But she’d needed the space and the time, and they’d finally come to an agreement. She would call and check in once a week, and in return, they’d let her be. She called them every Wednesday evening. “American Idol isn’t over yet. I didn’t want to interrupt.”
“I don’t like the new judges,” her mother said. “You need anything?”
This was always the first question asked. Followed quickly by the second: “And are you okay?”
Jade shook her head and pinched the bridge of her nose. “I’m fine, Mom. Really.”
“You don’t sound it. You sound nasally. Are you sick? If you catch a late-night flight, we could have you taken care of by morning—”
“Not necessary. How’s Dad?”
Her mother sighed. “Okay, the same as always, I expect. Stubborn and working himself into the ground, of course. Which means he’s overworking himself running the show. And we all know that only speeds up the symptoms of his Parkinson’s.”
“He’s not listening to his doctors?”
“Your father? Hello, have you met him? He knows it all, remember? And we both know there was ever only one thing that kept him home, happy in the knowledge that he didn’t have to work every day, and that was you being in the office instead of him. Baby, you know I don’t want to rush you . . .”
Jade kept her unladylike snort to herself.
“But you’re really coming home?”
Jade closed her eyes. “Yes.”
“Have you given notice there then? At your little dog place?”
Jade rubbed her forehead and stared down at her toes. She’d done a damn good job with them if she said so herself, though they needed another coat. “It’s an animal center, Mom. We see all animals, not just dogs.”
“And you . . . enjoy it. Checking in dogs.”
“I know you don’t get it, but I’ve been very happy here.”
“In Idaho.”
In Jade’s mother’s opinion, the entire country consisted of three cities. Los Angeles, New York, and Chicago. Anything in between belonged in some alternate universe, Idaho included.
“Idaho is very nice,” Jade said.
“So you’ve said. Why don’t I come visit?”
“No!” Jade lowered her voice with effort. “Like I said, I’m coming home.”
“Before November first.”
“Yes.”
“I could help you pack.”
Aka call a moving company. “I don’t have much to pack.”
And she didn’t want any visitors here. So far she’d managed to avoid a family invasion by going home to Chicago on the occasional holiday. The last thing she wanted was for them to show up en masse and see her life here. Not that she was ashamed of it. She wasn’t at all. But neither was she ready to share this world she’d found for herself.
Still, her mother meant well and missed her, so Jade made nice for a few more minutes, then hung up, feeling the usual guilt wash over her. She put a second coat of nail polish on her toenails and didn’t think of Dell or how she’d nearly inhaled him whole.
Much.
And in any case, it was hardly her fault. He’d more than met her halfway, and good Lord Almighty, he was no slouch in the kissing department. She’d nearly gone up in flames for him right there on the mats. One more minute of his amazing mouth on hers and she’d have stripped off her own clothes to get his hands on her.
Except that Adam had shown up.
Again.
She was suspecting a conspiracy but really he’d done her a favor because she had no business starting anything with Dell.
None.
They’d had all this time and hadn’t acted on their attraction. And now she was leaving. Getting involved with Dell was out of the question.
Not going to happen. And anyway, it’d been nothing but sheer hormones. That’s all. And pheromones. And good God, sheer testosterone, the stuff came off him in waves when she wrestled around with him on those damn mats.
“This is why normal people have regular sex,” she told Beans. “Keeps them sane. Sane by orgasms.”
Beans didn’t seem impressed by this kernel of knowledge.
“Okay, so I’m low on self-control,” she admitted. “Sue me. But it’s his fault—you should have seen him in those shorts, all hot and sweaty and . . .” Gorgeous. “Look, all I need to do is . . . not look at him.” Ever.
She’d have sworn that Beans rolled her eyes on that one before she leapt to the back of the couch and began to wash her face. “Oh, please. If you’d been standing in front of him, all hot and intent and protective and . . . hot, you’d have jumped him, too.”
Beans finished her face and went to work behind her ears.
