A Minute to Smile (12 page)

“Nursing,” she said when he gave her a curious glance. She held out her arms to display the plethora of herbs meticulously applied. “This should tell you why I feel such sympathy with your students. It was a statement of my disapproval of the pathological approach of modern medicine.”

With a quirk of his lips, he said, “And I’ll wager you studied herbs to the point of saturation.”

“Of course.” More seriously, she said, “I was actually a very good nursing student, as well. I was within the top ten.”

“So why aren’t you a nurse now?”

Esther licked her lips. Like a sore tooth, the subject ached when probed and she ordinarily steered clear of it. “I met my ex-husband,” she said, “in my junior year. I thought I could manage being married and going to school, but he took more time than I thought he would.” Feeling as foolish as she always did, she covered her embarrassment by rounding the table for a fresh beer of her own. As she took it out of the ice, she frowned at Alexander. “I seem to always be imbibing when I’m with you. Are you a big drinker?”

He glanced at her, eyebrows raised. “Why, I don’t know.” He lifted the dark brown bottle to his lips, and she saw that merriment was shimmering in his eyes. “What would being a ‘big drinker’ entail?”

“Guess it depends,” she said. “We are in Boulder, after all. Eating red meat is a pretty big infraction in some circles, but drinking seems to be acceptable—as long as you don’t smoke cigarettes when you do it.”

He studied her for a moment, quietly taking her measure. “I have the feeling we were talking about something else.”

She sighed, standing on the edge of her foot in discomfort. “We were talking about the mess I made of things when I got married, I think.”

“Why haven’t you gone back, Esther?”

“I don’t know.” She glanced up, seeing the stars shine over the dark shadow of the mountains. Somewhere in the herb garden, a cricket mournfully chirped. “I think it would be hard to be away from my boys as much as nursing would require me to be. And I think maybe I’ve found what I was looking for, here in the store, with all the little things that make people feel better.” She looked at him. “Here, I have all the good and none of the evil of medicine.”

He shifted, reaching toward her with one long-fingered hand. “Come sit down with me,” he said, his voice deep. In his eyes was something rich and kind.

She took his hand and settled next to him, feeling his thigh warm against her own. His cologne had faded, leaving behind the scent of the man himself, an elusive combination she couldn’t quite pinpoint—like a streambed lined with pine needles, perhaps. His hand was much larger than her own, the fingers strong and lean, with calluses on the palms that rasped against the ones she had on her own hands. For a moment, she wished fleetingly for the elegant soft hands of a lotion model instead of her working hands with their short, sensible nails.

To her surprise, he began to gently massage the tendons and small bones in her hand as he spoke. “I think, Esther, that you still feel some sorrow over that lost nursing degree.” His voice was deep in the darkness and his fingers moved over her hand, finding and releasing tiny knots of tension.

Somehow, the action dissolved her usual avoidance of the subject. She was able to respond honestly. “I loved it,” she said. “I loved everything about it—the biology and the chemistry and the patients.”

The pads of his fingers moved to her wrists and Esther found herself leaning back against the edge of the table, letting everything flow through her. “I adore my children and I wouldn’t go back to change anything, because that would mean losing them…” She trailed off, remembering the excitement of emergency room nursing, the thrill of obstetrics, the power of surgery.

“Jeremy will be in school next year,” Alexander said. “You might be able to finish then.”

“No,” she said, looking at his strong hands on hers, marveling at the gently aroused sensations they sent through her. “I have to support them,” she said, but the words came from someplace far away, not really connected to the moment. As if she were under a strange spell, she looked at him, letting her gaze wander over the high brow and strong nose, the silky beard of mahogany and silver. She raised her eyes to his lustrous, unruly curls.

He released her hands and with one finger, touched her chin. “You mustn’t let your dreams go,” he said.

A husky note in his words betrayed his lack of calm and Esther looked at him with a slow smile, pleased that she was not alone in this odd, drifting sense of arousal. She steadily looked up at him, feeling his finger trace the line of her jaw and move over her cheek. Sitting so close to him in the quiet darkness, she was aware of how much bigger he was than she, his chest and shoulders broad and sturdy, his legs longer, his head above hers.

