Dead Canaries Don't Sing (26 page)

“Sorry about the change of plans,” I said as we pulled up in front of my cottage fifteen minutes later. It was at least the hundredth time I’d apologized since we’d left the bar.

“That’s okay.” He said the words, but I could tell by his tone that it wasn’t really okay at all. “You take care of yourself.”

“You don’t have to walk me in,” I said. “It’s pouring,” I added, as if he hadn’t noticed the blinding fury of drops pelting the windshield.

As I opened the car door, Jimmy sat studying me. I figured he was considering whether or not to kiss me good night. I guess I looked pretty terrible, because he just took my hand, gave it a quick squeeze, then let it go.

I really am turning into a wet blanket, I thought miserably, dashing through the rain to my front door. I can’t even go on a normal date with a normal guy.

Nick Burby has ruined me for the entire male gender.

I was still cursing Nick as I lay on the couch with Cat curled up on my chest, the two of us watching
Saturday Night Live
. Max and Lou snoozed on the floor, lying beside us like two mismatched throw rugs.

Damn him, I thought, distractedly stroking Cat’s soft gray fur. Why is that stupid man always getting in my way?

But instead of being angry, I was overcome with an emotion that was much more confusing. And that stupid pain in my heart was back.

At least the throbbing in my head was beginning to fade, thanks to the wonders of Advil. I could feel my muscles relaxing, and my eyelids were starting to droop.

The sound of a soft knock at the door made me jump. Cat leaped off my chest with an enraged, “Meow!”

Max, vegged out on the floor beside me, glanced up, for once only mildly interested in who the interloper might be. Lou, meanwhile, dragged himself over to the door, uttering halfhearted
woof-woof
sounds.

And then his tail went into fourth gear, a clue that whoever had come to call was somebody on his A list.

“Who is it?” I called.

“It’s me. Nick.”

“At
midnight
?”

I tried to sound irritated, but deep inside I knew it wasn’t Nick I was trying to fool. My heart fluttered like a Victorian maiden’s as I unlocked the door.

He stood on my doorstep, illuminated only by the sickly light of the single bulb overhead. He looked pretty pathetic. His hair was slicked down, and big fat raindrops slid down his face. His jacket was splattered with wet splotches, except for the shoulders, which were soaked.

Under one arm he carried a cardboard box.

“It’s Leilani,” he said. “Something’s wrong.”

“Oh, my God!” I cried. “Bring her in!”

The dogs had started up, but through some miracle they actually responded when I ordered them in no uncertain terms to behave. Something in my tone of voice must have warned them I was serious.

As Nick set the box on the table near the kitchen, I stepped into the bathroom to grab a towel. When I returned, he had unfolded the flaps that had been keeping Leilani out of the rain and Cat was trying to sneak a look inside the box.

I peered at the sweet, funny little Jackson’s chameleon we’d adopted in Hawaii. One of her eyes was closed and bulging out.

“What do you think it is?” Nick asked anxiously.

I tossed the towel on the chair, then picked up the lizard and studied her. “She probably got something in her eye. A dust particle, most likely. I’ll take her in the kitchen and mist it with some water. That should wash it out.”

“That’s
all
? I was afraid it was something serious.”

“No worse than you or me getting something in our eye.”

“So she’s not going to die?”

“Not unless somebody runs over her.”

He didn’t laugh. In fact, he looked so traumatized that I was tempted to reach over and squeeze his shoulder as a show of support.

“What about you?” I asked as he followed me into the kitchen.

“What
about
me?”

“You don’t look very good. Didn’t you have fun tonight with Miss America?” The tenderness I’d felt for Nick only moments earlier evaporated. I focused it on the chameleon instead, spraying her eye and feeling relieved when she opened it and began swirling it around.

“It’s not what you think,” Nick said, watching Leilani closely.

“How do you know what I think?”

“Because I know you. Believe me, Tiffany is just somebody who’s been helping me study for the LSAT.”

I snorted. “Right. Don’t tell me—you two are just good friends.”

“Look, it’s over, okay?”

“I get it. She dumped you tonight.”

“Not that it’s any of your business, but no. As a matter of fact, she practically jumped on me as soon as we walked into her house.”

