Lorraine Rossini exchanged glances with the two sons who had accompanied her to her only daughter’s hospital room as she took in the news. With a sigh, she placed the infant seat she’d brought in preparation for her grandson’s homecoming on the brightly upholstered blue chair in the corner.
When she spoke, she didn’t bother masking her disappointment. Her voice rose a little more with each word she uttered.
“But any one of us can bring you and the baby home, Maddy. What possessed you to ask a perfect stranger to do it?”
She’d tried to call her mother last night with the news, but hadn’t been able to get through. What few relatives hadn’t piled into her room yesterday, her mother was busy notifying. Her parents were one of the few people left on the face of the earth who didn’t have Call Waiting. The message she’d left on her brother Tony’s answering machine had obviously not been picked up.
Maddy indicated her sleeping baby, silently asking her mother to lower her voice. “He’s far from perfect, Mom. And maybe that’s why I’m doing it.”
Her oldest brother ceased prowling around the room and looked at her. “Oh God,” Bill groaned. “The stray puppy syndrome strikes again.”
Unlike their childhood years, which had been spent in one-upmanship, bruised egos and skinned knuckles, today she and her brothers worked fairly harmoniously together in the family business, which was fortunate. But she knew her brothers still had a tendency to look upon her as the baby, and as such, given to foibles.
Frowning, Maddy reflexively began to protest the simplistic label her older brother had applied, then stopped. Maybe it was as simple as that. In a way. At any rate, dueling over semantics was a waste of time.
“John Thomas lost his wife a little more than two years ago,” she told her mother and saw sympathy spring instantly into her hazel eyes. Her mother had the ability to feel empathy for absolutely anyone. “And he’s gone through some of the same things I have, except that he hasn’t moved on yet.”
Standing over the baby, her youngest brother, Joe, glanced in her direction and gave her a knowing look. Only thirteen months older than she was, he, better than anyone, knew how her mind worked. “And you’re planning on moving him?”
Maddy sniffed, in no mood to put up with a lecture. The rest of her family was far too cautious. They played it safe when it came to decorating, too. She was the one who pushed for the outlandish, for the bright and cheerful infusion of colors.
“Nothing wrong with one person reaching out to another.”
Always the pragmatic one, it was Bill’s turn to frown. “As long as you don’t fall over while you’re reaching.”
She knew they all meant well and that what they said was motivated by concern. When Johnny had died they had all closed ranks around her like a huge protective coat of armor. She would have been lost without them.
“How could I do that?” Maddy asked, pointedly looking at her mother. “You’re all just a single phone call away.”
“Closer than that if you want,” Joe volunteered, clearly enamored with his new nephew. Single, he had no desire for a wife and kids in the immediate future, but doting on Maddy’s suited him just fine.
They had been wonderful, but they did have a tendency to overwhelm and she did need a little space. “I don’t need a support system right now.”
Lorraine laughed knowingly. “Say that again around the 2:00 a.m. feeding.”
“I probably won’t—” Maddy acknowledged. Her mother had volunteered to stay with her the first two weeks. Maddy had wanted to go it alone. They had compromised with her mother coming over to spend the nights. It was either agreeing to that, or having her mother camp out at her door. “And you’ll be right there to hear me not say it if I know you.”
Her mother nodded. “You know me.” She turned toward her sons, both of whom towered over her. “All right, let’s clear out before your policeman gets here and gets scared off again.” She shooed Joe away from the bassinet and both of them toward the door. “He looked like a rabbit about to bolt yesterday.”
“Wouldn’t you if you’d come up against that crowd? Besides, he just didn’t want to intrude,” Maddy explained. She saw the look on Bill’s face. “And you can save the raised eyebrows for later.” She kissed each brother in turn as they filed by her bed and smiled at her mother. “I’ll see you later tonight.”
“Count on it,” Lorraine told her just before she slipped out the door.
J.T. arrived twenty minutes later, a skeptical expression on his face as he entered the room after knocking on the door. From the looks of it, she’d been ready for a while, a suitcase by her feet and the baby dozing in a blue-and-white infant seat.
He’d come because he said he would, but he still hesitated.
“Are you sure you wouldn’t rather have someone from your family bring you home?”
“I’m sure,” she told him brightly. Now that he was here, she rang for the nurse who’d promised to show up with the mandatory wheelchair. “They’d only fuss unbearably and make me feel like an invalid.” Her eyes teased his. “Something tells me you don’t fuss.”
“Don’t see the need.” J.T. looked around. There was a profusion of flowers on every available flat surface in the room. The thought occurred to him that maybe he should have brought her flowers yesterday, but they probably would have gotten lost in this floral sea. Besides, it wasn’t as if he’d initially come to visit a friend. She was, after all, just a woman he’d helped all in the line of duty, nothing more.
If she wasn’t a friend, how did he pigeonhole her? he wondered.
Rather than tax his brain and have it go places he didn’t want it to go, J.T. decided to drop the whole matter and just concentrate on getting through it.
Like everything else in his day.
“You want to take any of these with you?” He indicated the flowers just as the nurse entered with the wheelchair.
