Single in Suburbia (19 page)

Mouth suddenly dry, Amanda tried not to picture it; told herself not to even imagine it, but she could think of nothing else. She could pretend all she wanted that she was bold and worldly and French, but in reality she was Amanda Sheridan, and the only man she’d seen naked in the past eighteen years was Rob.

Fido barked, mercifully from outside this time, the kind of mad barking that usually signified a mailman or a cat in the yard. The phone on the bedside table beside her rang and the movements in the master bath grew louder and more hurried.

It was then that she realized that Hunter James was probably going to rush into the bedroom to answer the phone. And that he might still be naked when he did it.

Frozen to the spot, she cast about for a means of escape. Or camouflage. She wished briefly that she could wiggle her nose like Nicole Kidman in the new
Bewitched
and disappear altogether.

But the bathroom door was already opening and Hunter James was striding through it. She squeezed her eyes closed and yanked the sheets up in front of her face. The air moved beside her, giving off a heady whiff of soap and man, and the phone stopped ringing in mid-shrill.

“Hello?” Hunter’s voice sounded directly beside her. She was still cowering behind a wall of sheets and had no idea what to do.

“Oh, hey, Marty. Yes, that would be good. Yeah, I’ve got a game schedule. I’ll e-mail it to you.”

He was quiet for a moment and then he said, “No, not right now. I’ve got something I have to take care of.”

Deprived of her sight, she could actually hear the amusement slip into his voice like it often did into his eyes. He was probably getting a good-sized yuck out of the fact that his flamboyant French maid was hiding behind his sheets in an effort not to look at him.

God, she hoped that something he had to take care of wasn’t Solange.

She began to back up, but she couldn’t see and the way the blood was whooshing through her veins left her disoriented and uncertain of her direction. She took another step. Her shoulder knocked into a wall.

Of hard naked flesh.

She froze. And hid behind the sheets like an ostrich with its head in the sand.

The phone was placed in its cradle. A hand touched one of hers and lowered it, bringing the shield of sheets with it until they were bunched in front of her waist instead of her face.

Because she really had no choice, she opened her eyes slowly. One at a time. And turned her head.

Her shoulder was embedded in Hunter James’s bare chest where tiny droplets of water glistened in a fine mat of blond hair. She swallowed. His hand still rested lightly on hers. Despite the dampness of his skin, his body threw off an unbelievable amount of heat. Everything about him, including the green eyes, was warm and inviting.

“Are you all right?” he asked.

She didn’t think about whether she was reacting as Solange or Amanda. It didn’t matter who she was at all. What mattered was that Hunter James was one of the most attractive men she’d ever met and his body was a Disneyland of hard angles and lightly sculpted muscles. And there seemed to be some sort of magnetic device implanted in it.

chapter
16

T
he tug of that magnet was powerful and almost impossible to resist. It pulled at her, teasing her senses, urging her to throw caution to the wind.

Kind of like Rob had probably felt when he first succumbed to Tiffany.

Abruptly her compass stopped straining north. One minute it was pointing toward the prize, urging her closer; the next it was spinning madly as if she’d just sailed into the Bermuda Triangle.

“Oh!” She jumped back, scalded by her own stupidity. Lowering her gaze, she took in the washboard stomach and silky blond hair that arrowed downward to…Relief and disappointment washed through her as her gaze encountered not a towel or bare skin, but blue jeans.

Her gaze flew upward. He was dressed!

She wasn’t Catholic or French, but she made the sign of the cross anyway.
Thank you, God!

“Are you OK?” He spoke softly and he was looking at her in a way that made her wonder just how deeply inside he could see.

“
Oui, monsieur
. I’m sorree.
Mon Dieu, tu me coupe le souffle
.” My God, you take my breath away.

Surprise settled on his face, and she thought how much more surprised he’d be if he could understand her.

“My fault,” he apologized. “I’ve been expecting a business call and when I heard the phone I didn’t realize…” His voice trailed off. “I’m sorry if I frightened you.” He took a step away to demonstrate his good intentions.

Amanda wanted to know what kind of business he was in now that he no longer played pro ball, how he felt about being a single parent, and whether his kiss would be as potent as she imagined. Solange just wanted to kiss him until he was as breathless as she was.

Both of them needed to get out of this room and back to work before she gave herself away completely.

“Ees not a problem,
monsieur,
” she said backing her way out of the bedroom, the sheets once again clutched against her chest. “Really, I believe that eet was my mistake.”

And this, of course, was completely true. She’d mistaken a perfectly clothed male for a naked one; mistaken a customer for a stud muffin; and come perilously close to launching herself into the arms of a man who’d done nothing more provocative than answer his phone.

If she was going to clean Hunter James’s house on a regular basis, she and Solange were going to have to have a little talk. It was absolutely imperative that they get their respective shit together.

“Are you telling me he wasn’t actually naked?”

It was Saturday afternoon and Amanda and Brooke sat around the glass-top table in Candace’s sunroom. The table was littered with the remains of the appetizers Candace had put out. They were on their second bottle of Chardonnay.

“Nope.” Amanda helped herself to a cracker slathered with cheddar. “But it took me a while to figure that out. All the blood had rushed to my head and I wasn’t thinking too clearly.”

Candace and Brooke laughed. “I can understand that,” Brooke said. “From what you’ve said, Hunter James is really something.”

“Well, he certainly brings out the Solange in me.” Amanda sipped her wine. “If I don’t watch out she’s going to be jumping into his bed instead of making it.”

Not at all liking how appealing that little scenario sounded, Amanda looked for a new topic. “This house is fabulous, Candace. How long have you been in it?”

