Handful of Heaven (7 page)

He liked that about her. He liked the idea of being with a woman who was strong enough to face life’s hardships. He liked a lot of things about Paige McKaslin, and he didn’t want to. A man ought at least to have control of who he liked and why, but in this one instance, it seemed out of his hands.

Suddenly, the wind changed and brought with it the alarming sense that he wasn’t alone. He knew who was standing in the driveway behind him. He knew, because apparently he wasn’t in control of this either, of how his and Paige’s lives were currently intersecting.

“Having problems, there, tough guy?”

“I hope you’re not mocking me. My dignity’s taken enough blows as it is.”

“You can stop pretending. I was so busy watching you in my rearview that I didn’t watch where I was going. I’m caught in a drift. You could have plowed your driveway, you know.”

“If I’d gotten out the tractor, then I wouldn’t have thrown out my back.”

“You never know. A big, muscle-bound man like you is bound to have one weakness.”

She was next to him, grabbing hold of his arm. She was a tall woman, taller than he’d first thought, but he realized, her slenderness was deceptive. She might look willowy, but there was no mistaking the strength in her grip as she helped him take another step.

Too bad his brain wasn’t working right, because all he could think was, She thinks I’m big and muscle-bound. He really shouldn’t be glad about that, right?

“I have no weaknesses that I’ll admit to.”

That made her laugh, and it was a pleasant sound. Not brassy or fake, but low and pleasant like a kitten’s purr. “That’s just like a man. Never show your vulnerable side. I know. It’s why my son drives me nuts.”

“Is that the only reason?”

“No.” She laughed again. “Can you get up the stairs, or will I have to carry you?”

“I’d like to see you try.” He weighed two hundred pounds. She couldn’t be more than one twenty-five. “There’s no sense putting your back out, too.”

“My lumbar disks thank you.”

“You have a bad back, too?”

“I like to blame it on carrying heavy trays of food for about two decades, but since I don’t like to admit I’m over thirty-five, I can’t use it as an excuse.”

“You don’t need the excuse, Paige. You don’t look a day older than thirty.”

“Careful. We’ll be lucky if a bolt of lightning doesn’t streak from the sky and strike us where we stand.”

“No lightning, see?” He dragged his foot onto the bottom step, refusing to lean on Paige because he was no weakling, and did his best not to let on that the pain was killing him. “I wasn’t lying. You’re an amazing woman. You’re lovely and you know how to cook some of the best—”

Lightning seared through the storm, arrowing like a bright finger from heaven to the trees behind the house. There was an explosion of thunder above and the crack of a pine tree beyond, and then there was utter silence.

Paige started to laugh. “I can’t believe it. Lightning struck.”

“Now don’t go taking this the wrong way, Paige. You might think I wasn’t telling the truth, but I was. Why else would I have asked you out? I haven’t done that since I was in college. I told you that.”

What was it about this man’s low rumbling voice that seemed to knock all common sense right out of her? Paige wanted to believe him, she really did, because she hated to admit it, but Evan Thornton—the
man
and not the customer—was starting to grow on her.

He could make her laugh, and she’d never appreciated the importance of a sense of humor in a man before. Tiny laugh lines crinkled around his handsome eyes, and it had a devastating effect.

Not that she could let it affect her. He was handsome, he was distinguished, and he was no thrill-seeking teenager. Not this man who’d built this fine house and made it a secure home for his young boys to have grown up in.

It took a lot of character to be the parent that stayed. A lot of strength to handle the hard—although rewarding—parts of being a father. And this man looked as if he could weather anything with good humor to boot—even the back pain that he was too proud to let her see full-force.

She knelt to snatch up the diner’s sack and propped open the storm door, since the handle was on her side. But Evan was taking none of that. Apparently no woman helped him. He seemed to be all male pride and ego as he grabbed the door and held it for her, even though his face went white from the strain.

“I hope you don’t mind if I use your phone. My cell isn’t working with this storm.” She stepped into the warmth, grateful for it, but not expecting the rush of tenderness for the stubborn, strong, unyielding man who limped in after her.

