ANNABELLE STOOD IN THE BATHROOM OF THE ST. Andrew’s rinsing her mouth and wiping her face with a cool paper towel after throwing up her entire lunch.
She hoped Colleen hadn’t noticed her shock. But at this point, it didn’t really matter. Her relationship with Mike was doomed. How could God be so cruel? How could he make her fall in love with both Chip and Mike?
Annabelle held on to the sink as another wave of nausea rolled over her. Her head ached, her heart ached, and since she’d stomped around the bathroom muttering curses, her ankle ached, too.
How was she going to tell Becca? Oh God, how was she going to tell Mike?
She dug through her purse, found blusher, and did her best to put some color back into her pasty complexion. She needed to finish her lunch with Colleen without letting on that her relationship with Mike had just been destroyed. She’d always suspected Mike and Chip were distantly related, but she’d assumed it would be in a long, long, long lost cousin kind of way, not in a brothers with different mothers way!
“Annabelle? Are you all right?”
She stuffed her blush back into her bag and smiled at Colleen. “I’m fine.”
It didn’t look as if Colleen bought that. Damn her inability to lie convincingly. “Okay, you caught me. I feel a little queasy. It’s probably from taking a megadose of ibuprofen on an empty stomach. You’d think I’d have learned my lesson after Mother’s Day.”
For once in her life, she actually got along with a boyfriend’s mother, and now she’d have to… How does one tell the man she loves that he’s the surviving brother of her first love? Sheesh, the writers of General Hospital had nothing on her life.
Colleen didn’t buy the ibuprofen bit either, but she was nice enough to let the subject drop. They returned to the table, where Colleen insisted on paying. Annabelle didn’t have the strength to argue. She wanted to go home and pretend the day never happened. Becca would insist on a blow by blow. Too bad the girl was going to get the shock of her life. Annabelle knew exactly how it felt and wasn’t looking forward to a reenactment.
Becca lazed on the couch with Dave, who, after an afternoon of quality time, snoozed beside his new best friend. Every now and then he’d awaken and give her feet or her face a swipe of his tongue. Becca regretted two things: that Dave was a dog, and that his was the only tongue, human or canine, she’d come in contact with in over a year. No offense to Dave, but she preferred a human male to Dave, who, she had to admit, was the sweetest ox she’d ever known.
The door swung open, and Annabelle stepped in. Becca took one look at Annabelle’s red-rimmed eyes and shoved Dave off her lap. “What happened to you?”
Annabelle fell into Becca’s arms and let loose a sob that seemed to come right from her soul. Becca had cried on Annabelle’s shoulder all through Chip’s illness and death, but she’d never seen her shed a tear. It was unnatural the way the girl could hold it together. Annabelle losing it now sent Becca into panic mode.
Dave barked and Henry and Wayne burst through the door like better-groomed versions of the Ghostbusters.
“What the hell happened?” Wayne turned on Becca and plucked Annabelle right out of her arms. “What did you do to her?”
“Nothing.” She tried to disengage Wayne from Annabelle. “Now damn it! Give her back to me.”
Henry pulled Becca under his arm and gave her a sideways hug. “Calm down. Wayne feels protective of Annabelle since her last crying jag.”
“She’s done this before? I’ve known her for almost five years, and I’ve never once seen her cry.”
Wayne made shushing noises and hummed something as Henry steered Becca into the kitchen and put the kettle on.
“She mentioned something about that.” He pulled a teapot from one of the upper cabinets and opened the small pantry, knowing exactly where to look for tea bags. You’d think he lived there.
“I know you mean well, but I really need to talk to Annabelle about something. Privately.”
Henry turned and looked over the top of his glasses at her. “I don’t recommend trying to get in between Wayne and Annabelle when he’s in full mother hen mode. Believe me, it will be much easier to let him calm her down. I promise to shoo him out as soon as possible. Until then, why don’t we give Annabelle a nice big dose of tea and sympathy? You look as if you could use some yourself.”
