CHAPTER FIFTEEN
AFTER HE hung up last night, Keir had held the earpiece in his hand to calculate his next move. Myah’s mind, like her words, ran a mile a minute. He’d heard it on the phone just now. Thinking. Always thinking. And he hoped she wouldn’t try to think herself out of their visit to his place.
He’d sent directions while still parked in his driveway.
As he sat through Neely’s short scene in a long play, humorous for all the wrong reasons, he bounced his leg and received more than one older brother look to pretend to enjoy the mistakes.
He barely maintained civility to tell Haylan and Skye thanks but no thanks to dinner invitations. Haylan’s with his in-laws would be fun with a myriad of people who had nowhere else to go on Easter. Skye’s might have come with an extra guest who happened to be available for dinner, single, and female.
He sped home and watched the clock. Toward one, a beep alerted him to check his phone. Leaving the hospital now. He had twenty minutes to pluck up any laundry, make sure his kitchen was clean, and ensure the bathrooms didn’t smell.
The house was in decent order for him, but how long since he’d had a woman over? Aside from a friend from church who didn’t mind doing odd things around the large house, a female he considered ‘dating material’ hadn’t passed through those doors in two years.
Keir checked the upstairs, main floor, and basement. Nothing stood out of place or smelled of ‘wash me, please’. Jolie lay in her doggie bed outside the bathroom and den, her rapid breaths undisturbed by the kiddie song and chatter from the TV in the next room.
At the doorbell chime, Keir glanced in the hall mirror. He cringed. Could have worn something better than the long sleeve, black tee with white graphics. Faded jeans looked sloppy. She probably looked really nice. He pushed up his sleeves for improvement but still resembled a seventeen-year-old skateboarder.
“Let her have fun, God,” he pleaded.
He took a breath and opened the door to find her in jeans, a v-neck, and short leather jacket. Thank God he wasn’t too underdressed.
“Key!”
He popped his eyes to the kid who pointed at him from his toddler-sized football jersey and cotton pants. Casual all around. Perrrfect. “Dyl!” he squealed back.
Dylan clasped his hands, guffawed, and snorted like this had been the funniest greeting ever, then he stormed into the house.
“Dylan, c—Hi,” she grinned politely. “Dylan Blake. Get back here. No one gave you permission to go inside.”
“No one has to. Open invitation.” He liked her unsure smile mixed with a smirk. “Now you, you’re a different story. You have to ask.”
“May I come in?”
He hiked an eyebrow.
“May I come in, please.”
Walking backwards to give her room, he tried a sneer. “That’ll do. For now.”
Myah matched his steps, a prowl forward with her own stern face. “It better, I know where you live now.” She grinned. “But thank you, oh keeper of the gate. And happy Resurrection Sunday.”
“It’s a great Resurrection Sunday.”
Her gaze wandered up the stairs to the second floor landing. “This is a lot bigger than I’d imagined.”
“Expecting a bachelor pad?”
“A miniature one. This is a bachelor pad after all, no?”
He’d never considered it one. Her purse and a diaper bag slid from each shoulder. He took the straps and set them on the stained-wood bench behind him.
“All from Mum and Dad. It’s paid for. Sometimes I don’t feel like it’s mine though, I’m just house-sitting until they get back from wherever.” He hung her jacket on one of the pegs as she hunched her shoulders and rubbed her arms.
“That’s so awful. There’s no time-limit on how to adjust to a blow like that. But it’s good you don’t have mortgage payments. You have the store too, right?”
Store? “The shop. Yeah. It’s actually a g—”
“Eehh…”
The strange noise from Dylan made them both turn to look down the hall.
“Whamdis!” the tyke demanded.
“Whamdis?”
“What’s this,” she translated. She moved around him and froze with a sharp breath. “Keir. Get it away.”
“Huh?” He looked from her tight face to his fun-loving, innocent, chubby puppy curled up like a fur-ball. “She’s fine.”
