Finding Jessie: A Mystery Romance (9 page)

“They told me. I had that happen to me once.”

“You did? How did it happen?”

“I was climbing a ladder and I fell.”

“Why were you on a ladder, Sam?”

“I was putting up Christmas lights for Mrs. Foster, the next-door neighbor lady.  I lost my balance and fell on her blackberry bush.”

She winced at the thought.

“That was nice of you to help her, Sam. You’re nice to people.”

“I try, Jessie. I’m not good at making decisions sometimes, but I surely try to be kind.”

“Christmas lights. You’re a Christian?”

“I’m a staunch atheist with a capital A, which stands for the inexplicable invisible angel on my shoulder. Either that, or I am crazy and hear a voice in my head. I prefer to think that the angel is real and not a figment of my imagination.”

“How come?”

“Because he’s very astute and very kind. I don’t know how to come to terms with my atheism and the angel on my shoulder.”

“Oh. I guess that will give us something to talk about while I get better.”

He smiled. “I will talk about anything you want to talk about. I’m just glad you can talk at all, Jess. You had quite a courageous swim.”

“The river was very cold. I was afraid, but then a buoy was there, where none had ever been before. They told me that when they rescued me. Do you believe it?”

“That seems far-fetched.” She did have a flair for the dramatic. But none of it seemed to be her fault.

“You’d think so, that it’s far-fetched, but here I am.”

She seemed to fall asleep then and it was a long wait before he could arrange for her prescriptions to be filled and her discharge to be official.

An orderly finally helped him wrap her into a down sleeping bag in the back seat of the Volvo station wagon and zip it up around her. He stuffed pillows all around her body, because there was no way she could wear a seat belt. He drove very carefully, through three hours of pouring rain and slippery turnpike, all the way home to his book-filled house in Port Sapphire.

Now, instead of Sam being alone in his book-filled rooms, there was Sam and
Jessie
.  

What are you going to do with this helpless young thing
? asked the angel on his shoulder.

Read to her
, Sam replied in his head.

You’ll have wings someday,
promised the angel on his shoulder.

“Let’s not rush things,” he replied aloud.

Chapter Four

Those first four days after her accident were rough on both Jessie and Sam. He’d rarely had a woman in his house, except overnight or maybe for a weekend. Now it was approaching five days and Jessie was still there. Though it took a lot of effort to care for her, strangely, he didn’t want her to go away from his house.
Ever.

He brought her lunch tray to the second-floor en suite bedroom. She was awake and playing with the cats, a small catnip mouse in her good hand, the Twins standing on hind legs to get at the stuffed mouse, which she let them sniff and then held it high, out of their reach, so they would jump for it.

“You brought lunch!” she exclaimed. “I’m so hungry.”

“You were still asleep for this morning’s toaster waffles,” Sam said.

“
Eww
. Good thing. I’ll make up for it now.” She threw the catnip mouse down the hall so that the cats would jump down from the bed and leave her alone with her food. They did so.

He put the lunch tray over her lap and she put the napkin in her lap.

“It smells wonderful, Sam. What is it?”

“It’s shepherd’s pie. I hope you like it. Mrs. Foster, the neighbor lady, made it. Her granddaughter, Cindy, brought it over in a basket. She was dressed up like Red Riding Hood and was getting into the role of goodies delivery. She also brought red velvet cupcakes.”

“I love cake, as you know. And I am something of a cupcake addict.”

“I remember. You were asleep and I didn’t want to wake you, but I’m sure that Cindy will come again.”

“I hope she does. She sounds like a delightful child.” She picked up the fork with her good right arm and took a taste. “Yum! Thanks! Please tell her I said thank you and that it was delicious.”

“Will do.”

She ate hungrily and still he wondered how, with an appetite like hers, she wasn’t plump at all. He hoped she wasn’t bulimic. He didn’t think so, though.

He sat in the recliner chair at the sunny window, reading the
Port Sapphire Star
on his Kindle Fire and waiting for her to finish eating so they could talk.

When she was finished, she plinked the fork down and told him that it had hit the spot. Then she asked him for a favor.

“I’m getting kind of ripe. It has been five days since the accident. I can take myself to the bathroom, but I would really like to take a bath and shampoo my hair. I just don’t know if I can get in and out of the tub by myself.”

He blushed and put down the Kindle Fire on the nightstand.

“Are you saying that you want me to help you take a bath?”

“Please,” she said, her blue eyes begging him. “Have mercy on me before I stink up your house.”

He laughed. “You do not stink! But if you want a bath, you shall have a bath.” He walked into the bathroom, plugged the drain of the claw-footed tub and adjusted the water temperature for her. “All right, Jessie. It’s filling up for you. How do you like it? Warm or hot?” he called.

