The Right Time (61 page)

“You can put up with anything for a couple of years, Hennessy. Teaching has to be easier than writing a dissertation, doesn’t it?”

She truly hated whiners, and when she heard that tone in her own voice it annoyed the heck out of her, but she didn’t have the ability to excise it. She
wanted
to whine. She
wanted
to complain about her deep-seated disappointment. “I’ll do what I have to do, but I’m not looking forward to it.” She could feel her shoulders slump, and she threw them back and tried not to look as discouraged as she felt. “I should have stopped at a Master’s and gotten a job at a place like your friend Nicole has.”

“But you
didn’t
.” Townsend got up and moved over to her, then grasped her shoulder and gave it a shake. “It’ll pay off in the end. Guaranteed. If nothing else, you’re getting a book published. That had to thrill your grandparents.”

“Oh, my lord. You have no idea.” She laughed, thinking of the look on her gramma’s face when she told her the news.

“Let’s have another cup of tea.” Townsend slid off the counter and filled the kettle. Hennessy watched her move, then a thought occurred to her: she hadn’t told her about the book.

They sat in the sumptuously comfortable living room, sipping their tea. It was way past odd to be in the same room, so close to one another after all these years, yet feeling like just weeks had passed. They were still finishing each other’s sentences and finding the exact same things made them laugh.

“You said earlier that Kate had another year of training,” Townsend said. “If you’re looking for jobs in Boston does that mean you’re going to settle here?”

Hennessy rolled her eyes. “I’m well past ready to leave Boston but she’s… I’m not sure what she’s thinking. I understand she wants to work at a major trauma center but—”

“You want to go home.”

In a second, her blood was boiling. “Hell, yes, I want to go home! I should have gone to USC in the first place. Having my doctorate from Harvard is nice, but being in Boston all this time has let her get really comfortable here. She’s making lots of contacts, working with people at the top of her field—”

“You’ve gotta have some sympathy for that,” Townsend said. “If you got the chance to teach at the Iowa Writer’s Workshop, you’d fall in love with Iowa.”

“I wish it were just that,” Hennessy scoffed. “Hell, I wish it were anything other than what it is.”

“Which is?” Townsend asked, that blonde eyebrow rising in question.

Torn between telling the whole truth and trying to put a good spin on it, Hennessy sighed and let the truth flow. “She doesn’t like the South. The whole damned region. I’ve offered to live anywhere within a day’s drive of Columbia and commute to be able to take this crappy adjunct job, but she finds some stupid reason she couldn’t possibly work in Atlanta, or Montgomery, or Nashville, or Raleigh, or Charlotte, or Charleston, or Savannah.” She took a breath. “I don’t even know if all of those cities have a first-class trauma unit but Atlanta does, and she won’t even consider it.”

“Why?”

“I’m not sure. Something about the way their unit is set up.” She let out a heavy sigh. “She finds the smallest things to nitpick when the South is involved.”

“Uhm…I hate to point out the obvious, but if she’s only got a year left you don’t have much time to reach an agreement.”

Hennessy took a sip of her tea, trying to keep her temper under control. Bitching about Kate was not just unproductive, it was unkind. “I know,” she said quietly. “She’d be happy if I took the year off and waited for her to get a job. But…”

“Sorry,” Townsend said, sticking her lower lip out. “I know it’s tough having a gorgeous, brilliant girlfriend who insists on working at some top-notch hospital so she can earn scads of money. You should have stuck with one of the good ol’ boys from Beaufort.”

Hennessy took the throw pillow at her elbow and flung it hard, catching Townsend in the chest. “Nobody likes a smart ass.” She chuckled when Townsend grabbed it and whipped it right back at her. “Careful. Your decorator might have to come over here and replace some object d’art.” She chuckled at her choice of words. “I find myself unconsciously using French expressions, and in my head, they sound just like someone from Paris said them. In reality, I sound like a Southern belle trying to get through high school French.”

“You’re never going to hear me complain about your accent. It’s adorable—in any language.”

After the third time Townsend tried to hide a yawn, Hennessy stood and said, “I’ll let you get to bed.”

“You don’t have to leave. I’m fine. It’s only…” She took her phone from her pocket and said, “How did it get to be one a.m?”

“We had a lot of catching up to do.” Hennessy stuck her hand out and pulled Townsend to her feet. “Are we going to keep in touch? I surely do want to.”

“I do, too.” They exchanged phones and updated their contact information. Then Townsend walked her to the door and put her arms around her, holding on tight. “I had a fairly shitty day until I heard a sweet, Southern voice call my name. I can’t tell you how happy I am to see you.”

Hennessy pulled away and kissed the top of her head. The urge to stay right there and fill her lungs with the scent of Townsend’s hair was so strong she dug her fingernails into the palms of her hands to snap herself out of it. “Me too. I…I would have tried to find you but—”

“I know. I wanted to see you too, but—”

“I know.” Hennessy kissed her cheek and opened the door. “We thought we were adults before—we really are now. We can be friends.”

The smile Townsend gave was so beautiful it almost brought Hennessy to her knees. “We always will be. A few year’s absence doesn’t change a thing.”

Townsend stood on the landing, watching Hennessy walk down the stairs. The light shone on the skin between her collarbones when a gap opened between her body and Kate’s dress. A flash of gold in the shape of an apple gleamed, and Townsend closed her eyes, relishing the memory of the day she and the other campers had presented the gift to Hennessy. It was all her doing, with the other students pulled in only to insure Hennessy would accept the gift. Now, all these years later, she was still wearing it.

Townsend leaned against the door, the pounding in her chest making her a little woozy.

They were still connected. She wasn’t sure how deep or how vibrant the connection was, but it was there. She was sure of it. Hennessy was back in her life.

She would never be separated from her again.

