Full House (2 page)

Deedee lifted impossibly long, thick black lashes. "Yeah." She didn't sound particularly thrilled about it. "My mother is his father's sister. Nick and I practically grew up together. He used to do some of the most outrageous things. Made his father so mad. It was the only time the man ever noticed he had a son." Deedee inhaled her coffee. "Nick's father was heavy into making money."

"What about Nick? Is he into making money?"

Deedee shook her head. "Nick never gave much thought to money, but when you're filthy rich you don't have to think about it. All he cares about is his newspaper and those smelly horses. He gets up every morning at five-thirty to take care of them, even though he employs people for the job. Have you ever seen a horse up close?" Deedee shuddered.

Billie inadvertently looked down at her foot. The swelling had gone down during the night, and it wasn't as sore, but it would take a while before the discoloration went away. "Yes, unfortunately, I
have
seen a horse up close."

Deedee followed Billie's eyes to the foot.
"Eeyeuuw,"
she said, wincing. "What happened to your foot?"

"You know Zeke? The big brown horse with the attitude? He stepped on it."

"Oh, honey, that's worth a lawsuit. And Nick is so rich he wouldn't miss the money."

Billie tried to hide her amusement as she sipped her coffee. Deedee was obviously annoyed at Nick. "I don't think I could get very much. Nothing's broken."

"Gee, that's too bad."

Billie decided the woman had a strange way of looking at things. She wiggled her toes. "I hope it's better by next weekend. I paid for three polo lessons in advance."

"You're taking polo lessons? Are you one of those horse-crazy people?" She looked distressed. "Oh, geez, I hope you're not taking lessons just to get closer to Nick. There are a least three women in every class of his who want to marry him. Let me tell you, it's not worth it. I know Nick's handsome and charming and wealthy, but the man steps in poo, for God's sake. Horse droppings, you know? Who'd want to live with a man whose shoes always smell?"

Billie smiled. She was beginning to like Deedee. "Actually, I took a class for the exercise." That was only partially true, of course, but she wasn't ready to tell Deedee how much she wanted to impress her children.

"Exercise?
Eeyeuuw,
I hate exercise. It's easier if you don't eat."

"I can't afford to starve myself. I need energy."

"For what?"

"Well, I teach sixth grade all day, and then I come home and cook and clean and take care of my own two kids, and then after supper I iron or do lesson plans, and then I watch a little TV and go to bed."

Deedee's eyes opened wide. "You do all that? In one day?"

"Yes, but you see, I never get any real exercise. Pretty soon the cellulite will take over and my only alternative will be liposuction."

"Gross."

"Mmmm. Well, I'm going to whip myself into shape this summer. I've started jogging, too." Billie refilled their cups.

Deedee wrinkled her nose. "I tried that once, but I got sweaty. I hate to sweat."

Billie took a peek at Deedee over her coffee mug. "I don't mind sweating. I bought weights, too. And then I signed up for the polo lessons. I figured all that bouncing around would be great for my backside."

"Too bad you have to do it on a horse."

"I kind of like horses. At least I did before I met Zeke. I still have a lot to learn. Like how to mount and dismount."

"You want to learn how to mount? You've come to the right place, honey."

Billie was almost certain they weren't talking about the same thing. She watched Deedee sip her coffee. The woman had a great body. "You don't exercise at all?"

"I don't have to. Like I said, I don't eat. That's another thing about Nick. He eats all the time and never gets fat. After a while, you find yourself hoping he'll choke on his damn doughnut." Deedee sighed. "I haven't had a doughnut in five years. I figure I won't eat until I'm sixty-five, and then I'm going to let myself go. I'm going to eat boxes of candy, and fast food, and a ton of Twinkies."

"Sounds like a good plan to me."

Deedee swiveled in her seat and looked at her luggage in the hall. "I guess I should unpack. I don't suppose you have a housekeeper?"

Amazingly, the woman was serious. Billie shook her head. "I can't seem to keep good help these days." She limped to the foyer. Her foot was beginning to ache from being on it all morning. "I'll show you to the guest room. It's upstairs. Sorry I can't help you carry anything."

Deedee picked out a medium-sized suitcase. "I'll just take this one for now."

