The Unsung Hero (7 page)
Swearing like a sailor, she stomped away, only to stop several feet away and light yet another cigarette.
Completely intrigued, all thoughts of a good night’s sleep forgotten, David shifted the strap of his pack higher on his shoulder and followed her deeper into the carnival grounds.
Kelly was sitting in the backyard, on the tree swing, when the lights went on in Joe’s cottage.
Tom was home.
Joe and Charles were still out at their weekly card game. Charles had awakened and had actually come into the kitchen at dinnertime, leaning heavily on the metal walker Kelly had put in his room for him.
She’d been preparing him a tray when he’d appeared. Chicken broth, a salad she knew he wouldn’t touch, a power shake, and an array of his favorite, enticing desserts. He didn’t say a word about the walker, and she clamped her mouth tightly shut and didn’t mention it either.
He’d simply taken a few obligatory sips of the power shake she’d made him. Then he’d headed out toward the driveway, mumbling about the card game, grumbling something about how someone had to keep track of Joe, make sure he didn’t go shooting off his damn fool mouth.
Kelly had seen no point in trying to talk Charles out of leaving. Even if lying at home in bed would extend his life by a minute fraction, at this point an extra week of staring at his bedroom ceiling didn’t seem worth it. The man was going to die. He might as well do exactly what he wanted for as long as he possibly could.
As if Kelly could ever talk her father out of doing exactly what he wanted.
Besides, she had her pager on, and Joe had her number.
They’d left in the station wagon, and Tom had gone with them, getting a ride to his sister Angela’s house.
Tom.
Kelly gazed at the lights blazing from the windows of Joe’s cottage—lights Tom had turned on.
What was it about Tom Paoletti that got under her skin?
Just seeing him today had done something to her. It had woken her up, brought her back to life. The evening air smelled sweeter, the sounds of the crickets louder, brighter. The stars that were starting to twinkle through the hazy clouds overhead seemed close enough to reach out and touch.
Kelly had to laugh at the sheer poetry of it all—particularly since everything she was feeling could be traced to one extremely basic and base need.
Sex.
Fifteen minutes alone in a room with Tom Paoletti, and she couldn’t keep herself from thinking about sex. One small smile from the man, and she was fifteen years old all over again, discovering the true meaning of the word lust as she sneaked a peek at his incredible body while he worked in the yard.
But the man had the power to move her in a way that was more than merely sexual. Just this afternoon, as she’d watched from the kitchen window, he’d greeted his great-uncle out on the driveway with an unabashedly unembarrassed embrace. The two men, young and old, had held each other tightly for a good long time.
Maybe it was their Italian heritage that set them apart from the cold-as-ice Ashtons, but Kelly couldn’t remember ever seeing her father wrap his arms around anyone—male or female—in such a public and emotional display of affection.
Worst of all, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d greeted someone with a warm embrace. Even when she was married, she hadn’t hugged or kissed Gary in public. Even in private, unless they were in bed, he’d been aloof. He’d been a lot like her father—filled with chilly Beacon Hill propriety.
The lights went on in an upstairs window of the cottage, in the room that had been Tom’s throughout his years of high school. Kelly well knew which windows were his. She’d spent most of those same years fascinated by him—that grandnephew of Joe’s who came to live with him because he couldn’t get along with his stepfather and because his mother couldn’t control him. That wild Paoletti kid with his hair down his back and his penchant for getting all the teachers and administrators in school steaming mad at him. Kelly had been aware of his presence in Joe’s little house down by the gate with every fiber of her being.
She looked up into the tree branches above her, at the tree house Joe had built with her the summer she’d turned ten. She’d spent many an evening up in her hideaway, dreaming about Tom Paoletti.
And the fact that from her tree house she had an unobstructed view into Tom’s bedroom window had certainly helped solidify those fantasies. She’d seen Tom in only his underwear more times than he could imagine. And yes, once or twice she’d even seen him naked, too.
Kelly looked into the tree again. She hadn’t gone up there in years. But she didn’t need to climb a tree to know that Tom would still look beyond hot without a stitch of clothing on.
Tom Paoletti.
She could remember the magical day she’d spent with him the summer after freshman year as if it were yesterday. The day—and the night. Through the years, she’d followed the news Joe had shared with her about Tom. And yeah, maybe she’d paid particular attention to the fact that he’d never gotten married, that he’d never even so much as brought a woman home with him, that he always described all his many brief relationships to Joe as “nothing special.”
He was, after all, Tom Paoletti. And as nice and kind as he’d once been to her, as many medals and honors and awards he won in the Navy, he still had a wild streak that ran deep.
Back in high school, she’d seen him out along the road by the beach more times than she could count, racing past on his Harley, the wind whipping his hair out behind him. She wanted to feel that exhilaration, taste that kind of speed. She wanted to fly like that with him.
She’d ridden on the back of his motorcycle just once. And she’d all but begged him to take her flying along that beach road. But he’d just laughed and kept his speed well beneath the posted limit.
Almost seventeen years had passed since then. And Kelly still wanted to fly with him.
She had to smile at the tackiness of that particular euphemism. Tom was home for thirty days—which would be just long enough for a perfect summer fling. At least she thought it would be. She didn’t have a whole lot of experience in that area.
She’d never spent time with a man for purely selfish reasons. Every relationship she’d ever had had been fraught with meaning and potential, and damn near quivering with importance. Just once, just once, she wanted to be with someone who didn’t give a damn about the fact that she’d graduated from Harvard Medical School at the top of her class. Just once she wanted to date a man without wondering how that growing relationship would further his—or her—medical career. Just once she wanted to be with someone a little wild, a little crazy, a little rough. Someone who wasn’t afraid of adrenaline rushes. Someone who would soul-kiss her on the beach and not give a damn who was watching. Someone who liked going dangerously fast. Someone like Tom Paoletti.
