Bedeviled Angel (21 page)

They righted their clothes in time for the doors to open, barely, and Melody walked out first, like a shield, Logan one step behind… until he saw the look on his son's face, a look twisted with something like panic but—

Shane charged Melody, launched himself into her arms, and buried his face in her skirt, so Logan couldn't see him. Even when he asked what was wrong, he got a negative shake of his son's head. Since Shane had missed Mel this week as much as he did, it made sense, really, that he should stick to her. And when she got him laughing right off, Logan knew he'd mistaken the look.

Then he got caught in the snare of Melody's gaze over Shane's head, innocent, yet seductive, no longer full of promise, but regret. "Bad idea," she said.

Logan denied the statement, with a slow, determined, shake of his head, shocking her, but arousing her interest. "Sooner or later," he said, leaving her to interpret his meaning, and just as he wondered whether she understood, she blushed and lowered her lashes.

"I don't feel like cooking today," Shane whined, in the same contrary mood that had been driving Logan crazy all morning. Ever since the night before, Shane had been clingy one minute, uninterested the next. Logan couldn't figure out what was wrong with him.

After discovering how much Shane liked creating Melody's signs, Logan had instituted a father-son crafts night the evening before, which had ended rather abruptly when Shane super-glued his hand to the dining room table, a family piece that would now need to be refinished.

This morning, he'd knocked the pot of ivy he'd watered without permission off the coffee table. To make matters worse, he'd blamed Ink and Spot for the mud on the carpet.

Logan hated the ivy anyway. Melody brought it up the night before, all homey and bedtime cuddly in bunny slippers and a pink "stir my cauldron" T-shirt. Refusing his invitation to come in, she'd handed him the freaking plant and announced that Ivy stood for friendship. Then she'd turned to take her fine little backside right back down the stairs.

Logan wondered what had prompted her to give him a friendship gift, after they'd all but decided to consummate their lust. Well, after she'd seemed willing, anyway.

That was it; she was running scared, again. He'd bet the bank on it. He'd be able to prove it, if he knew how much chunky doodle ice cream she'd eaten since they got home from work last night.

Logan grinned. He rather liked the scenario. It intrigued him that she might be as scared of the sizzle between them as he often was.

God knew he didn't want to be "friends" with Melody any more than he wanted to cook with her, well, not cook food anyway. But the fact remained that they still had to prep for next week's show. And he should be friends with her, because anything more than friendship with a load of dynamite spelled suicide.

"Da-aad." Shane tugged on Logan's sweatpants. "I don't wanna cook. I wanna go fly my kite."

"And I wanna go to the Sox game, but neither of us is going to get what we want.

We're going to teach Melody to prepare a Boston Tea Party, because we want to keep our job."

"I don't want a job."

"Well I do. Today we cook. I don't have a choice, and neither do you."

"Yes, you do," Melody said, standing there trying to hide her bruised feelings.

"Damn it, Mel."

"Don't act like I did something wrong. Last night you said I didn't have to knock, but you just proved that I do. I don't feel like cooking, either," she told Shane as she kissed his head and turned to go. "See you both later."

"I wanna go with Mel."

Logan rolled his eyes. "All we have to cook today is dessert," he said, speaking to Melody and Shane's sweet tooths. "Cakes," he said enticingly now that he had their attention. "With icing. Chocolate."

"And breads," Melody added, losing Shane's interest and earning Logan's censure.

"All of which we could have with ice cream," she said with a sigh of resignation.

"Ice cream?" Shane asked, doubtfully.

Melody regarded Logan. "Sorry about your baseball game."

"Sorry about what I said, the way I sounded. I had no plans for the game."

Melody smiled, but Shane was acting as if he couldn't trust either of them, which bothered Logan. Something was bugging his son, something had morphed him into a first-class brat this weekend, and Logan wanted to know what.

Melody took their aprons from the hook in the broom closet, handed one each to Logan and Shane, and donned her own, then she took out bowls and mixing supplies. She liked Logan's kitchen with its bright blue counters and yellow cupboards. She liked the cozy lived-in feeling that her remodeled kitchen lacked.

She watched Logan open a well-worn oak recipe file, ruffle through the index, with his too-big hands, and take out a dog-eared card that made him smile with some long-ago memory. The only family memories she had were with Logan and Shane, she realized. She was making them now. Logan placed the recipe on the counter and tapped it. "This one first. Butterballs."

She would always remember this. "You sure the Indians who threw tea into Boston harbor made butterball cookies?"

"It's a tea party. Make butterballs."

"Okey-dokey." Melody read the card, admired his mother's neat hand, and saw her corner note: "Logan's favorite." She held an open palm toward Shane and ordered, "Eggs," like a TV surgeon.

With a shrug, Shane took a dozen from the fridge, set the box on the table, and, with a good deal of interest, watched her struggle to get the first one out. "Slippery little sucker," she said before breaking the egg on the edge of Logan's ancient blue-striped pottery bowl.

