A Minute to Smile (13 page)

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When she got home later, however, Esther heard Melissa’s question echoing in her mind.
You aren’t playing Florence Nightingale, are you?

She checked on her children, shed her dress in favor of a pair of sweats and brewed a cup of tea. In the blessed silence of boys abed, she drank it slowly, sitting at the kitchen table. The quiet was so welcome she didn’t even turn on the radio for company.

Alexander Stone was undoubtedly wounded. But how many people reached their thirties without collecting wounds and sorrows? If she was to steer completely away from men with need of a healing touch, she’d end up an old maid.

Well, not exactly an old maid, she thought with a smile. They were generally virgins.

Restlessly she stood up and plucked a few yellowed leaves from the coleus in the window. Superimposed over the patchwork violet and green of the plant, she saw Alexander as he had been this morning in class.

He’d worn his tie of little cat faces, a bit of whimsy in his elegant attire, just as his serious, weighty lecture was laced with jokes and a gentle ribbing of students who fell prey to his word games—walking right into a trap he’d set for them. He paced the classroom, gesturing, turning, tapping the desk or the podium or a student’s shoulder. As the hour had progressed, his hair, so neatly brushed into place at the beginning, had fallen into wild disarray, curls tumbling to his forehead.

Sexy, she thought now. And intelligent. And funny. What woman in her right mind could resist such a man?

It was only when she grew insecure and questioning that she even remembered that Alexander was anything but the most fascinating man she’d ever met. When she thought of him, it wasn’t his wounds she conjured up. His glittering eyes, yes—and his oboe-hued laughter, his delightfully sensual lips, his ease with her children. All those things.

She hadn’t given much thought to her words before speaking to Melissa, but what she’d said was true. For once, she felt as though it was her own wounds that were being healed. All the tiny rips and tears her marriage had left in her heart were magically knitting themselves up.

One of her father’s pet sayings came to mind:

“What’s the worst that could happen?”

The bottom line. The worst. She turned away from the window and poured a second cup of tea from the kettle on the stove, sobering.

The worst? She could fall in love with him. Madly, deeply, eternally. There was something about him that intrigued and excited her in a way that no other man ever had. It was all too easy to imagine their relationship deepening, widening, spreading. She could see herself making love with him—now, and at forty and sixty and eighty—could see herself laughing with him and debating with him until they both needed canes to get around.

It was easy to imagine spending her life uncovering every corner of his soul, learning all his memories and dreams and sorrows. Too easy. With a little shock, she realized that she was already half in love with him, after only weeks of knowing him.

It was happening too fast. Too fast for her to be able to make any kind of solid judgment over the depth and breadth of his wounds, too fast for her to know whether or not he was a man like her ex-husband, who would never overcome his past.

The bottom line. If she fell in love with Alexander Stone only to find his wounds so overgrown with scar tissue that he could not return that love, it just might be the last straw for her own heart. Not that she would wither up and die—but she wouldn’t be able to risk herself. Not again.

With that in mind, she reaffirmed her weakening resolve to keep the delectable Alexander at arm’s length for a bit longer. No matter how much she wanted to let down her guard with him, she wouldn’t. Not until she was able to gauge the extent of his injuries.

F
or the next several weeks, life fell into a pattern. Esther worked in the store and gardens, took the children to their karate lessons, shared lazy suppers with Melissa and Abe, who seemed to be getting along quite well, much to Esther’s delight.

On Tuesdays and Thursdays, she gave a lesson on the medical practices of the dark ages or listened to Alexander’s lecture. After class, he sometimes invited her to share a cup of coffee with him and often popped in at her house for a few minutes on his way home in the afternoons. He allowed the children to practice their growing skills in martial arts with him and brought a soccer ball over to teach Daniel how to use his feet more gracefully.

As the days passed, Esther felt her attraction to him growing, rather than receding as she had hoped it might. He stuck to his promise diligently, never touching her in any even faintly improper way.

It didn’t matter. As he scuffled with the children in the backyard and his hair grew tousled, she longed to slip her fingers into the silky, wild curls. When he taught, she admired his quick bright mind and animated style, feeling the chills sometimes when his oboe-shaded laugh rang out over some particularly outrageous statement from a student. He laughed in an oddly robust manner, throwing back his head, his good teeth showing, his eyes crinkling up.

