Right by Her Side (12 page)

“I shouldn't have said that,” she replied, peeking up at him from beneath her lashes. “I'm not very good at this, Trent.”

“‘This'?”

She shrugged one shoulder, setting a line of little ducks printed on her scrubs to waddling. “You said you expect more consideration from your bed partners. I haven't had much experience with bed partners. Nobody since my divorce.”

He blinked. “I thought you've been divorced for a while.”

“Three years next month.”

Saliva pooled in his mouth. His convulsive swallow sent it down the wrong pipe, initiating a fit of coughing. Nurse Rebecca, of course, knew just where to whack his back, but it still took a few minutes to get his wheezing to calm down.

“You need a glass of water,” she said when he could breathe normally again. Her fingers went for the door handle.

His fingers went for her thigh. “Rebecca, we can't go back to the way things were before.”

He heard the little hitch in her breathing. “Trent, I don't know—”

“I do. I know that I can't live in that house and not have you in my arms and in my bed. It makes what we have better, don't you think?”

She stared down at his hand on her leg, as if the sight fascinated her.

It fascinated the hell out of him, because just a few inches away was the heaven he wanted to spend the rest of the night exploring. Without that damn atlas.

“What we have…?”

“A partnership. A marriage. A baby,” he answered. “We worked pretty well as a team tonight, wouldn't you say?”

She nodded. “You did well with my friends.”

“I like your friends. Several of them I already know, by the way. And you did well with my family yesterday.”

“Your sister Katie and her husband, you mean. I haven't met any of the others.”

He waved away her concerns. “They'll all feel the same way. The point, Rebecca, is that we deal well together. Out in the world. In bed.”

Beneath his hand, the muscles of her thigh twitched. “I wish you'd stop saying that,” she whispered.

“Bed?” He laughed. “Since I woke up this morning I haven't been able to get my mind out of it, how we were together in it.” And how, when he realized she'd run out on him, taking every sign that she'd been there with her, he'd begun to suspect she'd turned coward on him.

It wasn't going to last, though. Now their lives together included sex, and he for one was damn glad about it. Neither one of them would be content to go backward, no matter what she thought. They'd both be
better off; he'd prove it to her. Not to mention he was certain the people who worked for him would be happy to have a boss relieved of all the tension that had been building inside of him.

“Let's go inside,” Trent said, changing tactics.
Give her some time to get used to the idea.
Pushing her wasn't necessary. Besides, if he couldn't persuade her to his way of thinking, then he didn't deserve her in his bed. And she didn't belong there.

But she did belong there, he thought as he walked with her through the front door and then led the way toward the kitchen. His eye caught on the vase of yellow tulips on the dining-room table. Rebecca had removed the clear glass beads that usually anchored the waxy flowers in a soldierlike posture. They lazed in the glass vase now, almost lolling, looking, for the first time, natural and fresh.

Like Rebecca. The thought made his gut tighten. Struck by a sudden, new appreciation of her, he spun toward her and grabbed her shoulders. Her little “oh” of surprise gave him the perfect opening for his tongue. He thrust it inside her mouth, and the kiss that had been in his mind as something almost affectionate transformed into a hot intimacy that had him hard and aching in seconds. Lifting his head, he stared down at her red, swollen lips.

She blinked at him, her hands clutching his forearms. “What was that for?”

“Proof.”

“Proof?”

That we're about sex, sweetheart.
He didn't know
why the notion of it made his shoulders relax and that strange knot in his stomach unclench. “Hungry?” he asked, letting her go with a smile. They needed fuel for how he planned they'd spend the night ahead.

She swayed, and he grabbed her forearms again to steady her.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“I'm fine.” She tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “Did you mention food?”

“Soup and grilled cheese?” He smoothed her hair over her forehead, distracted by the way one of her soft waves clung to his fingers. “I think it's my cooking night.”

“That sounds good.” Her gaze on his face, she backed away from him. “I'll just change out of my uniform.”

He let her get as far as the bottom of the stairs before he stopped her. “Rebecca.”

She looked over. “Yes?”

“Why don't you put this on?” He tossed something at her.

On reflex she caught it. Her face flamed as she realized it was the red satin nightie. “I…you…” With further speech apparently beyond her, she shot him a look and headed up the staircase.

