Something About You (Just Me & You) (18 page)

This had to be hell on the poor girl, Gage thought
sympathetically. “Load me up with some more of that homemade cranberry sauce,
Molly,” he said. He didn’t want to tell her that his appetite was already
starting to fizzle.

“Speaking of marriage, when do you plan on getting hitched,
Fitzgerald?” Shuck asked.

“All in good time, sir,” Gage replied. “I prefer to know
what I’m up against before I sign away the rest of my life.”

“Any particular lady nibbling on the line?”

“Actually, Shuck, I’m more of a horse and lasso man,” Gage
said. “The answer to your question, however, is no. When I get married, I want
to make sure I have a keeper.”

“You never know what life has in store,” Molly demurred.
“Who knows? You and Miss Right may have already met, but the two of you don’t
even know it. It would be so nice if Sebastian and I had more couples friends.”

The wistful look on her face was so transparent, Gage didn’t
have the heart to tell her that the chances of him and Sabrina showing up at
the Parker-Cole casa on Twister night as a couple were next to nil.

“I dunno about that, Molly,” he said, keeping his tone
light. “It would take a helluva woman to put up with the likes of me.”

“Exactly, and I can only think of one helluva right off the
top of my head.” Molly gave him the benefit of her knowing Mona Lisa smile.

“One thing’s for sure.” Shuck jumped back into the
conversation. “You’re not getting any younger, Fitzgerald. My advice to you is
to put the pedal to the metal, or you’ll be coaching Little League from a
mobility scooter.”

“Good grief, Dad.” Sebastian shook his head as he buttered a
dinner roll. “Talk about putting the carriage before the entire team.”

“One
does
get married to have children,” Cybil
reminded her son. “Otherwise, what’s the point of it?”

Gage was about to spout off the first thing that came to
mind, which he knew would make Cybil Cole look as though she were trying to
ignore the source of an unpleasant odor. Then he noticed Molly’s crestfallen
face and remembered what Sebastian had told him about the likelihood of them
being able to have children, and entirely different words came to mind.

“Companionship,” Sebastian told his mother quietly. He put
down the butter knife, took Molly’s hand and dusted the bridge of her knuckles
with his lips. “That’s the point. I’m one of very few men lucky enough to marry
his best friend. If Molly and I ever do have a child together — and both
of us know that’s a very big ‘if’ — that’s just gravy.”

Molly’s mouth trembled into a smile, and she gazed at her
husband with dewy-eyed adoration. Gage made a decision at that very moment.
This
is what I want. This, exactly.
A woman who looked at him as though he
didn’t hang just the moon but the entire galaxy.

Someone who loved him without even the smallest of doubts.

Shuck harrumphed. “Tell that to Nola March,” he said,
reaching for as third serving of dressing. This time Cybil didn’t bother to
stop him. “If Nola had given Les more babies — that son he always wanted —
he might not have gotten that itch in his britches. Not much else to say about
that.”

“Which is already way too much, Dad,” Sebastian’s voice
sounded ominous.

Gage cleared his throat and jumped in. “Speaking as the kid
of parents who were always on the skids, sometimes it pays to quit while you’re
still ahead, Mr. C.”

“Are we talking about Sabrina March?” Cybil asked with
pointed idleness. “I fear that apple hasn’t fallen far from the tree,” she
sighed. “The question is, which one?”

Gage looked at Molly curiously, but her gaze was focused on
a point somewhere on the wall above her father-in-law’s head. Her mouth was
once again stretched into an unhappy line.

“That wasn’t a very … nice thing to say about Sabrina,”
she eventually said in a quiet voice. “She’s my best friend, not a piece of
fruit.”

Gage watched as Cybil muted her glare and continued to stab
away at her salad. Shuck’s face went red with mortification. He looked away
from his wife and stroked his jaw. Sebastian remained poised over his plate
motionlessly, knife and fork in hand.

“I’ll fetch the pies,” Molly rose to her feet automatically
and began to collect empty plates from the table. “I’ve made mincemeat,
bourbon-pecan, pumpkin—”

“—No need to, darling,” Sebastian interrupted her tenderly.
His utensils landed on his plate with a loud
clank
. “We’ve obviously
expended all outlets of civil conversation if we’re resorting to gossip and
innuendo about one of our friends. I do believe that our holiday festivities
have concluded for the day.”

