Holding a wooden spoon dripping sugar and chocolate, she swiftly pivoted around ... and almost had a heart attack when she saw Spence in her screen doorway. Eek, she said weakly.
Even in the muzzy darkness beyond the screen, she could see his effort to control a smile. Sorry, I really didnt mean to scare you. I was just about to knockbut then I decided you looked too busy for company and maybe Id better head back home.
It took a second to gather her scattered wits...but then she grinned. Now tell the truth. My singing just terrfied you speechless, didnt it? Come in, come in. I promise Ill quit. Ill even pour you a glass of lemonade... She glanced at her hands, spattered with chocolate and flour. Well, maybe youd better pour your own lemonade.
You do look busy
I am. The brownies are for Ms. Peters class tomorrowshes Joshs second-grade teacher, and I caught wind it was her birthday. Figured it was a good idea to start the school year by buttering her up. Theres nothing more boring than making brownies by yourself, though, so I couldnt be happier to have some company. Whats up? April isnt sick, is she?
No, shes fine, sleeping like a log. Spence stepped inside. Even in casual khakis and old sandals, he made her pulse rate accelerate to zoom speed. She came home from schoolits only the second day, mind youand tells me she now knows how to read. Nothing to it.
Owen chuckled, then motioned where he could find the glasses. Theres fresh-squeezed lemonade on the first shelf in the fridge...and Aprils so bright, I wouldnt doubt she moved past Dick and Jane in the first fifteen minutes. What a darling she is.
I think so, too, but actually, I heard she poured several handfuls of sand down Jacobs shirt this afternoon. I figured Id better find out if the McKennas were in hot water at your house.
So thats why hed stopped over? Head down, she started ladling brownie batter into the baking pan. No problem. I found the sand when I threw Jacob in the bathtub tonight, but believe me, dirt and Jacob isnt any news to our septic system. And whats a little sand between friends? Apparently Jacob paid her the ultimate compliment by telling her she played as well as a boy. No offense meant to your gender, but I bopped him with a towel. I swear my two came out of the womb thinking sexist... do you want to lick the bowl?
Lick the bowl?
Gwen had long suspected that the whole world treated Spence like a hotshotbecause he was. She always meant to kowtow the same way and treat him like the intimidating business tycoon he was, only shed never mastered how to do it. Hey, its fine with me if youre too grown-up to get your hands sticky. Personally I dont think anything beats brownie batter, but
Ill take the bowl off your hands.
She chuckled. Youre gonna do me a favor, huh? But maybe this is a bad idea. Youve got a white shirt on, and Mary Margaretll skin you alive if she has to get chocolate stains out of it
Ill handle Mary Margaret. I havent had brownie batter in a dozen years.
Well, you poor baby... He hovered like a four-year-old until she had the batter poured in the pan-then promptly and greedily absconded with the bowland the wooden spoon. Sheesh, whod have dreamed this would go so easily, she mused. Last night shed been mortified at the thought of having to face him again, when obviously she only had one choice. To be herself and to act like normal.
She grabbed a soapy sponge. Something about making brownies always took out her whole kitchen. There were drips of chocolate on the pecan cupboards and a dusting of flour everywhere on the coral Formica counters. Working around Spence at the island bar, she swiped and scrubbed with the sponge. She was conscious that her feet were bare, her face as scrubbed as a kids, and hed probably been around women all day dressed in elegant business suits. Her oversize brown T-shirt and red shorts were ancient and looked itbut hed seen her look worse.
Come to think of it, hed never seen her looking anything but worse. At the moment she doubted hed notice if she were wearing red satin or gold lamé. His head was buried pretty deeply in the chocolate bowl. Good grief. Doesnt Mary Margaret ever make you brownies?
She bakes. We had a mystery pie last night. I didnt have the courage to ask what it was. Definitely not brownies, though. And definitely nothing like this. Hows your head?
My head?
No headache? I only had one experience with dark sweet rum, way back in college, but I remembered it being pretty lethal the next morning.
Shed hopedshed so earnestly prayedthat hed forgotten all about last night. Well, I woke up this morning with a fairly good head pounder. Bad enough to convince me that if I were going to take up a vice, itd be something besides alcohol. She added swiftly, lightly, I can hardly remember anything that happened last night after the first sip.
