Cover Story (12 page)

Before I could respond, Grace stood and joined in the conversation. “Well, you wouldn’t have to do that around Tobi. She’s the last person who’d ever need rescuing. In fact, Tobi’s more likely to
do
the res— Ow! … What’d you—”

I removed my heel from the toe of Grace’s shoe and grabbed her elbow, leading her away.

“Nice to see you again, Anna, Simon.” I gave them a wave with my spare hand. “Shame we couldn’t stay and chat.”

“Bye, Tobi,” Anna called as she waved. Simon and Grace also called out their farewells as we wove through the people.

After I’d put half the crowd between us, Grace wrenched her arm away and swung around to block my path. “Okay. What was that about?”

“Nothing,” I said, folding my arms.

Her eyebrows rose. “Nothing?”

I nodded, narrowing my gaze
and
pursing my lips.

“I’m not buying it. You meet an Adonis who can’t take his eyes off you and you drag us away?”

“He could so take his eyes off me.” Couldn’t he? Well, my eyes had been glued to him, and he’d been there with me all the way … but … Oh, I didn’t know what to think.

I turned to look at a woman wearing a T-shirt with the hand-painted words, “Do you know where
your
gnome is?”

“No, he couldn’t,” Grace’s voice interrupted. “That man has the hots for you, bad. But don’t change the subject—why’d we have to leave?”

Sighing, I turned back to her. I’d known bringing Grace was courting disaster. “Did it occur to you that I might not like my personality dissected by my sister and a stranger?”

Hoping to avoid the disturbing visions she’d spawned, I sidestepped her and moved on, and began to plot Kevin’s imminent execution for foisting Grace on me during this assignment. Rat poison in his coffee? Perhaps Ebola virus in his aftershave? No, wait, anthrax in his—ugh—leathers!

Grace jumped into my path again—a perky, black-haired Great damn Wall of China. “You like him.”

Panic flared in my chest for a moment before I suppressed it. “I do not, I just don’t—”

“You do! You like him!” Her smile was smug and maddening. “You want to make jungle love with him.”

“I do not!” I had to squash a childish desire to shove my fingers in my ears.

“Then why are you blushing?”

I was pretty sure I wasn’t—well, I’d told my face not to, anyway—but I knew from experience there was no way to win this argument with Grace. “Look, I’m working here. Can we just drop it?”

She shrugged. “Sure, okay.” But she started singing under her breath, “Tobi and Simon, sitting in a tree, K.I.S.S.I.N.G.”

I rolled my eyes as I shouldered my way through the crowd. “I can hear you, Grace!”

“I meant for you to hear me, Tobi,” she called back, sing-song style and went on with her rhyme.

We passed a group of people dressed as Snow White and the seven dwarves—you’d think people would be able to differentiate between gnomes and dwarves—and found our way back to the market stalls. Not surprisingly, there were a number of booths selling garden gnomes and other garden statues, a craft stall where people could paint their own gnome and a stand of felt gnome hats for children.

We moved past a tent selling Dig Dog’s single and I saw Lukas further in. He looked up at the same moment and called, “Hey, writer chick!”

I pointed to my black fabric-band watch, shrugged and mouthed “sorry” before moving on. The last thing I wanted was Grace meeting Lukas, since she’d once asked me to introduce her to him; she’d done enough damage with Simon. I glanced at her but she was interested in something on the other side to Dig Dog’s stand. Luckily, because her new-man radar would have picked him up otherwise.

For another twenty minutes we moved around—I wanted to see everything for the story—and Grace tagged along behind. She behaved quite well, except for breaking into newly created, and progressively more explicit, verses of the kissing song.

Until she grabbed my hand and yanked me toward the food vans. “Tobi, I want some cotton candy. Come on.”

Cotton candy. It was my tenth birthday all over again. Our mother had taken us to a fair of some kind as a celebration. For who, I had no idea, because I sure had never liked carnivals of any kind. Grace loved them. She went on all the rides and played the games. And cotton candy had been part of the carnival experience.

Naturally, I refused to eat it. A mouthful of brightly colored sugar? Not likely. What was the purpose of it—besides rotting teeth and giving Grace a sugar rush?