Molly paused with one hand on her hip and pinched her
fingers at her brow as though she were in pain. “I have to agree with
Sebastian,” she said in a pleasant but unsteady voice. “I’ll get to-go
containers for you, Cybil. Shuck, I’ll stick in an extra slice of mincemeat. I
know it’s your favorite.”

Cybil said nothing but managed to summon up a look of
indifference. She blotted her lips with a napkin primly and balled it up on her
plate.

“What the hell?” Shuck looked incredulous. “You mean we
aren’t even going to watch the big game?”

After the Coles were ushered out with dessert plates wrapped
in cellophane, Gage and Sebastian sat on the front porch armed with two slabs
of Molly’s pecan pie and a six-pack of beer. Molly insisted on staying inside
under the guise of doing the washing up, but Gage had heard the sound of the
bedroom door closing as he walked outside.

“I clocked it at just under an hour,” he told Sebastian.
“That’s pretty damn good for a holiday with Cybil and Shuck. Damn good pie,
too. Your wife bakes like an angel.” Gage licked his fork. The nutty,
buttery-tasting filling tasted even richer when preceded by a gulp of light
bock, he noticed.

“That’s an hour of our lives we’ll never get back,”
Sebastian said. “Molly and I will never end up like my parents — will we?”

“I don’t think you have anything to worry about,” Gage told
him. “The two of you look good from where I’m sitting.”

“Did you know that my mom makes my dad move to one of the
guest rooms whenever he starts snoring in the middle of the night?” Sebastian
asked. “
Family
. You’re lucky you don’t have to navigate those waters,
bro.”

“Indeed I do not,” Gage said.

A cool breeze rustled through the trees, kicking up the
nutty smell of turning leaves and stirring up memories of Grandpa Fitzgerald
smoking his pipe and spinning another yarn. The accompanying realization was
sobering. Gage didn’t know how to explain to his best friend that every holiday
felt like a blank schedule just waiting to be filled with last-minute
invitations from married friends and coworkers.

“That came out wrong, didn’t it?” Sebastian asked, looking
apologetic. “Molly and I are your family.”

“I appreciate that, man,” Gage said sincerely.

“And there’s Sabrina, of course.” Sebastian took a swallow
of beer while he mulled over the idea. “She sort of comes part and parcel, if
that wasn’t obvious from your dinner table exchange with my well-intentioned
but oft-short-sighted wife.”

“You were right,” Gage smiled and shook his head. “Molly
does have strange ideas.”

“
Really
strange,” Sebastian agreed.

“The thought of me and Sabrina ending up together is—”

“—as impossible as staging an Ibsen play.”

“I was going to say ‘way out in left field’.”

“Indeed. That, too.”

“Have you told Molly to give up the dream?” Gage looked at
his best friend.

“No,” Sebastian replied. “I just can’t bust her chops like
that.”

It was best to let things play out as they would, Gage
decided. Molly would eventually come to see that trying to pair him up with her
best friend was a misbegotten notion from the get-go. As far as his own
feelings on the matter were concerned, it was best to stick with the facts.
Sabrina was a heart-and-soul kisser, and had their circumstances been quite
different, he wouldn’t mind the feeling of her lips on his again. She smelled
like lilies and incense — or sometimes baking apples and almonds — her
husky voice was made for whispering sweet somethings, and her runner’s legs
looked mighty fine under those tiny gym shorts. 

But she vexed the hell out of him, and Gage wasn’t in the
mood for a good mystery unless it was between the covers of a book. He recalled
the guarded look in her eyes and the way she’d stammered in distress when he’d
unclogged the damn sink earlier that day.

Almost as though she were fiercely guarding her piece of
turf.

There was one other thing Gage instinctively knew, and that
was that Cybil was dead wrong about his housemate. Sabrina hadn’t fallen from
anyone else’s tree.

Oh, no.

That particular apple was still on the top bough, well out
of reach.