When his hand moved to her hair, his fingers threading through it, lightly brushing her scalp, she closed her eyes. And she felt no surprise when his lips danced over her lids, whispered along her lashes, his breath sending a tiny stream of heat over her forehead, his beard tickling her cheek and nose. A shiver crawled over her spine at the lush mingling of sensations and she smiled softly. “Alexander,” she murmured, eyes still closed as he pressed his mouth to the center of her forehead, “you really are almost impossible to resist.”

He drew back, his hand trailing over her cheek before it fell away. “That is my intention,” he said with a wicked smile.

It would have been ridiculous to draw away now in fear. The last thing she felt was afraid. She let herself smile once more. “
Tsk
,
tsk
,” she said, leaning on one arm in an unconsciously provocative pose. “So much for promises.”

“You, dear lady,” he said, gripping her face between his fists, “are a temptress that would drive any sane man out of his mind. And before I am further tempted—” he dropped his hands and stood up “—I’m going to take my leave of you.”

Esther laughed, then stood up with him. “I’ll walk you around,” she said.

“No, I’ll find my way.” He inclined his head. “Thank you for a lovely evening.”

“The pleasure was mine,” she said, flexing her hands teasingly. Then, dropping the bantering tone, she said, “Really, Alexander, you were wonderful with my children tonight. Thank you.”

“I found them easy to be wonderful with. How long has Daniel been practicing his magic?”

“A long time. Abe taught him a card trick when he was about four, and he’s been obsessed ever since.” The talk of magic brought back a memory of standing in the tree, dropping the cantaloupe to the ground. “Alexander, I hope you don’t think I was too awful with Jeremy. I know it seemed dramatic—”

“You forget I was here the day he fell from the tree before.” He touched her hand lightly, then took it away. “He’s a bit of a daredevil, isn’t he?”

“That’s an understatement.” She looked at the tree, feeling a sick swoop of
what if?
“I’m terrified he’s going to get himself killed one of these days by just not paying attention. I don’t think I could stand it if something happened to either one of them.”

“You’d be surprised,” he said in a grim tone.

“No.” She looked at him. He’d lost both his mother and his wife in untimely ways and that gave him some insight into grief and loss. How could she explain the difference one felt toward a child? “It isn’t the same, Alexander,” she said finally, realizing there was no possible way to put it into words. To close the gloomy topic, she added, “Anyway, I think he got the message about the tree.”

“I’m glad.” He touched her arm. “I’ll see you Thursday.”

“The first lecture from the scary Dr. Stone. I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

“Good night, Esther.”

“Good night, Alexander,” she said, mocking his formal tone.

“Wicked wench,” he said over his shoulder.

Esther laughed throatily, watching him walk away until the night swallowed him. Even then, she stood there a long time, staring up at the sky full of stars, feeling full and warm and deliciously infatuated.

* * *

By long-standing tradition, Esther met her friend Melissa Thursday evening, a habit born when they had worked together in an herb store in downtown Boulder four years before. Esther had been newly separated, though not yet divorced. Melissa had been finishing her doctorate in library science and had recently left a man she’d failed to change in ten years. The infamous Jesse was a wanderer, and Melissa had wanted to settle down.

Tonight, Esther pushed open the glass door to a small upscale café and felt her lips twist wryly. She wondered if anyone in the place was below thirty—or over fifty.

Worse, it was recently reviewed in the
Daily Camera
who gave the nouvelle cuisine high marks, the service and wine list even better scores.

Joining Melissa at a small, exquisitely appointed table, she grinned. “We’re quickly becoming clichés, dear heart.”

“There’s no law that says you have to remain in a state of rebellion your entire life, Esther Lucas.”

“Who’s rebelling?” With a wave of her hand, she indicated the clientele. “This is—” Words failed her and she simply rolled her eyes.

Melissa grinned in acknowledgement of Esther’s unspoken commentary. But in spite of the hip-length black hair that she wore in a single braid down her back, Melissa blended right in. Exquisitely ethnic with almond black eyes, a graceful sweep of cheekbone and dark honey skin, she was fabulously thin, elegantly dressed in a batik cotton dress and simple sandals. “Okay, next time it’s pizza. Indulge me tonight. I wanted crêpes.” She stubbed out a cigarette—her own form of rebellion. “So tell me everything.”

