Waking Up (14 page)

She was determined to stay awake until he returned but after gingerly settling herself in bed, her eyelids promptly fell shut, and she was soon deeply asleep, despite the constant nagging ache in her ankle and the fact that her bedroom light was still on. She didn’t stir when her father checked her room briefly after he returned, tucking the covers up to her shoulders as tenderly as any mother before leaving again and turning off her light.

Two things woke her up late the next morning after a deep yet troubled sleep. One was the pain in her ankle, which was so stiff and swollen she was wholly unable to bend it at the joint, and the other was a hot, dry, cottony feeling in her mouth. She desperately needed a drink.

For a few moments, though, she simply stared around her bedroom. The sun was high and bright, an indication of the late hour, and the light spilled through the curtains at her window in a golden beam. She wondered if her father had taken time off work to stay with her, like he used to when she was too ill to go to school. She felt guilty for being such a bother and at the same time hopeful that he hadn’t abandoned her for the day. She was sure he wouldn’t.

“Dad?” she called, her voice blurry with sleep. At first there was nothing but deep silence, so she called again, louder this time, with some uncertainty.

She felt absurdly comforted when she heard footsteps sounding heavily on the stairs, and she struggled to a sitting position, wincing as she jarred her injured foot.

When Jason walked through her open bedroom door, she was pushing her tousled brown hair off her forehead, one side of her face creased with delicate lines from her heavy sleep, her eyes blinking and bemused. Her nightshirt was twisted at her torso, and the bedcovers were rumpled around her slim hips. When she looked up and saw him, surprise and dismay flooded her features at the same moment.

“Oh, no!”

He was casually dressed in worn Levi’s, with a plain white shirt rolled up at the elbows and blue tennis shoes. He looked fresh, alert and incredibly vibrant, and he grinned at her exclamation, swift and bright, as he walked into her room. “What an awful greeting, you ungrateful creature!” he teased, sitting on the edge of her bed as his eyes smiled at her. “If you want me to go away, just say so, though I might warn you, I’m the only help you’ve got at the moment. Your father’s gone to work.”

“I’ve just remembered,” she muttered morosely, as she sank back down on her pillow and buried her chin into her chest. “We were supposed to go to Cedar Point today.”

Her depression was so obvious he reached out a large hand and tucked her hair gently behind her ear. “We can go another day,” he assured her, letting his gaze roam freely over her half-covered figure. There were dark circles underneath her eyes and a tautly etched expression that hinted at her acute discomfort. Her full, lush mouth was turned down in a disconsolate bow.

She fought a brief, intense struggle and then gave in to petulance. “But I wanted to go today.”

He laughed quietly and shifted his weight so that her bedsprings creaked. “And here I was thinking that you had thrown yourself down those stairs just so that you wouldn’t have to go with me,” he teased. She couldn’t meet his brilliant gaze and was appalled when her chin started to quiver uncontrollably. He sobered instantly and put his hand heavily on her shoulder. “I was only joking, Robbie.”

“Don’t you think I know that?” she whispered, frustrated with herself, and she turned her eyes away to sigh. She bent her head in a weary gesture and rubbed the back of her neck with her hand.

His question was gentle. “Are you in much pain?” After a moment, she gave a reluctantly honest nod, and his hand squeezed tightly on hers before he stood. “Then I’ll go get your pain medication and a glass of water, all right? And after that’s had a chance to take effect, we’ll see about getting you dressed and downstairs.”

He was quick and he stood frowning down at her as she popped two pills into her dry mouth and then greedily gulped down the entire glass of water. Then he helped her to the bathroom, waited outside until she had finished, then carried her back to her bed. While she watched and directed, he moved around her room to draw out bright shorts and a comfortable top. He opened her lingerie drawer and rummaged for a pair of panties, his head bent, his broad, well-shaped back to her. She was not so preoccupied with her painful ankle that she wasn’t embarrassed by that, a slow, dark flush rising over her neck and face at the sight of his large masculine hand holding a handful of fluffy white nothings.