Grace dragged on my hand the whole way to the cotton candy stand, where we ran into the only other person I knew with the same excitement for festivals as Grace.

“Anna!” Grace leaned down to hug her new best friend. “And Simon.” She turned to wink at me. “Fancy meeting you two again. It’s like fate.” She moved her feet out of the way before I could reach them with my heel, so I made do with a glare.

Anna was oblivious to the sisterly battle, just excited to see us again. “Tobi, do you love cotton candy, too?”

I’d quickly smiled my greeting to Simon and was now busy not looking at him, an attempt to staunch that darn rising lust-thing. Unfortunately, as Anna was leaning against his thigh, if I crouched to face her, I’d be eye-level with his groin. I couldn’t win. “Er, no, I don’t love cotton candy, Anna,” I said, looking at the ground.

“You don’t?” Her eyes were wide with disbelief.

Grace put a hand on Anna’s shoulder. “That’s because Tobi’s never tried it. She doesn’t think—”

“
Thank
you, Grace. Why don’t you buy your cotton candy now?”

Grace rolled her eyes at Anna, who giggled. A consortium of Ridonkulous Street and my nutty family had formed to torture me. Just great.

Grace took Anna’s hand and asked her what color she’d like.

“Yellow, of course,” Anna answered with solemnity.

Grace ordered two sticks of yellow and, while they were being made, Simon ordered a stick from another cotton candy maker.

“One of these is for Anna,” Grace called to him.

“Thanks, but I need an extra.” He looked at me out of the corner of his eye.

I whipped my head from Simon to Grace in time to see her wink at him, then feign innocence, curling a long strand of hair around her finger. Marvelous, the consortium had expanded.

But I wasn’t playing along. I flicked open my notebook to review my progress, aiming to convey an attitude of aloofness with a touch of contempt. I had enough notes for a story; as soon as Grace had her sugar fix, we could leave.

“Simon,” Mini-Mom said in her little girl voice, once she was holding two spun sugar sticks, “would it be all right if Anna came for a walk with me? I want to show her those cute felt hats.”

Anna made a little jump and clapped her hands. “Oh, Daddy, please? Can I go with Grace?”

Exasperated, I tried to catch Grace’s eye to glare. She obviously had some fanciful notion of doing me a favor by leaving me alone with Simon. Which she wouldn’t be. Even though my eyes kept sweeping over his body. He looked damn good in the white T-shirt and jeans, but still it was a shame to cover the glory of the muscular thighs I’d seen the night he’d slept on my couch. Nevertheless, that didn’t mean I wanted to be left alone with him like a teenager on a blind date.

“Grace, we have to be leaving—”

“Thank you, Grace,” Simon said. “It seems Anna would love to take a walk with you.” He put a hand onto my elbow and pointed with his pink cotton candy toward a sprawling fig tree about fifty feet from the market stalls. “How about we meet you under that tree in half an hour?”

“Perfect.” Grace winked at me, grabbed Anna’s hand and moved off into the crowd.

I watched her go, sighed, then turned to Simon. “We may as well just wait for them under the tree. I’ve seen enough of this place.”

“Okay.”

We started walking in silence, but it didn’t last long.

“I like your sister.”

I didn’t look at him; I knew what he meant. What people always thought when they met ol’-life-of-the-party Grace. “Oh, yeah, everybody just adores Grace.”

“Really? When you try so
hard
to endear yourself?” His eyes were dancing in that exasperating way they had and I wanted to slap him. Or kiss him. Too close to call.

“Then why don’t you catch up with them? I’m sure Grace’d make herself
endearing
for you.”

He looked over at me and grinned. “You know, Tobi, I’ve been asking myself that same question.”

All the air left my lungs in the same instant, leaving me to gasp some back to reply, “You only met her half an hour ago!” So much for Grace’s theory that he couldn’t keep his eyes off me.

We arrived under the tree. There was no one else around—the ExtravaGNOMEza had only taken up part of the park. Simon indicated a bench seat and we sat, him still holding his untouched pink cotton candy.

“Not about Grace. About you. About why I haven’t looked at another woman since that morning I met you in my office.”