“Two years. One with Nathan and one on my own.” She ran a hand over the tabletop and glanced out toward the courtyard. “I objected like crazy when he told me that we were going to live out here in what I thought of as the boonies. My mother was even more horrified. But this house was completely custom-built. I put a lot of time and energy into it, and I didn’t have the heart to start all over again. Again.”

“You don’t miss Buckhead?” Brooke referred to the prestigious area closer in to town that encompassed many of Atlanta’s poshest neighborhoods.

“Every once in a while I have to go in for a shopping or restaurant fix. Or to visit some old friends. Or at a royal summons from my mother.” Candace shrugged as if it hardly mattered, but Amanda was learning to read beneath Candace’s flip tone. “Anyway, I’m starting to get used to life in the suburbs; I’m even coming to terms with the ballpark now that I have you two stooges to hang out with.”

Amanda let her gaze roam around the magnificent room. Afternoon sunshine poured in through expanses of plate glass and the bursts of color in the perfectly manicured courtyard garden were like candy for the eye. “Well, this stooge needs to earn more money. Right now, I’ve got the Menkowskis on Mondays, Hunter James on Tuesdays, Sylvia Hardaway on Wednesdays, and Susie Simmons on Fridays.” She ran the math in her head—something she did almost hourly—and deducted the percentage she insisted on paying Candace. “I’m not even bringing home nineteen hundred dollars a month. That’s not enough to pay the mortgage, which I’m responsible for as of this month, let alone our expenses. I’m afraid to think about what will happen if there’s an emergency of any kind.”

“Could you handle more houses?” Brooke asked.

“Absolutely.” Amanda turned to Candace. “I’m getting more efficient and if I pick up the pace a bit, I should be able to do two houses a day, at least five days a week. And maybe I could fit in a Saturday morning job. If we cut back far enough, we could squeak by.”

“I could book you for all of that and more, Amanda,” Candace said. “But I don’t see how you’re going to pull it off. Not alone anyway. Solange’s attitude can only go so far. You’ve got to have time to
do
the jobs. And have some kind of life too.”

“I can handle it,” Amanda insisted. “I
will
handle it.”

“It’s not that easy.” Brooke shook her head. “I have some money put aside for, well, just in case. Why don’t you let me loan it to you to take a little of the pressure off? You can pay me back when things turn around. It’s just sitting in the bank. I’d rather see it doing some good.”

“Same here, Amanda.” Candace’s expression communicated her concern. “Or if you don’t want a loan, why don’t you let me invest in you? We could come up with some catchy business name and you could use the seed money to look for help that you could train to work with you. It would allow you to take your time and really build something.”

Touched by their eagerness to help, Amanda considered the two women who not long ago had been total strangers. “You guys are great,” she said. “And I appreciate your support more than I can say, but I can’t take your money. I have to prove that I can do this. I need to know I can stand on my own two feet and take care of my family.”

Amanda took a long sip of wine. It warmed her from the inside out, just as Brooke and Candace did. “Just book me, Candace. I’ll do the rest. And whatever happens, I want you to know that I’ll never forget the way you’ve been there for me.”

Late that night, Brooke tiptoed into the bedroom and undressed in the dark. Naked she slipped into bed beside Hap and laid her head on his shoulder. She wished she were asleep like he was and not wrestling with her conscience, unable to shake her guilt for only offering Amanda money, when what she should have offered was herself.

Hap’s breathing was loud, a heavy in and out with an occasional exhaled whistle that was surprisingly rhythmic. Other women complained about their husband’s snoring, but Brooke welcomed the noise even when it kept her up. It was proof of all that she’d achieved; an audible affirmation of her place in the world.

Between snores and whistles, the sounds of the house settling reached her. Its creakings and shiftings provided harmony to Hap’s melody. It, too, was a symphony of her success and she treasured each note.

She had a husband and a home, neither of which her mother had ever attained. And not just any man or home either. She was living the life she’d seen in magazines and watched on television—when they’d had one—as a child. She, Brooke Mackenzie, was living in the very sort of house her mother had spent her life cleaning.

She liked Amanda and valued their growing friendship. She’d always been too busy escaping her past to let anyone get too close; Candace and Amanda were the first people she’d shared her secrets with.

But how could she risk exposure of all that she’d worked so hard to bury? If she cleaned houses with Amanda and was found out, her whole sordid past could come tumbling down around her; it could be the end of everything. She didn’t see how Hap could possibly love the real her, when he’d so readily accepted the self she’d manufactured.

Chilled, Brooke snuggled closer to Hap. Nuzzling her face into the crook of his shoulder, she rested her hand on his chest and pressed her breasts into his side. Maybe one day she’d feel secure enough to tell him about her mother. But the longer she waited, the harder it became. At the rate she was going, she’d be saving it for a surprise on their twentieth anniversary.

Hap stirred and pulled her closer. His face turned toward hers and without opening his eyes, he pressed a kiss against her forehead. “Why are you awake?” he murmured.

“Just thinking.” She ran her fingers up Hap’s bare chest and made a lazy circle around his ear. “I miss you when you’re away. Everything feels so empty.”

With one arm he lifted her on top of him and wrapped his arms around her back. “Well, I’m here now.” He settled her more firmly on top of him. “Can you feel how glad I am?”

She cupped his erection between her thighs and rubbed gently against it. “I think I’m getting the idea,” she whispered as she guided him inside her.

“Ah, that’s good.” He rocked against her, filling her as he moved, a great strong bear of a man who’d given her everything she’d ever wanted.

“Hold on, darlin’,” he murmured from beneath her. “I’m going to give you a nice little ride.”

“Oh, I’m holding on,” Brooke said as he kicked things up a notch. “It would take an army to shake me loose.”