Clay (12 page)

A
rty didn’t stay for breakfast. He was nervous about Beulah, he said; she’d filled her nest full of eggs and was likely to take a leg off anybody who came too close to it. Janna thought it was an excuse. He felt responsible enough to check on his friend, and also on Lainey, it seemed, but had little to say to Janna. Of course he knew that Clay could leave at will. It was possible, then, that the two men were conniving at something, though what it might be, Janna was afraid to think.

The day was incredibly hot, a moist, sticky heat that seeped in through the thin walls of the old house and made the two air conditioners work overtime. The sun glared down, laying a sheet of molten-silver on the lake’s surface so bright that it hurt to look at it. The heavy air was difficult to breathe. Leaves hung straight and limp on the trees, while the shadows underneath were as deep and dusty as old black velvet.

Clay appeared morose, almost sullen. Janna was so on edge that every sound made her jump. At the same time, depression gripped her so all she really wanted to do was lie on the living-room sofa and escape all her problems in sleep. She couldn’t do that, not only
for Lainey’s sake, but also because of silent dread from knowing she was closed up with a wolf that could slip his chain at will.

Lainey was fretful. She didn’t want to help Janna, didn’t want to draw, play or have a snack. Lethargic and restless by turns, all she wanted was to lie curled against Clay with Ringo in her arms, listening while he read bits aloud to her from a fishing magazine. When anything else was suggested, she protested so pitifully that Janna didn’t have the heart to insist. At least Clay didn’t seem to mind sharing his bed with her and the raccoon.

Lunch consisted of cold cuts, boiled eggs and salad, a fast and easy meal that didn’t heat the kitchen. Lainey had hers with Clay, though she clearly had no appetite. She’d have done no more than pick at her food if he hadn’t teased and cajoled until she finished at least a small amount.

Afterward, Janna cleared away the dishes, then got out her watercolors. The only thing that broke the silence for some time was the swish of her brush in water between colors, Clay’s voice as he read a scintillating tale about trout fishing, and an occasional rumble of thunder that indicated a distant summer cloudburst.

Clay came to the end of his article, but didn’t continue or turn the magazine page. The silence of creative concentration, broken only by the hum of the air conditioner, settled around Janna. She finished the series of interlocking water hyacinth blooms that she was working on before she finally looked up.

The room had grown so dim with the advance of the afternoon and the gathering clouds that she could barely see across it. She could just make out that Lainey had fallen asleep, lying in the protective curve of Clay’s body. He had dropped the magazine he held so it landed on the floor, and rested his head on the bent elbow of his arm. His eyes were closed and his chest rose and fell in a steady rhythm.

Janna laid down her brush and rose quietly to her feet. Walking to the bed’s edge, she stood looking down at the pair. How easy it was to trace the resemblance between them while they lay with their faces so close together. The changes caused by Lainey’s illness obscured it a bit, perhaps, but it should be plain to anyone with eyes to see.

She reached out a gentle fingertip to smooth Lainey’s fine, dark eyebrow then almost, but not quite, touched that same thick arch above Clay’s shuttered eye. As she stood with her hand hovering above his face, she was aware of a swelling fullness in her heart. It was stupidly sentimental, of course, but she felt an odd affection toward this man merely because he looked like her daughter.

Even as she recognized it, she was aware of the pull of another enticement altogether. He was a rare male specimen, more attractive than he had any right to be. There was strength in the firm mold of his jaw and the jut of his cheekbones. His long lashes made a shadow along the bridge of his nose. The beard under his skin made a blue-black shadow around the tucked corner of his mouth that tempted her to test it
for the rasp of stubble. He was truly fine, so much so that it was probably ridiculous to think anything she could say or do would influence him an iota.

She inhaled, slow and deep, and closed her eyes. Then she opened them again. She could only try.

Ringo roused and lifted his head, his small face with its mask like a bandit appearing sleepily inquisitive. She picked him up and set him on the floor. Then she bent over the bed again and pushed her hands under her sleeping daughter with careful movements. As she nudged the flat surface of Clay’s belly, she halted, half-afraid that he’d wake. In that moment of stillness, she became aware of his body heat and the resiliency of his skin under his soft T-shirt. An odd tremor moved over her, like a small earthquake of the senses. Warmth invaded the lower part of her body. She caught her breath, swamped abruptly by such a wave of desire that she felt light-headed with it.