And that tree needed a little shaking.

It wasn’t the first Thanksgiving Sabrina had spent at the
office. And she doubted it would be the last. Holidays were only numbers on the
monthly calendar — workdays with the small benefits of sparse downtown
traffic and a lax dress code.

After her workout, she had thrown on her most comfortable
exercise pants and a fleece top and had shoved her feet into her old clogs.
Thanksgiving deserved a nod to tradition, so she nipped by Threadgill’s
Southern Cooking, one of the few full-service restaurants open for business on
holidays.

Armed with a takeout turkey dinner, pie and caffeine, she
settled in behind her desk, turned on a small lamp and started her work. Several
hours later, her stomach began to squeal. The time on the computer monitor told
her that it was already four o’clock. She peered inside the Styrofoam
Threadgill’s container. The green salad and cranberry sauce resided in
compartments adjacent to the turkey and dressing entree, so she couldn’t reheat
it in the microwave without something wilting. She cut into the cold bird using
the flimsy biodegradable utensils and chewed unenthusiastically. The office was
so quiet that the only thing she could hear was the sound of her own breathing.
Maybe music would make her feel more productive. She turned on the radio.
Gage’s voice boomed through the air.

“—and so, my dudes, Gideon and I decided to do this turkey
day special just for you single men out there who had to play third wheel at
your married friends’ houses this year. It’s lame.”

“Totally lame,” Giggles concurred.

Great
, Sabrina thought miserably, stabbing a
congealed sweet potato with a fork.

“Yeah, man. When you get together with a bunch of single guys
and their ladies du jour, different story,” Gage went on pragmatically, “’Cause
you know damn straight that most of them will call it splitsville by New Year’s
Eve. But then you have your married friends—”

“Aw, man! Married!” Giggles crowed.

“—and you feel like a total schmuck because you’re the one
who showed up with the twelve-pack of Shiner Bock and everybody else brought
something that fits in a casserole dish. That’s when you start feeling like you
got the cosmic boot.”

“Dude!”

“Yeah. Like fu — ’scuse me, gentle listeners — like
effin’ Pluto, man,” Gage grumbled. “Can any of you dudes out there relate?”

Given the “gentle listeners” the show usually courted, it
would be a long day for the technician on the end of the dump button, Sabrina
thought. She was just about to change the station when the on-air banter
changed tracks.

“So, man. I hear you moved into a new casa,” Giggles said.

“Yeah, I got a new abode — and a new housemate,” Gage
said. “Can you believe it? I’m thirty-eight years old. I need to live alone.
The economy has me by the short hairs.”

“So what’s he like, the housemate? Is he chill?”

“She, dude.
She
.”

“Dude, naw!” Giggles exclaimed in disbelief. “A chick?
What’s she like? Is she
hawt
?”

“Oh. God. No, no,
no
…” Sabrina whispered in horror.

“She’s hot all right — a hot mess,” Gage replied.
“Workaholic with a serious espresso addiction. Straggles in from work at night
with her war paint down to her chin.”

“Sah-
weet
,” Giggles commented lasciviously.

“Think Edie Sedgwick after the Chelsea Hotel fire.”

“She don’t got a boyfriend or nothin’?”

“Those are double negatives, idiot,” Sabrina snapped at
Giggles, who of course couldn’t hear her.

“Nah, man,” Gage went on. “She’s got a body that won’t quit.
But anything under that tiny little equator of a waistline is Iditarod
territory. Couldn’t cross that latitude with John Baker mushing.”

The fork in her hand snapped. A large dollop of cornbread
dressing landed on her desk, taking the tines along with it.

“So I take it she’s ‘cool’ to hang with?” Giggles spoon-fed
Fitz a cue for the next zinger.

“Oh, she’s cool, all right. Temps drop by twenty degrees
when the CHB is in the house.”

“CHB?” Giggles and Sabrina echoed simultaneously.

“Yeah — cold, hard bi—” Gage stopped himself, and then
the two men exploded into raucous laughter.

Sabrina blinked hard. Had she just inferred correctly? Was
he about to call her a —
a
—?

