The Trouble With J.J. (15 page)

“You are a good father to her.”

“Oh, yeah?” he asked with a caustic laugh, still not looking at Genna. “Then how come I feel like a louse? How come I never know the right thing to say or do, and I always seem to blow it when it counts?”

Maybe everything had always come too easily for him, Jared thought. He’d never known what it was to struggle for something he really wanted. His profession came naturally to him; all the moves came instinctively. Now he wanted more than anything to be a good father and he had no idea how to go about it. He didn’t have a clue about what he was doing wrong. It was as if he suddenly couldn’t read a defense, his line was crumbling around him, and he was left holding the ball and not knowing what to do with it.

Maybe he just wasn’t cut out to be a father.

Maybe he didn’t have
it
.

Maybe Alyssa would be better off with her aunt.

He flinched as a hand settled on his arm. Genna’s hand.

“You’re a very good father to Alyssa, Jared,” she said, gently leading him back to the couch, where they both sat down. “You’re just not much of a mother.”

Now his brain was starting to dysfunction. He stared at Genna, bemused.

“Listen,” Genna said, tucking her bare feet under her Indian-style. “Alyssa just lost her mother. She’s afraid, hurt, angry. That’s a big load for a five-year-old to handle. On top of that, she’s gone from being cared for by a woman to being cared for by a man. There’s a big difference, in case you hadn’t noticed.

“You’re doing a good job. Maybe you’re a little too lenient—”

He scowled immediately at the insinuation, but his look softened just as quickly. “Do you think I spoil her?”

“Just a little.” Genna smiled gently.

“I guess I do. It’s just that I’ve hardly had any time with her and I like buying her presents and stuff.” He took a sudden interest in his fingernails as he added. “And I want her to like me.”

Genna looked from father to sleeping daughter
and back. “Lyssa loves you, Jared. She just needs a little time to adjust. You both do.”

The sense of what she was saying managed to sink into Jared’s befuddled brain. He gave her a feeble smile. “How’d you get to be so damn smart?”

“Psych minor,” she nodded, letting her own smile coax his to blossom.

He grinned. “Is that gonna cost me extra, Teach?”

“I’ll put it on your bill.”

The grin melted away and his look was one of pure need as he reached out to her. “Put this on the bill too, will you? I need a hug.” He pulled her into his arms, pressing his head to her shoulder as she kneeled unsteadily on the couch.

“I got another letter from Simone’s lawyer today,” he said, holding her tighter. “They’re going ahead with the suit. They think they can prove I’m not fit to keep Lyssa.”

“Oh, Jared,” she said with a sigh, cursing the unseen woman whose timing couldn’t have been worse.

“What if I’m not?” came his tortured whisper.

“You listen to me, Jared Jay Hennessy,” Genna said in her sternest teacher voice, pushing him
back so she could glare at him. “You may be a little offbeat—okay, a
lot
offbeat—but I can’t name one man who’d make a better father to that little girl. Now get that through your thick head.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said, smiling, though his eyes glistened with tears, as did Genna’s. He laughed. “Geez, I think we’re gonna cry.”

They both laughed at that, stray tears spilling over their boundaries. Then Jared pulled Genna to him in a crushing embrace, burying his face in her hair. “Oh, Gen, I’m so scared of losing her.”

“You won’t lose her,” she whispered, praying she was right.

With a supreme effort Jared blinked away the tears that had threatened, then sniffed, raising his head. He sat back, his face taking on the keen look of a hound on a scent, and murmured three words, “Apple spice cake.”

“With apple frosting.”

“Oh, wow.”

Grinning, Genna went to the kitchen and returned minutes later with a tray of cake and tumblers of milk, to find Jared stretched out on the couch directly across from his daughter, sound asleep. Smiling, she went back to the kitchen to start supper.

EIGHT

“H
OLY
H
ANNAH
!” A
MY
wailed. “You’re still baking!”

“Good morning, Amy,” Genna said sweetly without looking up from her task at the kitchen counter.

“What’s he done now?” She maneuvered her pudgy body onto a stool at the counter.

“Who?” Genna refused to take the bait. This wasn’t Jared’s fault. Not directly anyway. His news that Simone Harcourt was going ahead with the custody suit had upset her more than she cared to say. How did the woman think she could prove Jared was an unfit parent? That question had
nagged at the back of her mind since Jared had told her about this latest letter.