Once upstairs, Deedee stopped at the doorway to her bedroom.
"Eeyeuuw,
colonial. My bedroom is always French provincial. Don't you have any guest rooms that are French provincial?"

Billie was thankful for the patience she'd gained from teaching. "No. I'm not really a French provincial person."

Deedee dropped her suitcase on the bed. "Nick isn't, either. Once I redecorated his whole house. It was between my second and third marriages. No, wait, it was between my third and fourth." She waved her perfect ruby-red fingernails. "Anyway, I was staying with Nick for a while and he had to go off on a business trip, so I hired a decorator, and we worked overtime to have it finished before Nick got home." She sat down and tested the bed. "You should have seen the look on Nick's face. Megasurprise."

"Did he like it?" Billie already knew the answer.

"The man went berserk. Honestly, such a fuss over a few sticks of furniture. He has no taste." She opened the suitcase and looked petulant. "I thought I had my makeup in this one."

Billie cast a cursory glance at the bag. "Looks like lingerie."

"Damn." Deedee stomped off down the stairs, and began opening luggage. Finally she stood, hands on hips, and tossed her red hair over her shoulder. "It's not here. Nick must have left it with my shoes. He probably did it on purpose, knowing him."

"But you're wearing makeup."

Deedee shook her head. "This is my morning makeup. I have to change into afternoon makeup, and then when five o'clock rolls around I put on my evening makeup. There's a difference, you see."

"I would never have guessed, but I'm not exactly on the cutting edge when it comes to fashion and cosmetics." Billie's own makeup consisted of foundation, blush, and mascara.

"I'm an ex-beauty queen, honey. I
had
to learn these things at an early age."

"A beauty queen. No kidding."

"Won my first pageant when I was four years old. Went on to win

Billie studied the inside of her freezer and wondered what frozen dinner she could microwave herself for lunch. She had a choice. Low-fat chicken and vegetables, low-fat chicken with fettuccini noodles, or fat-free chicken soup. She closed the door and leaned her head against it.

She would have given her good foot for a juicy, medium-rare steak, seasoned fries, and a tossed green salad, swimming in thick blue-cheese dressing. And something chocolate, of course. A meal was not a meal without some sort of chocolate for dessert.

The house was quiet. Deedee was taking her second nap of the day, this one due to a migraine brought on by Billie's confession of her feelings for Nick. Okay, so she had overdone it a bit talking about lava and spewing fire, but Deedee had gotten the message loud and clear. Billie hadn't counted on giving her a headache; she had simply tried to put the quietus on Deedee's plan to find her a man.

Billie turned as someone tapped on the back door. She was almost relieved to see the familiar face of Raoul the bug man. She let him in. "How goes it, O Great Insect Warrior?"

His blue-black hair was combed neatly in place, and his lime-green tank top

By the time the show ended, Billie was thinking wrestling was sort of fun. Not the snake part, of course. Mostly she liked the fan enthusiasm and the flash of the extravaganza. And her mood heightened considerably when the limo driver pulled in front of a reputable steak house. She had been there before and knew they served the best beef in town. Her mouth watered, and her stomach growled, a Pavlovian response to the smells as they walked through the double glass doors leading inside.

She wasn't nearly so thrilled when Nick slid into the booth beside her, so close his thigh pressed against hers. The booth seemed to shrink to half its size. She tried scooting closer to the wall and discovered she was already as close to it as she could get without being on the other side.

"Could you move over a little?" she whispered.

He shifted in the booth but didn't so much as move a smidgeon. Instead, he slid his arms along the back of it, dropping his hand possessively on her shoulder. On the surface, it seemed casual enough, but there was nothing casual about the way Billie's body responded to his simple touch. Her stomach tightened, and she held her breath, afraid to release it in case it came out in a loud gush. He began drawing tiny imaginary circles along the base of her neck, his thumb rotating lazily. Billie's stomach did a tiny flip-flop. Once again, she caught the subtle hint of his cologne.

"What would you like?" he whispered.

Billie blinked several times. "Excuse me?" Her voice sounded like a croak.

"For dinner." His mouth curved into a half-smile, and there was a look of genuine amusement in his dark eyes.