I stalked back to the living room and put Leilani in her box. Cat was still sniffing around. “I’m sure that was terrible for you.”

“As a matter of fact, it was.”

“Why, for heaven’s sake?” I demanded, swinging around to face him. “Even though she has a name that belongs on a jewelry store instead of a birth certificate, she’s not bad looking, if you happen to like the type that looks like she spends two hours in front of the mirror just to—”

“Because it’s you I want, damn it!”

His words stopped me cold. I gaped at him, experiencing one of those rare moments in my life when I was actually speechless.

“It’s not as if you don’t already know that, Jess.”

“I thought you’d gotten over . . . us. That you’d moved on.”

“I’ve sure been trying. But to be perfectly honest, I haven’t exactly done a great job.”

My head was spinning so hard I probably couldn’t have put together a sentence, even if I’d known what I wanted the point of it to be.

Nick must have interpreted my silence as horror. I watched his face crumple.

“Look,” he said brusquely, “I’d better go.”

“It’s pouring rain out there.”

“It’s not going to get any better.”

“At least let me dry you off.”

I grabbed the towel off the chair and held it up. But instead of letting me pat his hair, he took hold of my arm and pulled me close.

“Maybe I’m crazy,” he said softly, “but I get the feeling you still like having me around. At least a little.”

His warm breath brushed my cheek. The sensation made me dizzy.

“Yes,” I admitted. “At least a little.”

“Maybe a lot?”

I hesitated. “A lot.”

The familiarity of his mouth on mine, the way my hand fit so perfectly against the curve of his neck, the feeling of his arms closing around me . . . it reminded me of being back in a place I’d missed terribly and couldn’t quite believe I’d returned to.

“What do you want, Jess?” he asked. “Is this the part where you decide this is all a mistake? Or is this the part where you tell me you really don’t want me to leave?”

I don’t want you to leave,
I thought.
But that
doesn’t mean I’m certain your staying isn’t a mistake
.

I was still listening to both voices in my head, trying to decide which one to go along with, when something outside the window caught my attention. Big, white flakes were drifting downward against the backdrop of the jet black sky.

“It’s snowing!” I cried.

“Wow! Look at that!”

The two of us stood in silence, still clinging to each other as we watched the first snowfall of the season sneak up on us when it thought everyone was asleep.

“What do you think?” Nick asked quietly. “Could this be a sign that we should snuggle together under the covers and keep each other safe and warm?”

“I bet the snow is making the roads slippery.”

“It’s pretty cold out there, too. They’re probably icing up.”

“And the heat in this place isn’t that great . . .”

“I remember.” He laughed softly. “All good reasons for me to stay. But I won’t—unless you can come up with the only one that matters.”

“I want you to stay.”

“That’s the one.”

Our lovemaking was as sweet as it had always been. Our bodies moved together as if we were recreating a dance we’d come to know so well that it was as natural as breathing. Being with Nick felt like an oasis in the midst of the insanity going on in the rest of our lives.

So did simply lying next to him, my head cradled inside the curve of his shoulder.

This feels good, I thought as I drifted off to sleep. This feels right.

It definitely beat sleeping with my menagerie.

Chapter 13

“The early bird may get the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.”

—Unknown

It wasn’t until the next morning that the full magnitude of what had happened crashed down on me. There’s something about sunlight that makes things seem an awful lot clearer then they do in the moonlight—or amidst the season’s first snowfall.

“I guess we need to talk about last night.” I wrapped my hands firmly around my mug of coffee, hoping its comforting warmth would fend off the very real threat of an anxiety attack.

Nick frowned. “Uh-oh. That doesn’t sound good.”

“I don’t want you to take it as a sign that I’ve, you know, come around to your way of thinking. The whole happily-ever-after bit.”

I wasn’t surprised to see the muscles in his face tense. But the words needed to be said. There was no other way.

“So for you, last night was just a one-night stand.”

“Kind of a cold way of putting it, isn’t it?”

“It’s cold, all right,” he returned.

“I just don’t want you to mislead you. I think . . . last time, we got our signals crossed.”

He sighed impatiently. “Terrific. The trauma of Jessica Popper’s less-than-perfect childhood raises its ugly head once again.”