He laughed and turned toward the kitchen, satisfied he'd signaled his intent. Whether she came down in the negligee or not, he'd see her in his bed tonight.

“Trent?
Trent?
” It sounded as if she was calling from the top of the stairs.

He stuck his head out the kitchen door. “Yeah?”

“My clothes aren't where they should be.”

Oh, right. He'd nearly forgotten that maneuver he'd dreamed up this morning when he'd been pissed at her for leaving him without a word. Keeping his voice calm and pleasant, he called back to her. “Sure, they are. They're in your room.”

Your new room.

She was silent a moment. Then, “Trent Crosby, what did you do?”

He grinned. Okay, he was a high-handed, arrogant bastard. But he'd always considered those his good points. He heard Rebecca move away from the staircase. Still grinning, he listened to her footsteps above him, following her progress along the upstairs hallway to the master bedroom. His bedroom.

Their
bedroom, now that he'd moved all her clothes from her closet into his.

How long would it take before she came down to read him the riot act? Or would she be glad that he'd removed the decision from her hands?

“You know I'm right, baby,” he murmured, one ear still cocked for what she'd do next. “We're married, we sizzle, so what could be more natural?”

By the end of the night she'd realize she belonged in his bed.

From overhead came a loud thump. The sound of something heavy falling to the floor. Bigger than a shoe. Larger than a lamp. Not an angry noise.

But an unnatural sound.

“Rebecca?” He was calling her name, and already running, though he couldn't say exactly why his instincts were sounding a loud alarm.

“Rebecca?”
he shouted, taking the steps by threes.
“Rebecca!”

But she couldn't reply, not when she was lying slumped in the middle of the bedroom floor.

 

“We need a doctor. A specialist. A health-care professional,” Trent said, his hands gathering up Rebecca's where they lay loosely clasped on the coverlet of his bed. “We need to take you to one.”

“Trent, I
am
a health-care professional, remember? It's nothing. I fainted because I didn't eat today.”

He glared at her, then reached over for the pack of crackers she'd asked for once he'd lifted her onto the bed and she'd opened her eyes. “And why the hell is that?”

She shrugged. “It was that kind of day.”

“There will be no more days like that, do you understand? You gave me two dozen more gray hairs.”

Rebecca's hand stroked through his hair and she gave him a little smile. “You're silly. Where's this alleged gray?”

He grabbed her fingers and held her palm against his cheek. “You need to rest.”

“I need to eat.”

That got him to his feet. “Steak, baked potatoes, and lima beans are on their way. I'm going to call DeLuce's.”

“Lima beans?” She made a face. “You don't eat anything green, yet you want me to ingest lima beans? I thought you mentioned soup. That sounds perfect.”

“Sounds,” he muttered. “Don't mention sounds to me.” The sound of her dropping to the floor above him would follow him for the rest of his life, he knew. Leaning down, he tucked the covers more closely about her legs. “I'm going to get your dinner. Are you warm enough?”

“I'm fine, Mom.”

He frowned at her, her smile doing nothing to lighten his mood. “You're the mom, damn it. You should be taking better care of yourself.”

“I will,” she promised. “But tonight you're doing a pretty great job. Thanks.”

“Stay put,” he said, frowning at her again. “I'll be in the kitchen. Call if you need me.”

He ran down the stairs and into the kitchen, then opened the soup and put it to simmering on the stove. Call. The person who needed to call was him. His fingers clumsy, he punched Katie's number and listened in frustration and worry to the ringing phone.
What should I do for her?
he practiced saying in his head.

What should I do for me?
That was what he wanted to ask, too. He was supposed to be having sex with his wife, not brooding over her. Not worrying about her. Not caring so much about her.

Katie's answering machine clicked on and he slammed down the phone. He couldn't call his other pregnancy expert, his littlest sister, Ivy, because the
time difference meant she'd be asleep now. So would her baby, he thought, and Ivy would give him a verbal lashing if he woke the child. Stirring the soup, he tried talking himself into a better frame of mind.

Rebecca fainted. She's fine. She's mine.

The last thought scared the hell out of him, so he took his mind out of his heart and tried putting it into the gutter.
She's mine, all right. Think of the red satin nightie.
Not tonight, but soon, soon he'd see her wearing it.