No?
Nope. Not a thing. I slept like the dead, though, thats for sure.... She finished her cleanup and perched on the kitchen stool next to him, still drying her hands on a watermelon-print towel. Not that she was in a hustle to change the subject, but the winning horse at the Derby couldnt have hustled any faster. Did you have a good day? Market some good business deals?
Had a great day. Marketed up a storm. So...did you have any time today to shop for some Victorias Secret underwear?
Beg your pardon?
Last night... He frowned, as if trying to recall her exact words. For a man whod been salivating for chocolate seconds before, suddenly he seemed to have forgotten all about the brownie bowl. You were talking about turning over a new leaf and becoming reckless. Im pretty sure you mentioned that a shopping trip to Victorias Secret was part of that agenda... whoops. Has Gwen disappeared on me?
He reached over to peek under the kitchen towel shed flopped over her head.
Nope. Shes still here, he announced gravely.
Shes hiding under the towel because shes dying of embarrassment, Gwen said dryly. I was counting on you to be a gentleman and forget everything I said last night. I never meant any of it
I thought you made all kinds of good sense.
Good sense? She pulled the towel off then, if only to see his face. She assumed he was pulling her leg, yet his expressionbewilderingly enough seemed sincere and serious. I dipped into half my supply of cooking rum for the annual rum cakes I make around the holidays. Far as I recall, I barely swallowed the first sip before I quit making any sense.
Well, I guess I came over for nothing, then, because that was exactly what I wanted to talk with you about. I thought maybe we could help each other.
Help each other? Gwen didnt mean to keep parroting him, but so farbeyond feeling eternally grateful that he hadnt brought up that blasted kissshe seemed to be having a major problem following the conversation.
Spence pushed aside the bowl and lazily propped his long legs on the opposite kitchen stool. You sounded... trapped. I understand how that feels, Gwen. My life is my daughter right nowand I dont want it any other way. But besides her and work, there doesnt seem to be any free time in a day. Single parenting is a twenty-four-hour-a-day job.
Youre not kidding, she agreed.
But even loving it, you can feel trapped. At least I do, sometimes. I imagine you feel just as buried under the same mountain of single-parent responsibilities.
I do, she agreed again, still unsure where he was leading.
Well, I dont think its selfishor weirdthat you feel like you need to break out sometimes. Maybe you were teasing about doing something reckless. But I think its a pretty human, healthy need to crave some time to yourself. And it occurred to me...
What?
He lifted a hand in a boyish gesture. It just occurred to me that were both in the same boat. Its really hard for a single parent to pull off any free time-without a fellow conspirator. Im guessing you dont hire many baby-sitters?
No.
He nodded. Me, either. Ive got Mary Margaret during the day for April, but I really hate leaving her with strangers in the evening just because I selfishly need some time off. I mean... I want to give my daughter that personal time, or at least know shes with someone who really cares about her. Strangers dont cut that mustard.
I feel exactly the same way, Gwen said honestly. I hate leaving the boys with baby-sitters. Even though Im home, Im either workingor running hardduring the day. Its not the same as real time with them, and especially because of the divorce I feel they need that time in the evenings. I just feel really selfish and guilty if I leave them.
Yeah. I understand. But I kept thinking about how our kids play together all the time, have a good time with each other, so its not like any of us are strangers. If we combined resources, it seems to me it could help us both. Which is to sayif you want an ally, Im volunteering to be one.
Well, Spence, youve got an ally right back. But I dont know exactly what youre thinking about doing....
I never had any set plan. I was just thinking... why dont we try something? He shrugged his shoulders, and then as if the idea had just popped in his head, suggested, Ive got an early workday tomorrow, should be home by four. How about if you just plan to take off, do whatever you feel like doing. Ill take the kids, do dinner, keep em busy until bedtime.
The thought of four hours freeactually freedanced in her head like a vision of sugarplums and gaily wrapped packages at Christmas. But a lot of years had passed since she believed in Santa. I cant possibly ask you to do that, she informed himand herselffirmly.