"I'll help," Shane said and flipped the box of eggs on its side. From across the room, Logan shouted, "No!" and dove, but it was too late. As if in slow motion, but too fast to be caught, one, two, three eggs hit the floor. Splat, splat, splat!

"Damn it, Shane!" Logan snapped.

Melody's heart tripped when Shane froze, his eyes dulled, and his little hands fisted.

She didn't know which of them seemed more upset; she knew only that she hated the fear on Shane's face and the helpless self-loathing on Logan's.

As Shane directed a yearning gaze toward his father,

Melody threw an egg at the refrigerator. Splat! "Eeeyyewwww," she said. "Look at it slime its way to the floor." She high-fived Shane. "Don't you love the sound it makes when it cracks?"

Logan regarded her with a look of horror as Melody's next egg hit Shane, square, in the chest. She dusted her hands with pride. "Good shot, Seabright."

"Okay, Mel, that's enough," Logan said, grabbing for the roll of paper towels.

"We get the picture."

Splat. Shane's egg hit Melody at the base of her throat. She screeched, and Logan whipped around in time to watch raw egg slip into her cleavage.

Shane raised his arms in an athletic dance of success and crowed.

Melody squeaked and yiked as she tried to dig it out, but the broken yoke kept slipping between her fingers. "Yuck!" she said, though Shane's helpless laughter made her laugh as well. "It… it—" She looked up at Logan. "It slipped through my bra!"

Logan looked like he might like to go after it… until he saw Shane with the refrigerator door open, holding a second box of eggs. "Don't you dare!" he shouted, and made for his son.

Melody stepped between them, and Logan stopped, startled, slipped in the slime, teetered, and hit the floor with a thud.

Shane dropped the eggs.

Melody dropped to her knees. "Logan? Can you hear me?"

He opened his eyes and narrowed them as fast. "What, do you think I broke my ears? Of course I can hear you."

"Are you okay?"

He raised himself on an elbow. "Could be, but I'm not betting either of you will be when I'm finished with you."

Melody took Logan's empty threat as a good sign. She gave Shane a thumbs-up, but he didn't seem inclined to celebrate as yet.

"You sure you're okay?"

"I'm sure," Logan said grudgingly, attempting to sit up… until Melody knocked him back by breaking an egg on his forehead.

LOGAN'S shock at getting egged was comical, but while they waited for his further reaction, Melody rose and stepped toward Shane.

The belly laugh, from somewhere deep inside Logan, took them all by surprise, even Logan. As his laughter erupted full force, Melody pushed Shane forward, until he lost his balance and fell against his father's chest, and the two of them got into a wrestling match, there on the egg-slimed floor.

Their laughter sounded like music to Melody, until Shane's morphed into something different, and suddenly he was sobbing with deep, soul-searing grief.

Melody watched, throat tight and aching, as Logan sat up and took his son in his arms to rock and shush him. "What is it, sport?" Logan asked gently. "What's the matter? You've been upset since yesterday. Tell old Dad what's up, will you?" he begged. "It's killing me seeing you so unhappy."

Shane shoved his father roughly away and rose to stand over him. "You forgot me!"

"Forgot you?"

"At day care, like Mom used to." Shane swiped his eyes as if he were too old for tears, too strong. "She used to forget me all the time, and I had to sleep at the sitter's." He stepped closer to his father, stood straighter. "I won't sleep at day care," he said. "Pretty soon, you'll be giving me away like Mom did. I don't want you anyway. I hate you!" he shouted, and launched himself at Melody.

Logan looked stricken.

"Oh, baby," Melody said, bending to Shane's level, trying not to cry all over him.

She smoothed his hair and hugged him. "Don't cry, sweetheart. Your dad loves you so much, and he knows you don't hate him. He would never give you away. He doesn't even like to let me borrow you, remember?"

Shane pulled from her embrace and regarded his father. "You gotta let her borrow me sometimes, 'kay?"

Gut-punched by the turnabout, Logan sobbed, and that was all it took for Shane to step back into his father's arms, the younger Kilgarven now soothing the older.

Melody rose and left the apartment. As she made her shaky way down the stairs, she wiped her eyes, aware she was in deep trouble. Not only did she love Shane, she was deathly afraid she was falling, and hard, for his workaholic father.

She could love a man who wept for losing his son's love.

Logan Kilgarven was the best father she'd ever come across. The kind of dad she'd wanted for herself. The kind she'd want for her own children, if she wanted children.

Deep trouble, and to save herself, she needed to turn her energy in another direction.

MELODY'S "Boston Tea Party," her third
Kitchen Witch
show, was a huge success, especially her Wild Rose Faery Jam, a symbol of the goddess, Melody told her audience, though which goddess that was, Logan didn't know.