“Who? Houdini,” Amy said sarcastically, popping open the can of diet Coke she’d brought along. “Who do you think?”

“Can’t imagine.”

“What are you making?” she asked suspiciously.

“Christmas cookies.”

“It’s the middle of summer!”

“Think of all the spare time I’ll have at Christmas.”

“Yeah, you’ll have all kinds of spare time when they lock you up at the funny farm.”

The back door banged open, saving Genna from any more of Amy’s observations. “Delivery for Genna Hastings.”

“Doesn’t anybody knock anymore?” Genna questioned as she wiped her hands on a dishtowel and pinned the delivery boy with a look. Then her eyes fell on the vase in his hands. It was a delicate milk-glass vase with a ruffled edge, and it was overflowing with violets and baby’s breath.

Without another word Genna took it from him and went into the dining room, where she put the
flowers on the table and slouched down on a chair to read the card.

For yesterday, when I needed you and you were there—J.J
.

Amy handed the delivery boy two fresh Santa Claus cookies just as Genna burst into tears. The young man’s eyes went huge with interest. Amy smacked him for staring and shooed him out the door. By the time she made it to the table, aching to hear a tearful true confession, Genna had reined in her emotions and gotten rid of the evidence of her outburst with a pink tissue. Amy grabbed for the card, but her friend held it out of reach. She scowled.

“They’re from Jared,” she accused the air. When Genna refused to answer, she slapped a chubby hand on the table and cackled like a crazed chicken, her dark eyes dancing. “I knew it! You
are
softening up! He’s winning you over!”

“Baloney.” If Amy was going to get an admission out of her, Genna was determined to have a little fun making her work for it.

“Ha! He sends you flowers and you burst into tears—”

“An allergic reaction.”

“Yeah, sure. Allergic to telling the truth.” She
got on her knees on the Windsor chair and leaned across the table toward Genna, bracing her hands on the smooth wood surface. “Okay, Hastings, come clean—”

Bang. “Break out that new dress, Genna,” sang a smoky sexy tenor. “I’m taking you dancing tonight.”

“Blast you, Hennessy,” Amy snarled at him. “She was just about to break!”

Jared took in the scene of Amy half on top of the table, her well-rounded backside sticking up in the air, and all sorts of weird explanations zinged through his brain.

Genna gave him a bland smile. “Yes, Amy was about to bring out her thumbscrews.”

He bit the head off a reindeer cookie and chewed thoughtfully. “This sounds too kinky even for me. Is there some deep dark secret you’re not telling me, Gen?”

“Why, yes … yes, there is.” She smiled enigmatically, her eyes taking on a gleam of mischief she had seen so many times in Jared’s. His gift had taken her by surprise, tilted her off balance. Now a rare burst of reckless abandon overpowered her, bringing her to her feet and propelling her toward the man.

It was Jared’s turn to be shocked. And Amy wanted a confession? Well, why not give her one that would knock her socks off?

Suddenly wary, Jared took a step back, but Genna caught him, sliding her arms up around his neck. She gave him a sultry smile, tipped back his baseball cap, and kissed him full on the mouth.

Amy screamed.

Jared went through a rapid series of reactions—shock, followed by a swift involuntary rush of passion, then back to shock. Still hanging on to his mutilated reindeer cookie, he backed away from her, breaking lip contact at last.

“Genna!” he exclaimed as he turned red.

Genna grinned impishly and shrugged. “I love you.”

Amy screamed again and staggered for the back door, fanning herself with a gingerbread man.

A smile twitching at her lips, Genna went to the sink and calmly started washing cookie sheets. She couldn’t believe how good she felt now that she’d said it out loud. She loved Jared Hennessy. It felt doubly wonderful because he was none of the things she had forced herself to believe she wanted in a man. With Jared she would never wonder
whether she had fallen for the man or his MBA. With Jared she had no doubts.

Except about the future.

She didn’t know how much time she would have with him. She didn’t know if he had welcomed her confession or cursed it. She had agreed to a no-strings relationship, yet she had come out and said she loved him. Well, that didn’t mean she was expecting him to say it back. She was simply being honest. If he didn’t like it …

Well, she decided determinedly, I won’t think about that today. I’ll think about that tomorrow. Nor would she think about the fact that Scarlett had ended up without Rhett while proclaiming tomorrow was another day. These were the eighties after all. A woman could have a summer romance if she wanted to.