My heart missed a beat. “Y-you haven’t?” My vocal cords were unaccountably uncooperative, but my eyes were following orders—they transferred focus to my shoes.

“No, and I keep asking myself why. It’s not like you’ve given me an ounce of encouragement or even been pleasant on more than a couple of occasions.”

“Well …” It was true, but it didn’t sound so good out loud.

“Although you do run from me a lot, and that tells me something.” I could hear a smile in his voice. “And you did drag your sister away from me earlier. If you didn’t care, I don’t think you’d react so strongly.”

Why did this man find it so easy to see through my every action? Despite feeling a little cornered, I was intrigued enough to probe a little. “Did you come up with any answers, when you asked yourself why?”

“At first, I wondered if it was because you seemed unattainable. I haven’t been with anyone since Isabel died, and so I figured my subconscious had picked someone I couldn’t have.”

It sounded plausible, like one of Grace’s psychobabble theories, and the knowledge was devastating … until I remembered he’d said “at first.” I raised my head and looked into his eyes and saw the heat lurking there. “But you don’t think that now?”

“Nope.” He moved closer on the bench seat, close enough for our thighs to touch. A shiver shot up my spine.

“W-what do you think now?”

“Now I think it’s that you plain turn me on.”

That flame that had been simmering low in my belly since we’d run into him leaped back to life. I had to restrain a shiver as Simon kept talking.

“There’s something about your uptightness that makes me want to be the one to make you lose control.”

I swallowed.

His voice dropped to a hoarse whisper even though no one was near. “I want to see you in my arms, so out of control that you’re writhing and screaming with the pleasure of it.” He picked up my hand and raised it to his lips. He kissed my palm gently, eyes not leaving mine. “I want you mindless with wanting me.”

He laid my hand back in my lap, then plucked a piece of cotton candy from the stick he still held. Almost too slowly, he reached forward to put it in my mouth. My lips opened and he placed it on my tongue.

The spun sugar melted almost immediately, leaving an intense sweetness coating my taste buds. It was something that would normally make me turn up my nose, but for some reason, the effect fanned that internal flame more.

When I could get my voice to work, it came out huskier than I remembered. “Are you having some?”

His eyes were still on mine as he nodded and bit into the pink cloud. His tongue looped out to pull the pink mass into his mouth and, dammit, I was jealous of cotton candy. He plucked another piece and held it out to me and I reached forward, this time brushing his fingers with my lips. My breathing had become shallow and fast and, as the sweetness melted in my mouth again, I glanced at Simon’s chest. It was moving in a similar rhythm to mine, although it was much more muscular and framed by nicely defined shoulders. I had another flash of him in T-shirt and boxers on my couch and almost groaned.

My gaze drifted back to the cotton candy and suddenly, I wanted the sweetness in my mouth again. I felt something fall away—possibly good sense—and wanted to experience everything I’d been denying myself. Now.

I wrapped my hand around Simon’s on the stick and moved it closer to his face, my own following closely behind. My cheek brushed his roughened one as I bit into the soft candy. As the sugar dissolved, I could feel Simon’s breath—hear his intake of air. His scent mingled with the sugar and filled my senses. Nothing existed besides him, me, and candy.

Then I turned and opened my mouth to more cotton candy—and Simon. The combination of the heat of his mouth and the unbearable sweetness melted any remaining reserve I had. His lips moved over mine, his tongue tasting, entwining.

I ran a hand over his shoulders, feeling the strength I’d seen there. Electricity tingled in my fingertips as they made contact with his skin, and the charge traveled up my arms and through my body. Was that normal? Maybe there was static electricity in the air. Who cared?

The faint sound of the cotton candy landing on the ground was followed by his newly freed arm wrapping around me, pulling me into his lap. I went with extraordinary enthusiasm.

He pulled back and sank his face into my neck. “Tobi, I want you so much.”

Want? Whatever I was feeling went far beyond
want
. Beyond any simple desire I’d ever felt before. Beyond the nicely contained version of sexual itch I was comfortable with. This was Hollywood-style lust. Without reason. Without sense.

Without control.

Without control?

