Harper forced her eyes open. Thanks to her wet jeans and socks, her legs were freezing.
She heard a man’s voice, a low chuckle, and clanging dishes.
The TV was on but muted.
Red’s chair was empty.
She sat up, fought a wave of pain and dizziness, and stood. “Gramps?”
“Don’t get your knickers in a knot,” he called. “I’m fine.”
His voice came from the direction of the kitchen behind her, so she stepped that way and froze.
Red…Gramps…was seated at the kitchen table sipping from a steaming mug.
Jack smiled over his shoulder as he stirred a steaming pot of something that smelled of chicken and some heavenly spice she couldn’t identify. “Have a nice nap?”
“How’d you get in?” That was a stupid question, though. Had she even locked the door?
One eyebrow lifted. “You always wake up so cheerful?”
She tried to come up with a good retort but was silenced by a shudder. She should’ve changed out of her wet clothes before she’d fallen asleep. She crossed her arms and eyed the steamy mug in Gramps’s hand.
“Go change into something warm and cozy,” Jack said. “I’ll have a cup of tea waiting when you get back.”
She stared at him. This man, this total stranger, was going to make her tea?
She squinted at him. What was his angle? Why was he there acting like a neighbor, a friend? She nodded toward the mug Gramps held. “That better be caffeine-free, or he’ll be up all night.”
Jack’s smile stayed in place, maybe even got a little wider as if he found her amusing.
His response made her want to growl at him, but he’d probably break into raucous laughter.
Jack tapped the side of his head with his fingertips. “Actually thought of that.” He looked at Gramps and added, “When you got a face as pretty as this”—he circled an invisible outline of his face with his free hand—“they think you must have all the brains of a sweet potato.”
Gramps lifted his cup in a sort of salute. “Happens to me all the time, son. All the time.”
The men chuckled at their brilliance.
She maybe did growl a little as she turned toward her bedroom. Just what she needed, some man to give Gramps more material.
When she reached her room, she froze. Her bed was made with the cheap bedding she’d bought on sale. The suitcase had been left on the bed.
Gramps couldn’t have maneuvered around it with his bad hips and back. And he’d been too tired to do anything.
Which meant Jack, a total stranger, had found her sheets and stretched them across the bed. He’d pulled the comforter on, made sure it draped evenly over both sides. He’d stuffed her pillowcase with the pillow on which she’d lay her head.
Even as she marveled at the kindness, the image of his hands on her bedding made her shudder again.
She tore the duct tape from her luggage and dug through it looking for something warm.
A total stranger had come into her house, had made her bed, and was now fixing her tea. And her dinner. What kind of weird dimension had she and Gramps landed in? Because nothing in her experience had ever led her to believe that men like Jack existed outside of romance novels. He might have been joking about the pretty face, but he hadn’t been wrong. The man was good-looking in a rugged, flannel-shirt-and-work-boots kind of way. Though he may have looked different from the men in her past, she’d learned the hard way that no matter what a man wore—suits and ties, joggers and sweatshirts, or jeans and flannel—men were not to be trusted.
She found a clean pair of jeans and a sweatshirt. Then she pulled something else out of the bag. Her fleece pajamas. Baggy, fluffy, ugly, pink fleece pajamas.
He’d said to slip into something warm and cozy. These fit the bill.
She peeled off her still-wet clothes, careful with her wrist, which was more tender after the debacle on the porch steps, and climbed into the fuzzy warmth. With a cup of something hot, she just might warm up before spring.
She touched the cut on her neck. It was healing. Hopefully, Jack wouldn’t notice it.
What did he want from her? If he was like every other man she’d ever known, at least every one who wasn’t so old he needed a little blue pill and an hour’s notice, she could guess exactly what he wanted.
She pulled on a pair of dry socks and slipped her feet into her furry slippers.
Nothing said no-way-not-gonna-happen like furry yellow slippers.
She shuffled back to the kitchen and leaned against the doorframe. Now that the sleepy haze had worn off, she noticed all the changes since she’d first seen the room. Stuff…everywhere.
“I hope you don’t mind.” Jack adjusted the heat on the stove and turned to face her. He started to say something, stopped, and said, “Nice jammies.”
“They’re warm.”
Their eyes met and held for a second before he cleared his throat and turned back to the stove. If she wasn’t mistaken, a flush of pink climbed up his neck as he poured water from a saucepan into another mug, added a tea bag, and handed it to her.