The Fairy Godfathers were both very skilled at “handling” people, though their tactics were diametrically opposed. Wayne tended to wade into the fray and get caught up in all the swirl of emotion, while Henry was the calm and supportive Rock of Gibraltar type. She was certain Henry would be able to walk through a mud pit and still come out clean, pressed, and smelling delicious. Too bad he was gay.
Becca sipped tea and ate cookies that appeared out of nowhere. When Wayne and Henry were sure the waterworks had stopped, they offered to dog-sit and leave the women alone to talk. Annabelle blew her nose and nodded.
They both watched the boys leave. When Becca turned her attention to Annabelle again, she hiccupped, trying to regain her composure.
Annabelle played with the tassels on a pillow she’d made, avoiding Becca’s eyes. The pillow reminded Becca of the old Annabelle. Bright colors mixed in a way that one thought would clash, but became something uniquely beautiful.
“I had lunch with Mike’s mother and…”
She covered her face with her hands and mumbled.
Becca pulled Annabelle’s hands away and held them. “What?”
“Mike’s father’s name is Christopher Larsen… you are Mike’s half sister.”
There, Annabelle had said it aloud, and when she got the guts to look Becca in the eye, all she saw was sympathy. Not shock, not horror—if anything she looked relieved.
“I take it this little bombshell isn’t news to you?”
Becca only shook her head, guilt dripping off her like water over Niagara Falls.
Annabelle had never felt such rage; she ripped her hands out of Becca’s and stood. “You knew and didn’t tell me? You’re my best friend, and you kept this from me?”
Becca’s face turned white. “I came here to tell you. I planned to, but I thought it would be better to tell you after we finished going through your past.” She stood and reached for Annabelle.
Annabelle pushed her away. “So you let me find out in the middle of a freaking restaurant? I had to run to the bathroom and throw up. I had to hide it from Mike’s mom, all because you didn’t want to tell me until after… Hold on. How did you find out?”
Becca seemed to shrink in stature. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t think I was doing anything wrong until after I did it. I had no idea…”
“What did you do?”
“I showed the pictures of Mike to my father. I asked him how he was related to us.”
“What pictures?”
“The pictures I saw on your computer. Honest to God, Annabelle, I didn’t think… I didn’t think about how this would affect you. We always shared everything. It never occurred to me to ask your permission. I just printed the pictures and took them home with me.”
“And you showed your father?”
“I asked him who Mike Flynn was to us—in the middle of the country club dining room, no less. I thought he was going to have a coronary. Once he heard Mike’s last name… well, Mike’s mother and he were lovers way back when, and he said she just disappeared. He never knew Mike existed.”
“Until you opened your big mouth and told him.”
Becca nodded. “I’m so sorry. You can’t imagine how sorry I am that I handled this so badly. But, Annabelle, if I didn’t tell my father, it would have come out some other way.”
Annabelle paced the length of the apartment. Becca just followed behind.
“When did your father find out?” She stopped and turned to Becca. “What’s he going to do about it? Oh God, once he finds out that Mike and I—”
“Are in love? You can’t let this change anything between you and Mike.”
Annabelle threw up her hands. “How could it not change everything? Once your father gets involved with Mike, our relationship is over.” She wrapped her arms around herself. “I won’t allow your father to treat me the way I was treated when Chip and I were together. Not even for love. It’s not worth it. I’m not that same insecure girl I used to be.”
Becca took the same pose but made it look stubborn instead of the way Annabelle felt, as if her arms were the only things protecting her from completely falling apart.
“And Mike isn’t Chip. No matter how you feel about my father, or how mad you are at me, you need to tell Mike. He needs to hear this from you. You two can work it out. I know you can.”
Annabelle shook her head. No way could this end in anything but disaster. If she had learned anything from her past with Chip, it was that she wasn’t cut out for a life that included Dr. Larsen. No matter how much she loved either of his sons.
“I’ll tell him Memorial Day weekend.”
“I’m so sorry, Annabelle. I’m so sorry.”