But even that didn't conjure up any comforting images. Instead he could only picture her curled up on his floor in that goofy duck-wear. His valentine crumpled on the floor.

His.

She's mine.

He grabbed the phone, desperate for help. Punching out the familiar number, he didn't even try to plan ahead of time what he would say. When the familiar voice answered, he blurted out the first thing that came into his head. “My wife fainted and I don't know what to do.”

There was a long silence. “This isn't the tyrannical troll that lives in the next office, is it?”

“Claudine, it's me. Trent. I—”

I'm not comfortable with this. I don't want to feel this way.

“Claudine, I need help. Please.”

A
fter a steaming bowl of minestrone soup, Trent brought Rebecca a woman. More specifically, a woman who looked familiar.

“This is my secretary,” he said, ushering her into the bedroom. “Claudine.”

Short and squarely built, Claudine had a head of thick silver hair that contrasted with her black eyebrows and dark eyes. The eyes crinkled at the corners when she smiled at Rebecca, shoving Trent out of the way at the same time. “I'm your
assistant.
We're supposed to remember that, aren't we?”

He shook his head, watching Claudine bustle forward. “We will remember that when you stop calling me, we.”

Without looking at him, she waved him off. “Go away. Find something useful to do.”

He scowled, retreating to the doorway. “Nag.”

“Donkey.”

“Witch.”

“Donkey's hindquarters.”

Despite the insults traded, Rebecca could see, with a strange glee, Trent still hovered. “Claudine, are you sure…?”

His assistant's voice and expression softened. “Go. Take a drive or something. We'll be fine here.”

She didn't have to ask him again. Trent disappeared.

Once alone with the other woman, Rebecca wasn't sure what to say, however. “I'm sorry that he called and asked you to come. I told him I was fine.”

Claudine perched on the edge of the bed. “He panicked, that's all.”

“Trent, panic?” It didn't seem conceivable that the big, bad businessman could ever lose his cool. “He doesn't look panicked to me.”

“Learned that iron control from his father. But he can't fool me. I've worked with him for almost a decade and I worked with Jack Crosby before that.”

Rebecca shook her head. “If you say so. But I still don't know why he had to drag you over here.”

Claudine smiled once more, those dark eyes of hers twinkling. “I didn't mind getting a chance to see you again, this time as Trent's bride.”

“Oh, well, about that…” Each time she had to pre
sent herself as his wife, it was getting harder, not easier to pull off. “We, uh, we…”

Get it together, Rebecca.

“We have a lot in common.”
Lie. They had one thing in common, and that was their avowed pessimism about love.

Claudine nodded as if what Rebecca had said aloud made some kind of sense. “He tells me you're pregnant.”

“Oh!” Another wave of awkwardness flooded over her. She'd just tried to pull off the happily married-couple thing when all along Trent's assistant knew the truth. “Well, I…we…”

Claudine leaned over to pat her hand. “I came of age in the sixties, Rebecca. I've heard of premarital sex.”

Maybe Trent's assistant
didn't
know the truth. “I'm just a couple of months along.”

“And that can be the hardest time of all in a pregnancy,” Claudine asserted. “You're tired. You're hungry. You're not hungry. You're still tired. And though you don't
look
any different, you're starting to feel very, very different.”

Rebecca relaxed against the pillows. “I take it you're a mother?”

“Four boys. Men now. But you don't forget how it is to be pregnant, especially that first time. It can be frightening, like finding yourself on a train that not only never slows down, but has no stops, either.”

“Yes,” Rebecca said, smiling. “I feel that way, not just about the pregnancy, but about…” Her voice trailed away as she realized what she was about to say.

“About the marriage?” Claudine prompted. “That's
natural, too. I'd known my husband all my life, but I remember looking at him across the table on the second day of our honeymoon and thinking he was a stranger. A complete, total stranger. I wanted to run home to my mother.”

Rebecca laughed. “And did you?”

Claudine shook her head. “My head might have seen a stranger but my heart still knew who he was.”

My heart knew who he was.
The words echoed inside of Rebecca. She didn't want her heart involved in her marriage. She didn't.

“That's why Trent called me, you know.”

Rebecca blinked. “What?”

