Yours, Mine & Ours (3 page)

Finally he located the little doll—the real one—on
the pillows under the canopy deal. The rosebud mouth was emitting a few teensy snores. The red hair curled all over the pillow. She'd kicked off half the covers. Mike set the poodle down, who promptly circled and settled at the foot of the bed, then tugged up the covers. He discovered a clearly sacred blankie had fallen on the carpet, and retrieved it. He knew about sacred blankies. Anyway. The kid was fine. The dog was fine.

But on returning to the empty room next door, he discovered that Amanda wasn't remotely fine.

She'd made it to a sitting position. Was sitting with her knees up, one hand on her forehead, making choking sounds as if she were holding back tears…only, tears were flooding her eyes in thick clear drips, turning her pearl-cream skin blotchy, turning… Aw, hell, she wasn't just a mess. She was a complete mess.

“Something hurts that bad?” He crouched down.

“Go away. Thank you for helping. But go away. I'm fine.”

Yeah, he knew that female twist. No matter what he did now, he'd be in trouble. She wasn't fine. But she didn't want him here—and he sure as hell didn't want to be here. But he sure as hell couldn't leave a woman crying her eyes out.

“I'll tell you what,” he started to say.

“No. I mean it. I'm fine. I'm just having a meltdown. People have meltdowns. I'll get over it. But
I really don't want to do this in front of a stranger, okay? So just go away.”

“I will, I will. But here's the thing. What if you have a concussion?”

“I don't.”

“It looked as if you fell partly on the side of your head, because I felt quite a bump—”

“I don't care.”

He squinted, scratched his nape, thinking that was another female comment that was invariably booby-trapped. Obviously she had to care if she had a concussion, if she needed medical attention—for her daughter's sake, if not for her own. She wanted him to disappear. He got it. But if he went back to his place, he wasn't going to sleep all night, worrying whether she'd collapsed over here alone.

“I've got a plan,” he said firmly. “You head into the shower. Clean up. Get the paint out of your hair and all that. And I'll be downstairs. Nowhere near you. You come out of the shower, call down that you're all right, then I'll lock your door and go home.”

She was still sniffling hard, but she let loose an almost inaudible “All right. Only because I'm worried about Molly.”

“Got it.” He didn't care why she agreed. She agreed. He helped her stand up, trying to think like a big brother, not an adult man who was handling attractive female flesh, but it wasn't that simple. When a woman was vulnerable, a guy instinctively reacted.

It was a sick instinct, a stupid instinct, an instinct that got a guy in trouble every time, but whatever. The brush of her body against his provoked an unfortunately magnificent hard-on. He'd just touched her side, her arm, her hair… That was all it took. Some baby-blue paint came off in his hand when he touched her hair…which she saw.

“It's just latex,” he assured her. “It'll come out with plain old soap and water.”

It seemed an innocent enough comment to him, but, par for the course, he must have picked just the wrong thing to say, because her eyes welled up all over again. Still, she stumbled off, disappearing into master bath right off her bedroom, and closed the door.

That left him staring at her mess. It wasn't his problem, of course. And he'd the same as promised her that he was going downstairs, away from her personal space. But it really
was
a mess. It wasn't just the overturned paint can, but the wet brush lying on the floor, the overturned ladder, the roller and pan still soaked with that same sissy-blue color.

If she had to come out of a fresh shower and clean all this up…well, he could just picture her breaking into tears all over again.

It's not as if that was his problem, either, but he was stuck hanging around until she came out of the shower. She could still fall. She could still have a concussion. He wasn't about to leave Teddy alone next
door much longer, but he was probably committed for another ten minutes anyway.

So he started to clean up…except that when he picked up the paintbrush and actually looked at the project—well, she had only a couple of square feet to go near the ceiling. It was downright silly to seal up and clean up, when just that little bit was left to do.

He finished the bit of wall in two shakes. She still wasn't out of the shower—he could hear the water running from beyond the closed door. She was making noise—some might call it a frightening attempt at singing the blues—but the noise at least verified that she hadn't keeled over.

He'd just do a little more cleanup. And then split.

 

Amanda couldn't
believe
it took so long to wash off all the paint.

She shampooed and soaked and shampooed all over again. She scrubbed her skin practically raw, then conditioned and rinsed and soaked some more.

Eventually she had to climb out. She just didn't want to. She wanted to stay holed up in the bathroom until her neighbor was gone for sure. How humiliating, to have a meltdown in front of him. She was a crybaby. Always had been, always would be.

But she'd hoped her hunky neighbor would never have to know that.