Annabelle walked back to the couch, tossed the pillows to the side, and sat. Becca was right, and she looked as sick as Annabelle felt. Mike would learn the truth eventually. “It’s okay. I know you didn’t mean it. I probably would have done the same thing if I were you. It’s better that this came out now, before I got in even deeper than I already am. I’ll be all right.”
Eventually, maybe… someday, when her heart stopped breaking.
Annabelle waited for Mike, looking forward to seeing him, and dreading it at the same time.
He’d been working so much, she spent more time texting him and leaving voice mail messages than she spent in his presence. She missed him, even though she tried to put him out of her mind. He’d made such a big space for himself in her life that when he was absent, the yawning hole he left made her feel empty. She tried not to think what life would be like without him. Though, after this weekend, she’d find out. She wasn’t looking forward to it.
The Felix the Cat clock on the wall counted down the time, and with every swish of his tail, Mike became later and later. She paced back and forth in her new flats, thankful she didn’t have to wear that ugly boot anymore. She straightened the painting she’d hung over the couch—one of her own works she’d painted while going through her Tuscan phase. She’d pulled the colors from the painting and chosen the new drapes she’d hung—a mix of jewel-tone silk sheers she made out of the stash of rich fabrics she’d collected. She’d even had the Fairy Godfathers build her a cornice she’d covered to pull all the colors together. Matching handwoven table runners covered the table and the buffet where she displayed a few pieces of pottery given to her by Becca. She looked around and thought about losing Mike. The only bright side was that she’d made herself a home. It was hers. It looked like her, it felt like her, and for once in her life, she was happy both with her home and herself. She just wished she could change her circumstances.
Her mind spun with a jumble of inexplicable and sometimes diametrically opposed feelings. She never thought she’d find someone who would invade her mind and pop up in her thoughts at the most inopportune times. She’d thought a lot about it since Becca had left. She’d gone and fallen head over heels in love with the one man she’d never be able to have. She’d even sketched Mike—not that she’d meant to. She didn’t know she was still capable. But when she cleaned off her desk before leaving for the long weekend, she unearthed her blotter and found a sketch of Mike looking back at her. She must be going stark, raving mad, because she didn’t remember drawing it. The sketch—and it was a sketch, not a doodle—was definitely her work, and the subject was definitely Mike.
The phone rang. She checked the caller ID and confirmed her suspicion. Becca. The girl was still pushing her belief that Annabelle’s relationship with Mike could survive this bump in the road. What Becca deemed a bump, she saw as a sinkhole the size of New Jersey. There was no way over it, under it, or around it.
“Hello.”
“Is he there yet?”
“If he were, would I be talking to you?”
“I guess not. I’m so sorry—”
“I know. Please don’t start.”
“Okay, I’m sorry.”
“There you go again.”
“Are you going to tell him?”
“I said I would. I’ll tell him when we get back. I promise. I want him to have this weekend before I do. I want what little time we have left to be wonderful.”
“How are you going to do that when you have this… thing… hanging over your head?”
“I don’t know, but I don’t want to spoil our last weekend together. He’s worked so hard to get the time off. I want to enjoy it with him. There will be plenty of time when we get back to make both our lives miserable.”
“I think that’s a mistake. Honey, if you tell him as soon as you get there, you’ll have time to work through this together.”
“There is nothing to work through. Look, Becca, I’ve thought about this a lot. Mike is the son your father only dreamed of. He’s going to want to give Mike everything. He’ll have a new father and you. I don’t want him to have to choose between his family and me. I love him enough to let him go. And I won’t go back to what I was when I was with Chip. I deserve more.”
“Mike might not appreciate you making decisions about his life for him.”
“Becca, it’s my life. I know what’s best for me, and I know Mike. Someday he’ll thank me for this.”
“Someday, maybe you’ll get your head out of your ass long enough to see that you two belong together. I just hope that when you do, it’s not too late.”
“I’ve got to go. I think Mike’s here.”
“Promise me you’ll at least think about giving him a chance?”
“Love you, Bec. Bye.” She hung up the phone and put the whole situation out of her mind. She was good at it. She’d done the same thing when Chip died, and it worked well for two years. She could do it for another weekend.