“He thought you might be missing your mother right about now. He said she'd passed away, but he hoped that another woman, an older one, might be able to give you some comfort.”

The corners of Rebecca's eyes stung. “He did? He said that?” Her nose was tingling and she had to rub it. “That's so sweet.”

“I thought so myself,” Claudine said. “I also thought it was testament to his feelings for you. This is a man who lives and breathes his business, but he's been coming up for air, real air, since he married you.”

Yes, but Trent doesn't have any feelings for me,
Rebecca thought. At least not the warm, fuzzy kind. But she couldn't say that, of course. Her eyes stung again. “He's going to be a good father.”

Claudine nodded. “He is. He takes his responsibilities very seriously. Even some responsibilities that aren't his.”

“Robbie Logan,” Rebecca murmured. “And his brother Danny's little boy.”

The other woman nodded again. “There are so many who see Trent as heartless, while I think it's that big heart of his that he's always desperate to keep well-protected.”

Even though she doubted the assertion, Rebecca was mortified to feel a tear roll down her cheek. “Hormones,” she said, laughing as she wiped it away.

Then Trent was in the doorway again, a brown paper bag in his arms. “Damn it, Claudine. I didn't bring you over here to make my wife cry.”

The older woman smiled at Rebecca but didn't let a beat go by. “It's because I just told her the amount of my measly salary, you ungrateful tightwad.” She got to her feet. “Now it's time for me to go home and search the want ads for a second job so I can keep up with inflation.”

“I heard the Portland Playhouse is holding auditions for
The Wizard of Oz
. You could try out for the Wicked Witch of the West.”

She sailed toward him, her chin high. “Cad.”

“Shrew.”

“Brute.”

“Crone.”

She smiled as she past him. “Malefactor.”

Trent froze. “Okay, fine,” he said, his voice sulky. “That point's yours.”

Claudine sent Rebecca a triumphant look over her shoulder. “They always are. Good night, Rebecca!”

With her pulse racing and her stomach feeling as if she was on a long elevator fall, it was all Rebecca could do to give a little wave. Then, clasping her hands tightly together, she paid careful attention to Trent, who sat himself down on the other side of the bed.

Don't give yourself away,
she thought as she watched him rummaging in his bag. His short hair was a bit mussed, as if he'd scraped his hands through its earlier perfect order.

He tossed a couple of magazines on her lap. “I didn't know if you were a
Cosmo
or a
Vogue
girl, so I got them both.”

Her throat was too dry to thank him. He didn't know if she was a
Cosmo
or a
Vogue
girl. But it didn't seem to matter, because she was dizzy with this terrible thing that was happening to her.

Out of Trent's bag came two pints of Ben & Jerry's ice cream. “Phish Phood for you, Chubby Hubby for me.”

She managed to find her voice. Maybe she could will this moment into normalcy, maybe she could will away this horrible, calamitous, dangerous disaster that was happening to her. “What if
I
want the Chubby Hubby?”

He grinned at her. “Then you'll have him, if I eat many pints of this stuff.”

It wasn't going away. She couldn't will it away.

He set the ice cream aside and then he swung his long legs onto the bed. Reaching behind him, he adjusted the pillows so that he was propped up beside her. Rebecca breathed in, smelling Trent's lime-soap scent, the June evening air, a whiff of mingled perfumes
from the inserts in the magazines on her lap. They filled her head like the notes of a song and she knew it was music she'd never forget.

The bag rattled as Trent slid his hand inside again. “I thought we could have some fun with this tonight.” He held up a book.
Baby Names: The Good, the Bad and the Out-and-Out Ugly.

And if she hadn't already fallen, that would have shoved her over. Why? Because the attractive, intense man who'd driven her home earlier tonight had had sex on his mind. But now, the tender protector who was stretched out beside her was willing to spend the evening with her playing Name that Baby.

But the fact was she already
had
fallen. Sometime between the minestrone and the music sounding in her head. Maybe when she'd found out he'd wanted to give her a mother in the guise of his assistant. But, no. “It was the malefactor that did it,” she murmured.

He frowned. “What?”

That look on his face when Claudine had bested him. Crestfallen, little-boy sulky, yet still man enough to acknowledge some other winner. Maybe it was silly. Maybe it was a secret she'd always keep. Maybe she'd never be able to tell her grandchildren the moment she'd fallen in love with their grandfather.