Men. She’d forgotten there was a lot of good in them, too. And wasn’t that the danger?

E
van craned his back the few necessary inches so he could reach the door and shut it against the shower of snow. Pain exploded once again in his lower back and, with the scrape of bone against his disk, his back was relatively back in place. Residual pain shivered through his left leg, but he gave a prayer of thanks heavenward.

“Oh, that was your back?” Paige must have heard the popping sound. Her rosebud mouth had softened into a concerned O, and sympathy shadowed her deep-blue eyes. “Evan, you need to get some ice on that. Do you have some anti-inflammatories?”

He couldn’t answer. He could only stare at her as she set down her sack and her purse and untied her coat’s hood. Coming closer as if naturally meaning to help out. He’d been facing problems—even something as minor as a strained back—alone for so long, he couldn’t seem to wrap his mind around it. She was coming at him and in the half-light of the foyer she looked mysterious, cloaked in shadow, but also warm and vibrant with life, her heart showing vulnerable and open.

“You’ve got to give that some rest. Let’s get you into the living room. Is it this way?” Again she took his arm, but he couldn’t stand to let her think he was weak. He intended to shake his arm away from the warm, firm grip she had, but he couldn’t stand that idea either. “I’m all right. It’s been a while since you’ve been around a wounded man, right?”

“Oh, you don’t want my help. Fine. Limp into the living room all on your own steam and I’ll get some ice for you. Unless you’re too stubborn to let me do that for you?”

“You think I’m amusing. I can tell. Your eyes are sparkling.”

“The male gender can be very amusing. Sometimes.” She released him, trouble quirking her soft mouth into a sweet smile. “Or maybe I just like to see a man suffering. It’s appropriate.”

“Hey, I’m one of the good guys.”

“I didn’t say you weren’t.” She left him to his own maneuvering.

Good thing. He didn’t think he could keep pretending everything was all right. He limped over to the sectional in the living room. The crackling fire sent warm soothing radiant heat over him. He was frozen clear through, but that seemed the least of his worries.

His back was aching like a cracked tooth, and he sighed with relief as he eased onto the cushions. The fire’s warmth enveloped him like an electric blanket. The tension in his back eased up a bit. Much better.

“Here’s an ice pack.” She bustled through the house with the same snappy efficiency that she used in the diner. “I’ve got two anti-inflammatories, a glass of water. If you want, I can heat up the dinner I brought over while I wait for the tow truck. Sound good?”

“Paige, you’re not on duty here. This is my home. You don’t need to wait on me.”

“I don’t mind.” She handed him a sealed plastic bag of ice, wrapped in a kitchen towel, and set the glass and ibuprofen caplets on a saucer on the coffee table. “I’ll be right back.”

Why would any man leave her, he wondered, not because she was fetching him what he needed, but because she was so caring about it. It was easy for him to see the real Paige, the woman with a big heart she seemed to be afraid to show to the general public. She was a private person, he realized. Was she, he wondered, as lonely in her life as he was?

He popped the pills and washed them down with a swallow of water. As he positioned the lumpy ice pack against the small of his back, he could hear her in the kitchen. The whisper of cabinet doors opening. The clink of plates and the rustle of the big paper sack.

It had been a strange sensation to see a woman in his house bustling around and taking care of things. Fortunately it didn’t bring back memories of Liz, because she’d never been the efficient, get-things-done type.

What it made him think of was, not the past, but the present. How good it was to hear the movements of another person in this way-too-big house. How comforting it was to hear the gentle pad of a woman’s footsteps and gentle voice in the other room.

Yearning filled him. It was a sweet and rich longing, and more powerful than he’d ever known before. A longing for what he didn’t really believe in. And yet it felt right there within his reach. Being with a woman—a wife—in a way that was compatible and companionable, but it was more than that. Not just love of the heart but of something deeper.

And exactly why was he thinking this way? His back must be hurting worse than he thought, to make him so sentimental.

“Bad news.” She returned with a plate full of dinner salad glistening with Italian dressing. “The tow truck isn’t going to be here any time soon. I’d be better off hoofing it back to town.”

“I could take you.”