And sometimes, Esther would be engrossed in something and look up to find Alexander very still, studying her. The barely concealed yearning in his eyes awakened by degrees something long silent within her, but she wasn’t quite brave enough to hold out her hand to him, to beckon him closer. The raw memory of herself doing just that in the herb garden still haunted her much too clearly.

One weekend when her sons were with their father, Alexander invited her to come to his house for dinner. He broiled steaks on a grill outside while Esther admired his collection of roses. A heavy bank of clouds moved in before they could eat, however, and they settled in the kitchen with bottles of ale just as rain began to fall in earnest.

Piwacket, chased inside by the storm, sprawled on the pale blue floor, his tail flicking. He glared at Esther with a malevolent yellow gaze as she ate. She ignored him at first, but after a while a part of her was piqued. Shifting in her chair, she looked right at him. “Just exactly what did I ever do to you?” she asked.

The ratty gray tail switched and he most distinctly frowned.

“I wouldn’t bother,” Alexander said. “He’s only come this far so that he can remind me not to throw out the peas when we’ve finished.”

Esther chuckled. “Peas?”

“He’ll eat the meat scraps, too, of course, but he’ll scratch your eyes out for peas.”

Esther gave the cat a sidelong look. “Why is he named Piwacket?”

“It’s from a children’s story.” He sipped his ale comfortably. “Susan taught second grade and that was a favorite of hers—it’s about the tattered cat of an English junkman that leads a band of cats to take over a neighborhood.” He lifted an eyebrow as he looked at the animal. “Suits him.”

But in spite of the disparaging tone, Esther could see he was fond of the beast. She grinned. “Susan brought him from the hospital?”

“Not that he ever had anything to do with her.” A shadow flickered over his face, then disappeared. “Do you know what he did the second day we had him?”

“Tell me.”

“Dragged a snake into the bathroom while I was shaving and dropped the damned thing at my feet.”

“Was it dead?”

“Very.” He grimaced.

“Probably thought he was doing you a favor.” Esther cocked her head. “You know, like paying his keep.”

As if he knew he was the subject of their conversation, Piwacket ambled over to a more visible spot and flopped down with a heavy sigh, his torn ear twitching in annoyance as he studiously ignored them. His enormous belly rippled out in front of him. “Quite a spare tire there, old man,” Esther said.

Piwacket swiveled his head and glared.

She laughed.

After dinner, Alexander gave the peas to his cat and led Esther into his comfortable living room. “I have a surprise for you,” he said, and a mischievous expression crossed his face.

He picked up a rectangular plastic box—a rented movie for the VCR. As he handed it to her, he punched the buttons to turn the equipment on.

Esther glanced at the title and grinned, clasping the box to her chest.
“The Haunting,”
she sighed. “Where did you find it?”

When he turned to look at her, Esther could see that he was deeply pleased at her reception to his surprise. “At that giant place where they claim to have every movie ever made.”

Just then, a huge crack of thunder rattled the windows and Esther laughed nervously. “Are you sure you’re up to this on a stormy night?”

He raised a brow. “Are you going to cling to me in terror?”

Esther bit her lip, smiling, and brushed by him to put the movie into the VCR. “We’ll see who’s clinging to whom, Dr. Stone.”

A shimmer of light flashed over his eyes. “I suppose we shall.”

They sat together on the couch. Not friends, but not lovers, either. Alexander almost casually settled his arm around her shoulders and she nestled ever-so-slightly closer to him. His lean body was warm and smelled of smoke from the outdoor grill, of cologne and that subtle undernote that belonged to him alone.

“Have you ever seen this?” she asked him.

He shook his head.

As the black-and-white film unfolded, Esther reveled in the simple joy to be had in watching her favorite movie while nestled close to a man she was madly attracted to. His touch was casual, gentle, without demands, but she was aware of a seductive arousal growing softly between them, fueled by small brushes of his thigh against hers, his fingers against her shoulder, his hard chest against her arm.

A laziness spread through her, as delicious as the heavy gold light that buttered the city in late afternoon.

And yet, there was no urgency, no need to rush further. Not just yet.