Youre not asking me to do anything. Im offering. And you can offer back the same way. Hey, if it doesnt work out for the kids in a good way, we just wont do it again. But I cant see how well know unless we try out an experimental run, do you?
No, she said hesitantly.
So were on for tomorrow? Ill pick up your boys around four?
Well...okay, I guess. As far as I know, theres no reason why that timing wouldnt work out....
Shed barely, hesitantly, agreed before Spence up and left. It was late, of course. Time for any parent of young children to be packing it in, and Spence never visited for more than a few minutes. Still, Gwen found herself at the kitchen window, hands on her hips, until he disappeared into the nights shadows.
She felt... odd. Her pulse was charging, her nerves kindling awarenessbut that was just hormone nonsense, she suspected. Even a woman in a coma would probably notice those liquid brown eyes and that slow, wicked grin of his, and the kiss last night had naturally upped her sexual awareness quotient around Spence. No man had ever made her feel wicked before.
If she hadnt been a card-carrying Good Girl for thirty years, maybe he might have affected her less potently. But shed liked that kiss. Liked that wicked, reckless feeling. Liked himsuddenly, personally, and way too much.
Still, her deplorable lack of control over her hormonal response to him didnt seem to completely explain the chugging, charging, uneasy beat in her pulse. Spence was turning into a serious friend. No one else, not even her sisters, understood how much or how long shed felt trapped. Spences perception had come as a surprise, like finding a kindred spirit, and hed been so nonjudgmental and undersranding....
Abruptly the oven timer buzzed. Swiftly Owen whisked out the brownies and set them on the rack to cool, then glanced at the clock and mentally shook her head. The boys would be raring wide awake by six-thirty. It wasnt time to think. It was time to crash. Shed be crabbier than a porcupine if she didnt catch some shut-eye.
She turned out lights, checked on her monsters, then climbed into a Miami Dolphins T-shirt and burrowed between her lemon-yellow sheets. That quickly, the whole house was dark, quiet and peaceful.
Yet she tossed. Then turned. Sleep refused to come. Those uneasy warning bells kept clanging in the back of her mind.
Spences whole plan about helping each other sounded wonderful. She craved some free time right now. She needed the space to figure out who she was and where she was going with her life. Josh and Jacob thought Spence was majorly cool, and likewise, she was crazy about his daughter. For fellow single parents to help each other was the best of all worlds, because they both shared the same concerns.
It was just that she felt ... steamrollered ... into the plan. Spence couldnt help being a dynamic, take-charge type of man. But Gwen was just coming to understand that hiding in a steamrollers shadow was exactly what she had done with Ron. It was all too easy to let a lion leadif you were a mouse. And by making a man her whole life, shed not only bored one husband straight into divorce court ... shed become boring to herself, somehow lost any concept of her own life in the process.
She needed to be careful. Infinitely careful not to fall seriously for Spence. Eventually shed look for love againafter she mastered this independence business and learned to stand up for herself. But she already knew that she was a disastrous failure with steamrollers. Spence could never possibly work for her.
Falling for him would be her worst nightmare.
Spence decided he was going to put up his feet and read the newspaperas soon as he quit pacing the floors. The kitchen clock read 8:20. He always had a full quota of energy, but hed never been a nervous man. There was no earthly reason for him to be wearing a path between the kitchen, hall and living room.
The house was quiet. Dead quiet. Mary Margaret had long gone home, and all three kids had hit the sack around eight. They were already asleep. Hed checked. Josh and Jacob were camping in the spare bedroom, and April was sawing zzs on her pink pillow. The plan, in the morning, was for him to wake up the boys in time for them to flash over to their own house to get dressed for school. The boys had loved the idea of sleeping over, and that way Gwen didnt have to fret about getting home at some exact time.
She could dance until dawn if she wanted to, Spence had told her.
Hed even meant it.
Sort of.
There was no reason to expect her home, he told himself irritably. No reason to be prowling around the house when he was whipped after a long day. He could dive into the paper or a book. Pour himself a drink. Call his younger sister. Turn on his computer and work on a new advertising program that had been biting on his mind all day.
All those ideas struck him as stupendous, but he was still pacing a road between the kitchen and living room when he finally heard a sound just before nine.