Someone exactly like Tom Paoletti.
Life was too short. Kelly was more aware of that now than ever, with her father’s impending death looming over them. She needed to make some changes, take some chances with her own life.
And what better place to start than with Tom Paoletti?
She wanted comforting arms to hold her when the night got a little too long and dark. But she didn’t want long term or heavy or complicated. She wanted simple, friendly sex, the likes of which she knew Tom could give her.
The fact that Tom was leaving in thirty days was a good thing. It set an end date to the affair—a boundary that would remind her constantly that she couldn’t let herself love him more than just a little. She liked the idea of going in with her eyes wide open, with the relationship—and its ending—clearly defined right from the start.
And as for Tom, he’d probably jump at the chance for a no-strings, short-term fling. She knew he was attracted to her. At least, she thought he was attracted to her. Except for the fact that he’d turned her down before . . .
But that was then, this was now. And the new, bold, chance-taking Kelly Ashton was going to take hold of this opportunity with both hands.
She’d ask him out. To dinner. Just the two of them.
The worst that could happen was he could turn her down, right?
Oh, God, what would she do if he turned her down?
But guys did this all the time. They asked women out, facing the uncertainty and potential rejection.
How hard could it be?
Kelly headed back inside, knowing that if she were a man, she’d be turning out the light in her monk’s cell in the monastery right about now.
Would she get the nerve to ask him? She didn’t know.
The only thing she knew for certain was that this was going to be a summer she was going to remember for the rest of her life.
________________________________________
Four
TOM SHOWERED AND turned on ESPN in an attempt to rid himself of his relentless headache. He was reaching into the refrigerator for a beer when he heard voices out on the driveway.
Joe and Charles were back.
It was earlier than Tom had expected. In the past, their card games had been notorious for going on late into the night.
Of course, in the past, Charles hadn’t been dying of cancer.
“Have I ever asked you for anything?” he was saying angrily now, his voice reedy and thin, cutting through the quiet of the night. “Have I?”
Joe’s voice was softer, but no less intense. “Yes! All those years I kept silent . . . ? You think I wanted that medal that’s up in the attic? You think I don’t think about her every time I walk past that attic door?”
Holy shit. Charles and Joe were arguing. Joe, who barely spoke in anything longer than a monosyllable, who never lost his temper, was spitting mad and speaking in paragraphs.
Tom put his beer down on the kitchen counter and pushed open the screen door, stepping out onto the back steps. The outside air was heavy with humidity, and he had to grip the railing as a wave of dizziness hit him. Dammit, when was this going to let up?
The two old men still sat in Joe’s car, but the windows were open wide and their voices carried.
“Maybe you think I’m like you—that I’ve forgotten,” Joe continued hotly. “Well, I haven’t! I don’t take a single breath without remembering!”
Charles looked apoplectic. His face was red and he was shaking with rage. “How dare you suggest I—”
“It’s time,” Joe shouted over him. “Jenny’s gone—the truth can’t hurt her anymore. But you’re the one who’s afraid of that truth, aren’t you? It never really had anything to do with your wife.”
Charles started to cough, a dry, racking hack that shook his body. “Damn you,” he rasped between coughs. “God damn you! I want you out of here! You’re fired, you son of a bitch!”
“Hey, hey, guys . . .” As Tom moved toward the car, he realized that Kelly had come out of the main house. She approached from the other side, wheeling some kind of tank behind her. Oxygen.
“Stop this!” she said sharply. “Right this minute! Both of you!”
Joe got out of the car, slamming the door shut. “You can’t fire me, you pompous, selfish bastard, because I quit!”
“Whoa,” Tom said, blocking Joe’s path to the cottage. “Everyone take a deep breath and count to ten. Let’s rewind that last bit. I know you both didn’t mean any of it. Let’s just calm it down a little, okay?”
Kelly gave some kind of inhaler to her father. After he took a hit of the medicine, she helped affix a face mask to him, adjusting the tank, trying to make it easier for the old man to breathe. As his breathing grew less labored, she looked at Tom over the top of the car, shaking her head slightly, her eyes wide. This was as much a mystery to her as it was to him.
Her eyes widened even farther as she saw him standing there in—oh, damn—only his boxers.
She’d changed, too—into a pair of running shorts and a sports bra, sneakers on her feet. From the sheen of perspiration on her skin, it was obvious that she’d been interrupted in the middle of a workout.
He tried not to look at her trim, lithe body, but all that smooth skin was distracting as hell. Of course, he was one to talk, half naked as he was. But with Charles having some kind of attack and Joe quivering with anger, this wasn’t the best time to go inside to find himself a pair of shorts and a T-shirt.
“What’s this about?” he asked, shifting slightly left so that Joe couldn’t go around him and escape into the house.
Charles yanked the mask away from his face. “Seven, eight, nine, ten,” he rasped. “You’re still fired!”
“Dad!” Kelly said in exasperation as he started coughing again. She put the mask back on him, rolling her eyes at Tom.
He turned to his uncle, bracing himself against the side of the car as another wave of dizziness hit him. Shit. All this circus sideshow needed was for him to hit the deck face first. “What’s going on?”
Charles pulled his mask off again. “You want to know what’s going on? I’ll tell you what’s going on. Judas here has agreed to give an interview with some stupid fool who’s writing some stupid book about the Fighting Fifty-fifth.” He started coughing again and when Kelly reached for his mask, he pulled it away from her with a quelling look, putting it up over his mouth and nose himself.
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