“You don’t understand. Dylan is terrified of dogs.”
Dylan, the one terrified of dogs, dropped to his knees in front of the pooch as she sprang awake. Her short tail made her fishtail as she scampered over to prop up on the tiny folded legs to sniff her latest curiosity. Keir glanced at Myah in front of him, but facing her son. Her profile held dread and reserve. The panic in her stark real.
He touched her arm. When she continued to monitor the introduction, he gently shook her hand. “See. Dylan’s fine. He may not like dogs, but she’s pintsized enough for him to feel big.”
Myah looked at him, her breaths shallow through her worried mouth. “He’d been frightened for days after a large dog tried to play with him last year. Kept waking up in a panic pulling at his clothes and crying, ‘Bite me. Bite me,’ afraid the dog was coming to tear at him.”
Keir never thought of how the small child might react to Jolie. She was less than the size of a football. “I’m sorry. It never crossed my mind she could cause a problem. I’m glad he’s okay.”
He observed the two and walked over to crouch in front of Dylan. Jolie followed the sound as he snapped his fingers to his left and called her name. She abandoned her new playmate to waddle between his legs and sit to await instruction. In due time she’d learn to heel as instructed.
He moved her to the proper position on his left. “She’s a little younger than you, Dylan. Almost two months old. So she needs someone to tell her what to do and take care of her. Can you do that?”
Face somber and awestruck at the responsibility, Dylan nodded. His eyes dropped to the dog while his mouth slowly dropped open. Dylan then looked at his mom. Oh. Keir hoped the kid didn’t think he was getting the dog.
“Good. So whenever you’re here you get to see her, and I’ll share Jolie with you. ‘kay?”
Dylan nodded again.
“I can’t hear you, Dylan.” Myah had full command of a mother tone.
“Yesssss,” came an awed rasp.
Keir twisted his lips to control his laughter. He strained his face at Myah for putting the fear of God into the kid, and she cracked behind her stern mommy madness. Training puppies or little boys, he got it now.
Jolie yawned, and Keir didn’t know if it was a morbid sense of humor or if he truly wanted to show Dylan his pup was harmless, but he slipped his hand into her gaping mouth and wrapped his fingers around her bottom jaw in rough play.
She chomped down. Her growl that would one day demand caution, came as no more than a pitiful croak. Though the grip of her teeth stung, this was as bad as it would get, and it soon ended when her quirky wrench caused her feet to slip and she landed belly up.
Keir held her head down and slid her in front of him as he rubbed her belly to show Dylan how to slay the beast. Eyes on the puppy, Dylan touched the stubby, lighter tummy hair, then withdrew his hand. Astonished eyes matched his gasp. When Jolie was freed, she looked between them as if to determine who had tackled her. She went to sniff around her new friend, and from the smile on Dylan’s face, they appeared to be a perfect match.
“I can’t believe my son is playing with a pit bull.”
“Not a pit bull, a Ca de Bou.”
“A dawg. I’m grateful he’s not running and screaming.”
Keir flicked Jolie’s ear. She turned to nip but was too slow. “Yeah, ’cause she’s real ferocious.”
For his remark, he got his own ear-flick. Keir snatched Myah’s hand as he stood. A tug brought her closer. It was too soon to kiss her, like guzzling liquor at nine in the morning, although he debated whether her eyes said she expected him to take a sip. He let go and stepped back to scratch a convenient itch at the back of his head.
“Need anything? Sandwiches? Fruit? I can get you something to drink.”
“We’re fine for now. The hospital had refreshments.”
“What do you say we go out for ice cream later? I forgot to pick some up on the way home, but the iconic shop is open. An old fashioned parlor might be fun for Dylan.” When her jubilant nod suggested it might be just as fun for her, he smiled. “All right. Things are looking up. I’m glad you made it today.”
“Me, too.” Her bottom lip was much too tempting for his honorable peace of mind.