He knew exactly what he was doing to her, she thought. The man oozed sensuality. He had flirting down to an art, and he was obviously enjoying making her squirm.

But why? she asked herself. She was hardly the sort of woman a man like Nicholas Kaharchek would desire. She did her own nails, had her hair trimmed by the next available operator at a no-frills salon, and purchased her clothes off half-price racks or sidewalk sales. She was an ordinary woman, an average housewife, probably nothing like the women Nick normally dated.

Perhaps Nick thought he was doing her a favor, she thought suddenly. Probably he thought she would get all starry-eyed and tongue-tied over a drop-dead gorgeous millionaire who only had to crook his finger at a woman to capture her heart. If Nick was interested, there was only one reason why, and the thought wasn't especially flattering.

If only her body were as determined to steer clear of him as her head.

Billie wondered if Nick knew what was going on inside of her, and the thought that he might indeed be attuned to her building attraction was unsettling. He only had to look at her a certain way, touch her lightly with those expert hands, to send her thoughts into a tailspin and create a heat wave low in her belly. In a very short time he'd managed to spin a web of intimacy around them, the likes of which she had never known. It was simultaneously provocative and completely nerve-wracking, and like a fool, she found herself waiting in anticipation for his next touch.

She reached for a cracker, tore open the cellophane, and took a bite. Anything to keep her mind off the man beside her, she told herself.

Nick noted Billie's discomfort and knew she was as aware of him sexually as he was of her. Instead of feeding his ego, as it would have in the past, he found himself utterly confused. The oh-so-proper mother of two who baked cookies and taught sixth-graders was the sexiest thing he'd ever come up against. What was this power she had over him that made him desire her?

She was adorable, with her fresh-scrubbed look and hair that made him think of spun silk. She had the prettiest legs he'd ever seen on a woman, and her curves enticed him. But he was accustomed to pretty women. What he wasn't accustomed to was her simple nature. The women he dated were sophisticated, traveled in the right circles, knew where to vacation, how to play the game, and how to please a man in every sense of the word. Like Sheridan. His smile faltered.

Billie Pearce didn't even seem to like him. She didn't put on airs, didn't try to be witty and charming; in fact, she didn't seem to care that she was getting cracker crumbs all over the white tablecloth. Perhaps that was it. She was unpretentious. She was just Billie.

"So what did you think of Big John?" Deedee finally asked, looking up from her menu. "Isn't he wonderful?"

Billie felt Nick's eyes on her, sensed his knowing smile. "Big John? Uh, he was ... um, awesome."

"He definitely likes you," Deedee said, following the length of Nick's arm with her eyes. Some of the glitter had fallen to her cheek. It was clear she didn't appreciate her cousin putting his hands on Billie. "And wasn't it romantic the way he got thrown out of the ring, almost at your feet?"

Billie nodded solemnly. "Very romantic. I especially liked it when he did that thing with his tongue again, and the woman beside me fainted."

"I told you he was hot. And believe me, Big John knows how to treat a lady. Unlike some men who go through them quickly, and then toss them aside without a second thought."

Nick didn't miss the look Deedee shot him. She did not want Billie to become involved with him. He merely smiled. Deedee was still sore at him for hauling her out of her bed in her nightie and insisting she leave his home immediately. She'd had no idea he was trying to save her pretty neck. For now, she would just have to think the worst of him. And cad that he was, he would enjoy participating in the game.

"We're going to a formal reception at some embassy tomorrow night," Deedee said. "How about if we get you a date with Big John, and we can all go together?"

Billie formulated a mental list of preferred things to do: a basket of ironing that needed tending to, that kitchen drawer that was overflowing with junk and begged to be straightened, the spots on her carpet she'd been meaning to clean.

"A date with Big John could get you noticed by a lot of important people," Deedee said.

Billie pondered it. A date with Big John was just behind cutting off her thumbs with a carving knife. "That's nice of you to offer, but I don't think so. I think Big John is ... ah, well, how do I put it? Far too big for someone like me," she said at last. "I'm sure it would be uncomfortable." She looked up and found three pairs of eyes staring. Deedee was blushing, something Billie had not thought possible. Beside her, Nick chuckled. Frankie's thick dark brows were arched high over his forehead, forming an upside-down V.