I jumped back to my end of the bench seat, trying to clear the mist that had descended and find the thing I needed for thinking … What was that again? Oh, right. My brain. I felt it click back into gear as I banged my forehead hard with the heel of my hand. I cast a furtive glance around. No one was paying the slightest bit of attention, but still …

Why had I let that happen? In
public
. I straightened my clothes and ran a hand over my hair. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Simon watching me, his breathing ragged. My own breath wasn’t flowing so smoothly either, which just highlighted what was wrong with this picture—for a split second, I’d let myself go.

Well, okay, it’d been a long split second, but that was beside the point.

The point was, control was my friend. My very good friend. Without it I’d be vulnerable, exposed. Therefore, my friendship with control had to be prioritized over any other friendships that threatened it. And whatever this was with Simon, it quite obviously posed a threat, and as such, had to go. Now, I had to try to find
just
the right words to make him understand this couldn’t happen again.

“Simon, this can’t happen again.”

He didn’t seem overly concerned by my declaration. He just leaned back and regarded me with those damn twinkling eyes of his. “Why not? I thought it went quite well.”

I nibbled a thumbnail and backed further away. “It just can’t.”

“Is it that guy from the video store?” He ran his fingers through his hair and I winced as I realized I was the one who’d mussed it up.

“No, Cameron’s an ex-boyfriend.”

“There’s someone else?” He still seemed less than worried as he retrieved the abandoned cotton candy from the ground and dropped it in the trash can at the end of our bench seat.

“No! I wouldn’t have done this if there was someone else.”

He nodded and flashed me a knowing grin, though what the heck he thought he knew was beyond me. “Then why did you do it?”

I looked around wildly for Grace. Surely the half-hour had come and gone? “Momentary lapse of sanity. But it Can’t. Happen. Again.”

Simon brushed his hands on his jeans then sat back as if waiting for a show to start. “I won’t accept that, unless you can give me a reason.”

What did it matter if he accepted it or not? I was hardly answerable to him—I lived my life on my own terms. Well, except for the gnome articles. And being told to bring Grace today. And my mother in general. But, besides my career and my family, I absolutely lived life on my own terms.

Then I looked into his eyes and I realized it
did
matter. He’d offered me honesty and genuineness since I’d met him and I owed him the same back.

“Okay, here’s the thing. I know you think I’m too controlled, but I like it that way. Self-control is the best defense in a world that—” Wants to beat me down? Chew me up and spit me out? “—has risky elements.”

His jaw dropped and he leaned forward as he rushed to speak. “Hang on, I’d never—”

“I know you wouldn’t, that’s not what I meant. But, we’ve just proven you
are
a danger to my self-control. While we were,” I gestured wildly, “I forgot we were in a public place.”

He relaxed back into his seat and grinned. “For a moment there, so did I.”

“And that doesn’t bother you?”

“Not really.”

Was that a sign of a free spirit, of confidence or—and this territory seemed strangely familiar—lunacy? “I don’t like it. I don’t like not being in control of myself. One slip might not seem like a big deal to you, but it’s the first step on a path I don’t intend following.”

He reached for my hand and held it despite my squirming. “I think you’re blowing this out of proportion.”

I managed to retract my hand and folded my arms over my chest. “That’s a possibility. However, this is how I feel. I’m sorry I’ve given you mixed signals, but it’s not a mistake I’ll ever make again.”

He grimaced the tiniest bit then relaxed again and smiled, almost as if declaring he was willing to bide his time.

To my intense relief, Grace and Anna were finally tramping across the grass toward us, linked hands swinging in time with their steps, chattering like chimpanzees. As I stood and walked over to meet them, I reflected that the ExtravaGNOMEza had taught me two things.

First, Hollywood-style lust was no myth.

Second, it wasn’t something I ever wanted to experience again. Yes indeedy, no question about it.

Probably.

*

Grace and I arrived back at my apartment having discussed her walk with Anna in great detail. Although, “discussed” was possibly an exaggeration—Grace had talked and I’d pretended to listen. I wasn’t thinking about Simon. Or his mouth. Or his hands. No, I was planning out my article. Mostly.

I threw my keys on the coffee table, filled the percolator with ground coffee and plugged in my laptop.