Jade shook her head and set down the bottle of nail polish. She’d had a glass of wine, but she was still unnerved, quivering with tension and unused adrenaline. If Adam hadn’t interrupted them, what would she be doing right this very minute? She was picturing it when the knock came at the door; she jumped and knocked over the nail polish. She righted the bottle, attempted to keep her heart in her chest by pressing hard between her breasts, and did the duck walk to the door so that she didn’t smear her toes. She looked through the peephole, then went still.
Dell. He’d showered, put on jeans and a long-sleeved graphic henley that emphasized the chest and arms she’d had her hands all over earlier.
He looked . . . perfect.
She looked down at herself. She wore the oversized Harvard sweatshirt she’d pilfered from Sam years ago, Toy Story–themed pajama bottoms. At least she didn’t have on her donkey slippers; they were by the couch waiting for her toenails to dry.
Yeah, she was a catch.
When she opened the door, Dell wore a solemn expression—until he took in her pj’s.
At that, a small smile crossed his mouth.
She tried to remember if she’d put mascara back on after her shower. She hadn’t.
When it became clear she wasn’t going to invite him in, Dell simply stepped into her. And dammit if she didn’t back up, and then she was watching his very fine ass as it moved into her place.
He stood in the center of her living room and turned to face her. “We have unfinished business.”
Twelve
They had unfinished business?
Assuming he meant their near physical miss, Jade hesitated.
With another small smile, Dell shook his head. “I meant your training. You left early.”
“Figured we were done.”
“Yeah. That got a little out of hand.” He paused, but she shook her head.
“If you’re going to try to apologize again, don’t.”
He just looked at her with those dark eyes, and she let out a breath. “Look,” she said. “We both know the truth is that I kissed you, so if anyone should be apologizing—”
“I’m not apologizing for the kiss.”
“Oh.” She blinked. “Then . . . ?”
Instead of answering, he sat on her couch in the same place she’d just vacated and took in the movie playing on the TV, the spread of fingernail polish, the half-eaten bowl of popcorn, the opened laptop.
Too late she realized what she had up on the screen.
He smiled, then laughed out loud, his amusement eradicating the lines of tension in his beautiful face. He leaned forward to read more.
“Hey,” she complained. “That’s private.” She moved toward him to shut the laptop, but he held her off, easily grabbing both her hands in one of his wrists and tugging her down beside him.
“Watch the freshly done toenails!”
He grinned and did just that, taking in the pale blue polish. “Pretty.” Then he went back to her screen, reading her things-to-do-in-her-spare-time spreadsheet:1. Organize junk drawer.
2. Clean hairbrushes.
3. Relax.
4. Don’t think about Dell.
Dell slid her a look but didn’t point out the obvious, that she wasn’t doing anything on her list.
&n
bsp; “Cute pictures,” he said of the piglet and calf pictures on the other half of her screen. Both were close-ups of two adorably earnest but wary faces. “Friends of yours?”
She sighed. “Yes.” When he only looked at her, brows up, she shrugged. “I’ve adopted them from Adopt a Farm Animal.” She tugged her hands free of his and refilled her wineglass.
“You adopted a pig and a calf?”
“It’s the late-night commercials. They play sad music and show pictures of abused, neglected animals.”
His smile widened.
“They look right at you! Oliver, the calf—” She pointed at the picture. “He’d been abandoned and had nearly starved to death before he was rescued. And Miss Piggy was heading to the bacon factory. Now I write a check for fifteen bucks a month and they live happily ever after. What’s the big deal?”
“Christ, you’re cute.”
“I—” She narrowed her eyes at him. Cute? “You take that back.”
“Okay, you’re not cute. You’re . . . sexy as hell.”
They both looked at her attire and he laughed when she winced. “You are,” he maintained.
“You’re a very nice man to lie like that.” She grabbed the laptop from him, shutting the screen. “And now you’ll forget about the fact that I’m so pathetic that I watch DVDs on Friday and Saturday nights instead of going out.”
He looked at her for a long moment and she groaned and covered her face. “Don’t tell me that’s why you’re here, that you thought I was feeling . . . vulnerable.” She dropped her hands and glared at him. “Because if you say that, I’m going to kick your ass, Dell, I mean it.”