When he turned around with a complete outfit in his hands, she was looking down fixedly at the print border of her top sheet, furious at her own lack of mobility and extremely self-conscious with Jason in her room. At first she hadn’t been, for he had seen her looking far worse than she did at the moment. She had felt perfectly normal and acted quite naturally, until she noticed his vital, mature maleness, as though for the first time.

He walked over and tossed the things down to her. They fell in a flutter all over her covers, and as she refused to look up, he said quietly, “I’ll be just outside the door if you need any help. Let me know when you’re ready.”

As soon as the door had closed behind him, she pulled the shorts awkwardly over her ankles, cursing at her own clumsiness when she yanked her injured foot painfully. Then she balanced like a stork on one leg to get them drawn over her slim hips. The sleeveless shirt was the easy part, and with her hair even more wildly tousled, she called out, “I’m done!”

The doorknob turned and he entered again, took one look at her, and went to her dresser top for her hairbrush. He sat on the edge of her bed again, ordered her to turn around, and set about getting the tangles out of her brown hair. That flustered her even more than his rummaging through her clothes had, and she snapped with a great show of irritability, “My hands weren’t injured, you know!”

“Oh, shut up,” he said and continued to brush her hair.

He was quite gentle, and the long, soothing strokes through the soft brown length felt good. She muttered under her breath without much heat, “Stubborn.”

“And you’re a spoiled brat.”

She hadn’t thought he’d heard her, and she roused at his response. “I am no such thing!”

His hand clamped down hard on her upper arm. “Sit still. You are. You always have been, and I’ve spoiled you as much as anyone else has.”

“Hah,” she retorted bitterly. “I supposed you think you were doing me a big favor when you pulled all those pranks on me.”

He grinned unseen by her. “You know you loved every bit of it.”

“For heaven’s sake!”

He conceded, “Well, at least you loved the attention.”

“I most certainly did not!” was her indignant exclamation to that.

“Of course you did. Now, that was your own fault. If you had sat still like I told you, it wouldn’t have hurt.” She put a hand to her stinging scalp and tried to think of a suitable retort.

“I suppose you’ll be saying next that I enjoyed having that frog you put down my back,” she muttered, her voice losing its bite as he set aside the brush and started to stroke through her silken hair with his fingers.

His laugh sounded softly behind her. “What a long memory you have! Does that still rankle after all these years? I thought I had apologized for doing that.”

“Yes, but only because your mother made you.” She turned her head slowly to one side as the fingers of one of his hands found their way underneath her hair to the soft skin at her neck.

“Did she tell you?” He bent forward and rubbed his face in her hair, which surprised her into trembling.

“She was making sure that you did what she told you to do.” He pulled the sleek brown length aside and slid close to press his lips against the nape of her neck. His mouth was warm, and the light touch of his breath sent a delightful shiver down her back. She tried to wriggle away. “Don’t, Jason.”

He laughed again, his presence at her back immediate and palpable. “That’s what you used to say to me all the time. Couldn’t you tell that the pranks were my way of showing that I liked you?”

“Good grief, with some of the things you pulled?” Her breath came short and fast, for some reason constricted in her throat.

He stood and then bent over to tuck his arms around her, one firmly around her shoulders while the other slid under her knees. Then with a gentle, easy movement, he straightened and headed out of the door, very careful not to knock her bandaged foot. She slid her arms around his neck, the skin sheathing that strong column warm against hers. As he strode through the upstairs hall, he replied drily, “What did you expect me to do, send flowers? Come on, Robbie, I was just a kid.”

“Well, I don’t care what you say. I think it was a pretty strange way of showing you liked me,” she grumbled. He went down the stairs lightly, and she could feel the fluidity of his working muscles, his lean gracefulness. At the moment she was too worn out and in too much pain, but later she was to flush darkly at the memory of the sensation.

