Crossing the Lines (3 page)

He took her hand and helped her to her feet.

“Thank you for your assistance with Jay, my dear.” His chaste kiss mimicked the sort she’d gotten from her grandmother. “Shall I walk you to your door?”

Done. Gone. His vulnerability hidden away, maybe for good. The rejection squeezed her lungs. He was still in pain and struggling to cope. He had to be. “I could stay a while—”

“No.” He lifted his chin. His chest broadened as he inhaled. “You’ll go to bed and be well-rested.” Glancing at the antique wall clock, he shook his head. “Partially rested. I shouldn’t have kept you so late.”

The clock hands neared one in the morning, but tired didn’t describe the ache in her bones. “It wasn’t any trouble, Henry.” She felt adrift. Inadequate. “I’m glad I could help. If there’s anything…you’ll let me know?” Unable to identify what he needed or how to offer it. Jay, safe and healthy, probably. If she stopped delaying him, he could go to bed with his lover. “Or I could stop by tomorrow. Whatever you and Jay need.”

He’d been steering her toward the door, and he pulled it open now. “It’s fine, Alice. Your friendship is much appreciated.”

She mumbled something, an acknowledgement, a denial—she wasn’t sure, and it didn’t matter. The door closed behind her. The empty hallway chilled her. No radiator. No Henry.

She’d let things go wrong somewhere, but the catalyst eluded her. A failed trial, and Henry would keep watch at Jay’s bedside alone.

Sleep, when it found her, offered little rest at all, and she walked through Thursday like a zombie.

2

“Your weekends with us are intended to be about you and your needs, my dear. My attention this evening would, I’m afraid, be unduly focused on Jay’s needs. You are not obligated to spend that time—”

“Wait.” She almost never interrupted Henry. Damn straight he wouldn’t skip out over the phone on a Friday afternoon. She’d tried that maneuver. Once. He hadn’t let her get away with it. Fuck if she’d let him get away with it, either. Not when he always pushed her so hard to share her needs with him. “What if I feel I need to help care for Jay?”

A nosy Nellie strolled past the corner of her desk.

She lowered her voice. “It’s supposed to be my time, right? So if I want to help…”

His silence sent a prickle down her spine. Surprising him would be okay. Offending him, not so much. If she only ranked as an occasional playmate, he might tell her to stay out of their relationship.

No. He’d welcomed her assistance on Wednesday at first. The sexual benefits might be segregated, but the friendship endured.

“
Do
you feel that way, my dear?” The curious note in his voice defied interpretation.

“He’s my friend. I care about him.” If Henry felt awkward about saying yes now, then he thought her needs conflicted with Jay’s. That he couldn’t balance them as he usually did. “You haven’t had a break since he got hurt. Why not let me take care of you both for the night?”

“Would that please you, Alice?”

“Yes.” Hell yes, and yes again, no hesitation.

“You’re quite certain?”

Disbelief. How insulting. “Of course I am. Why wouldn’t it please me?” She hunched over her desk with her cellphone and whispered. “You tell me what you want done, and I’ll do it. How’s that different from our regular Fridays or not focused on my needs?”

Her heart battered her ribs. The hum of the office lights swelled like a discordant soundtrack for her life.

“Very well. We will see you at the usual time despite the unusual circumstances.”

* * * *

She wasn’t at all certain what to expect when she knocked Friday at seven.

Henry had left a note on her door. Following his terse instructions, she’d dressed in casual clothes as she had Wednesday, yoga pants and a worn henley, and forgone eating dinner. As though she’d curl up at home with a frozen meal for one and watch mindless videos. Fridays were Henry’s time. If that’s what he told her to do, that’s what she’d do.

Henry answered the door. Him performing Jay’s usual task with Jay at home struck her like a hammer. Jay couldn’t perform those tasks, because he could’ve been dead or comatose instead of hobbled.

The beaming smile she meant to offer him faltered.

He gave none in return, his face a flat mask. “Good evening, Alice.” He ushered her in, and she slipped off her shoes. “Jay is resting on the couch. Go and sit beside him, please. I’ve placed a pillow on the floor for you.”

On the floor. She’d been demoted. “Yes, Henry.”

Henry’s agitation didn’t manifest in fidgeting the way Jay’s often did, but his tension bled into the air. Distracted and stressed after two full days of caretaking. He’d warned her she wouldn’t get all of his attention, and she’d signed up for it anyway.

She settled into the floor pillow’s cushy depths in the waiting pose Jay favored, her legs curled beneath her. Close to, but not crowding, him in his half-propped perch at one end of the couch.

The television emitted brightness and low chatter behind her. The heavy, rich scent of meat and potatoes flowed from Henry’s post in the kitchen. Homey. Comforting.

Henry called to them. “Jay, you may give Alice your greetings now.”

Grinning like a fool, Jay reached for her. “C’mere, Alice! He’s been promising for hours you were gonna come visit. It seemed like forever.”

Pain-med euphoria. Must be.

She raised up on her knees and leaned in, searching for safe places to touch. The swelling of his nose didn’t seem too terrible, but the bruising across his eyes spread broad and deep. The map of his bruised body from Wednesday pressed at her, a mental inventory impossible to shove aside.

Even awkward and one-armed, Jay hugged her tight. Tape and gauze rasped against her shirt. When his grip loosened, he fumbled for her lips. His painkiller-delayed coordination and her surprise merged in awkward harmony. Muscles readied for Henry’s voice, for a command that never came.

Once Jay aligned their mouths, he kissed her like a lover he hadn’t seen in months. His desperate, hungry kiss conveyed passion and affection.