“My rig’s blocking your driveway.” She slipped the plate and the paper napkin and fork onto the coffee table in front of him. “I’ve got a call in to Alex. He can finish up his dinner at the church and come rescue me.”

“I think I can handle freeing up your Jeep. I’ve got a winch on my truck. It’ll be no problem.”

“And what about your back?”

“It’s fine. Just a little stitch, that’s all.”

“Sure it is, tough guy.” Paige wasn’t fooled one bit. “What is it with you men? You can’t show an ounce of weakness?”

“Exactly. Never let your guard down. I bet you know something about that.”

“Okay, now you’re getting too personal.” She wasn’t sure what to do with Evan Thornton. He sat there with his hair tousled, looking about as rugged and welcome as a dream man, but he was real and sincere. She liked him. She didn’t want to, but she did. “I don’t want my reputation as an ice queen ruined. It’s kept all those bothersome suitors away for years.”

“Why would you want that? You like being alone?”

His question surprised her like a right hook and her knees wobbled. She sank to the couch, not at all sure what to say with her heart jackhammering in her chest, and Evan’s gaze unwavering. It felt as if he saw too much of her, and she wasn’t sure how to stop him. “Now you are being way, way too personal.”

“I guess you’re like me. Alone is better than betrayal.”

Like an ax hitting her chest, her heart cracked wide open. Sometimes it felt as if she were the only person on earth who’d had a disappointing marriage at best, and a devastating wound she’d shown no one. Ever. “In the diner, it’s like all I see are couples. Married people are everywhere. Young and old and in between. With kids, without kids and empty-nesters. It’s not the happy couples I notice. It’s the ones that sit in silence. They don’t talk. They don’t look at one another. And I think how lucky I am not to be with someone who sees past me.”

“My wife saw me just fine. She just wasn’t content with what she saw.”

“How could that be? All anyone needs to know about you is to see what a fine job you did raising your sons.”

I could kiss you, lady. Evan’s chest cinched tight. Her compliment surprised him, but it did more than that. It touched him where he was vulnerable, in the deepest places of his heart. He’d tried so hard for his boys’ sake. It hadn’t always been easy, especially not alone, but then Paige would understand that. She would know how it felt to be alone raising kids. “That means a lot coming from someone who’s raised a good kid, too.”

“He is a good kid, but I keep my eye on him. I’ll get your supper in the microwave and you should be set. Is there anything else you need?”

“Paige, I’m serious. Don’t wait on me.” He stood, refusing to acknowledge the grimace of pain in his back or the residual traveling pain making its presence known in his leg. “I think whatever popped out of place has popped back. Let me grab my keys and I’ll help you out of the drift.”

“You shouldn’t be up moving around.”

“Hey, I’m tough. That’s the first lesson you’ve got to know about me. Not much can get me down, and if it does, it doesn’t keep me there.”

“Note taken. I’ll never try to suggest you take it easy again.”

“Excellent.” Evan couldn’t say why her smile lit him up inside, but the effect was like a ray of light on the dark side of the moon as he limped over to get his keys.

The storm had worsened since she’d been in Evan’s house. She shivered, swiped the wind-driven snow from her eyes and tried to see him in the near whiteout conditions. The stubborn man just didn’t know when to stop.

Or maybe it was just her perspective. She hadn’t been around a man in a personal capacity in a long, long time, excluding her son, who was more boy than adult at this point of his life.

Evan Thornton had to be in agony, she knew because she had a slipped disk that bothered her from time to time, so she knew what it felt like. And he was acting as if he was impervious to pain, as if he hadn’t just been unable to move less than twenty-five minutes ago.

He straightened from the winch on the front of his rig, highlighted by the headlights that cast him in silhouette. Invincible, he seemed to rise up to his six-foot height and from her vantage on the down slope of the hillside, he seemed ten feet tall.

In that moment, her breath caught between her ribs and she couldn’t explain what happened within her; she only knew that something in her heart felt different simply from looking at him. He cut through the beams of light and blended with the night. Although her eyes could not make him out against the dark and the storm, it was as if her heart could sense him standing there, unbowed and mighty, like some Wild-West hero brought to life.