She toweled off, pulled on a clean T-shirt and shorts, opened the door a peek to let out the steam—and to listen. No sounds. She'd have heard Molly—she'd been known to hear her baby from two floors away from behind closed doors. But in this case, she only listened for the clump of a heavy footstep, a tenor sigh…the hint of testosterone in the air.

Nothing.

Still rubbing the towel through her hair, she tiptoed across the hall to her bedroom…or her bedroom-to-be. Until the room got painted and carpet was put in, she'd been camping on a couch. The point, though, was that Mike was definitely gone.

But so was her disaster area. The paint can, news papers, roller and pan, brushes—everything had disappeared. He'd finished painting the rest of the wall. A few splotches of “Clear Skies” blue still marred the floor, but there was nothing else in the room—except for a note.

“I stole your ladder—so you wouldn't use it again. Mine's hanging in the garage. Borrow it anytime you want. I'll have your painting supplies back on your porch by tomorrow—it was just easier to clean up in my basement than mess up your new place.”

There was no signature, no personal comment. He'd just come to her rescue out of the complete blue. Did the whole silent take-care-of thing.

She flipped off the overhead light, stalked over
to the window—carefully avoiding the splotches of paint—and stared down at his place.

There were no lights on that she could see. No dangerously good-looking adult male in sight. But he was going to be a problem, she could just smell it.

All her life she'd needed a hero.

Except for now. Right now she needed to stand on her own—to learn to stand on her own—or die trying. She was running out of chances to feel proud of herself and her life. The suburbs was it. Her foxhole in the battle. Her line in the sand. Her Custer's last stand.

She wasn't going to
need
a man. Ever again.

T
he next morning, keeping his eye on the time, Mike clattered down the basement steps just ahead of his son. Teddy was running in circles—even on the stairs—chanting, “Hoboy, hoboy, hoboy!”

His joy, naturally, was about the worm-farm project. And before Teddy had woken up, Mike had hustled downstairs to set it up. The “ingredients” needed for the farm were all laid out—the plastic drawers, newspaper, garbage, burlap and, of course, the worms.

“Now, both of us have jobs,” he told his son. “Your job is to tear up the newspaper. Like this. That's to make the bed for the worms.”

Teddy took to ripping up paper like a nun took to
prayer. “I'm doing this really, really good, aren't I, Dad?”

“You sure are. And then…we're going to add just a little water. That'll be my job.” Mike wasn't born yesterday. A “little water” to his son was like inviting Armageddon. “But you get to do the next thing. The worms need food. Something we call ‘organic waste.'”

“What's that?”

“Organic waste is the stuff we usually put down the disposal. Like old lettuce. Maybe some carrots and carrot stalks. We could try a little broccoli.”

“Dad,” Teddy said earnestly. “I think we should give the worms all the broccoli in the whole world.”

“That's precisely how I feel about brussels sprouts. Okay. Now…we add the worms.”

“Can I do that? Can I? Can I?”

“Are you kidding? The worms are
totally
your job.”

“Thanks, Dad!” The thrill on his son's face was almost as good as Christmas.

Finally, the project was finished, and Mike could put the lid on. “Okay. Your grandma's coming in fifteen or twenty minutes, so we've got just enough time to get you cleaned up. But remember, we can't look at the worms for at least two weeks.”

“Except for peeks.”

“No. No exceptions. No peeks. No looking at all. Light can hurt them. Okay? Promise.”

“I promise with my whole life. I promise, hope to die.”

While Mike was dunking Teddy in the tub and then getting him brushed and dressed, he took advantage to give his son the bigger worm picture. “Even though we have to wait two weeks to see the worms again, we have lots of good things to do in the meantime. Like building our water garden in the backyard.”

“For the frogs.” Teddy lifted his hands so Mike could thread a fresh T-shirt over his head.

“Yeah, for the frogs. The frogs are going to love those worms. And there'll be extra worms for fishing. And we can even use the worms' waste besides that.”

“What waste?”

“Their castings and tea.” Mike should have known his son wouldn't let him off that easy. “That's their poop and urine. It works like a fertilizer. So we can dump that in another part of the yard, like where we plant bushes or trees… Hey, I hear the doorbell. That'll be your Grandma Conroy.”

“No! Do I
have
to go, Dad? I want to stay with you.”

His parents may have been unhappy about the divorce, but both were thrilled to have their one and only grandson suddenly within three miles of them. Barbara Conroy had always tended to dress on the
formal side, but today she wore snug jeans and a long T-shirt—a perfect getup for surviving the day with a four-year-old. “Hey, you.” She snagged a kiss off him first, gave him a motherly look over. “You doing okay?”