“Almost hot! I’m not just dirty. I’m achy, too, from lying in bed.”

“Anybody would be. Five days is a long time to just lie around.”

“I know. I feel like I’m not earning my keep,” she said.

“That is not for you to worry about, Jessie. Your job, right now, is to heal.”

“Okay. Thank you.”

He got out a couple of clean towels and when he turned around, she was at his side, naked, except for the sling.

“I’m a little dizzy. Could you take off this darn sling, please? I just can’t manage it. If I don’t get my arm stretched out, I think I’m going to scream. My elbow’s cramping.”

He removed the sling and gently helped her bend her arm. He saw her wince a bit.

“Bad?”

“Actually better than yesterday. I haven’t taken a pain pill today. I’m trying to wean myself off them, so I don’t have to be helpless and ask you for everything.”

“That’s all right. I don’t mind.”

She smiled at him, like some naked, bruised Venus in his bathroom. Even with all of the healing burns and bandages, she was beautiful.

“I hope this isn’t too embarrassing for you, Sam. I know how shy you are.”

Sam grinned and tried not to look at her breasts, never mind lower than that. “And you? Why aren’t you shy with me?”

“Well, I can be shy and lay in your bed stinking, or I can be brazen and get a bath from you. It was a hard choice, but stinking is much more humiliating than being naked in front of you.” She paused. “I guess I
trust
you. I just realized that. Being naked usually in front of anyone throws me into a panic.”

“You
should
trust me. I hope I haven’t given you any reason not to.”

“You haven’t.”

“Good.” He offered her his hand and she held onto it with her good arm to balance herself as he helped her into the clawfoot tub and helped her sit down slowly in the hot water.

“Oh, that feels like heaven. I love your tub. It’s so long that I can float on my back.” She did so and closed her eyes.

He stole a direct look at her while her eyes were closed. He could see every inch of her through the clear water. Her breasts were small and like little pink shells on her pale golden skin. Without any flab on her, her hipbones jutted out a bit, leaving an inward curve to her groin. A soft-looking downy mound of light red hair punctuated the juncture of her long legs. Everywhere he looked at her, she was like a beam of warm light, and he drew warmth from her, just from seeing her in his bathtub.

He cleared his throat and put his razor and shaving gear out for her. “I don’t have any body wash, or whatever you gals use to smell so good.”

She opened her eyes and sat up in the tub.

“That’s okay. Regular soap and shampoo will be just fine.” She eyed the shaving gear. “No razor necessary. I kind of go natural all over. My leg hair is so sparse and light-colored that I don’t bother with the social custom of shaving. I hope you aren’t offended.”

“Not at all. A lot of New England women don’t shave. But mostly, I think it’s because they are bundled up all winter and they need that leg hair for warmth.”

She laughed and splashed him a bit as she adjusted herself comfortably in the tub.

He put the shampoo within reach, handed her a fresh bar of Ivory and a washcloth, and turned to leave the room before she saw how excited he was getting. He could feel himself rising, a fifty-seven-year-old man, without touching himself. Again, just the sight of her had him worked up to a near froth. He remembered that those parts had not worked reliably for quite a long time before he’d met her.

“Sam,” she called, “would you come back in about twenty minutes and help me wash my hair? Please? Then I promise I won’t bother you for the rest of the day.”

“S-sure,” he spluttered. “You can bother me anytime.” He nearly fled from the bathroom, feeling foolish for what he had just said.

He heard her splashing about in the bath, even humming and breaking into song.

Instead of puttering about the house, he stood outside the bathroom door, listening to her sing.

When she finally called to him to come in the bathroom about twenty minutes later, he entered with a bottle of hair detangler and a Roseville pitcher from the kitchen. “This detangler is really for people hair, but I buy it for the cats’ fur.”

“You bathe your cats?”

He chuckled. “In this very tub. When you have two boy cats, you’ve got to bathe them and comb them once in a while, or the whole house will smell like cats and there’s a chance that everyone will wake up with fleas some cold morning when you are all lumped together in the bed!”

She laughed. “How do the Twins take to the bath ritual?”

“They struggled as kittens, but after two years, they suffer their baths with great indignant expressions and only the occasional claw mark administered to their poor, innocent bather.”

She laughed, and then held out both arms. “Look Sam, I wanted to show you that my arm feels a lot better. I can move it about halfway to normal.”

He breathed a sigh of relief. “I’m glad. You’re getting better a lot faster than I did when I hurt my shoulder.”

He filled the pitcher with clean hot water from the tap and tested the temperature with his fingers. “I think that should be satisfactory.”

“Ready?” he asked.

She nodded and he gently poured the water over her head, and then two more pitchers and when her long red hair was all wet, she looked like a Disney mermaid.