She tried not to bump his nose.

“I missed you,” he said after he let her lips go.

She didn’t doubt his word, even though they’d already spent more time together than they did in a normal week.

“I’m glad you’re back.” He had to be stoned. Sure, Jay was an open, happy sort of guy, but not that open. Henry must’ve given him relaxed boundaries because of his medication.

His right arm, splinted in its brace, lay across his stomach. His legs extended sideways down the couch, leaving the thinnest space beyond his feet in their thick socks.

“I missed you, too,” she said, because it seemed the right thing to say and it wasn’t a lie. “I was worried about you.”

“You helped. The other night. I remember.” He planted a smacking kiss on her cheek, the sort a child might bestow. In his t-shirt and sweats, he resembled one who’d stayed home from school. “Henry says it’s okay if I thank you.” He kissed her other cheek. “Thank you, Alice.”

Jay. Making her eyes itch. So goddamn sweet, and a fucking truck could’ve killed him. “It was my pleasure, Jay.”

He nodded, a serious expression overtaking his face. “Henry’s in charge of your pleasure. That’s how you know it’ll be good.”

Amusement tingled in her mouth. No laughing. Not at the earnest sincerity proving Henry and sex never left Jay’s mind. Five bucks said he’d skipped undershorts today. “That’s true. He has a gift.”

“Oh! But I have a gift for you. Wait—” He struggled to turn. “Henry, can Alice open her present now?”

“I don’t see why not.” He’d paused his work in the kitchen to watch them, it seemed. “We’ve time yet before dinner.”

Jay settled back against his pillows. “It’s in my bedroom, on the dresser. It has your name on it. I picked it out special for you.”

Leave without Henry’s permission and root around in Jay’s private room. Yeah, right.

“Go ahead, Alice.” Henry answered before she’d gotten a question out. “You know which room is Jay’s.”

She walked down the hall to the second door on the right. The first, always closed, hid Henry’s studio. The next stood half-open. Slipping inside, she sidestepped the messenger pack threatening to trip her.

Neat, organized Henry permitted Jay to keep things as haphazardly as a teenage boy. Impossible. The unmade bed and clothes strewn about demanded she believe. Half a bike stood upside down in the far corner with a bare rim and tools spread nearby.

Dresser. Sure. Probably the clothing-draped lump on her left.

She picked her way across the floor to the lump. Nothing labeled
Alice
jumped out.

The door swung farther open, and Henry stepped inside. “Jay isn’t the most organized. Do you need assistance, Alice?”

The pile atop the dresser and the biking gear tossed on the bed ignored her vigorous gestures. “How does he live like this?”

“He doesn’t, generally.” Henry crossed to her side and pulled things off the dresser. “It’s the one place where he knows he needn’t answer to me. Consequently, you’ll almost never find him here.”

“He doesn’t like that kind of freedom.” She tested the hypothesis in her mind, fitting the idea into her Jay-puzzle. “Knowing you’re in charge comforts him.”

The feeling wasn’t so different for her. Sometimes, at least.

“Mmm. You’re alike in that way, you and Jay. But he needs it more than you do, I think.” He paused, gaze flicking toward her. “You find it more difficult to admit to or allow what you need. Ah. Here we are.”

He lifted a brown paper bag with her name scrawled in black marker. No shiny paper, no bow. No wonder she hadn’t spotted the gift.

“Not to worry, it’s neither alive nor edible. I did make certain he’d selected an innocuous object. Nothing you’ll find disgusting, shocking, or offensive, I trust. But Jay was rather secretive on the subject.” Henry gestured her out of the room in front of him.

“You let him get away with that?” she teased. He’d relaxed since she arrived, and he hadn’t made any sexual overtures. His behavior said friend, not dominant.

“He was uniformly cranky yesterday.” Henry had a gift for understatement. If he thought Jay’d been cranky, the day must’ve been awful.

“I may have suggested he think on how he might thank you for your assistance Wednesday. He happily informed me this morning he had just the thing and did not require my help in acquiring it. Thinking about you proved a suitable distraction from his injuries. I wasn’t inclined to question him.”

Wow. He’d proffered a fuller answer than she’d expected, especially on a contract night. He wasn’t obligated to explain himself to her.

Maybe he’d forgiven her for whatever she’d done Wednesday night to make him tired of dealing with her. Pushing for an emotional bond outside a contract night and making him uncomfortable. Trying to force him to accept comfort. Tonight would be different. Contract time. She’d comfort and relax him with her body once they’d taken care of Jay.

She settled back on her pillow with a greater certainty the night would go well. Whatever Henry had planned, she’d be allowed to take care of them both. She had a purpose, a function, in the mechanism of their relationship.

Henry handed the lunch bag to Jay. “Here you are, my boy. This is what you picked out for Alice this morning?”

Grinning, Jay nodded. “That’s it. Alice, you have to open it now, okay? You’re gonna love it.”

His enthusiasm, drug-induced or not, infected her. He pushed the bag into her hands, and she slid a finger under the tape holding it closed. “I’m opening it. Gimme a minute here. It has an expert wrapping job.”

“I did it myself. Henry didn’t help at all. It’s
my
thank-you. I bet Henry will give you something else. But it won’t be as good as mine.”

Lifting out a pair of binoculars, she pinned her perplexed smile in place. Jay’s pharmaceutical cocktail must’ve skewed his estimation of a good gift. “They’re nice, Jay. I, umm, haven’t really used binoculars before.”

Not really. Or at all. Maybe he wanted them to catch a baseball game at Fenway?