Page 28 of Almost Dead (The Cahills 2)

“No, Dad-dee!”

Cissy shook her head as she started making Beej some oatmeal.

“Maybe he just needs breakfast,” Jack suggested, trying to jolly his son out of his grumpy mood by lifting him high overhead and swinging him, but B.J. wasn’t having any of it and began wailing as if in pain.

“I see Daddy’s missing the magic touch too,” Cissy said as she turned her attention to B.J. “We’ll have breakfast, then go upstairs and have a real bath, as last night you ended up with only a lick and a promise, and we’ll change and…” Her voice had lifted an octave as she spoke to her son, smiling at him and wrinkling her nose, but he turned away from her as well.

“Apparently Mom’s got an equally magic touch,” Jack observed.

“At least this morning,” she said, adding, “Coco needs to go out, and the furnace is still blowing cold air.”

“I’m on it.” He drained his cup, then opened the door to the backyard. The sun hadn’t yet risen, but at least the rain had stopped, leaving the air thick and damp. “Come on,” he said to the little white dog.

Coco stood as if planted on the hardwood floor under the table. “Come on, Coco, let’s do your thing.”

The stubborn animal wouldn’t budge.

“Oh, for crying out loud!” Cissy said, unable to keep a tinge of amusement out of her voice. “Come on, Coco.” Carrying the toddler, Cissy walked outside, and the stupid little dog happily followed. Over her shoulder, Cissy called to Jack, “You could have picked her up, you know.”

“And risk being bit?” he asked, following her.

“Wimp!” she said but laughed as Coco started sniffing the wet grass.

The house phone rang. Still holding Beej, Cissy headed back inside to answer it. “Hello…Yes, this is she…. No, I haven’t heard from her,” she said, her voice edged with irritation. I don’t expect to…. What? Look, I have no idea, okay, none! That’s all I have to say on the matter. Don’t call back!” Cissy slammed the phone down so hard that outside Coco jumped and looked up from her close examination of a clump of crabgrass.

Jack could hear Cissy grumbling under her breath as she walked into the living room. It sounded as if someone had asked her about Marla. He grimaced, imagining what might come next, how many reporters and snoops and gossips would keep bothering her. Wishing he could stave off the flood and help, he let the dog back inside.

Well, there was one thing he could do.

The furnace, a giant rumbling monolith, was in the basement, down steep, switchbacking steps through a door just off the kitchen. Jack found a flashlight in a junk drawer in the kitchen, then headed downstairs and past the laundry area to the ancient heater. It looked like a giant octopus with huge tentacles rising to the ceiling and the rooms above. Its replacement had been next on the to-do list, but, of course, that was before all hell had broken loose and his marriage had crumbled. No, that was wrong. It hadn’t completely died, he reminded himself, though Cissy acted as if the marriage were on its last gasps and there was no hope of resuscitation.

Jack wasn’t about to give up.

He spent half an hour with the damned furnace, figured out that it wasn’t cycling on and that the element was probably kaput. The ducts were fine, might need to be cleaned, but it was the furnace itself that needed replacing. Not a surprise.

He found a towel in the dirty-clothes basket positioned near the washer. Wiping his hands, he climbed the stairs and reentered the living room, where Cissy, having already folded the sleeping bag, was sitting on a corner of the couch, Beej on her lap playing with a toy bunny.

“It’s shot,” he said.

“Your professional opinion?”

“Yep.”

Cissy sighed. “I’ll call some places this morning. Get a few bids.”

Jack noticed the time on the clock in the living room. No matter what he did, he’d be late for work, and he couldn’t bag out. He had a meeting at ten with reps from a major hotel downtown. The hotel reps wanted a feature, and since the unique hotel was a major advertiser, Jack was ready to discuss it. He would have loved to run upstairs and shower, but that was impossible. Cissy had thrown every last stitch of his clothes on the driveway the morning after he’d spent the night at Larissa’s. There wasn’t so much as a sports jacket in his side of the closet any longer.

There were no two ways about it, he’d have to stop by his apartment to shower and change before driving to the office. “Gotta run,” he said reluctantly. “Do you want me to take you up to your grandmother’s house to pick up the car?”

“Oh.” She glanced at the clock mounted over the mantel. “No, I’ll call a cab once Tanya gets here.” Her lips tightened just a bit when she mentioned the nanny’s name, the nanny Jack had found for their son, a woman of twenty-eight whom, for some reason, Cissy didn’t quite trust despite Tanya’s stellar list of recommendations.

“Are you sure? I’m not crazy about you going back there alone.” He was giving her an out, even though he didn’t have much time.

“I’ll be fine. Go on. You’ll be late.”

He hesitated.

“Jack, go. You were supposed to be out of here before I got up, remember?”

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