It's In His Kiss (5 page)

Leaning around the door, she made a horrible face at him. "He said he didn't think I was all there, and before you make a smart remark, he did
not
mean he thought I was crazy." She walked back into the living room and sat on back down on the couch, grabbing the pillow and hugging it. 

"I know what he meant."

"You do?" She avoided his eyes. "Well, you're one up on me then. He had to explain it, because I actually did think he meant I was crazy. That might have been easier to take."

"Why?"

Cat tossed back the last of the water. "Hey. I'm not a convicted felon. You don't need my confession. Besides, you just said you knew what he meant."

Michael smiled his million dollar smile. "Let's just say I want to be sure we're reading off the same page."

Cat toyed with the glass, trying to balance it on its edge on the coffee table. She didn't want to repeat David's words. She harbored a frightening suspicion that they were true. "He said he didn't think I was 'totally committed' to the relationship." She shrugged.

"And?"

"And what? Is he right?" She shrugged again. "Can we talk about something else for a while?" She looked up hopefully. "Or were you just leaving?"

"So what are you going to do now?"

She made a face. "I won't be running home to Mother, if that's what you mean. She's getting married again, this time to a guy named
Hank
. I think I'd rather live on the street." 

"You're still feuding with your mother?"

"Why would you think that's changed at all? Hasn't Sara kept you up to date on The Many Loves of Janice?"

He nodded. "She's kept me up to date. She also told me your grandmother died. I'm sorry Cat." 

Grief washed over her like a shower. She smiled crookedly. "Yeah, me too. I miss her."

"What happened to her house? She always said she'd leave it to you."

"The university bought it. Gram didn't have a choice. She lived in an apartment the last couple of years, then in a nursing home for about six months. That pretty much took care of the money."

"Was she unhappy?"

"No. No, she was fine, almost up until the end. You know Gram. She was a rock."

"So what are you doing?"

"I have a great job." Her chest swelled with pride in spite of her desolation. "I'm a full-fledged web designer." She flung her arms wide. "I will have to lose the fancy schmancy apartment, though. I can't afford it by myself."

"So where'd Mr. Big Shot go?"

"David Winfield. Back with his parents, just until he can find a place, of course. It doesn't hurt that his parents live in Belle Meade."

Michael whistled in appreciation.

"Oh, come on. Whistling at living in Belle Meade? You're practically on his front porch. Imagine, I could have been a rich bitch country club wife." Cat stretched out again on the couch. "A bunch of this furniture is his. We bought it together. He magnanimously informed me I could keep it."

"Are you going to?"

"Sure. I'm not stupid, just broken-hearted." Her voice gave out on that last word. She looked at him. "You never told me why you didn't call me."

He grimaced. "I know you don't like the answer, Cat, but it hasn't changed."

"You know I didn't mean I never
ever
wanted to see you again. I just never wanted to see you again right at that moment. After all, look what you'd said to me." 

"I was only stating the truth."

"Oh sure. The truth according to Michael Grey." She took a deep breath and lowered the pitch of her voice. "
You trample on hearts like you're making wine. Just don't be surprised when one turns around and tramples on you.
" 

Michael's jaw clenched and his mouth set into a thin line. "Well?" he muttered.

"Well what?"

"There you go. Somebody finally beat you to the draw. Dumped you before you dumped them."

Cat felt tears prick her eyes. "Thanks, I feel much better now." She curled up into a fetal ball, and pressed her nose into the corner of the couch. "I'm tired. Hit the lights on your way out, will you? And thanks for coming by. Don't know what I'd have done without you."

She lay there, listening to the silence, broken only by Michael's steady breathing. Finally, he opened the front door, then the room was blanketed in darkness and the door closed quietly.

She took a long breath, and felt a sob welling up from deep in her chest. Michael was back, with his deep blue eyes and his disarming smile. And as always, he was a magic mirror, reflecting her true self back at her. She’d missed him like crazy, but she wasn’t sure she was ready to look into that mirror just yet.

The door opened again. Light flooded the room. "Wait a minute."

