since the doctors think that if Janey wakes up again, it will help to have familiar faces and things around, I’ve kept her on.” He sighed, fingered his short, thick goatee and said, “I wouldn’t have moved Janey at all, frankly, but my grandfather died six months ago, and Seth and I are all the family my grandmother has left, so I decided to move everyone home to New Orleans, and that meant bringing Janey, and therefore, Brown with us.”
Chey nodded her understanding, then ventured carefully, “Exactly what is Janey’s condition, if you don’t mind my asking?”
He shook his head and moved once more down the hallway toward the stairs. Chey fell in beside him as he spoke. “She’s in a coma, obviously. The doctors don’t know exactly why, some sort of trauma to the brain. She was drinking that night. It was March, Seth’s first birthday, as a matter of fact. Anyway, she fell into a nearly empty swimming pool. It’s a miracle she didn’t drown, but I sometimes wonder if that wouldn’t have been kinder.”
Chey stopped and waited for him to turn to face her. “I’m sorry,” she told him sincerely. “Two years of watching your wife languish in a coma must have been very difficult.”
“Ex-wife,” he corrected.
Chey blinked at him, the air fixed in her lungs. He wasn’t married! Not that she should care. Better if he were. But surely he hadn’t divorced his wife after she’d been injured. In Chey’s opinion, that would have been despicable. It wasn’t, however, any of her business.
He folded his arms and tucked in his chin, looking down at her, his blue eyes holding hers as surely as any physical touch. “We should get up to the third floor now,” he said, changing the subject.
She nodded, and he moved down the hallway once more. As he led her toward the upper and final story of the house, he talked about the changes he had made to accommodate the couple who cooked and cleaned for him. He’d had everything updated to their personal specifications, including the plumbing and wiring. Obviously, he considered it their private domain. The attics, however, were of prime interest to her, and she was right about the treasures hiding there.
Though dusty and disorganized, the place was crammed with enough antiques to keep an antique-lover happily busy for days just cataloging and investigating, exactly what she determined to do. At first glance it looked as if she could furnish the entire house with what she found there. It was an absolute treasure trove, and though she wasn’t dressed for it, Chey could not resist digging through the most easily accessible portion. Before she realized it, she was absorbed in her discovery. She forgot about the pristine condition of her suit and everything else. It was one magnificent find after another, and the next thing she knew, Brodie was pushing hair out of her face, hair that should have been confined in its usual sleek twist. She looked up at him, shocked speechless to find him so close. He wound a golden-blond strand around his forefinger and tugged gently. She felt it all the way to the soles of her feet.
“I thought Wonderland was the temples of Malaysia or the rivers of India,” he told her softly, “but I see that for you it’s a musty old room full of used furniture.”
Her heart, which seemed to have leapt up and lodged in her throat, was beating so hard she could barely speak, but somehow she managed to form the words, “Not used, antique.”
His smile spread all the way across his face. “Antique,” he conceded. Then she realized that his face was descending toward hers, that he meant to kiss her. She tilted her chin up, but at the first electric brush of his lips against hers, she yelped and hopped away, bumping her upper thigh on a sharp corner. Dumbly, she looked down and recognized a walnut sugar chest, probably built about 1840. One part of her mind spun out an assessment. A plantation piece from the days when sugar was a precious commodity kept under lock and key, it was not found much north of the Mason-Dixon line and would make an excellent occasional table. Another inner voice screamed that she should run before something awful happened, something that would change her life forever, something for which she was not prepared.
Defensively, she grabbed a lamp and cradled it in front of her as a shield, babbling, “I have to get back to the office, but if you don’t mind I’d like to take some of these things with me for appraisal.”
He looked at her for a long moment as if trying to decide whether or not to remove the impediment and press the advance, but then one corner of his mouth kicked up in a wry smile and he nodded. “Just show me what you want, and I’ll carry it downstairs.”
Inwardly, she breathed a sigh of relief—and tried her best to ignore the underlying disappointment.
Brodie stood leaning against a pillar on the front porch, thoughtfully stroking his goatee as he watched Chey’s flashy little car roll down his drive toward the street, the almost nonexistent back seat crammed with several items he’d lugged down from the attics for her, among them the lamp she’d latched onto when he’d tried to kiss her. The lamp might be a priceless, once-in-a-lifetime find, but it was more likely that she’d latched onto it in pure self-defense, because he’d definitely scared her with that attempted kiss. What he didn’t understand is why the hell he’d done it.
Oh, she was a spectacularly attractive woman, and he’d fully meant to kiss her from the instant he’d laid eyes on her—starting with those small, slender feet and those long, slender legs and ending with that long, slender neck, pretty oval face and sleek, pale golden hair. He wanted to ruffle her cool exterior, pull down that hair, kiss off that pink lipstick, rip the buttons from that neat, tailored suit, watch those light green eyes darken with unregulated passion. He wanted to strip her naked and lay her down. But Brodie Todd was a pragmatic, if sometimes emotional, man, and he’d realized from the beginning that she wasn’t likely just to topple over and invite him to join her.
Unlike so very many women of his acquaintance, this one was going to take finesse. He accepted that as part of the challenge, a sort of enhancement. In her enthusiasm over the contents of the attic, she’d given him proof of the passion he’d suspected all along, and he’d lost sight of the big picture, the ultimate goal. She had gotten so caught up in her dusty, jumbled finds that she hadn’t even noticed when her stockings shredded and her bright hair began sliding free of its confinement. He had become so caught up in her that he’d forgotten to go slowly, to move cautiously—until she’d literally leapt away from him, and then it had taken all his control not to drag her back to him. He was surprised that she hadn’t bolted in that very instant, but she’d taken her time, pretended indifference by concentrating her attention and her enthusiasm on the things in the attic. Then she had run, and she was running still.
He wondered how far he would have to let her go before he could coax her back to him. He did not wonder why he was so damned certain that he was going to do it, not that he was at all certain that he should. It would be complicated. Chey Simmons was not some casual conquest to enjoy one night and forget the next morning. She was going to be around for a while, beginning Monday morning when she had promised to fax the formal designs for his approval. Unfortunately, his fax was going to be down on Monday morning. Yes, continued interaction with his family was guaranteed. Luckily, they had liked her. True, she hadn’t seemed particularly taken with Seth, but she’d handled him well. Then again, she ought to have, considering the size of her family.
Nine siblings. He was still surprised and a little awed by that. He wouldn’t have thought it would, but somehow the size of her family added a complex cachet to her persona. His only frame of reference was the closeness that he had shared with his younger brother. The idea of multiplying that by nine boggled the mind. For the first time, the thought occurred that if he’d had more siblings, he wouldn’t be so alone now. Then again, people couldn’t be replaced. His brother would still be gone, still be missed. He would still have a hole in his life and heart that could not be filled.
Pushing