“Thank you.” She heated her hands on the warm cup and inhaled the scent. Smelled like cinnamon and something heavenly she didn’t recognize. “This is perfect.”
“Some kind of herbal something,” Jack said. “I thought it would warm you up and help you relax.” He stirred the soup. “When I bought this house, it was filled with… Well, it seemed like junk. All that stuff was still in my garage, and I remembered…” He turned to the counter, pointed at an old microwave and a toaster. Behind the toaster…was that a coffee maker? “No idea if they work.”
She eyed the appliances, thought of what they represented. Coffee and food. Glorious—and easy—food. Her eyes tingled. Seriously, what was wrong with her? “That’s… Thank you so much.”
“We cleaned them up,” Jack said. “The microwave was…well, it’s clean now.”
Gramps added, “It looked like someone had nuked a rat in there.”
“Nice visual.” She couldn’t help smiling.
“Smelled like it, too,” Gramps added. “But we got it clean.”
“You helped?”
“Not like you were gonna do it,” the old man said, “snoring and drooling on the sofa out there.”
“I was not!”
She glared at Gramps, whose eyes crinkled with his smile. Proud of himself, the old codger.
Jack opened the cabinet, though not before she saw the corners of his lips twitch in an almost grin.
She was stifling her amusement when she caught sight of what was in the cabinet. Plates, bowls, cups.
“What did you…? Where did all that stuff come from?”
“Oh,” Jack said. “I had some extras. Didn’t have much silverware, but I grabbed a box of plastic ware at the store. Should hold you over ’til you go shopping. There’s a little convenience store in Nutfield for essentials, but you’d be better off starting at the Walmart in Epping. Cheaper than our local store.”
Cheap was good. Cheap was necessary.
She spied a sack on the floor beside Gramps. Snatching it up, she asked, “How long was I asleep?”
“Couple hours, if you drifted right off,” Jack said.
“Hours? I can’t have!” That would mean it was nearly nine o’clock. She sat at the table and looked around for a clock, but there was none. Her phone…she’d tossed it somewhere earlier.
“Girl, you haven’t slept in days,” Gramps said. “I’m just glad you got us here without snoozing at the wheel and killing us both.”
“I would never…” She glanced at Jack, who’d gone back to stirring the concoction on the stove. “I was wide awake when I was driving. Just… I guess…”
Jack grabbed bowls from the cabinet. “Tired, obviously.”
“She works too hard,” Gramps said.
“Works?” Jack ladled some soup into a bowl, shooting her a glance over his shoulder. “All I’ve seen her do is sleep.”
“Trust me, son. She works like a dog. Doesn’t get enough rest.”
She cleared her throat. “I’d prefer you didn’t talk about me as if I weren’t in the room.”
“Well, go on, then. Get out.” Gramps waved his hand toward the hallway, then laughed at his joke. “It sure was easier when you were sleeping.”
She ignored the remark and looked in the grocery sack. She found a box of plastic forks, spoons, and knives.
Jack slid a bowl of soup in front of her. “Red had only nice things to say about you.”
There was that kindness again. What was she supposed to do with that?
But what had Red…Gramps said? The man was more lucid tonight than he normally was at this hour, amazing considering the day they’d had. It figured that the one night she needed his dementia to flare up, he’d be clear-thinking.
Had he exposed her? She glanced at the old man, who winked at her. When she turned toward Jack, he was setting another bowl of soup on the table, and he seemed content, guileless, and utterly without suspicion. How long could that last?
She opened the package of plastic ware and handed a spoon to Gramps.
He grunted his thanks.
Jack slid into the chair beside them.
“No soup?” she asked.
“I ate chili earlier. Go ahead.”
She lifted her spoon, then set it down when she caught Gramps’s pointed look. Apparently, even though Jack was there, even though this was the most surreal experience in the world, Gramps would still pray.
He set both of his old, wrinkled hands on the table. She took one. After a moment’s pause, Jack took his other. Gramps eyed them both until she and Jack closed the circle with their joined hands.
While Gramps prayed, she tried not to think about the warmth and strength of Jack’s grip.
Men often seemed that way at first, didn’t they? But they always had a reason behind their kindness.
Considering all Jack had done for them already, she had little doubt about what he was after.