Maybe it wasn’t too soon to kiss her. Keir bent and scooped up Jolie. “Let me show you the house.”
She followed him to the back and ooh’d over his spacious glass and light wood kitchen cabinets. He’d always been keen over the dark oak dining room set he’d purchased all by himself after Skye stripped him bare. Dylan stood mesmerized by the 72” flat screen TV in the den playing one of the children’s stations.
Upstairs, after seeing the decked out training cage in the wide hall outside his master bedroom, Myah skewered him with a funny look.
“It’s a training cage. That’s Jolie’s safe place. I have to carry her up and down the stairs for now because she’s too little and everything is blocked off.” He indicated the low boards he’d set up outside various rooms around the house. Jolie squirmed under his arm to be set free. “But she knows I’m close during the night and we keep each other calm.”
Myah glided her hand on the carved banister as they made their way downstairs. “I thought that’s where you kept your child slaves.”
“Sometimes.”
She smiled. “So Jolie stays there while you’re at work?”
“Usually I take her to the garage and my brother looks after her with his own dog there, and Skye can bring their mother over for a few more weeks.”
“Your brother picks her up from your garage?”
“He takes her to the garage. Our shop.”
“Your garage is a shop?” Her eyes darted in the direction of the side of the house. “A store?”
“What store? My shop is a garage.” Did something get off track here? In the kitchen, he set Jolie down, who waddled off with Dylan. “Haylan and I…” He read Myah’s face, “own a business I never told you about.”
Myah’s lashes blinked on her blank face.
“We’re mechanics. That’s the auto shop we own in Austin.”
“You.” She looked around. “I don’t get it. You work at DRU-Med.”
He knew he’d have to reveal more sooner or later. Kind of wished it were later. Yesterday, he’d told her about his problems involving the accident, not about the dynamics of his livelihood. “Meet the sequel of those headaches I keep getting.”
Behind her eyes, the mechanisms fit pieces together on her frowning face. “Keir. I’m so sorry. You have so much going on.” Her fingers ran over his eyebrow. “But you never really left the garage if you still work on vehicles.”
“Cars. Small cars, but only rarely. And it’s not too bad taking them from the back to the garage when no one else is driving around the lot. But they’re still cars, the size I’ll never get caught dead in—and I mean that. But there are other…”
He watched her hand rise slowly, palm toward him. He shut up, reached out, and streamed his fingers down her invitation. Her digits curled when he fondled the center of her palm, but he retraced his stroke, knit with her fingers, then slid apart; constant contact but never holding hands in this primordial conversation.
In a way, this was kissing her. Keir relished the simple, slow contact, luxurious in its exchange. He took time to study her hand, its shape, colors, her oval nails, her strength through it.
“There are some deep layers to you, my man.”
Funny how she thought that. He felt one-dimensional compared to the small but significant ways she showed she cared. Like this. Letting him touch in a way they both knew transcended their hands. Myah proved to be a woman who didn’t mind complex, deep layers; who wanted to touch him back.
Though the tender communication had been her idea, he’d use any skill he had so she wouldn’t want to end this soon. He trickled his fingers along hers to her palm. Part of him believed they’d become too intimate in the fine intricacy of movement. He searched her eyes to see if she’d figured it out.
For sanity’s sake, he clasped Myah’s fingers and squeezed reassuringly before he turned and led her to the living room. She broke away to the den to share out a coloring book and toys for Dylan. Keir sat in the center of the sofa, humored as he watched and listened to her lay down the rules of behavior to the little guy as long as they were in a stranger’s house.
Leaving him waiting, she flipped a coy look and strolled to take in the paintings and various family photographs around the room. Her warm gaze turned to him periodically as if to size him up by the impressions she received from the images.
Only Dylan’s giggles and Jolie’s snuffling paused her tour as she took leisure in exploration of his grandparents, parents, siblings, nieces and nephews. He wanted to join her, take her through the stories behind the snapshots, but also wanted her to feel comfortable in his space without his help. If she could get there on her own, it wouldn’t be because he’d carved out an impression for her first.
