued.

“Well, if he’s not, he should be. He’s more feminist than any woman I’ve ever met.”

“I doubt you would know a feminist if she bit you on the butt.”

The Caveman smiled. “I’ve never been bitten on the butt by any woman, feminist or not. But I’m willing if you are.”

Folding her arms beneath her breasts, Mae said, “By your lack of manners, the size of your neck, and the slope to your forehead, I assume you play hockey.”

Hugh glanced at John and laughed. Giving shit and taking it when it was thrown right back at him was one of the things John like about Hugh. “‘Slope to your forehead,’ ” Hugh chuckled as his gaze returned to Mae. “That was a good one.”

“Do you play hockey?”

“Yep. I’m goalie for the Chinooks. What is it you do, wrestle pit bulls?”

“Pickle?” Georgeanne reached for the relish plate and shoved it at Hugh. “I made them myself!”

Once more John felt a tug on his belt loop. “Do you know how to fly a kite, Mr. Wall?”

He looked down into Lexie’s upturned face; her eyes were squinted against the sun. “I could try.”

Lexie smiled and a dimple indented her right cheek. “Mommy,” she hollered as she spun around and raced toward the other side of the table. “Mr. Wall is gonna fly my kite with me!”

Georgeanne’s gaze swung to him. “You don’t have to do that, John.”

“I want to.” He placed his juice box on the table.

Setting down the relish plate, Georgeanne said, “I’ll come with the two of you.”

“No.” He needed and wanted time alone with his daughter. “Lexie and I can manage.”

“But I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“Well, I do.”

She quickly glanced over her shoulder at Lexie, who knelt on the ground untangling string. She grabbed his arm and pulled him several feet away. “Okay, but not too far,” she said, stopping in front of him. She rose onto the balls of her feet and looked over his shoulder toward the others.

She whispered something about Lexie, but he wasn’t really listening. She was so close he could smell her perfume. He lowered his gaze to her slim fingers resting on his biceps. The only thing keeping her double Ds from brushing against his chest was a tiny slice of empty space. “What do you want?” he asked, raising his eyes up her smooth arm to the hollow of her soft throat. She was still a tease.

“I just told you.” She lowered her hand and dropped to her heels.

“Why don’t you tell me again, but this time keep your breasts out of the conversation.”

A wrinkle appeared between her brows. “My what? What are you talking about?”

She looked so genuinely perplexed, John almost believed her innocent expression. Almost. “If you want to talk to me, don’t use your body to do it. Unless, of course, you want me to take you up on your offer.”

She shook her head, disgusted. “You’re a sick man, John Kowalsky. If you can manage to keep your eyeballs off the front of my dress, and your mind out of the gutter, we have something more important to discuss than your absurd fantasies.”

John rocked back on his heels and looked down into her face. He wasn’t sick. At least he didn’t think so. He wasn’t as sick as some of the guys he knew.

Georgeanne tilted her head to the side. “I want you to remember your promise.”

“What promise?”

“Not to tell Lexie you’re her father. She should hear it from me.”

“Fine,” he said, and reached for his sunglasses on the bridge of his nose. He shoved a side piece down the front pocket of his jeans, leaving the glasses to hang by his hip. “And I want you to remember that Lexie and I are going to get to know each other. Alone. I’m taking her to fly her kite, and don’t you follow us in ten minutes.”

She thought for a moment, then said, “Lexie’s too shy. She’ll need me.”

John seriously doubted there was a shy bone in Lexie’s body. “Don’t bullshit me, Georgie.”

Her green eyes narrowed. “Just don’t go where I can’t see you.”

“What do you think I’m going to do, kidnap her?”

“No,” she said, but John knew she didn’t trust him any more than he trusted her. He had a feeling that was exactly what she thought.

“We won’t go too far.” He turned back toward the others. He’d told Hugh about Georgeanne and Lexie, and he knew he could count on his friend’s discretion. “Are you ready, Lexie?” he asked.

“Yep.” She stood with her pink kite in hand, and together the two of them headed away from people throwing Frisbees, toward a nice grassy expanse. After Lexie got her feet tangled in the kite’s tail the second time, John took it from her. The top of her head barely reached his waist, and he felt huge walking next to her. Again he didn’t know what to say and did very little talking. But then, he didn’t need to.

“Last year, when I was a little kid, I was in kindergarten,” his daughter began, then she proceeded to name each child in her class, relate whether they owned a pet, and describe the breed.

“And he gots three dogs.” She held up three fingers. “That’s just not fair.”

John looked over his shoulder, determined that they’d walked a couple of hundred feet, and stopped. “I think this is a good spot.”

“Do you gots any dogs?”

“No. No dogs.” He handed her back the spool of string with the stick through the center.

She shook her head sadly. “Me neither, but I want a dalmatian,” she said as she grasped each side of the stick. “A great big one with lots of spots.”

“Keep the string tight.” He held the pink kite above his head and felt the gentle pull of the breeze.

“Don’t I have to run?”

“Not today.” He moved the kite to the left and the wind tugged harder. “Now walk backward, but don’t let out any string until I tell you.” She nodded and looked so serious he almost laughed.

After ten tries, the kite rose about twenty feet in the air. “Help me.” She panicked, her face turned skyward. “It’s gonna fall again.”

“Not this time,” he assured her as he came to stand next to her. “And if it does, we’ll put it back up.”

She shook her head and her denim hat fell on the ground. “It’s gonna fall, I just know it. You take it!” She shoved the spool toward him.

John lowered himself to one knee beside her. “You can do it,” he said, and when she leaned her back against his chest, he felt his heart stop for a few beats. “Just let the string out slowly.” John stared into her face as she watched her kite soar higher. Her expression turned quickly from trepidation to delight.

“I did it,” she whispered, and turned to look over her shoulder at him.

Her soft breath brushed his cheek and swept deep down to his soul. A moment before, his heart had felt as if it had stopped; now it swelled. It felt as if a balloon were being inflated beneath his sternum. It grew big and fast and intense, and he had to look away. He looked at the people flying kites around him. He looked at fathers and mothers and children. Families. He was a daddy again.
But for how long this time
? his cynical subconscious asked.

“I did it, Mr. Wall.” She spoke quietly, as if a raised voice would bring her kite crashing to the ground.

He looked back at his child. “My name is John.”

“I did it, John.”

“Yes, you did.”

She smiled. “I like you.”

“I like you, Lexie.”