Mike parked outside Annabelle’s apartment in the Mustang Nick had loaned him. He had his bag packed, the gas tank topped off, a cooler filled with food in the trunk, and an economy-sized box of condoms in the glove compartment.
He also had bags under his eyes so large they could be mistaken for oversize luggage. He’d worked around the clock. Not only did he cover his normal shifts, but also the shifts of those he’d traded to free him for the weekend. Spending Memorial Day weekend with Annabelle was worth every minute—he just hoped he didn’t sleep through it.
He couldn’t attribute all his sleep deprivation to his long hours at work. He’d also spent time researching Eastern Heart Specialists. He’d prepared for his interview the way he prepared for his board exams. He studied the practice, making lists of specific questions to ask or find answers to. The last thing he wanted was to move from one terrible work environment to another.
It had been years since he’d last looked up the old man, and part of his research was to ensure his father wasn’t involved in the practice. As far as Mike could see, his father was still on the board of University of Pennsylvania Hospital, but he’d closed down his practice. Maybe the old guy was slowing down. His father’s partial retirement was a happy thought. He didn’t want to see the man. Not that he was too worried about it. After all, his father didn’t know he even existed.
Mike got out of the ’Stang and straightened his aching body. The sun shone hot against his back. He checked his watch and winced. He was two hours late picking up Annabelle. He’d hardly seen her in the past few weeks, which wasn’t helping his peace of mind. The worst part about it was that their lack of time together didn’t seem to bother her. The last time he’d seen her, she’d seemed happy to be with him, but unlike every girl he’d dated, she never once complained about his absence. She never called and interrupted him at work, though she left nice messages or texts in answer to his messages or texts. No matter how many times Mike told himself that was a good thing, he had a hard time believing it.
He let himself into the building using the key he’d kept when Annabelle had sprained her ankle. Dick Doyle, Annabelle’s doctor, had sent Mike a letter saying pretty much what she’d said after Mike hounded her to go for a follow-up. Her ankle was healing well, and she could stop wearing the stabilization boot unless the pain increased.
Mike knocked. When Annabelle opened the door and smiled at him, it was as if someone had given him a shot of adrenaline. Damn, she looked good. When she wrapped her arms around him and didn’t let him go even after Dave nudged his big head in between their bodies, all the tension he’d been holding on to since he’d seen her last evaporated.
He looked around the apartment and was amazed by the transformation. It had seemed like forever since he’d hung the paintings she’d had resting against the walls, but now there were a few more already hung. He smiled when he realized that several of the ones he’d never seen before were signed by her. New drapes, lots of sculpture and pottery. The place looked like a little art gallery, only dustier and hairier. It had been a while since he’d vacuumed, and it didn’t look as if Annabelle had.
“I threw together lunch. Well, not personally. I walked Dave down to the deli and picked up salads and sandwiches. I thought that would be safer.”
Mike gave her a quick kiss, not wanting to tempt fate. Kissing Annabelle was dangerous business. He didn’t want to take the chance they’d end up falling into bed. When they did fall into bed together, he wanted to hear nothing but the surf pounding the shore and heavy breathing—no sirens, no traffic, and no neighbors.
“Can we take it to go? It’s late, and I don’t want to waste a minute of our long weekend.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to take a nap? No offense, but you look like you haven’t slept in a week.”
She wasn’t far off. “I’m fine. I stopped at Starbucks and got a couple of ventis for the road, and I got you a raspberry mocha.”
“How about I drive, and you sleep? You don’t need any more caffeine.”
“Do you know how to drive a stick?”
Mike grabbed the sissy bar in the three-tenths of a mile it took Annabelle to turn onto Hamilton Avenue. By the time she merged onto the Brooklyn Queens Expressway, Dave was crying, and Mike was saying Hail Marys.