Maddy smiled a greeting at her as she sank down into the chair, Johnny safely tucked into her arms. It was left to J.T. to pick up her suitcase.
“No, I’ve already told the nurses to distribute them around the hospital to people who don’t have any. Flowers cheer things up, don’t you think?”
There were flowers on Lorna’s grave. There was never any cheer there.
“No,” he replied grimly.
The look in his eyes warned her not to continue on that route.
“Don’t forget the infant seat,” she cautioned as he fell in behind the nurse who was pushing her out the door. He retraced his steps and picked up the seat.
“Did your captain mind?” she asked as he came out into the hall. They headed to the elevator. The nurse, he noticed, had mercifully chosen to be quiet.
J.T. pressed the Down button. “Mind about what?”
“You taking time off to bring me home.”
The doors opened and he moved his hand in the way of the beam, allowing the nurse to push Maddy and the baby into the car safely.
“This is my own time.” J.T. got in beside them, pressing the button for the first floor. “I work the night shift, remember?”
“So those were your regular hours?” She smiled. “Lucky for me.” Twisting around, she looked at the nurse. “He delivered my baby. I was in labor and my car stalled out in the middle of the road.”
The nurse looked at him with genuine appreciation. “Lucky for you he came along,” she echoed Maddy’s sentiment.
He’d never taken well to attention, either good or bad. J.T. shrugged at the observation. “If I hadn’t happened along then, the cop patrolling in my place would have.”
The elevator stopped on the second floor and two people got in, shifting to the left of the wheelchair. Maddy looked up at J.T. “You see the glass half empty, don’t you?”
He didn’t see how it was any of her business how he saw anything, and he didn’t particularly like the fact that she was asking him in front of an audience. Because he knew that ignoring the question would only make her ask it again, he played along with her assessment. It wasn’t really far off anyway.
“Half empty, dirty and cracked.”
Instead of saying anything, Maddy nodded to herself. It looked as if she had a lot of work cut out for her. But then, she’d already surmised as much and, at any rate, she felt equal to it.
He’d been in her driveway the day before, but hadn’t really taken account of the place until now. She lived in a large two story building, the kind that housed a family with multiple children, all of whom had their own rooms. Pulling up the hand brake, he scrutinized the place she’d resided in for over five years. Ever since she’d gotten married.
“You live here?”
She thought it a strange question, seeing as he’d parked her car for her yesterday. “Yes.”
He looked at her. “Alone?”
She had, she thought, until now. “Why? Don’t you like it?”
She loved the house, loved every corner of it. There were special memories tucked away in every room and it bore her mark from top to bottom. Knowing that all his taste was in his mouth, Johnny had given her free rein to decorate as she chose.
He shrugged, knowing he’d get lost in a place like that. Having sold the house he and Lorna had bought together, he lived his days out in a bare apartment. It held a refrigerator, a table, a bed and a bureau, more than enough for him.
“Just seems like a huge house for one person, that’s all.”
“One and a half now,” she corrected, glancing toward the back seat where her son dozed.
It was time to get him inside. Maddy couldn’t wait to see him sleeping in the frilly bassinet her mother had insisted on buying for her. She began to open the passenger door, but J.T. reached over and placed his hand over hers to stop her.
“Wait a second,” he ordered. She looked at him quizzically. “Don’t just go jumping out of the car. You’re still weak.”
He didn’t strike her as the type to play Sir Galahad. “You don’t know me very well, do you?”
The smile she gave him told him that she intended on correcting that.
She could intend whatever she wanted, he thought, that didn’t change anything. After he brought her inside her home, his responsibility, even by the wildest stretch of interpretation, was at an end. He’d go his way and she’d go hers. End of story.
“No, but I don’t believe in taking chances. Sit.” It was a sternly worded command, not a request. Getting out of the vehicle, he rounded the hood and came up to her side. “Okay, now you can get out.”
Her grin grew wider. “Yes, sir.”
But the grin faded just a little as she gained her feet and the brisk, cool world around her shifted just a little out of kilter. Stunned, Maddy automatically grabbed his shoulder. She felt his arm close around her, pulling her to him as he steadied her.
A warmth spread through her that had less to do with her near faint than with the man who had prevented it. Taking a breath, she looked up into his face. “I guess you were right.”
His expression was stoic. “I tend to be.”
She smiled, making no move to regain her footing without him. “I’ll try to remember that.”
He shouldn’t be holding her like this, no matter what the reason. It was too familiar. And felt too good. “Can you stand up?”
If she hadn’t felt so nice against him, she would have felt foolish. But she didn’t. Testing them, she found that her knees felt far less rubbery than they had a minute ago. “Yes.”
He had every intention of releasing her then. He didn’t mean to go on holding her. And he knew he didn’t mean what he did next. He had no idea what came over him. Maybe it was her nearness, or maybe it had to do with the fact that she looked so much like Lorna.
Or maybe it was because he’d been alone for so long. He absolutely refused to believe it was because of the woman herself.
But whatever the reason, whatever the explanation, what happened still happened.
Bending his head, he brushed his lips against hers.