But that was it.

 

“I want to know when I'm going to meet this wife of yours,” Trent's mother said. “Why didn't you bring her to dinner tonight?”

“Because she had a long day at work and I thought she'd rather stay home and rest.” Not that he'd asked Rebecca. He'd told her he had a business dinner and that he'd be home late. All his dinners with his mother ran late, because it took hours to get her complaints out of her system.

“Maybe I should call her and have her meet me for lunch at the country club.”

Trent didn't look up from his prime rib. If he showed alarm, then his mother would make sure she did that very thing. “I'd rather you wouldn't, Mom,” he said in a mild tone.

“Are you ashamed of me?” Sheila demanded.

“Of course not.” He lifted his gaze, taking in the beauty that a plastic surgeon was paid a fortune to preserve. Injections vanquished the lines of discontent on her face. Creams softened her skin and bleached away the marks of age. Her neck was as smooth as the blade of a scalpel. Shame wasn't the emotion his mother brought out in him.

“Are you ashamed of Rachel, then?”

“Rebecca,” Trent corrected with an inward shake of his head. “Her name is Rebecca, and I'm not ashamed of her, either.”

“But a
nurse,
Trent. Couldn't you have found yourself someone more…stylish?”

“Maybe you could do something about that for me, Mom. Talk to the administrators at the hospital and see if they can bring on board Stella McCartney to design the scrubs the staff wear.”

“Scrubs.” Nose wrinkling, his mother lifted her wineglass and took a sip of the triple-digit bottle of pinot grigio she'd ordered because he'd be paying for it. “That very word makes my point.”

Trent mentally tightened the armor he donned before any encounter with his mother and let the asinine comment run off his back. Katie had questioned him about why he put himself through these meetings with their mother, but she didn't understand.

First, she
was
their mother. As the oldest, the oldest son, he couldn't shake off the sense of duty that he felt toward her.

Second, she'd found out about his marriage. Flown from her home in Palm Springs, or so she said, just to offer her congratulations. If he hadn't agreed to have dinner with her, her curiosity would have led her to contact Rebecca for sure. This way, he hoped to put his mother off that idea. Sheila wasn't really interested in Trent's wife, only in how his marriage would affect her.

If he continued his duty dinners when necessary, then he hoped she'd otherwise stay out of his life.

His mother took another sip from her glass. “I always liked your first wife, Mara. What happened?”

“Mara left me, Mom, remember?”

“That's right.” She nodded. “Because you didn't have time for her. Too wrapped up in the business, just like your-father-the-bastard.”

And last but not least, Trent had to admit that he'd agreed to this dinner in order to remind himself what his mother was like, what Mara was like, what women
could be like. What could happen when you made the mistake of exposing your underbelly to the female half of the world.

He was a pessimist. So sue him.

“By the way, how
is
your-father-the bastard and that bimbo he married?”

“Dad's well, Mom, and Toni, too. I'll tell them you asked.” Trent forced himself to cut another bite of his meal, put it in his mouth and chew.

“Don't you do any such thing, Trent Crosby. I wouldn't care if that man was going in for a quadruple bypass tomorrow, not after the way he's treated me!”

“Boy, it's sure great to see you, Mom,” Trent said, picking up his glass and toasting her. “It's as if no time has passed at all.”

She narrowed her eyes. Sheila was selfish but not stupid. “Don't take that tone of voice with me, Trent. Danny is bad enough.”

Trent froze, then carefully set down his knife and fork. “You've been talking to Danny?” His little brother didn't need any more grief in his life. “I wish you wouldn't, Mom.”

She speared a bite of her squab. “You wish I wouldn't meet your new wife, and you wish I wouldn't talk to your brother. My very own son! You don't always get what you wish for, Trent.”

“Don't I know it,” he muttered. He lifted his water glass and tried to swallow back the headache that was beginning to drum at the back of his neck. If he could get what he wished for, his mother would be tucked
away in Palm Springs and he would be tucked away in his house with Rebecca—in bed. But since she'd fainted the week before, he'd kept his distance. He stayed at work late, coming home long after she was asleep—in his room. He told her he'd been sleeping in the guest bed so that he wouldn't disturb her.