“Couldn't be better.”

She said something to him—but his attention was diverted when a car pulled up next door. It was a meeting of the Lexuses. His mom's was lipstick-red, Amanda's mom favored a custom-painted sapphire. Apparently it was a mutual grandma-pick-up-grandkid day.

Both grandmothers looked alike—blondish hair, great bones, slim and both appearing energetic and younger than their years. They spotted each other, about the same time Molly skipped out the door and saw Teddy.

Molly stuck out her tongue at Teddy. The insult was returned. Then Slugger started baying because the poodle next door started an excited-barking thing. The grandmothers started talking and laughing at the commotion, but for one whole, long second, all he saw was her.

Amanda.

The grandmas herded their respective grandkids into their respective Lexuses. Mike heard Amanda tell her mother, “Mom, please don't call her princess” and then a minute later, “Mom, no buying her
a million toys. Just be together, okay? Have a good time.”

And her mom responded with a chant of “uh-huh, uh-huh” as if they'd had this conversation a zillion times before, and the whole while she was winking at her granddaughter. Molly appeared to need several suitcases to be gone for a few hours.

Teddy just galloped to the car and climbed in. By the time the cars pulled out and all the noise disappeared—even the dogs quieted down—suddenly there were just the two of them with nothing more than a spare stretch of driveway separating them.

Lightning arced between them, even though there wasn't a single cloud in the sky.

“I owe you a big thanks,” she called out.

“No sweat.” He'd put her painting stuff on the back porch before daybreak, hoping he wouldn't have to run into her. But now, the more he looked at her, the more he relaxed. Last night, there'd been something…off…between them. An intimacy, because of being alone at night, the dark, her not wearing much and then nothing while she was in the shower, her crying, the whole thing.

It wasn't as if that chemical-lightning thing had disappeared. If anything, the charge was more intense—but now he was braced for it. And looking at her this morning was reassuring. She looked…well…prissy. Not vulnerable and cute, like last night, with the naked navel and the wild heap of red hair.
Today, her hair was scooped up, a spotless yellow shirt paired with white shorts, sandals with yellow flowers. And she had on makeup. At this hour of the morning.

He hadn't shaved in three days now—hadn't brushed his hair in two. No reason to spruce up—he wasn't trying to please or attract any female again. Still, he was glad to admit he had a heap of things he had to do—she hastily admitted the same—and they both took off in opposite directions.

It was the truth, besides, Mike thought self-righteously. With Teddy gone, it was a perfect chance to make a trip to the hardware store.

 

Amanda let Darling out for a quick business trip in the backyard, petted Princess, grabbed her car keys and list and headed out. She'd had a spiffy Austin Healey before the divorce. Now she had a white SUV, which looked like a clone of all the soccer moms' transport vehicles up and down the neighborhood.

Mike was gone, she noticed. At least, his garage door was open and his truck nowhere in sight. She hadn't forgotten what a hero he'd been for her last night, but thankfully, she'd wakened this morning certain that he was a resistible hero. They both had their hands full with major life changes right now. And she wasn't about to forget the major life lesson that had been battered into her by the divorce.

She wasn't going to be the needy one in a relationship ever again.

She backed out of the drive and turned left—then immediately realized she should have steered right. It was going to take a while before she got her bearings in the neighborhood, and hardware stores were hardly her normal milieu. This morning, though, she had a major hardware-store type of list. She wanted bricks, to make a brick walkway in the back. Mulch. Stones. Eventually she wanted a porch swing back there, too.

In the meantime, she needed just
stuff.
Gardening gloves. A little spade. A little shovel. She didn't even have a flashlight in the house. Somehow she had to figure out a way to mow the grass. And Mike—not that she wanted to keep dwelling on her neighbor—had intimated she needed a sturdier ladder.

She located the store—after only a couple of wrong turns—and even found a reasonably close parking spot. She'd been in one of these warehouse hardware stores before. Once. But she didn't have a clue where anything was, so she just grabbed a cart and pulled out her list. She figured she'd get the boring stuff over with first—the household tools. Hammers and screw drivers and flashlights. Picture-hanger doohickeys. Things like that.

Thankfully that chore didn't take long, but once she wandered into the garden center, there seemed
a million choices, a million things to look at. She slowed down. Absently started humming…

Moments later, she realized someone else was humming, too. A man's hum. Not in the same aisle where she was looking at bricks and stones, but somewhere not far. When she stopped humming to listen, he stopped, too.

When she started humming again, so did he.

