Page 24 of Almost Dead (The Cahills 2)

“I’ll look at it.”

“Okay.” Cissy gazed at him uncertainly, as if unsure whether she’d won or lost. “Then, good. Good night, Jack.”

“Good night,” he said, but she was already striding out of the living room, across the foyer, then hurrying up the stairs, her bare feet nearly noiseless on the hardwood steps. Above, as she walked, the floor creaked. He heard a door open and shut, then watched a pillow and a sleeping bag come hurtling down the stairs. The sleeping bag bounced against the door of the closet in the foyer; the pillow skidded across the floor and stopped when it hit the back of the couch.

“Thanks,” he called up the dark staircase toward the landing.

“Don’t mention it.” A second later he heard the distinctive creak of the master bedroom door as it opened, then shut with a soft thud and a click of the lock. Obviously Cissy was taking no chances that he’d try to sweet-talk his way into their king-sized bed.

He wasn’t that deluded.

He picked up the sleeping bag, unrolled it, and tossed it over the slick leather cushions of the damned couch. Throwing the pillow toward one end, he surveyed his work. Not that great, but at least it beat the car, he thought as he walked into the kitchen, found the last beer in the refrigerator, and uncapped the bottle. After taking a long, not-that-satisfying pull, he carried a growling and suspicious-looking Coco outside, deposited her on the turf just off the patio, and waited in the cold drizzle for the damned dog to sniff every damned bush before she finally got down to her damned business.

“This isn’t exactly what I had in mind,”

he confided to Coco as he carried her inside and found a dishtowel to wipe her tiny wet paws. For all his efforts, he was rewarded with a warning growl. He thought for a minute that the feisty bit of fluff might actually bite him. “Don’t even think about it,” he advised, and when he set the dog onto the floor, she scrambled to get away from him, nearly skidding as she headed for the stairs and ran up them as if she were a dog half her age and was fleeing for her life.

“Good riddance,” Jack muttered.

With one look up the darkened stairs, he returned to the living room, flopped onto the couch, and picked up the remote. He thought of the irony of his earlier assessment of the single life. Even married and in his own house, it wasn’t much different.

He clicked on the local news, and there, filling up the flat screen, was the last picture his wife had of her mother: Marla Amhurst Cahill’s mug shot.

You’re a fool!

Cissy peeled off her clothes, let them drop to the bedroom floor, then stepped into pajamas that had gotten at least one size too big for her over the last month. Her appetite had been off; the stress over the separation from Jack had cost her ten pounds she could ill-afford to lose.

And now he was downstairs.

Great!

Stupid, stupid, stupid. Tonight on the couch. Tomorrow up here in the bedroom? And then what? Are you going to forgive him just like that? Set yourself up for more heartache? Put yourself and B.J. on an emotional roller coaster for the rest of your lives? You can’t do it, Cissy. No matter how much you want to. Jack Holt is a player, plain and simple. He might not ever intend to hurt you, but if you let him, he’ll break your heart over and over again.

She couldn’t let him.

It was that simple.

She walked into the small master bath that she and Jack had carved out of an existing attic space, brushed her teeth and stared at a face she barely recognized. Her eyes, whiskey gold, as Jack had referred to them, were rimmed in running mascara, the whites shot with red veins from all of the crying she’d done since finding her grandmother on the floor of the foyer. Her nose was pink, a couple of damned zits daring to erupt on her chin, and her cheekbones more defined than ever. She scrubbed off all remnants of her makeup, dug in the drawer for acne cream she was way too old to be using, then gave up the search when she heard Coco scratching at the door.

“Hang on for a sec,” she called, then walked through the bedroom.

She opened the door, half-expecting Jack to be on the other side, his shoulder propped against the doorjamb, an irrepressible grin tugging at his lips, devilment in his eyes.

But the dog was alone.

Insanely she felt a little bit of disappointment.

“Come here,” she whispered to the dog, “let’s go check on Beej.”

She heard the soft noise from the television in the living room filtering up the stairs and noticed the illumination of a flickering screen playing against the wall of the staircase. Sighing, she found it ridiculously comforting knowing that she wasn’t alone tonight. That Jack was downstairs. In their house.

Oh man, Cissy, you ARE a basket case!

She pushed open the door that she always left just slightly ajar. Inside B.J.’s room, her son was sleeping in his crib, and her heart swelled at the sight of him in the one-piece pajamas that covered him head to toe in soft, powder blue cotton. His blond curls had dried from the bath, and his lips were parted as he slept on his back. A mobile of airplanes through the ages, biplanes to Lear jets, hung suspended from a ceiling where she and Jack had painted clouds.

“Don’t let his angelic demeanor fool you,” Cissy whispered into Coco’s ear as she stared at her son. “He’s been a holy terror all week.” With her free hand, she adjusted Beej’s blankets and watched his small chest rise and fall.

Satisfied that he was sleeping soundly, she slipped back into the hallway and then nearly screamed when she saw a dark figure near the stairs. Her hand flew to her heart the nanosecond before she recognized Jack. “Holy God, Jack, what’re you doing up here! We had a deal.”

---