Cat turned over and squinted up at his tall, lean figure in the doorway. "Forget something?"

He walked over and stood directly in front of her with his hands stuck in his back pockets and his hip cocked. His face was grim, his eyes hooded. "I've never seen you eating condensed milk to drown your sorrows. Double chocolate fudge ice cream has always been your cure for depression, ever since that day your mom married Slick Jannsen and left you with your grandmother."

Cat's face flamed, but she lifted her chin and looked at her friend defiantly. "I was all out of ice cream." Her words were not convincing, even to herself. She held her breath, dreading what was coming, but knowing Michael knew her too well.

"You were going to break the engagement, weren't you?"

She winced. "No."

He held her gaze until she couldn't take it any more and collapsed back against the seat cushions. "Okay, well maybe I was having a few second thoughts. But he dumped me."

"Well, maybe you ought to think about what he said."

"Hey--." She folded her arms. "Whose side are you on anyhow?"

"I've always been on your side, Cat. Always." He switched the lights off again and left, closing the door.

She lay still for a few minutes, just in case he came back, then she rolled off the couch and put the chain on the door, not a particularly easy task with watery, blurred vision. She wiped her face, then flopped back down, hugging a throw pillow to her breast.

Tears, hot and unfamiliar, wet her face and clogged her throat. How dare Michael come waltzing back into her life after being gone for six years, acting as if he knew what was good for her?

As long as she remembered, he'd been throwing his weight around, trying to run her life, acting as if he knew her better than she knew herself.

Okay, maybe she
had
been planning to talk to David about their relationship. Maybe there was a tiny smidgen of relief, deep down below the hurt, that he'd done the breaking up. It was just that she had this stupid empty place inside her that she needed to fill. With what, she didn't know. 

Giving up on sleep, Cat stuffed the pillow behind her head, wincing at her stiff neck.

Michael was back.
It was so good to see him. She'd missed listening to his low, rumbly voice, missed looking at that gorgeous, beloved face. Her mouth quirked into a smile, but it soon faded. 

No matter how glad she was to see him, the fact remained that he'd been in Nashville three years and hadn't contacted her once. Not once.

The empty place began to throb. She tried to make it stop by thinking of the warm, sturdy comfort of his chest, the steady beat of his heart, the faint rustle of his breath against her hair, but as wonderful as it felt to have him back, it hurt that he hadn't called her the minute he'd arrived.

For some reason, tears were pricking at her eyelids again. She blinked hard and pressed her lips together but they still came. Had she really been so mean the last time she'd seen him?

They'd always argued, about everything from how to save the world to who should date who and why. What was different about that last day? He was acting as if she'd somehow hurt him, when he was the one taking off for Japan and leaving her alone.

Well, he'd paid her back, big time. For some reason, that hurt a lot more than her breakup with David. She squinted at the red numbers on her digital clock and wondered if it was too late to run out for double chocolate fudge ice cream.

 CHAPTER THREE

Michael slammed the ball into the wall as hard as he could, which wasn't nearly hard enough. The echoing thud was satisfying though, and when the ball ricocheted off the floor and straight back at him, he was ready.

"Ugh!" he grunted as he slammed it again, then ducked as it rebounded straight back, too fast. His foot slipped on a patch of sweat, and he went down hard on his butt.

Cursing, he flung the racket and stayed down. Turning up the bottom of his sleeveless practice shirt to wipe his face, he conceded defeat to the racquetball. It had beaten him, fair and square.

Tonight hadn't been a good night, all around. No matter how hard he hit the ball or how violently he swung the racquet, he still saw Cat every time he closed his eyes.

Lying on the sofa with that sleep shirt stretched over her round, cute butt. Her short black hair that made her look like a sexy little pixie. The hurt look in her big green eyes that he was terribly afraid he'd caused. Sara was right, he shouldn't have waited so long to contact his best friend.

He pushed his fingers through sweat-dampened hair, and wiped his face again. It wasn't Cat's fault that he was hung up on her. Somehow, he had to get over her while remaining friends, because even if he couldn't have her the way he wanted her, he couldn't imagine his life without Cat in it.