It wasn’t fair that he could do that to her without moving a muscle, without even knowing it. She was supposed to be in control here. And yet, she should not have been surprised. She had always, in those long-ago days with Matt, been more responsive at this time of day. Lainey had been conceived, she was almost sure, during a long, sultry, afternoon of napping and making love.

She’d almost forgotten. How could she have let it slip from her mind? It seemed impossible. Regardless, she didn’t remember the passion of that afternoon being this powerful, this irresistible.

Clay didn’t move. It seemed an insult that he could remain unaffected. She was glad, however, since it gave her a chance to salvage composure. She waited a second longer, collecting her strength, then she lifted Lainey against her chest and straightened to full height. Moving as quietly as possible, she eased out into the hall and along it to the other bedroom. She settled her daughter with the sheet over her legs and her rag doll beside her then tiptoed out of the room and closed the door.

Thunder grumbled almost directly overhead. Janna lifted her head to listen, then glanced down the hall toward the kitchen. Beyond the open blinds at the windows, she could see the leaves on the trees thrashing in a fitful wind. The noise of the air conditioner that pumped cool air down the hall drowned out most of the sound, but it appeared that a summer storm was heading their way. It would be welcome if it would cool things off for a little while.

She moved toward the kitchen. Pulling the glass-topped back door wide, she stood in the opening. The wind swept in, carrying the marshy scent of churning lake water. She squinted against it to see the windblown waves of the lake rolling shoreward, reflecting gray under the darkening sky. They washed against the shoreline with the sound of surf, while farther out they wore topknots of dirty white foam. The outspread branches of the cypress trees swayed, shedding bits of leaves like tattered green lace, while their seed pods struck the water and short stretch of ground between it and the house like miniature cannonballs.

Then she saw across the lake the white curtain of the approaching rain. It swept toward her, dragging a veil of fog behind it where the cool water hit the hot surface. The wind that lifted the tendrils of hair around her face grew cooler and carried the indescribable smell of newly wet earth. Then the first drops splattered the ground and porch steps with fat, liquid splotches. They rattled down, turned to a rapid drumming, became a steady roar.

Janna could feel the tension draining from her to be replaced by reckless exhilaration. She breathed the moist air into her lungs, shook her head with a lift of her chin so the coolness could reach her throat and scalp. For a brief moment, she had the urge to walk into the downpour and stand there until she was wet to the skin.

At a sound from behind her, she turned. Clay leaned with his back to the hallway wall and one foot propped against the baseboard behind him. He was watching her with a dark, almost hungry look in his eyes.

There was no conscious decision, no plan or purpose. She simply started toward him. Her stride was smooth and even, her pace neither fast nor slow. Her muscles glided with the ease of internal heat. Her skin felt fresh and moist with windblown rain. Inside her was instinct and determination. She held his gaze, coming closer, closer until she could almost reach out and touch him.

He blinked, then narrowed his eyes. Suddenly he wasn’t there, but was sliding away, stepping aside as
if allowing her to enter the bedroom ahead of him. She paused for a startled instant, but there seemed nothing left to do except move past him into the room.

Maybe she didn’t turn him on, after all? How ingenuous of her to assume that she could, at will, or that any feeling she had must be mutual simply because he’d made a few suggestive comments days ago. That would teach her to think of herself as a temptress.

Voice brittle, she said, “This should cool things off.”

“Or make them more sultry.” At her quick glance, he added, “I mean when the sun comes out again and the humidity rises.”

“Yes. Yes, I suppose so.” She halted, uncertain of how to go on or what direction to take.

“Was there something you wanted to talk to me about?”

She swung to face him. “What makes you think that?”

“Nothing really,” he answered, his gaze on a hangnail he’d discovered on his thumb. “I just got the idea that you might want Lainey out of the way for a bit.”

He hadn’t been asleep after all, then. Or else her attempt to make him more comfortable by moving Lainey had disturbed him. Not that it mattered. He was waiting for her answer. Searching her mind, she grasped at the first thing offered.