She glanced around the corner into the next aisle. Saw nothing. Shaking her head, she continued on. She would have to find some help, get someone to carry the bulky items for her. In the meantime…well, she wasn't sure how she ended up in the plumbing aisle, but suddenly there he was.

Mike.

He spotted her about the same time she spotted him. He had a faucet set in his hand. She was still holding her list. But for a petrifying second, she forgot what she was doing altogether.

She told herself swiftly that it was nothing like the night before. Granted, he'd come across as this handsome, wonderful white knight, all sexy eyes and protectiveness and strength…but she so wasn't about to believe in the fairy-tale thing again.

And once she caught her breath, she realized it was okay today. Better. He was just an oversized scruffy mutt, after all. And as long as she didn't look directly in his eyes, she didn't feel any of those…well, zingers. As if she'd been prodded with something electric and
compelling. As if she was somehow meant to move closer to him.

She tried a light laugh. “I swear, we keep meeting in the oddest places!”

He finally looked away from her, too, and lifted the package in his hands. “I've been looking at faucets. Nothing exactly wrong with what we've got, but there's a new kind…” He showed her. “You can turn it on and off with a wrist, never have to touch a handle. Which means that little boys—and big ones—don't necessarily have to wipe out a whole sink when they're cleaning up.”

“Now that would be a miracle,” she said with an other laugh, this one more natural. “I'm new at the yard-and-gardening business. Never had any ‘green' to work with in the city. So I've just been shopping for some general tools and landscaping stuff.”

“Yeah, we're getting into that kind of trouble in our house, too.”

So much for small talk. She took a breath, knowing she really needed some things to be said. “Look. I can't thank you enough for last night. You certainly didn't need to finish painting the wall or doing the cleanup—that was way over the top. And after I cried all over you, too.”

“Yeah, that was really awful. Don't do it again.”

She was startled, then realized he was teasing. His crook of a smile momentarily disarmed her, but then,
blast it, she realized she was looking at him again, feeling the pull of, say, an earthquake or a tsunami.

“Well, I owe you a payback.” She hoped her voice came out sounding normal.

“Forget it. No problem.”

“I was thinking of bringing you a homemade lasagna—”

“Whoa. Complete change of mind. You
do
owe me a payback.”

This time they both laughed. “So you like lasagna. Okay. Done deal. I'll bring it over tomorrow, around 5:00 p.m. or so.” She pulled her cart, as if she were going to go back to her shopping, but then couldn't seem to resist asking, “Was that your mom who picked up Teddy?”

“Yeah. Barbara. And my dad's name is David. They're over the moon we bought the house here. Teddy's the first grandchild. Their place is just a few towns over, in Lisle.”

She pulled at her cart again, as if she had the good sense to cut the small talk and go back to her shopping chores. Somehow, her feet seemed rooted right there, temporarily, though. She couldn't seem to quell a second round of nosiness. “How about Teddy's mom?” When Mike lifted an eyebrow, she said swiftly, “I know, I know. It's none of my business. But if we're living next door, I don't want to accidentally say something hurtful or difficult for your son, so…you know.”

“Yeah, I know.” His arched brow suggested he knew perfectly well she was being nosy. But he answered. “Right now I've got primary physical custody. My ex-wife hasn't remarried yet, but she's about to be.” He lowered the brow. “Truth is, Teddy's real bent out of shape about his mother. He doesn't get it. Why his mom would take off. He seems to believe that she personally abandoned him.”

Amanda shot him a sympathetic look. “I'm sorry.”

“I didn't tell you to solicit sympathy. But it's like you said—if we're living so close, we should probably know what the situation is with our kids.”

She nodded, and immediately came through with her stash of baggage. “My ex is Thom. He has regular visitation rights, although he only makes it half the time. I had a job in advertising—we lived downtown Chicago—but after the divorce… Well, Molly's about to start preschool, so I figured it was time to move to the suburbs, settle where there were good schools and families and other kids for Molly to play with.” She added wryly, “To be honest, I'm finding the move a little bit of a culture shock.”

“Hey, you're not alone. I never envisioned living in suburbia, either. But I felt the same, for Teddy's sake. Wanted the kind of neighborhood where he could grow up, go out and play, meet other kids, do the good-school thing. And the clincher for me was living closer to his grandparents.” Abruptly he
straightened, as if he feeling he'd shared too much. Or that he'd found too much in common with her. “Well, I'd better—”

“Me, too,” she said instantly, and did a quick U-turn with the cart. “I need to move on. Just remember, lasagna tomorrow. If you're not there at five, I'll just leave it on the front porch. See you later.”