Genna had never had a summer romance. She’d had summer jobs and had gone to summer school, but she’d never had a summer love. She’d been too practical and level-headed for that. Now she was thirty and for once she was going to throw practicality out the window. She was going to love Jared Hennessy for as long as she could, and when it was over, she wasn’t going to have any regrets.

Jared sneaked his arms around her and snuggled
up to her from behind. A shiver danced through Genna at the feel of her bottom tucked intimately against the most masculine part of him. She giggled as he nibbled at her neck. Apparently he had recovered from his attack of shyness now that Amy was gone.

“Do you realize it’s been almost four whole days since we made love?” he queried against the sensitive flesh of her throat.

“Really? That long?” she quipped breathlessly, her bones turning to molasses.

His hips arched against her backside provocatively. Taking her earlobe between his teeth, he stated,
“That long.”

Genna gasped and groaned, dropping her dishrag into the sink with an audible plop. She braced her hands on the counter, her senses reeling.

“Bernice and Alyssa are making pasta. I’m told that takes a
long
time.” His fingers slipped under the over sized pink T-shirt she wore and teased the undersides of her breasts.

“Long time …” The words fluttered from her lips like butterflies. Lord, what this man could do to her body!

“You’ve never shown me the upstairs of your house, Genna,” he purred, running the tip of his
tongue down her throat while he circled a finger around each of her aching nipples. “I’ll bet there’s lots of interesting stuff up there.”

“Mmmm ….”

“Why don’t I lock the door and then you can show me?”

“Mmm.”

How her rubber knees got her up the stairs, Genna wasn’t sure. What she was sure of was that she wanted Jared with an intensity that robbed her of all coherent thought. And it was obvious he felt the same way. If their lovemaking had been unhurried the first time, this time it was anything but.

They made it to the general vicinity of Genna’s white iron bed before they found each other’s arms. They met in a blaze of passion and urgency. Tongues dueled as eager hands tore at buttons and zippers. Genna’s baggy jeans hit the floor and she kicked out of them as they went down on the bed in a tangle of arms and legs.

“I want you,” Jared moaned hotly against her mouth. He pulled her legs up around his bare hips and thrust into her without preamble.

The excitement of sudden need had been their fore play. Genna was more than ready for him. She
ran her hands down his back, arching against him wantonly, savoring the satin heat of their union.

Jared watched her for a moment. Beneath him Genna was the most beautiful creature on earth. She gave herself to him so freely, without hesitation or reservation or coyness. She loved him. A shudder went through him. This was what he needed to make his life complete, for this woman to love him.

Another shudder rolled through his body, reminding him of his hunger for Genna. Her eyes fluttered open and locked with his as they moved together in passion’s dance, as they raced together toward passion’s edge and hurled themselves over it.

With her name on his lips Jared dropped his head to her shoulder and collapsed on top of her. They were half on the bed and half off, and he weighed a ton, lying on top of her, but Genna didn’t care. She felt wonderfully complete and content in a way she had never experienced before.
I love him
.

“Did you mean it, Gen?” he asked in that smoky voice that turned her blood hot and heavy in her veins. He raised up on one elbow and looked deep into her eyes.

“I love you,” she said simply, acutely aware of how vulnerable she was to his rejection. There was every chance that he wouldn’t want her to admit being so involved. She started to open her mouth to tell him he didn’t have to worry, that she was a big girl and she could handle a short-term relationship. But he banished the noble speech from her mind with a tender kiss.

A slow, sweet smile curved his mouth. He brushed her tangled hair back from her face and tugged her T-shirt up. Keeping their bodies joined, Jared bent his head and leisurely attended to her breasts with his mouth, kissing, sucking, laving.

Genna moaned with delight. A tide of renewed desire surged through her, stronger than the one that had swept her upstairs in the first place. It gushed through her arms and legs, fingers and toes. It settled like a whirlpool in her breast, the sensations swirling around and around as Jared’s tongue swirled around and around. Then his warm lips closed on the turgid tip and he sucked urgently.