“Arty didn’t stay long this morning, and he didn’t
seem himself. Anything wrong that I should know about?”

Clay gave her a dry look. “Maybe he’s embarrassed because he couldn’t impress you by finding a bushel basketful of the Aphrodite’s Cup.”

“Oh, please. Arty’s old enough to be my grandfather.”

“He’s still a male and still kicking, isn’t he?”

For some reason, that observation made her feel a little better. “I’m sorry he couldn’t find it.”

“You had your hopes pinned on that plant for some reason.”

She turned away from him, going to her desk where she picked up a drawing then put it down again. Overhead, the rain began to slacken to a slow drumming. Finally she said, “It was just an idea.”

“But an important one.”

Her lips tightened. “I could have used the money that it would bring. I thought…it seemed, somewhere in the back of my mind, that if I could just find it, then everything would work out for Lainey. She’d be all right. It didn’t happen, so I have to move on.”

“To what?”

What indeed? To escape her own thoughts as much as his question, she asked, “Are you sure Arty didn’t say anything? I mean, you wouldn’t think of keeping anything from me just because you felt I shouldn’t hear it, would you?”

Clay tilted his head and he dropped into an exaggerated drawl. “Why, Miss Janna, ma’am, do you really think that, prisoner and all that I am, I’d care
two bits about whether you were worrying your pretty little head?”

“I do think so, especially if it was for your own good.” Her voice held no amusement.

He stared at her for the space of a heartbeat, his gaze unrelenting. Then a slow grin spread over his face. “I probably would.”

She was going to get nothing from him, which was a situation she should be used to by now. Clay could apparently leave at will but was still pretending to be in captivity. Why on earth would he do that when he didn’t seem particularly attracted to her? Or was it simply that he was suspicious? Possibly he’d recognized something different about her and was wary of the reason. His next word seemed to confirm it.

“You went back out on the lake again this morning, didn’t you? Still no sign of the Aphrodite’s Cup?”

She shook her head. “Finding it was a crazy idea, I see that now. Even if I could have synthesized the dye and sent a sample with a set of designs overnight to the company I work with, the legal work for a new commission would never have been done in time. My banker is a good man, but I doubt he’d increase my loan on the basis of some nebulous future benefit.”

“Highly unlikely,” Clay agreed with irony.

The look she gave him was harassed. “Thank you, I needed to have my stupidity pointed out to me.”

“It wasn’t stupid,” he said, his voice dropping to a softer note. “Just desperate.”

She gave a winded laugh. “Exactly. I don’t sup
pose you have several thousand you’d like to lend me?”

He was silent so long that she turned her head to stare at him. His expression was sober and reflective. For an instant she felt something akin to hope. Then he gave a slow shake of his head. “Sorry. Can’t do it.”

“I assume you have a reason?”

“I don’t like this whole idea.”

She lifted her chin. “So you’re morally offended?”

“I’m afraid Lainey may not survive it.”

“That’s my worry,” she said shortly.

“So it is,” he said quietly. “Why aren’t you?”

“Because,” she said in a voice like the scrape of fingernails on a chalkboard, “it’s a worry, not a certainty. No, she may not survive this transplant, but she will definitely die without it.”

“There are legal channels.”

“Which I’ve tried. Her blood type is O. The wait for a donor organ is a year or more for her type, compared to only a few months for the others. We’ve waited almost three years and been turned down twice as candidates because of compatibility factors. We’re running out of time.”

“So how do you know this Dr. Gower will even check for compatibility beyond a simple cross match?”

“I have to trust him.”

“Even though he’s accountable to no known
agency? What are you going to do if he slips up? Besides cry, of course.”

The name she called him was not a compliment. Even as she spoke, she was swamped by a wave of despair. He’d put his finger squarely on her most terrifying nightmare.

“She’s your daughter,” he said, the words even. “It’s your privilege to decide what’s right for her. In the meantime, here I am. What is it you want with me, Janna, a convenient baby-sitter, a sounding board, maybe an outlet for your frustrations over this deal? Or do you really want a sex slave, after all?”