Grace sat on the lounge, feet tucked beneath her, watching me, like she was waiting for something. When I glanced in her direction, she spoke.

“So, are you going to tell me?”

I flipped open my notebook and leafed through the pages. “Tell you what?”

“How far you got with Mr. Gorgeous while I distracted his kid. That man is so deliciously virile, I’m a little jealous he only has eyes for you.”

My gut clenched. “Nonsense. He doesn’t, and we just talked.” I threw the notebook on the desk and walked back to the kitchen.

“Well, when I came back, you had a please-don’t-think-anything-happened-because-it-didn’t expression on your face, he had the whole smoldering thing going on and, even now, you still have cotton candy in your hair. Please tell me you at least got to first base.” She seemed as excited as a newly minted cheerleader.

I snorted and took out two cups, surreptitiously checking for candy remnants in my hair. “First base? How crass. Are you having coffee?”

“Yes, please. So, are you going to tell me?” She curled a shiny lock of black hair around a finger in a way I’d often seen men admire.

I put sugar in Grace’s cup and shoved the canister away. “In a word, no.”

“Why not?”

See, I knew this socializing thing wouldn’t work. Despite the messages of greeting card companies, family intimacy and serenity are mutually exclusive. Working in journalism I’d picked up things. Such as, you’re more likely to be beaten, raped or murdered by someone you already know. And while an interrogation into my love life wasn’t quite on a par with a torturous death, the principle was the same: familiarity leads to bad, bad things.

“Why not? Because it’s none of your business, that’s why.”

The words came out a little harsher than I’d intended and Grace flinched before lifting her chin and looking me square in the eye. “You know, Tobi, maybe you’d be happier if you’d open up once in a while.” She crossed her arms in challenge.

She’d chosen the wrong target.

“To you?” I raised an eyebrow and flashed a patronizing smile.

“Why not?”

“Because in this conversation so far you’ve used words like ‘first base’ and you expect me to not only continue this ridiculous exchange, but to extend it?”

Her eyes filled with tears and her bottom lip wavered. “Well, at least I’m making an effort.”

My stomach dropped. I hadn’t meant to make her cry. Problem was, I had no idea what to say to crying people. Me, who made my living with words. That’s why I usually avoid anyone sobbing. “Grace, I—”

“Save the sympathy, Tobi, I’m not asking for it.” She swiped roughly at the tears slipping down her cheeks. “I just want you to realize the world doesn’t revolve around you. Other people have problems too but they still make an effort. Do you think it’s easy for me to smile and laugh every day? When I’m so scared inside that sometimes I can’t breathe?” She thrust the back of her hand to her chest and the tears flowed more freely.

“Oh, God—” But she wouldn’t pause for me to say more.

“Do you think I want to get out of bed in the morning when some days all I see ahead of me is sadness and worry?” Her eyes flared despite the tears trickling from them. “But at least I’m making an effort, at least …”

She covered her face with her hands and I moved to sit awkwardly beside her on the couch, hugging her to me. I couldn’t remember hugging her before and it felt weird, but I ignored the feeling and squeezed her tighter. “Oh, Gracie, I had no idea things were this bad.”

After several minutes—or was it just one?—she raised her watery eyes to mine. Hers held no blame or anger as she spoke. “It’s okay, I didn’t tell you.”

But I was the eldest. I had a responsibility. Why wasn’t she angry at me? I’d be angry at me. Heck, I
was
angry at me and it’d be a much lighter burden to bear if she’d just join in and cast a little blame my way. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t blame yourself. If I’d tried to talk to you, or anyone, I might not have got this bad. It’s my fault.”

She rested her head on my shoulder. I couldn’t remember anyone doing that before. I was strangely pleased, yet still self-conscious. “If I’d been a better big sister in the first place, you wouldn’t have hesitated about reaching out to me. It’s my fault.”

She laughed and sat up, turning to face me. “We could go on for hours, back and forth. What’s important is we’re talking now.” She wiped the remaining tears from her face.

“Yes, and since we are … Grace what happened to us? How did things get like this?” I needed to know about her
and
me. Lord knew I had bags of hang-ups for every one of hers.