The movie began to spin its spell, capturing its audience with eerie sorcery. Soon Esther found herself holding Alexander’s hand tightly, and both of them leaned forward into the story, soft gasps coming from one or the other. In one scene, when the heroine tried to explain something to the others, the doors of the room were flung open violently and next to her, Alexander flinched.

She smiled in approval. No matter how cynically he professed disbelief in the legends and lore that provided the underpinning of society, there was a part of him that had been left untouched by reason.

But at the end of the film, he gave an outraged cry. “That’s not right!” he protested.

Esther looked at him in surprise. “Why?”

“It’s just not. There should be something else. . . .“ He frowned. “A happy ending.”

“Horror stories don’t always have happy endings,” Esther said. “They just have to make sense.”

“There ought to be a feeling of good vanquishing evil,” he argued, frowning toward the blank screen as if to make the ending he wanted appear. “A sense of order restored.”

“Order is restored,” Esther said with a smile, taking his hand. “What else would she do, having had this utterly shattering experience?”

He looked at her, his changeable eyes almost black. “I suppose you’re right,” he said. “There’s always the moment of truth, isn’t there? The moment when the hero can choose good or evil.” As she watched, his irises lightened, gaining sparks of green and blue, growing lighter and lighter as he smiled. It was the first time Esther had ever seen the change occur.

“You have eerie eyes,” she said with a mocking frown.

“Do I?” He raised an eyebrow.

“Yes.” Again that subdued ripple of arousal rippled through her, a whisper blowing over her spine. Cocking her head, she smiled lazily. “Like a vampire.”

“Mesmerizing?” And again, his irises flickered, turning nearly turquoise. How did it happen? She’d heard of it, but never seen it.

“Like a vampire,” she repeated softly.

Slowly he pushed a handful of hair away from her neck. His fingers traced a spiral pattern from her ear to her shoulder. “Hmm,” he said, his deep voice nearly a growl. “I do find myself with a strange need to—” he grabbed her suddenly, playfully “—bite your neck.”

Somehow, he managed to be teasing, making properly vampirish noises as his teeth lightly sunk into her flesh. But at the hot touch, at the tiny nips, the slowly flickering flame that had warmed her all evening suddenly exploded. She grabbed his shoulders, her breath suddenly gone in an ache of furious, ripe hunger.

“Alexander,” she finally managed in a ragged voice. To her shame, there was no hiding the rasp in her voice. When he lifted his head, she couldn’t meet his eyes. She swallowed. What was wrong with her? He was only playing and she was ready to rape him. Weren’t these roles somehow reversed? Wasn’t it the woman who was supposed to be constantly fending off the man?

His voice, when he spoke, was gentle. “I did it again, didn’t I?”

Quizzically she raised her eyes. Her vision snagged on his mouth, framed with dark and silver threads, the lips firm and full. She wanted to taste them again, explore them with her own lips—

She sighed. “It isn’t you, Alexander. It’s me.” He caught her chin before she could lower it. “I chased you back into your little shell, when I was really only trying to pull you out.”

“You didn’t do that. I did.”

“Sort of.” He touched her cheek with the back of his hand. “You see, I keep trying to pretend that I’m only mildly interested in your body.” He smiled and small lines from years of laughing crinkled around his eyes. “I like your mind and your approach to life, but I’ll tell you honestly, Esther, I don’t spend my time imagining what our next debate will be.”

She smiled softly, looking up at him. His eyes sobered and he moved forward, almost as if against his will. His mouth hovered millimeters away from hers, so close his beard tickled her chin when he spoke again. “There has not been a moment since I first saw you that I haven’t imagined kissing every single inch of you.”

As if to illustrate, he closed the tiny gap between them, pressing his mouth to hers, dropping his hands from her face in order to pull her closer to him. This time, Esther could find no resistance—she gave herself up to the glorious feel of his chest against her breasts, to the press of his thigh against her knee, to the sensation of his mouth teasing and coaxing and exploring her own. A tiny flicker of hope flared within her, that perhaps she had found a man who wouldn’t feel threatened by the lusty turns of her nature. In that moment of flaring hope, she opened herself to Alexander and heard his groan of acceptance.