Never.

The T had stopped running
, so Hennessy had to find her way home by using the MBTA app on her phone. She’d protested when Kate’s parents bought both of them smartphones for Christmas, but she used the darned thing constantly. One more chink in her armor of self-sufficiency. When you let yourself get used to the niceties…

Well sick of moaning about her objectively beautiful life, Hennessy dug her keys out and entered the apartment. It was a perfectly fine little spot. A bit dark, definitely small, but easily big enough for the two of them. She snapped both locks into place and went into their bedroom to change. Images of Townsend’s gorgeous, rambling space kept invading, but she consciously blocked them. There was no sense in lusting after something she couldn’t have—at the moment. In another four or five years, when Kate was making good money, they’d be able to afford a place half as nice. Probably in Boston, a town she couldn’t wait to leave.

Growling with anger at herself, she changed into some of Kate’s scrubs and started to clean. Normally an early to bed, early to rise type, when she knew she was too keyed up to sleep she tried to occupy her hands. Gramma always said idle hands were the devil’s playground, and that wasn’t far from the truth.

She started with the kitchen, tidying the mess Kate had left that morning. Through years of dogged determination and gentle persuasion, Hennessy had finally convinced her to make herself a healthy breakfast. So she didn’t mind cleaning up strawberry hulls and kiwi skins from the sink. She smiled as she regarded the perfectly shaped strips of skin. Kate kept their knives nearly as sharp as her scalpels. You’d never find a jagged edge on a peel in their sink.

Now that she had Kate eating a decent breakfast, she was going to convince her to take some food along for her lunch or dinner. When Hennessy was working on her dissertation, she hadn’t had time to cook, but now she had time to burn. For the first time in her life, she could goof off if she chose to. Laughing at the mere thought, she considered what to cook.

After finding only some Andouille sausage in the refrigerator, she went with a classic. Red beans and rice. Kate wasn’t a huge fan of Southern cooking, but she seemed to like red beans. What sentient being wouldn’t?

Once she had everything simmering on the stove, she regarded the kitchen. The apartment desperately needed painting, but their landlord had agreed not to raise the rent if they agreed to forego some updating when they signed their latest lease.

Atop the chalky, dull paint, the kitchen bore a thin layer of grime. She’d worked so hard on polishing her dissertation for publication that she’d let a lot of chores slide. Kate wouldn’t have noticed if someone came in and stole all of their furniture, since all the poor lamb cared about was collapsing into bed. But that was no excuse. Hennessy was the homemaker, and she had to do her job.

In a half hour, everything from the cabinets was jammed onto the counter. Then she scrubbed the interiors, getting off six year’s worth of dirt and grease. Once everything was neatly returned to the proper space she worked on the cabinet fronts. It was amazing how much dirt accumulated around the knobs and drawer pulls, but there was nowhere for it to hide when she attacked it with a toothbrush.

The harder she worked, the less she thought. Her body got into a good rhythm, with dirt her only focus. The beans started to send off that long-familiar scent of pork and garlic and cajun spices as she started on the refrigerator, scrubbing it from the very top down to the underused freezer.

After the kitchen floor was gleaming as brightly as the old tile could manage, she went to her desk, shoved into the corner of their bedroom.

Her desktop computer played its little tune when she turned it on, then Hennessy sat down and started to review all of the research for her book. There were folders inside of folders inside of folders, many of them duplicates. Carefully, she considered what she might ever look at again, then started to throw all of the unnecessary files in the trash. Her concentration was so locked-in, she yelped when a pair of hands settled onto her shoulders.

Then Kate bent to kiss her cheek. “What’s up?” she asked. “The whole house smells like…garlic and beans. Did you get up super early and start cooking?”

Hennessy swiveled around. Kate had that tired yet jumpy look on her face. The same one she probably wore. “I couldn’t sleep. Maybe I’m trying to match your schedule.”

A hand settled on her head, then tenderly trailed down her face as Kate gazed into her eyes. “I know you’re kidding, but that would be awesome. Really awesome.”

Kate didn’t have many needs. All she wanted was a wife who’d help make her the best trauma surgeon in America. That really wasn’t asking too much—of someone who wasn’t trying to forge her own career.

Hennessy looked up at her, seeing fatigue make those usually perky blue eyes droop. “You look like you could use a nice, long shower.”

“I could definitely use one of those.” She took Hennessy’s hand and pulled her to her feet, then slid an arm around her waist and placed her lips up to Hennessy’s always sensitive ear. “What I really need is someone to wash my back. Interested?”

By the time the words were out of her mouth, Hennessy’s body began to react. No matter what, they’d always clicked in bed. Kate had promised the rabid desire of their initial lovemaking would only last a few weeks, but she’d been full of it. One suggestive kiss, a hungry look or even a text message could make her engine rev. And she’d never made an overt sex move that Kate had refused. Not once.

Hennessy pulled the tie that held Kate’s loose scrub pants up. Their eyes met as she grasped the hem of her top and whipped it over her head. Bra and panties were lying on the floor in seconds, abandoned next to her clogs. Then Kate’s hands glided over Hennessy’s body as she stripped her. They hugged for a long minute, their bare bodies getting used to each other again, their libidos coming to life. After going into the bathroom together, Kate got into the shower to adjust the water, while Hennessy brought their toothbrushes along. They stood under the warm water as they brushed their teeth, grinning at each other through foamy smiles.

Now things got interesting. As their mouths met, Hennessy took the soap and washed every bit of her lover’s body. By the time she reached her favorite part, her probing fingers were met with a slickness that made her smile. “You’re so easy,” she murmured into Kate’s smiling mouth.

Then she was pressed against the tile, Kate ravenously sucking on a hard nipple while a practiced hand slipped between her legs and slick fingers slid inside.