Somebody tapped on the glass. He looked up, blinking the sweat out of his eyes as the door opened. "J.R., what are you doing here this late?

J.R. walked in looking as sweaty and frustrated as Michael felt. His sharp-featured face, accented by short, dark blonde hair and a matching goatee, was grim behind his ironic smile.

"First, it's not late. It's morning--early morning, but morning nonetheless. Second, I could ask you the same thing. Third, I'm probably here for the same reason you are."

 Michael looked at his watch and groaned. "Four a.m. I know what kind of day I'm going to have. Serves me right. Schmuck," he muttered under his breath.

 "Did you just call yourself a jerk?"

 "Close," Michael said.

 J.R. held out a bottle of water, which he grabbed gratefully and turned it up. The cold stuff felt great as it slid down his throat, and dribbled down his chin. He handed the bottle back to J.R. and stood, stretching his tired muscles. He shot his friend a glance. "More like an idiot."

 "In that case, we're not here for the same reason. I'm here because my
brother's
an idiot." 

 Grabbing his towel and racquet, Michael headed for the showers. "What'd he do?"

 "Hank has decided he's fallen in love with this woman." J.R. stripped and wrenched on the shower faucets.

 Michael did the same in the next stall. "The one you were talking about? The one who's ten years older than him?"

 "
And
a gold-digger." 

 "You've met her?"

 "No. Not yet. But what else does a woman who's nearing fifty want with a man who's not even forty yet?" J.R. shouted over the sound of the shower.

 Michael laughed and threw a bar of soap over the three-quarters wall at him. "You mean besides the obvious?"

 J.R. nodded reluctantly and shrugged his soapy shoulders. "Well, okay. But damn. You'd think he'd learn. One cheating gold-digger in a lifetime would be enough."

 "So now she's too old for him, she's a gold-digger, and she cheats? Sounds like a country song."

 "Ha. I just worry about him, you know?"

 "Yeah. You're the only guy I know who thinks he has to take care of his older brother."

 "Yeah, well." J.R. ducked his head under the shower spray, then grabbed a towel and threw one to Michael. "So what's eating you?"

 Michael wrapped the towel around his lean hips. He slicked his hair back, squeezing water out of it, then started dressing. He shook his head at J.R. "I did something pretty stupid tonight--last night."

 "Oh yeah? Was it at least fun?"

 "Huh. Not particularly." He paused, thinking of Cat in her sleep shirt, looking at him with those big green eyes, driving him crazy with wanting her. "Maybe parts of it."

 "So--"

 "I went to see Cat."

 "Cat? Oh yeah, your friend from school. The one you're so hot for." J.R. ducked as Michael tossed his wet towel at him.

 "I am not hot for--," he sighed, "Yeah, her."

 "Good." J.R. pulled on a T-shirt.

 "Good?"

 "It's about time you let her know you're here. What happened?"

 "Everything I was afraid would happen. She's mad at me for not calling her. She's still playing tough as nails, and she's still getting hurt." He shrugged.

 As the two men walked out of the gym, they both squinted and groaned at the rising sun.

"You want to get together for a game tonight?" J.R. asked.

 Michael rolled his neck, working out the knots. The punishing solitary workout had done nothing to relieve his tension or his frustration over seeing Cat again. "Yeah, sure. Around nine?"

 "Nine? That'll work. I gotta go. I've got an early meeting."

 "Yeah, me too. Eight o'clock."

 They looked at each other. Michael laughed shortly. "Unless I'm mistaken, Mr. Jimmy Rodgers Blair, Esquire, my eight o'clock is with you."

 J.R. grinned at him and took out his cell phone. "Carol, call Assistant D.A. Gray's office and cancel my eight o'clock. Right, and send over that motion to dismiss the Montgomery case. It's on my desk. I'll be late getting in today."

 He listened for a second while Michael watched, amused. "Nope. No reason to reschedule. I'll talk to him at the gym." He punched the off button. "So, Mr. Assistant District Attorney, you want to grab some breakfast and talk about you coming back to the firm?"