Page 53 of No Kind of Hero
“Aw, baby.” How could she make him feel so powerful, and so helpless? “No. I know who I’m in bed with. I know it’s you. And it’s all I want.”
The scarf was still draped over the lamp, the light still held that rosy glow, and Evan’s body was still warm and solid beneath hers. And then he reached out for the clock on the bedside table, set it back down with a sigh, and said, “I need to go pick up Gracie.”
“Oh. Right.” They’d never even made it under the covers. That was one of those tests. Did you get under the covers afterwards, snuggle and talk, fall asleep? Or did one of you get up, get dressed, and go home?
She should think about that some more. Not doing it would be a mistake and she knew it, but she didn’t want to do it now. Her dress was half on the bed, half on the floor, and every bit crumpled, but she grabbed it, pulled it around herself, and fumbled for the buttons.
Evan’s hand came down over hers, stilling it. “I’d like you to stay.”
She swallowed. “Even if Gracie’s here?”Wouldn’t that make it real?she wanted to say and didn’t. That wasn’t something either of them needed to look at too closely. At least it wasn’t something she was in any big hurry to do.
“She’s a baby. Like you said. Besides, she likes you. I like you too. I know you don’t have your nightgown or whatever, but you know—nightgowns are overrated.”
He took his hand away, and she finished buttoning her dress and said, “I have a toothbrush in my purse. And so you know—I sleep naked.” Instead ofReally, I need to get up early. Maybe you could drop me off,which would have been a much smarter response.
He stopped in the middle of buttoning his jeans. “Really. Doesn’t seem all that proper.”
“Could be I’m not as proper as I look.”
He pulled his shirt on over all that chest, then smiled at last and said, “You know—I think I figured that out. And if there’s anything sexier than a good girl with a secret bad side, I can’t think what it is. Could be I’d be crazy about having you naked and next to me all night long. In fact, why don’t you unbutton that thing again and get started on the naked part right now? I could stand to come home to that.”
She hesitated. “Is Gracie at your mom’s?”
“Yeah.” He was frowning, and she knew why.
“If I came with you, it would make it real,” she said quietly. “Like you dancing with me in front of Candy and Rob Farnsworth.”
He waited a minute, then said, “That doesn’t make me sound too good. Like this is about me proving something, and using you to do it.”
That lump in the pit of her stomach? It was reality. “A lot of effort for nothing, making that statement to the world—at least the Wild Horse part of it—when I’m leaving in a week.”
He looked at her as he finished buttoning his cuffs, and she couldn’t read his expression one bit. “On second thought,” he said, “why don’t you come with me to pick her up? Keep me company.”
It took ten minutes to get to his mom’s house, because it turned out she didn’t live in town. There were so many things to say, though, and ten minutes wasn’t enough. Eventually, she said, “I just realized that you always knew where my family lived, and I never knew where your family did.”
“Your kind of family doesn’t tend to know where my kind of family lives. And not so much family anyway,” he said before she could react to that. “Just my mom.”
“Are your parents divorced?”
“Yep. Dad took off a long time ago. Barely remember the guy.”
“So how—” She stopped, then went on. “How did you get to be such a good father?”
“Same way my mom learned to be a good mother. I was the only one left to do it. This is it.” He pulled into a blacktopped driveway and parked beside another car, and Beth climbed out and followed him through the black night, up wooden steps onto a neat deck edged by terra cotta planters. Yellow light and the sound of voices—television voices—came through a screen door, the other door left open to let in the cool night air.
“You didn’t grow up with neighbors,” she said.
“Nope.”
“That’s why you need the quiet.”
“Probably.” He knocked once on the screen, called out, “Hi, Mom,” and went inside with Beth following.
A sturdy brunette dressed in a blue cotton robe swung her slippered feet off of a brown chenille couch, looked between Beth and Evan, and said, “Well, hi.”
Evan said, “This is Beth Schaefer, Mom. My mom Angela,” he told Beth. “How’s Gracie doing?” he asked his mother.
“Hasn’t shaken that cold,” his mother said. “Or maybe she was just missing you, because she sure didn’t want me to put her down tonight.”