Anger rose up inside of me like a bad case of indigestion. “Thank you, Dr. Freud. Look, if I wanted to be psychoanalyzed, I’d—”

“That didn’t come out right.” Nick hesitated. The air around us felt unnaturally still. “Jess, I love you. I want you in my life. But this thing you have about holding on to your self-sufficiency as if it’s some kind of . . . of
life raft
or something is getting to be too much, even for me. I won’t let myself be jerked around emotionally at every turn.”

I was suddenly finding it hard to talk. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe we should just chalk last night up to bad judgment. On both our parts.”

I didn’t want to be without him. But he was absolutely right: unless I could make the commitment he was entitled to, unless I could let go of my own independence or fear or whatever it was that kept holding me apart from him, it wasn’t fair for me to keep pulling him back.

Nick didn’t deserve to be jerked around emotionally. And as strange as it may have sounded, I cared about him too much to do that to him.

That didn’t keep my heart from feeling as if it was being crushed in a vise as I watched him pull on his jacket and pick up the box that was Leilani’s temporary home. I was surprised to see that Cat was still sitting guard over her, and Nick gave her a quick pat on the head. Even the dogs were strangely subdued. Lou picked up his tennis ball, then immediately dropped it. Max lay on the floor, his eyes moving back and forth between us.

As Nick opened the door, I could see that the snow was already melting, and only a few white patches remained.

“Thanks for taking care of Leilani,” he said.

And he was gone.

Must be allergies, I told myself, blinking hard to stop the stinging in my eyes.

Max and Lou frolicked beside me joyfully as we stepped outside into a brisk, sunny morning. With Nick gone, the cottage seemed absurdly empty, and I couldn’t bring myself to stay inside another minute. A long walk was precisely what I needed to clear my head.

I’d only been outside for a few seconds when I suddenly got the eerie feeling I wasn’t walking alone.

Nick?
I jerked my head up, already feeling my heartbeat accelerate.

It was almost as bad. Max and Lou were bounding toward Betty, who was shuffling toward me through the heavy, wet leaves. She was encased in a fake fur coat that covered her from her neck to her knees, the “fur” dyed a shade of lime green that bore no resemblance to any living creature outside a Dr. Seuss book. Still, with the high, black patent leather boots, it worked.

“ ’Morning, Betty.” I shielded my eyes with my hand, hoping she wouldn’t notice the guilty look I was certain was on my face.

“Looks like a
very
good morning to me,” she said. Her blue eyes glittered as brightly as the silver eyeshadow that she somehow made appear tasteful.

“You’re out early,” I observed, sticking my hands deep inside the pockets of my fleece jacket.

“Just doing some raking.”

“Personally, I’ve always found that using a rake is extremely helpful when raking.”

She bent over to return my dogs’ enthusiastic greeting. “All right, so I was spying.”

Inwardly, I groaned. I knew what was coming. “And I saw a familiar face around here,” she continued.

“Did you also see the scowl on that familiar face?”

“Oh, dear. And here I just assumed from the looks of things that you two had made up.”

“Leilani—the chameleon Nick and I got in Hawaii—had a problem with her eye.” I could feel my cheeks reddening. “He brought her over so I could treat it.”

“I see. I suppose that explains why he was here so early in the morning.”

I left that one alone. In fact, I thought I was getting off easy.

But then Betty said, “He’s still deeply in love with you, Jessica. And you’re still—”

“The only reason he came over was that he was worried about Leilani!”

A heavy silence followed. I was only able to tolerate it for a few seconds. “So, are you still debating between Africa and the South Pacific?”

“As a matter of fact, I’ve made my decision.” Betty looked at me oddly. “What about you, Jessica? Have you made yours?”

I spent the rest of the day keeping maniacally busy. I filled my refrigerator with food and my drawers with freshly washed clothes. I weeded through the mountain of junk mail that was threatening to require a room of its own. I checked in with some of my clients by phone, learning that Winifred Mack’s cat, James, was well enough to prowl the neighborhood again and that the Weinsteins’ Pointer, King, was engaged in an energetic game of Frisbee with Justin and Jason at the moment. It was all a welcome reminder that I had more important things going on than my tumultuous social life.