“You know, I’ve often asked myself that and I still haven’t got an answer.” She curled up tighter on the couch. “I’ve got bits and pieces of reasons, but nothing strong enough to explain it all.”

Sounded familiar. But if Grace, who considered herself qualified enough to analyze everyone after one psychology class, couldn’t figure it out, then I had no chance. She must know something else. “How long have you been feeling like this?”

“Truthfully? I don’t ever remember not feeling like this, but it’s been getting stronger since my first divorce. And then,” she bit her lip, “in the last couple of months it’s been the strongest I’ve ever felt.”

This depth of emotion from Grace was surprising when it shouldn’t have been. Of course she was only human, but I’d relegated her and our mother to plastic-emotion land in my mind. Now I’d been smacked in the face by reality, I wanted to know everything. “But
what’s
been stronger than before?”

“I’m not sure I can explain.” She looked up at the ceiling, as if for inspiration. “It’s like the world is gray and filled with sludge and unless I make a really big effort to add color and light, I’ll become gray sludge too.”

A light bulb in my mind blinked then lit with realization. “So that’s why you sometimes seem a little … dramatic. You’re over-compensating?”

She shrugged and nodded.

“And you’ve always felt like this?” I asked tentatively.

“Not this bad.” She shrugged again. “But always a little.”

“Even when you’re with Mom and living it up?” I knew I was harping, but it was a new perspective on something so familiar, and the ramifications were running round my head.

“Especially then. Look, I’m sick of talking about me, let’s change the subject.” She flashed me what I now knew to be a compensation smile.

“But this is really important, Gracie.”

“I know. But I don’t have any more answers. Anyway, you still haven’t answered my question about Mr. Gorgeous.” She sat up straighter. “What happened under the big ol’ tree? Come on, Tobi, after everything I just opened up about, the least you can do is tell me about one little thing.”

“Oh, all right.” I moved over onto a side chair and gave my hair a nonchalant flick. “He did kiss me.” If you could call that near-nuclear explosion a kiss.

Her eyes widened in anticipation. “And?”

“And nothing. He kissed me and it won’t happen again,” I said with a lack of emotion.

“I bet he didn’t say that—he was still smokin’ when I got there.” She waggled her eyebrows.

“No, I stopped it.” I brushed at the leg of my pants. Dammit, the spot was pink cotton candy. I scrubbed it with a finger. Did cotton candy come out in the wash?

“You what? Why?”

I glanced back at her and shrugged. “He’s just not right for me and—”

“
What?
Why would you throw that away? You’re hot for him!”

I opened my mouth to protest, but she held a hand and kept talking. “Don’t bother denying it, it’s written all over your face when you’re with him. You’re as interested in Simon as he is in you. Do you know how amazing that is? Men are never interested in me—”

I rolled my eyes. “You’ve got to be kidding me.” Grace had been uber-popular since her first, toothless, baby smile. She was gorgeous, sure, with long black hair like Mom, and supermodel features, but it was more than that. People always liked being around her. When we’d been kids, I was often rendered invisible purely by standing next to her.

“They’re not. Some are interested in my body or getting their photo in the paper with me or being seen with me. And since the divorces, some are even interested in my money. But I don’t remember if a man has ever just wanted
me
the way Simon seems to want you.”

“It’s not—”

She held her hand up again and continued: “If I had a kind-hearted, decent man like Simon interested in me, I sure as hell wouldn’t be throwing it away.”

Damn, it all sounded so reasonable—so obvious—when put like that. So why did the thought leave me scared spitless? “Well, I’m not you and I have my reasons.”

“What reasons?”

Good question. “They’re complicated.”

“No, you’re complicating it yourself.” She threw her hands in the air. “For goodness’ sake, Tobi, loosen up!”

There were those words again. I took a deep breath. “Not that I’m agreeing in any way, shape or form, but … what sort of thing would a less … uptight person do?”

She shrugged. “They’d seduce him.”

“Seduce him?” My breath hitched in a tangled mess of excitement and panic.

She nodded. “Seduce him.”

The panic strong-armed the excitement out of the way and took complete control of my body. “Oh, no, no, no, no. This conversation is oh-ver.”