She hadn’t bothered with the top couple of buttons on the flannel shirt he’d given her to sleep in and he’d noticed the valley between her breasts. What was worse, she had been too ill to even try to be enticing and she had still managed to tie him into a knot the size of his fist.
“You’re one sick SOB, Malloy,” he muttered, shaking his head.
As he sat there trying to figure out what it was about her that he found so damned alluring, he frowned. He wanted her out of his hair as much as she wanted to leave. So why did he keep insisting that Heather needed to stay another night? Why couldn’t he keep his mouth shut, help her get her son buckled into his car seat and wave goodbye as they drove away?
Looking down at the little boy sitting on his lap, T.J. shook his head. “Be glad you’re too young to notice anything about girls. They’ll make you completely crazy with little or no effort.”
When Seth looked up at him and grinned, T.J. suddenly knew exactly why he was being overly cautious about them leaving. He couldn’t stop comparing Seth’s situation with T.J.’s own as a kid. Every child deserved to have their mother with them for as long as possible, and although Heather was clearly over the worst of her illness and thought she was ready to go home, he wanted to make sure there was no possibility of a serious complication. If she had her hands full taking care of a kid and a ranch while she continued to recover that would increase the chances of her having a relapse—or worse.
“I’m just trying to keep your momma upright and mobile for you, little guy,” T.J. said, smiling back at the child.
The little copper-haired boy on his lap gave him a big grin and patted T.J.’s cheek as he babbled something T.J. didn’t understand. He figured Seth was thanking him for taking care of his mother and an unfamiliar tightening filled T.J.’s chest. As kids went, Heather’s was awesome. Friendly and well-behaved, Seth was no problem to watch and if he ever had a kid, T.J. wanted one just like him.
He gave Seth a hug. “I’ll make sure to see that you’re both taken care of so that you can be together a long time.”
He had a sneaking suspicion there was more to his interference than that, but he wasn’t going to delve too deeply into his own motivation. He wasn’t sure he would be overly comfortable with what he discovered. Hell, he still wasn’t comfortable with the fact that he found his nemesis even remotely attractive.
The sudden crack of thunder followed closely by the sound of rain beating hard against the roof caused T.J.’s smile to turn into an outright grin. “It looks like Mother Nature agrees with me about the two of you staying put,” he said, drawing a giggle from Seth.
A few minutes later, when Heather walked back into the bedroom after her shower, T.J. noticed she wore the new set of gray sweats Jane Ann had picked out for her. He wouldn’t have thought it was possible, but damned if the woman didn’t manage to make baggy fleece look good.
His lower body twitched and he had to swallow around the cotton coating his throat. Heather was as prickly as a cactus patch and tried to reject everything he did to help her, but that didn’t keep him from wanting to take her in his arms and kiss her senseless.
Unsettled by the wayward thought, he focused on telling her about how the nasty weather would change her plans. “You don’t have a choice now. You’re going to have to stay here until tomorrow.”
Her vivid blue eyes narrowed. “Are you telling me that you won’t allow me to leave?”
“Nope. I’m not telling you anything of the sort,” he said, quickly deciding that he needed to watch the way he phrased things. He had seen that warning look in his sisters-in-law’s eyes when his brothers made a verbal blunder and he wasn’t fool enough to ignore it. “I’m just making an observation.”
Heather frowned. “Would you care to explain that?”
“Listen.” He pointed toward the ceiling and knew the moment the sound of rain pounding on the roof registered with her from the defeated expression on her face. “It’s coming down like somebody’s pouring it out of a bucket. With as much rain as we had yesterday, the creek is full and it’s a good bet the road is already starting to flood again.”
Groaning, she sank down on the side of the bed. “I have things I need to do at home.”
T.J. shrugged. “The livestock are already taken care of. I’m sure whatever else there is you need to tend to will keep until tomorrow.”
As soon as the words were out, he could tell he had pissed her off again. “Do you dismiss what you need to get done as unimportant?” she asked, spearing him with her sharp blue gaze.
“It depends,” he answered, wondering why she had taken offense to his comment and why he found her spitfire temper a little exciting. “If it needs my attention right away, I take care of it.”
“Then what makes you think the things I need to get done are different?” She stood up to fold the clothes she had worn the day before and stuffed them into the shopping bag. “You don’t have any idea what I have to do or what might need my immediate attention.”
He felt as if he had stepped into a minefield—any way he went could prove explosive. “I didn’t mean to imply that your concerns are less important than mine.” Suddenly irritated with her short temper, he set her little boy on his feet and watched Seth walk over to his mother, then he rose from the rocking chair. “I just meant that whatever you need to do will have to wait until after the water recedes again. And before this escalates into something that could make the remainder of your stay a pain in my...” Pausing, he looked down at the toddler gazing up at him. He wasn’t about to add a word to the kid’s vocabulary that she could take him to task over. “Make the remainder of your stay difficult, I think I’ll go see what I can rustle up for our supper.” Walking out into the hall, he turned back. “I’ll be up later to help you and Seth downstairs. And don’t even think about trying it on your own. A broken neck won’t help you get away from here any faster.”
Before she had a chance to tie into him over something else, he closed the door. He descended the stairs and went into the kitchen to see what he could find for them to eat.
“So much for trying to be a nice guy,” he muttered as he opened the refrigerator to remove packages of deli meats and condiments. Slamming the food down onto the kitchen island, he turned to get a loaf of bread from the bread box on the counter. “If she fell down the stairs she’d probably find a way to blame me and then sue my ass off.”
“Do you need me to help with dinner, Malloy?”
When he turned back, Heather and her son stood just inside the doorway. Closing his eyes for a moment, T.J. tried to shore up his patience.
“You didn’t listen to a dam...dang thing I said, did you?” he asked, opening his eyes to look directly at her. “As weak as you are you shouldn’t have tried the stairs on your own. Did you even consider that you or your little boy could have fallen and been seriously hurt?”
“I’m not a hothouse flower. I can do things on my own. I have been doing things on my own. Besides, we took it slow and I held on to the railing,” she said, shrugging one slender shoulder. “As you can see, Seth and I made it to the bottom without incident.”
He shook his head at her stubbornness. “Do me a favor and don’t try it on your own again. I’d rather you didn’t tempt fate.”
“I’ll