“Jackass,” she muttered savagely. Rabid with anger, she
grabbed the telephone receiver and stabbed in the number to KCAP with a pencil
eraser. She paced around the Think Tank while the phone rang and rang.

“We have a call coming in from the House of
Representatives,” Gage finally announced. “Don’t you just love caller I.D.?” he
added conversationally. Then the next thing she knew, his voice was rumbling in
her ear.

“Fitz residence. To whom do I have the pleasure of
speaking?” She could hear his voice coming out of the radio speakers after a
slight delay.

“It’s the b–(BEEP).” Her voice sounded like she was gargling
with acid.

“Wow. I do believe I’m in trouble.” Gage faked a chastised
tone, which only galled Sabrina more.

“Rein in the commentary, Fitzgerald,” she ordered. “Or you
can park your a-(BEEP) in the garage when I change the locks. Are we crystal?”

— we crystal?
She heard her voice echo in the room.

“Did I lie, kids?” Gage addressed his radio audience
blandly.

Giggles giggled. “She must be righteously pissed if she
called you by your last name.”

“As for you, toadie,” she addressed Gage’s irritating
sidekick. “Stop egging him on.” Then she slammed down the phone. A dumb silence
coursed through both the airwaves and her office.

“I think she means that part about the garage,” Giggles
finally said nervously.

Gage sighed. “What’d I tell you? Welcome to my life.”

The feigned persecution in his voice plucked at her nerves
like a fingernail on a violin string. High E. Pizzicato. Sabrina punched the
radio off, fuming.
Damn the man.
She realized that a big part of his job
involved a talent for hyperbole, but today he’d gone too far. Now her
concentration was scattered to the winds.

She grabbed her keys and purse. The slam of the office door
sounded like a clap of lightning in the empty Annex halls. She pitched the
Styrofoam container and coffee cups in a communal trash bin. So “Fitz” thought
she was cold, hard bitch?

She’d fix that particular wagon.

Wheel by wheel.

**

“You need liquid reinforcement, man?” Gideon asked as the
taxi idled in front of the house.

Gage’s coworker produced a silver flask from the inside
pocket of his coat jacket. Gage took it, unscrewed the cap and took a long swig
of the flask’s contents.
Gin.

“Thanks.” He winced as the potent smell of juniper berries
burned his nose. 

Sleep-in mornings were few and far between, so he’d made the
most of his evening out. After the Thanksgiving show ended, he and Gideon had
headed out to the Gingerbread Man along with the other single guys at the
station for drinks and a few laughs. Now Gage could see the television
flickering blue through the living room window. That meant Sabrina was home and
seething. He remembered the husky sizzle in her voice when she called up the
station.

Maid March meant business.

“I think I better make it a double,” Gage muttered and took
another hearty swallow from the flask.

“Here’s to difficult women.” Gideon gave him a sympathetic
look.

“Yeah. Cheers,” Gage agreed.

“Got quite a few of those on the line myself.”

“Really?” Gage looked at the other man with unconcealed
surprise. Whenever he overhead women swooning over their latest paramour,
Gideon didn’t exactly come to mind. Gage’s coworker had a wiry frame that
seemed to be made up of mostly knees and elbows. Twin puffs of curly dark hair
sprang from either side of his pate.

“Star appeal is sex appeal, dude,” Gideon explained with a
salacious grin. “Lotsa chicks are Fitz girls. But some of them want their
Giggles. Use it or lose it. Am I right?”

“Right like rain,” Gage agreed. He screwed the cap on the
flask and handed it back to Gideon reluctantly. 

“Give me a call
mañana
, dude. That is, if you’re
still standing,” Gideon added with a cackle.

Gage collected his belongings from the back of the cab and
watched it drive off into the night. His workmates got to go home to bachelor
pads and warehouse apartments shared with understanding girlfriends, the lucky
bastards. Who knew what trouble was brewing on the other side of the door in
front of him?

He walked through the doorway and came to a sudden halt,
squinting at the unlikely vision in front of him. Sabrina sat cross-legged in
front of the television set wearing a slinky black robe knotted at the waist.
She wore full war paint. Her eyes were lined with kohl, the lids smudged with
sultry shades of charcoal and gray. Gage supposed this was what those silly
glamour magazines described as a “smoky eye” look. Her lips were glossed into a
cherry red fuck-off pout, and she’d moussed her hair into a strategically
mussy, model-on-the-catwalk look.