She toyed with frames and artifacts, gazed at them with a look of thought.
When she joined him on the sofa, he didn’t mind that she settled at the end. He raised his arm and lined it on the back of the seat if she ever wanted to get closer. He liked to control the chase in a relationship, though it was nice to know every once in awhile that the fox let him catch the scent.
“You have a great home.”
He’d always thought the moss greens and browns were boring, but he loved it now.
Myah turned in the seat to face him with humor in her features. “You’re the one without a family and you got the big house.”
“With my family it made sense.”
Myah’s squint said she was unconvinced.
“Skye’s a doctor and her husband’s an assistant bank manager. They didn’t want it or need it, and Haylan can’t stand the reminders. He moved in from his condo after the accident, but bought his own place as quickly as he could when he got his head on straight.”
“What about the business? How does it work? You all have a stake in it.”
“Not Skye. I go in some weekdays and one weekend a month, but Haylan’s the controlling owner.”
Those expressive eyebrows rose in surprise. “So sometimes you work every day for two weeks straight.”
He nodded. “I got nothing else to do.”
Her laugh came with a shrug. “Sleep would be nice. So tell me. DRU-med. Why? You have your own thing.”
Myah never ran out of words. He grinned at the places her mind would go to find them.
She glanced into the adjacent room. “I have Dylan to get home to, so I can’t spend all my time working. No one’s going to raise him but me. But you’re okay spending all your energy for someone else?”
“For the most part. It’s a good cause. And I fix cars in the name of Treasure Auto on the side, so it all worked out. My fam is doing exactly what we want to do.”
“Interesting. Treasure Auto.” She checked on Dylan again before her eyes lowered. “You’re so busy.”
Keir sensed withdrawal. He reached out and tickled his fingernail down the bridge and tip of her nose. A fine woman she was. Asked a question without posing it. “Hey.” Before he could trace her lips, he drew back. “You know, I make time when it’s important enough.”
The bashful look said she got the hint. “Too bad we don’t have much time today.”
“You don’t?”
“Not me, you. Don’t you have to work?”
“It’s Easter Sunday, baby. I don’t work tonight.”
She grinned at his playful words. “You mean we have all evening?”
He dropped his jaw to mimic her bright, exaggerated gasp.
“Excellent.”
Yes, it was. “By the way, do you have tomorrow off? I did a job on Thursday and the client gave me tickets to the zoo. Two adults and two kids. Want to take Dylan?”
“Brookfield? You’re kidding. You know, I’ve never been to the zoo. Are you sure you want to use them on us?”
He plucked at his lips and pretended to reconsider until she thumped his chest. “Oomph.” He was about to shuttle over for a snuggle when he noticed both Jolie and Dylan chasing the puppy’s tail like the sport of the century. “Dylan, want to go to the zoo tomorrow?”
“Zoom!”
Keir knew he had no idea what they were talking about, but the eager eyes took in his mother’s happy expression and so he joined in. Keir felt, as well as saw from the corner of his eye, Myah slide into his space.
He grinned at Dylan. “I’ll come for you at ten sharp. Tell your mum, ‘kay?”
Dylan ran toward him and launched himself half onto his lap. Trying not to block with his knees, which would do damage to Dylan like a rock, Keir protected his jewels and his stomach as the body crashed in.
Myah laughed and ran her thumb over a small cheek. “He gets like that. My little human projectile.”
“Right.” Lesson learned. Don’t get the kid too excited.
Dylan jabbered something about a cucumber and a spider. Myah looked up and smiled. “He wants to know if you’ll join us.”
Clearly, not all of his Neely translations were universal.
“Tomar.”
“Yes, tomorrow. You and your mum get to see animals.” He turned to look at Myah. He felt like a World Series champ when she gazed back, he detected another hidden blush. “And I get to see your mum.”