In the living room, Jason eased her onto the couch and then knelt on the floor close by, bringing his face down until his straight nose touched hers, gray eyes vivid with laughter and something else. He said softly, “Aren’t you glad I show that I like you in different ways now?”

That had her blinking rapidly and she grew hot as she tried to pull away, but he held her head still as he tilted his own sideways. Firm, full lips took hers as her eyes fell shut, and he kissed her lightly, teasingly before drawing away. She opened her eyes slowly and stared at him, both looking and feeling bowled over. His own lean, handsome expression lightened until he looked positively delighted. He stood and whipped away, a curiously excited, intense movement, and he called back over his broad shoulder, “You should be starving. I’ll go and make you something to eat, okay?”

“Okay,” she mumbled, but she was doubtful whether he had heard her or not as he was already striding purposefully down the hall. But she didn’t bother repeating herself. She had the feeling that he wouldn’t listen to her anyway.

He was soon back again, with a tray balanced carefully in his large, capable hands. The first whiff of spicy, aromatic coffee hit her like a sledgehammer. She had forgotten that she hadn’t eaten supper the night before, and she was suddenly ravenously hungry. She fell on the plate of delicately seasoned scrambled eggs and toast which he had prepared, with an enthusiasm that caused a swift, amused grin to crease across his face. Only when her plate was neatly clean and her cup of coffee drained did she sit back with a sigh of relief. When she glanced up, she found that he had done nothing but sit and watch as she ate, slumped indolently in her father’s favorite armchair.

“Want any more?” he asked. She tucked her bare foot underneath her, the other leg stuck straight out, and she took in every detail of his appearance. His hands were laced and tucked behind his head, arms flexed back, and his long, muscular legs were stretched out in front of him, the faded denim of his jeans straining against his thighs and lean hips. His shirt was open several buttonholes at his throat, giving golden glimpses of his hair-sprinkled chest. Having seen him shirtless countless times before, she couldn’t think why that brief bare expanse was so tantalizing.

“Nothing more to eat, thanks,” she replied, though she couldn’t help the look she threw to her empty cup.

His quick gray gaze caught it, and he straightened attentively in his chair. “How about another cup of coffee?”

“I don’t know,” she said longingly.

“Sure you do,” he told her impatiently. “Yes or no, do you want another cup?”

“Well, maybe if you had a cup…” she started, not looking at him.

“Yes or no!” he rapped out.

He startled her so much she cried out, “Yes!”

He rose to his feet and gave her a glowering look as he growled exasperatedly, “Now, why on earth couldn’t you have said that to begin with?”

Her eyes fell, and at that she wore such a truly miserable demeanor that Jason’s face quivered between real irritation and gentleness for a moment before giving way to the milder expression. “I don’t want you to wait on me hand and foot,” she muttered, avoiding his gaze as she pleated the bottom hem of her shirt between her fingers.

“Robbie,” he said with great patience, “it’s a lousy cup of coffee. I’m not exactly breaking my back.”

“But this is your vacation,” she said, as if that explained everything. He looked more mystified than ever.

“What does that have to do with anything?” He was staring at her in puzzlement, and as her brown eyes lifted to meet his, they filled with unexpected tears, going liquidly brilliant, startling both herself and him. His expression reflected his shock, and then, realizing she was taking the whole thing with utter seriousness, he dropped his impatient attitude and sat beside her on the couch.

She scrubbed angrily at her eyes with the backs of her knuckles and looked so much like the younger, defiant Robbie he’d known that he sighed heavily. “You shouldn’t be wasting your free time playing nursemaid to me!” she snapped with a surprising fierceness. “Thank you very much. I’ve had enough. Go away.”

“But I don’t want to go away,” he said with an odd little laugh. His hand landed lightly on her back, and he rubbed up and down. “I want to stay and argue with you. Want to play a game of cards?”

“No.” Her tone was still truculent. The last thing in the world she wanted was for him to feel obligated into staying with her. She’d be glad if he left. At least then there would be some peace and quiet.