Damn, she cleaned up really nice.

If nice is what he could call it.

“She lies in wait,” Gage observed softly. “And here I am
with a peace offering.”

He intrepidly crossed the living room and placed the paper
honeycomb turkey he’d purloined from the KCAP break room on the coffee table.
Sabrina gave it a cursory glance, then turned her attention back to her
documentary.

“This is just a wild guess, but you’re pissed off about this
afternoon’s impromptu show,” he went on. “
The World at War
cannot be a
good sign. Or is this mandatory viewing for top-ranking legislative staff prior
to entering the hot zone?”

He knew it was far from over when Sabrina hit the mute
button on the remote and gave him a sultry smoky-eyed glare. She didn’t speak a
word. Instead, she rose to her feet lightly. The short black robe revealed a
tempting expanse of her well-defined runner’s thighs. He watched as she slowly
and deliberately unknotted the tie and tilted her head back in an acquiescent
lingerie model pose. Certain things were beyond his control, and Gage felt a
familiar bulge rising in his jeans.

She knew what she was doing, right down to the letter.

The question was …
why?

“This is getting a scary,” he said, disconcerted. “Look, if
you’re going to bust my chops for the ‘cold, hard bitch’ comment, bust away. I
probably deserve it. But I’d prefer you do it when I still have a buzz on. It’s
less painful and far less memorable.”

Sabrina still said nothing. She slunk forward slowly,
letting the robe fall open to reveal a black net-trimmed bra and matching
underwear. The gently rounded curves of her breasts and the nipped-in waist
he’d imagined beneath the horrible bridesmaid’s dress were right there in front
of him on display. He had an unexplainable urge to trace the flat, dark moles
that peppered the smooth skin of her belly with his fingertips. As though
reading his mind, a small gasp hitched in Sabrina’s throat as she looked at his
hands hungrily. 

She moved closer until they were nose to nose. Or rather,
nose to chest; she used the lapels of his jacket to pull herself up on her
tippy-toes. They were close enough for him to catch a whiff of
Passage
d’Enfer
and for her to smell the gin on his breath. Her lips were so close
to his he could feel their heat against his own. Every instinct told him to
wrap his hands around that tiny little waist and crush her mouth against his.

She was making it too easy …

Or was she? Glimmering in those big brown eyes was coy
feminine calculation he recognized in women who wanted either expensive jewelry
or revenge.

The heat of her skin was driving him insane. He swallowed as
his erection throbbed impatiently against her belly. Sabrina molded her body to
his and swayed with him pliantly as she closed her eyes and exhaled a soft,
shuddery sigh.

“Thanks for the offer,” she finally said in a husky voice,
dragging her hands seductively down his lapels before releasing them. “But I
think I’ll pass.”

She released him abruptly and took a couple of steps back,
giving him a full view of her skimpy outfit. Her mouth parted slightly. Gage’s
heart pounded as she distractedly traced the edge of her black bra where it met
the swell of an ivory breast. Then with a little toss of her head, she turned
on her heels. He watched her sashay down the hall, the tassels of her robe ties
swinging. She threw him a smoldering look over her shoulder before disappearing
into her bedroom. The sound of the door clicking shut ushered in a sudden wave
of sobriety.

So Maid March knows how to work it after all.
Gage
tore off his jacket, feeling frustrated and irascible, like the perpetually
horny, self-doubting teenager he had once been. The teenager who hadn’t always
scored with hot girls like Sabrina. Girls who had made him worry that he hadn’t
been man enough to take them on.  

The air in the room felt heavy and oppressive. He went over
to the thermostat to turn down the heat, only to find that it had been turned
off entirely. He stared lustfully at the closed door to Sabrina’s room. She’d
proved her point. Unfortunately, proving it left him with a dull, unsated
feeling in his loins that he could take care of with either a cold shower or a
warm palm. 

Maybe he should rethink his descriptors after all.