The woman was a female Mario Andretti on speed. She brought the RPMs up to a racer’s whine before shifting, downshifted into turns and accelerated out of them, and passed every car she approached while giving Mike a blow-by-blow of her shopping spree with Wayne. Which, in and of itself, wasn’t troubling— what gave him pause was the fact that she talked with her hands. You’d think they were chatting over coffee instead of speeding through rush hour traffic. The estimated time of arrival on the car’s GPS dropped at an alarming rate. The way she drove while petting Dave’s head and occasionally wiping his mouth with a napkin left Mike amazed.
Mike wasn’t used to cars. He grew up in Brooklyn, and he and his mother not only had no need for a car, they had no money for a car. He did get his license when he was in med school, and had even owned a car at one time, but he never felt as if driving was a natural thing for him to do. Annabelle looked as if she’d been born to it and clearly enjoyed driving. The wind whipping through the cracked window teased the curls falling out of the twist held together by a pencil.
He leaned back in his seat, closed his eyes, and let sleep take him. He awoke a few hours later to the crackling sound of tires rolling over a shell driveway.
“Mike, we’re here. At least I think we’re here. This is the address, right?”
Mike opened his bleary eyes and took a deep breath of salt air. The cedar-shingled house grayed by age rose above them as the roar of the ocean and the scream of seagulls drifted through the windows.
“Yes. This is it.”
Annabelle’s eyes widened. “Nick owns this place? The whole place?”
“Yeah. He wanted to get a house large enough to sleep the whole family. His mother, grandmother, Vinny, Mona, and the kids.”
“He could sleep them and their thirty closest friends.”
Mike shrugged. It looked like a typical Westhampton beach house—only bigger. He opened the car door and stretched as he rose. Annabelle followed suit and released the door locks before she reached into the backseat and leashed Dave.
Making his way to the popped trunk, Mike threw his bag over his shoulder and picked up Annabelle’s. The woman certainly wasn’t a light packer. Dave took off with her, his nose to the ground sniffing everything in sight and watering every area of the front yard he could reach to mark his new territory. He wasted no time claiming what was his.
Annabelle turned toward the ocean. “I wish I was allowed to run. I’ve always loved running by the water. When I lived in Philly we’d take road trips to Ocean City, and I’d run on the beach every morning.”
“I never knew you lived in Philadelphia. When was that?”
“A few years ago. I went part-time to art school and waited tables.”
There was still so much he didn’t know about her. He did know enough to see that something was bothering her. It would be a mystery until she decided to talk to him about it. He just hoped she did. “Give it another month, and once your doctor gives you the okay—”
“Yeah, but in another month, I won’t be here. I’ll be in Brooklyn.”
“Nick usually takes the family out here for a week or two in July. I always get an invite. You and your parents probably will too.”
“I don’t think so.”
“Why not?”
“Can you picture you, me, and my parents trapped on a glorified sandbar? Yup, that’s my definition of hell. It would be like a twenty-four-hour marriage channel. All nagging, all the time. You can count me out. There’s not a house large enough. Besides… it’s against my religion to make plans more than a week in advance.”
“Hold on, you spent the last year planning a wedding.”
“I’m a recent convert.”
Mike dropped the bags and stepped behind Annabelle. His hands went to her waist, and his mouth to her ear. “Wanna hear my short-term plans?”
She inhaled a sharp breath, and when he pulled her against him, she let it out with a whoosh. His hands moved forward and splayed against her stomach just below her breasts.
“Yes.”
His lips quirked at the breathless quality of that one word. His dick twitched against her.
“Oh yessssss.”
He kissed the side of her neck down to the thin white spaghetti strap holding up her blue and white cotton top. Damn, he knew he should have waited to get inside. “I want to make love to you for seventy-two hours straight.”
“I’d like to see you try. But first, I think we need to eat. You’re going to need your strength.”
For now, the only thing Mike needed was Annabelle, but then, he didn’t want her to think the only thing on his mind was sex. They’d have plenty of time to make love… over and over and over again. There was no need to rush it, no matter what his body told him.
He reluctantly let her go and picked up the bags he’d practically thrown on the driveway before. He carried them up the stairs to the deck and unlocked the door.
Dave barged through the threshold and almost knocked Mike over. Then came Annabelle, clinging to the other end of the leash like a skier behind a boat.