She didn’t believe in heroes. Not at all. Not in real life. Not in her experience. So why was she thinking this way? Was it simply the possibility of the fairy tale of true love worming its way into her thoughts again, after all this time and all her experience to the contrary? She’d banished the hope long ago when Jimmy had walked away from the grill and out the door with a fun, young blond thing while she’d had a crying baby with an earache, a busy diner and a call from the deputy about her younger sister in hot water again.

A woman had to stand on her own two feet in this tough world. She shouldn’t be wasting her energy wishing for a white knight on a shining stallion to rescue her from her problems. The only help she needed was God’s help.

The driving wind chose that moment to ram against her so hard, she lost her balance, tumbling against the snow-driven door of her Jeep. Visibility vanished and she lost sight of the mythical man she’d woven out of old daydreams. Out of loneliness, too, she had to admit. For the business of her days and the fullness of her life, she was alone in the most fundamental way.

Maybe that’s just the way life was, she’d been even lonelier when she’d been married all those years ago. She’d felt so utterly lonely, wanting the loving tenderness from her husband who would rather watch football or play his video games or go out playing pool with his buddies.

This loneliness was better, she told herself firmly, cloaked and isolated by the drifting snow and pummeled by a wildly vicious wind, she did the only thing she could. Called out a thank you to Evan, wherever he was—if he had any sense, he’d be in the warm cab of his truck right now—and she fought the gusts to open her vehicle’s door, where the idling engine was blowing hot blasts from the vents—but the temperature outside was so cold, it did little to warm the interior of the Jeep.

With her teeth chattering from the frigid conditions, she hopped onto the seat and slammed the door.

And gave a jump when the passenger door opened and a dark presence slid into the other seat. The wind slammed the door shut and they sat in the glow of the dome light, the gusts shaking the vehicle and howling wildly around them.

“I can see why the drifts got so deep.” Evan’s low baritone rumbled as warm as firelight.

“I’m going to have a fine time getting back to town. I’d best get going. I owe you—again—for helping me.”

“Then I expect you to pay up.” His words were softened by a mysterious crick of his mouth in a sly—and very charming lopsided grin—as he flicked on her radio and hit the scanning button. “Thought you might want to hear this.”

She already knew with a punch of certainty which channel he was scanning for—one of the local stations, which was in the middle of an emergency broadcast. All county roads were closed due to extremely dangerous weather conditions. “I left the twins in charge of the diner.”

“Then call them and tell them to close up. They live right there in town, right?”

She nodded. The journey home for them would be relatively safe. “I can ask Dave to drive them on his way. He’s an old hand at dealing with this weather.”

“Then did you want to come back with me and use my phone?”

“No, I’d better risk getting home. Although, I’m not that sure how long that’s going to take me. Could I ask you another favor?”

“Try me.”

It went against her grain to ask anyone for help like this, but she thought of the girls’ safety—there wasn’t anything more important than that. “Could you call the diner for me?”

“Consider it done. You’d best get going before this gets any worse, and we both know it can. Be safe.” He opened the door to the fury of the blizzard conditions. “You’re going to owe me big-time. How about escorting me on Wednesday night? You’d be doing me a favor. I’m shy.”

“You’re not shy.”

“No, but help me out here. Go with the flow, like my boys say. It’s a new meeting. I’m afraid to go alone.”

“A big strong man like you? You don’t seem afraid of anything.”

“I’m big on the outside, marshmallow on the inside.”

This man was
so
not fooling her. “No man is marshmallow on the inside.”

“How do you know that? Are you an expert?” A quirk of humor tugged at the corner of his mouth.

Yeah, he was charming, all right. What was a girl to do? “Let’s just say I have had practical experience with the species.”

“Well, some men fall outside the normal bell curve of averages. That would be me.”

“So, you’re below average?”

That made his dark eyes twinkle. “I was thinking more of the other side of the chart. More than your average guy.”

“I’m not sure that’s a good thing.”

“Then it’s a date?”

“No. I’m not agreeing to a date. I don’t date.”