Page 67 of Running Scared
Just then he heard a gentle tap at the door, and his sister came in, her rich, dark hair pulled back from her pretty face, the lines at her eyes and her bold nose giving her character and kindness, which was so much more interesting than her beauty.
“Hey,” she said, bringing in a tray of—oh thank God—chicken curry sandwiches and cantaloupe.“Bailey made us save some for you.”
Dean tried to swing his feet over the edge of the bed, and the room started swimming.He pushed back so he could lean against the pillows and was humbled when Laure started shoving extra pillows behind his shoulders until he could sit up and eat.Mr.Bumble slid to the side and eyed them both with vague disapproval until he was settled.
“Thanks,” he said humbly.“Ireallyappreciate it.”
“Course, little brother,” she said, her lovely brown eyes lighting up with a smile.“You know this family—anytime.”She offered Mr.Bumble her finger, and the cat rubbed up against it in a most dignified fashion.Dean figured his sister had charmed the cat, as she seemed to charm every other living creature, and was glad.
Like all the boys in the family, he sort of worshipped Laure.
And now he nodded and, to his mortification, felt his eyes burn as they hadn’t in the hospital.“You all really came through for me and Bailey,” he said.“I… I am so grateful.”
“Well, Bailey and his dad are treasures.You know that, right?”
Dean managed a rather watery smile.“I do.”He knew his cheeks turned red, but he had to say it anyway.“I really love him.We’re getting an apartment together here.”
She smiled like a teenager and kicked her feet.“Eeeeeeee!He told us.And we’re so excited.We miss you!”
Dean gave a soft laugh.“Well, as much as it pains me to admit it….”
She gave him a surprise kiss on the cheek.“You miss us too,” she said simply, and something in her eyes flickered, and Dean knew who she was thinking about.
“He misses us too,” he said mildly.“You know that’s not why Sal moved to Grass Valley.”
She sobered.“I know,” she said.“I… I can’t even blame him.But as much as he tries to be bitchy and campy and funny….”
They both shared a sympathetic look, and Dean knew, suddenly, what Laure and Val must go through as the oldest siblings.Their brother Sal’s heartbreak was real and painful and unfixable, but that didn’t mean Laure and Val hadn’t wanted to try.
“He’s still hurting,” Dean said for her.
“Well, you or Val need to get married,” she said practically.
“What?”he tried to straighten up more, but his head threatened to pop off his shoulders.
“One of those long, fancy affairs that gets him down here for two weeks instead of a couple of days.”She nodded forcefully.“We could totally fix his life.Look at you there, your perfect doctor boyfriend in the yard, charming the parents and my teenage sons and Prock’s adorable little monsters altogether.I mean, Chance says even Marcus approves, and you know how hard it is to slip one past the work wife.”
Dean recalled that frantic first meeting between them, and how Bailey and Marcus had seemed to click.Not romantically—thank God—but as though they understood the pitfalls of their situation and needed to work in tandem to overcome them.
It occurred to him now, taking a bite of his mother’s food, with his sister confiding in him like he was—gasp!—an adult, thathewas both the pitfallandthe situation.
“I think they’ll plot a lot,” he said, musing.“Try to manage me.You know….”
“Make you saner?”she said, that eye-crinkling smile in place.
“Yeah,” he said, swallowing blissfully.He looked his sister in the eyes again.“He makes me better, Laureate.”
She nodded.“Well, you used my full name.I guess it’s locked in stone.”She frowned then.“By the way, did he tell you Mom toldhimabout the name thing?”
Dean blinked in surprise.Thanks to all seven children absolutelybeggingtheir parents to let the name thing betheirsecret, to be told only in strictest confidence and fudged on all school reports, he’d assumed that he might be able to keep his whole name to himself until he was forced to sign a wedding certificate or something.
“Really?”he asked.
She nodded soberly.“He hasn’t used it against any of us, but hedidtell me that Laureate Ivy was a godsend.I could have been Honorarium Vassar, and then I would have beenreallyscrewed.”
Dean managed a chuckle.“Oh God.He’s right.”He gave his head the lightest of shakes.“His humor—it sneaks out and surprises you sometimes.”
“Yeah.”He’d finished his sandwich and the cantaloupe, and she snagged his empty plate from his fingers as she stood.“Get some more sleep,” she said softly.“He’ll come in when everybody’s gone or settled.And then you two can plan to the moon and back.”Her smile was sweet, nostalgic, remembering, he was sure, the husband who had been killed at war, thousands of miles away, when she’d been a young, heartbroken mother.