By the time Mike caught up with her, she’d gone through the foyer and into the great room, which opened onto the back deck, the pool, and then the ocean. The east side of the house was mostly windows showing off the spectacular view. The sun shone on the water, sailboats with brightly colored spinnakers bobbed in the distance, and the sea grass over the dunes danced in the wind.
“Wow.” Annabelle spun around to take in the rest of the place. A large fireplace. Big, comfy white slip-covered couches. A dark wood floor and painted beams gave the house a comfortable feel without it being overly beachy. A figurehead of a hand-carved mermaid hung over the stone fireplace and looked as if it was taken off the bow of a tall ship.
“Amazing.” The mermaid called to her, so she approached the fireplace, stepped onto the hearth, and ran her fingers over the weathered wood, trailing over the ridges of the scales chiseled on her tail. “This looks real.”
“I’m pretty sure it is. Nick’s not into reproductions.”
“Oh.”
The kitchen on the other side of the room was something out of Architectural Digest. Granite counter tops, dark wood cabinets, and industrial-size stainless steel appliances.
Mike disappeared while Annabelle walked around picking up and examining knickknacks. When he returned, he set a cooler in the kitchen. Annabelle opened the cooler and shooed him away. She couldn’t really cook, but she was good at putting stuff away. “I’ll empty this. Is there anything left in the car?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
He stared at her so she stared right back. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and rocked on his heels. “I’ll bring our bags to the bedroom. Do you want to come up and look around?”
“I’m going to set out lunch for us. I’m hungry. I’ll explore with you later. Okay?”
Annabelle was nervous, and she wasn’t the only one. Why Mike was nervous, she couldn’t imagine. She’d caught him looking at her in that way he had—the way that made her feel as if he could read her mind. God, she hoped he couldn’t. If he could, her plans for their first and last weekend together would be destroyed. She didn’t want it to end yet. She was going to put it off as long as she possibly could. She loved him enough to give him that. They’d both end up hurting, but at least when he looked back at their time together, he’d have a few happy memories. And so would she.
She emptied the cooler into the refrigerator, dumped the ice, and put the cooler on the porch to dry. She’d come a long way since the day she freaked over Mike telling her that he loved her. The conversation she’d had with Becca came to mind, and she cringed when she realized Becca had known long before she did that this was more than just sex. It had been more since day one. She hadn’t realized it until it was almost over.
Annabelle was lost in thought when Mike came up from behind and wrapped his arms around her. “Hey, what’s wrong?”
“Nothing. I was going to heat the knishes, but I’m not sure how to turn on that oven.”
He’d changed when he was upstairs into a sleeveless T-shirt and a pair of board shorts, and smelled of sunscreen. She stood back and watched as he took over in the kitchen, arranging the knishes on a cookie sheet and placing them in the oven. He took out two plates and began serving the food from the deli containers she’d left out.
Mike moved around the kitchen with the same intensity as he moved around an X-ray machine. Within minutes, he had two plates full of food, napkins, and silverware in his hands.
“Could you grab a few beers? I left some in the fridge last time I was here.”
“Sure.” She retrieved the beers and followed him out to the deck.
“I closed the gate to the steps so Dave can’t take off.”
Dave commandeered a lounge chair with a mattress-like cushion and fell asleep with his big head in between his front paws. His back legs twitched as he let out a muffled high-pitched bark. Leave it to Rosalie to have a dog that talked in his sleep. He was probably dreaming of chasing seagulls on the beach.
Mike stared at her like he couldn’t believe his luck and guilt slammed into her hard. She smiled and prayed it didn’t look as weak as it felt. She had to get her shit together. “I’ll go check on the knishes.”
Mike watched the emotions bouncing around Annabelle’s face like a ping-pong ball with ADD. She must be nervous as hell to choose to do anything in the kitchen. Nervousness could be a sign that a person was moving into unexplored territory. What territory was the question.