“We haven’t even ordered,” Esther protested, feeling an unusual sense of reticence overtake her. There was little Melissa didn’t know about her, but Esther found she was unwilling to share anything having to do with Alexander. It was too new. “There isn’t much to tell, anyway.” She picked up the menu. “You start.”

“I know this game,” Melissa countered. “I’ll tell you everything and then you’ll hem and haw and tell me nothing.”

“There’s nothing to tell. I’m helping him with his class—that’s about it.”

Melissa narrowed her eyes. “There’s never anything to tell when it’s important to you.” With a teasing shake of her head, she leaned over the table. “I’m supposed to be the stoic one here, all right?”

“I forgot.” She touched her head with the tips of her fingers, then took a breath and blew it out. “He’s really scary, Melissa.”

“Scary how?”

Esther glanced at a vase on the table, a single Calla lily with statice. Critically she thought they ought to have left out the statice, then realized the thought was a dodge, a way to avoid thinking of Alexander. Because every time she called up a vision of his changeable, twinkling eyes or his boldly sculpted face or the woodwind notes of his laughter—

“I can’t breathe,” she told Melissa. “Sometimes when he’s talking to me, I just forget or something, and then I have to stop and take a long breath.” She met her friend’s gaze. “Isn’t that silly?”

“No.” Melissa touched her hand.

To cover her embarrassment, Esther lifted her water glass and took a sip. She put it back down carefully and with a finger, joined the circles of condensation on the glass. “It’s really nothing right now. We’re just friends.”

“Doesn’t sound like friendship.”

Esther looked at her. “It has to be,” she said definitely.

Melissa knew her well enough to take the hint. “Okay. Just one question.”

“What?”

“You aren’t playing Florence Nightingale, are you?” She frowned. “Abe told me a little about him.”

“No.” She fingered the cloth napkin under her silver. “I think for once I may be the one healed.”

“You look great.”

“Thanks.” Esther lifted her water glass, in which a slice of lemon floated. “What’s the word on Jesse?”

A secretive expression flitted over the shiny dark eyes. “I’d like to wait for a minute, if you don’t mind. We need a bottle of wine for that.”

“Hmm. Sounds interesting.” But she waited while the waitress took their order, talking about the boys and the store and the class.

Finally Melissa poured each of them a glass of delicately colored white zinfandel. Ceremoniously, she lifted her fluted glass toward Esther. “I would like to propose a toast to the end of a miserable, ridiculous period of my life,” she said with a rueful smile. “The famed Jesse appeared on my doorstep last night.”

Esther’s eyes widened. “Really? And what happened?”

“Nothing!” The sound of triumph that escaped her lips was very close to a chortle. “My heart didn’t go pitty-pat, my stomach didn’t flip over, my hands didn’t shake—I even invited him in and talked to him for a couple of hours.”

“Wonderful!” She touched Melissa’s glass with her own.

“No, wait. That’s not all.” She squared her shoulders. “I didn’t order him out of my life in a fit of tears, or beg him to tell me why he couldn’t settle down. I said it was good to see him and I hoped whenever he blew through town he’d stop by.”

This moment of truth had been brewing for several months—in spite of Melissa’s panicked calls to Esther from time to time, her friend had finally grown weary of waiting for a man with incurable wanderlust. “How did he take it?”

Melissa sighed. “I think he wanted to cry, but of course, men don’t do that. He told me he was sorry, and then he left.”

“Whew!” This time they toasted in earnest. “I’m proud of you, Melissa.”

“Me, too.” She bit her lip. “When I was with Abe at the concert on Friday, all we did was hold hands—but I felt more good things with him than I ever did with Jesse.”

“You went to a concert with Abe?”

Melissa nodded.

A flutter of worry passed through her belly and she swallowed a cool sip of wine. “I think we’d best not talk about what happens with you and Abe. I’ll mother both of you to death.”

Melissa touched her hand over the table. “Don’t worry, Esther.”

There was something so strong and sure in her voice that Esther nodded. “Okay.” She smiled to herself. And she’d been thinking that the great improvement in Abe’s outlook had been due to the fact that he’d been working in the store a few times a week.