Reaching for her wine, he helped himself.
“Say something,” she demanded.
“Are you kidding? I don’t want to get my ass kicked. And you could do it now, too.” He flashed a grin but she just stared at him, deadpan.
He sighed. “I’m not here because I thought you were vulnerable. I’m here because you ran off rather than face the fact that we—”
“Hey. I didn’t run off.”
“Jade, you left smoke in your wake.”
Okay, so she’d run off. Bad habit. “It was just a kiss.”
He slid her a look.
“Okay, it was an unexpectedly great kiss.”
He nodded. “Yeah.” His voice was low and a little rough, and she felt her nipples harden at the sound of it. “Each time gets even greater.”
Oh so true. “But we’d be stupid to keep doing it.”
“Right.” He looked at her. “Why’s that?”
“Because . . .” God, his eyes. And that gorgeous mocha skin, sun-burnished and so smooth, except for a five o’clock shadow across his jaw after a long day. She already knew how it felt beneath her fingers, which were itching for another touch. “Because we work together. Because you date like other men change socks. Because I’m leaving soon. Pick one.”
“Right,” he said, nodding agreeably. “I almost forgot about all that.”
She nodded.
He reached out and ran a finger along her temple, making her . . . yearn. She leaned into him and closed her eyes.
“And we’re more than co-workers,” he said quietly.
“We’re friends.”
He didn’t say anything and she opened her eyes.
“Yeah,” he said. “We’re friends.”
“Friends don’t kiss like we did without becoming . . . naked friends.”
“And?”
“And you have a no-relationship decree in place. You’ve told me so yourself. And even if you hadn’t, your actions speak louder than words.”
“What does a relationship have to do with becoming naked friends?”
Okay, he had her there. There was a silence, and she waited for him to push the issue, but he just started eating her popcorn. Then he took another drink of her wine. “I thought maybe you were upset about something else,” he finally said.
“Like what?”
“I thought maybe me touching you brought up some bad memories.” His eyes never wavered from hers so when she grimaced, she knew he saw it.
“I . . . No. Not like you’re thinking.” She looked down at her hands, which twisted together until her knuckles turned white. She hadn’t talked about this. She didn’t want to talk about this. But she could admit he deserved a few answers. “I wasn’t raped.”
He covered her hands with one of his as he let out a low breath that had a lot of relief in the sound. “I’m glad. But something happened to you.”
“Yes.” His skin was warm on her suddenly chilly fingers and she found herself turning her hand palm up so she could hold on. “A long time ago.”
“Eighteen months.”
She stared down at their entwined fingers. “Eighteen months.” She shook her head. “But I’m fine now and getting more fine all the time. I don’t need a babysitter, Dell. Or a shoulder to cry on.”
“Well, that’s a relief. I never know what to do with tears.”
Not true. Just this morning she’d seen him holding forty-eight-year-old Missy Robinson, who’d fallen apart in the exam room when he’d had to tell her that her Alaskan husky had cancer. He’d held her for as long as she’d needed, looking devastated for her but perfectly at ease in the role of comforter. “With all those women you date, I’d think you’d have a lot of practice at tears.”
She had no idea why she said that. His dating, or not dating, wasn’t her concern.
Dell grabbed the bowl of popcorn and the remote and leaned back. “Maybe I’m not quite the hotshot you think I am.”
She stared at him. He was good at letting people come to their own conclusions, and he’d certainly never tried to be anything he wasn’t. His eyes met hers, clear and warm and open. “What are we doing, Dell?”
“Well, I’m hoping to watch a movie and eat the rest of your popcorn.”
“Because . . . ?”
“Because I like this movie and I love popcorn. And because Adam’s at my house barbecuing chicken and vegetables. Vegetables.” He shuddered again.
After Oceans 11, they switched to SNL. “I bet this isn’t how most of your dates end,” she said.
He was quiet a moment. “Was this a date?”
She met his gaze. “If it was, it’d be my first since—” She paused. “A really long time.”