He ignored the way she avoided the bedroom. He should be thankful she hadn’t joined him, because he had a hard enough time concentrating on unpacking when he was in there alone. He could only imagine what would have happened if she’d gone with him.
He shut down that train of thought, though not quickly enough. Imagining was not helping him to forward his plan. A plan that escaped him as soon as Annabelle stepped out onto the deck. Every time he saw her, his brain went into testosterone overload. It zapped everything but his sex drive. She’d donned sunglasses and lost her shoes. Her toenails were painted a fluorescent orange, like some newfangled emergency vehicle. It should have looked ghastly, but it didn’t, and then there was that sexy little ankle bracelet.
“I think I turned off the oven, but you better check it later just to be safe.” She had a hand stuffed into a lobster oven mitt and held the baking sheet, looking for a place to put it.
Mike was too caught up in staring at her to realize she could use a hand—maybe two. She set the hot tray on a wooden table and tried picking up a knish with her fingers but moved them away quickly. That threw cold water on him. Mike pulled his tongue off the floor.
He took the oven mitt from her and picked up the baking sheet. “I’ll just put these on a plate. That way we can set them on the table.” God, she was sweet. She turned bright red, and it wasn’t from the sun either.
“Sorry. I didn’t think about logistics.”
Mike gave her a quick kiss. “No problem. Be right back.”
He took the burnt knishes back to the kitchen. What had she been doing in here? He got a plate out of the cupboard and using a spatula, proceeded to chisel the knishes off the tray. He stifled a grin. Damn, she really couldn’t cook, but the weird thing was, he thought it was cute. How sick in love was he?
When he looked up, he saw her leaning against the doorframe, watching him. “Okay, I burned them. I told you I was bad in the kitchen.”
He reached for her hand and, carrying the burnt food in his other hand, took her out to the porch. She nervously fingered the little drawstring on her white skirt. He pulled her over to sit on his lap.
Reaching around her, he moved her plate next to his, and handed her a beer. “I happen to like crispy knishes.” He clinked his bottle against hers. “Cheers.”
Annabelle shrugged and took a drink. “You really expect me to eat sitting on your lap?”
“Why not?”
“’Cause I’ll make a mess.”
“I’ll chance it. I like being close to you.” With one hand wrapped around Annabelle’s waist, Mike tried cutting one of the burnt knishes single-handed. When that didn’t work, he dipped it in some sour cream, hoping it covered the taste of incinerated potato, and smiled as he took a bite. Chewing it as the crust crumbled in his mouth was a whole new experience.
Annabelle tossed her sandwich on her plate and took the rest of the knish from him. “Don’t. Look. I love you for trying, but you’ll make yourself sick. I thought maybe we could scrape off the burnt layer.”
Mike swallowed and then chased the taste down with some beer. He wouldn’t be surprised if he had charred remains of the poor knish stuck in his teeth.
“It wasn’t that bad.” He lied like a rug and said a silent prayer to whichever saint covered the whole domestic accord area. He’d have to go to his little dictionary of saints and find out. He had a feeling he’d need a lot of help in that particular area, if the look on her face was a clue. “What did I do?”
“Nothing.” She squirmed until she sat on his lap facing him and anchored her hands in his hair. The next thing he knew she kissed him like her life depended on it, sucking his tongue into her mouth. He groaned and pulled her against him. She broke the kiss, and when he opened his eyes, she had a sad look on her face.
“I really missed you. More than I ever expected to.”
“Aw, Belle, I’m sorry. I missed you too. You do know this was unusual—the way I’ve been working isn’t normal. I won’t let us be apart for that long again.”
“I know, but it was okay. I’m fine by myself. I’m better with you, but I don’t mind being alone.”
Mike wondered if she was trying to convince him or herself. “Are you still hungry?”
Annabelle shook her head, and her eyes brightened. “Wanna go for a swim?”
No, he wanted to take her to bed. Right now. But, he’d do anything to put that light back in her eyes. “Sure.”
She climbed off his lap and gave him a quick kiss. “I’ll get my suit on. Where’s our room?”
“Up the stairs, second door on the left.”
“Be back in a sec.”