McCloud's Woman (42 page)

Clay looked up with interest. “You’ll have to buy out the people who own the beach property, won’t you?”

The mayor glanced uncomfortably toward the happy party in
Cleo’s backyard. “They won’t all have to sell. Most of the land to the
east of here is uninhabitable, occupied by trailers and fishing shacks.
They’ll be happy to have the money.”

Mara, meanwhile, was considering the old notebook in TJ’s
hand.“A mystery,” she murmured. “Some of that money might still be
hidden somewhere.”

Right there and then, TJ decided it was time to answer a
few questions of his own before opening up a whole new can of worms. He
had all he needed for his report, and no need to share it with the crowd
drifting in their direction.

Catching Mara’s elbow, he returned the book to the mayor
and steered her toward the cottage. “Write your story later. We need to
talk.”

She widened her eyes at him. “Why, do tell, Timothy John. What can we possibly have to talk about?”

He still didn’t know whether to strangle her or hug her,
but he wasn’t doing either while covered in filth. “Books and bones and
babies,” he told her curtly, half-dragging her across the sand. “Not
necessarily in that order.”

“You can’t make me talk,” she warned jovially.

“Oh, yes, I can.” Out of sight of the rest of the party,
TJ scooped her up and carried her across the cottage porch, shoving open
the unlocked door with his shoulder, and kicking it closed behind him.

Only when he had her completely to himself did he dare lean over and kiss her.

Mara eagerly inhaled the scent that was TJ and threw
herself into the kiss with all her wounded heart and soul. She could
never replace what was lost, but TJ’s desperate hunger washed over her
like a soothing balm. She might be reading far more into his kiss than
she deserved. She was very good at fooling herself. But this was TJ, and
she would trust him far more than she trusted herself.

She spread her palms across his back, reveling in his
strength as he held her. Instantly, he lowered her to her feet. With a
dazed look on his face, he shoved a hand through his hair, and stared
down at her.

“I stink. I’ve got to take a shower. We can’t do this
anyway. Wait here. Don’t go, or I warn you, I’ll hunt you down.” He
jogged up the stairs, taking them two at a time.

Mara couldn’t follow at that pace. As he’d reminded her,
she wasn’t in any condition to be thinking of an act that might create
another child.

The idea of TJ and the shower however... That was all
about living. She’d vowed to live her life to the fullest, and so she
would, one day at a time. She wanted to take TJ with her on that
journey into the future. She wanted to show him how much she loved him,
how beautiful life could be—if he would let her.

She prayed he would give her a chance to share thousands
of showers and sunrises and sunsets. Gripping the cottage windowsill,
she stared out at the surf lapping the beach a few yards away. The few
years of a human lifetime were grains of sand in the face of the
eternity out there.

Vowing not to waste another moment fearing the future
because of past heartbreaks, she swallowed her uncertainty and listened
for the sound of the shower shutting off.

By the time TJ clattered down the stairs, dressed in a
blue button-down short-sleeve shirt and khaki shorts, looking his
respectable professorial self, Mara had ice water in tumblers creating
wet spots on the navy tablecloth she’d spread over the porch rail, and a
bouquet of sea oats waving from an empty blue wine bottle. She could
set a scene anywhere. She smiled at TJ’s stunned look.

“I’m good at this, you know. I designed the set on that
jetty.” She gestured toward the ugly gray rocks now covered in what
appeared to be sand, sea oats, and waving palmettos.

TJ grabbed a glass of ice water and gulped half the
contents. Firmly setting it down on the railing, he met her questioning
gaze. “I still want to marry you.”

Mara laughed. She couldn’t help it. The man must be close
to six-foot-six and over two hundred pounds, and he looked as if he’d
just volunteered to climb down an active volcano. He didn’t look any
more pleasant at her laughter.

Before he could stalk off in a snit, Mara leapt from the
rail to throw herself into his arms. He caught her, as she’d known he
would. TJ had excellent reflexes, which was good, given her precipitous
tendencies. “I love you, Timothy John McCloud. I love you, adore you,
and I want to spend my life with you, but we have one or two problems.”

His arms closed around her, and joy swept through her at
his instant acceptance. TJ wasn’t one to hesitate, ponder, or calculate
her worth. She snuggled there, with his head resting on top of hers as
if nothing could separate them.

“No, we don’t,” he assured her. “Last night, I cursed
myself for not telling you how I felt, and I’m not letting you go until
you understand. I love you. I’ve loved you since you were a skinny kid
following me around, singing
Do-wah-diddy-diddy
off-key, and I love you even more now and probably more tomorrow. I don’t want to lose you.”

She needed those words so badly, she thought she’d soak
them up before they emerged from his mouth. Flattened against TJ’s hard
body, she was whole. It was the most exhilarating sensation she’d ever
experienced. She didn’t interfere with his confession. Couldn’t. She
just meekly nodded and let him ramble.

“I’m not good at words or feelings, never learned what to
say when. I’m more comfortable with old bones that can’t talk.” He ran
his hands down her back, keeping her nestled against him. “But I can say
things to you that I could never say to anyone else. I love you whether
you look like a librarian or a starlet or Scarlett. You bring
terrifying things out in me, but I’m more alive when I’m with you. The
other night—” His voice broke. “Don’t make me try to explain how I felt
that night when I thought I could lose you—that the world could lose
you. You bring life to everyone you touch.”

She heard his tears, knew how painful this was for a man
so courageous and honorable he would risk his life to save another’s.
She cupped his face and pressed a kiss to the side of his mouth. “You
don’t have to tell me, TJ. I know. I’ll always know. Whatever you feel, I
feel. It’s frightening, but we’re old enough to deal with it this
time.”

He directed the kiss more firmly, inciting her to passions
they couldn’t explore yet. Before they went too far, he set her back
from him and took a deep breath. “I love you, and I don’t know what the
hell to do about it, but I’m not letting you get away again.”

“We could go inside for a start,” she suggested, with a
slight gesture toward the crowd at Jared’s. “We’re not completely out of
sight.”

Glaring at the party on the hill above them, TJ tugged her
into the dim light of the front room, and carefully seated her on the
sagging sofa. “I don’t have a house to take you to. I don’t have a
glamorous life to offer. I had a call this morning from the state police
in New York in the wake of all these news stories. They’re offering a
steady contract, but I haven’t given them an answer. I can rebuild my
independent contracting business without the feds, but that means
traveling.”

“Sit down, TJ, you’re making me dizzy. It’s like watching a Ping-Pong ball when you pace like that.”

He flopped onto a slatted wooden rocking chair across from
her. He clenched the rocker arms, then ran a nervous hand through his
still-damp hair. His crooked eyebrow quirked in an expression more
doubtful than questioning, but Mara didn’t underestimate the intellect
behind that expression for a minute.

She’d intimidated the Intimidator with weapons he hadn’t learned how to handle.

“I have to finish this film,” she told him, while he
gathered his forces and regrouped. He’d march right over her if she
didn’t take the initiative. Maybe she’d needed these years of experience
to learn how to handle a man like TJ, so she didn’t become the floor
mat her mother had been. “A lot of people’s jobs are at stake if Sid
keeps the company, and I won’t let that happen.”

“Let me take care of Sid,” he suggested hopefully. “Any
man who doesn’t appreciate what he has in you ought to be flushed down
the sewer.”

“You aren’t listening.” Unable to stay away from him any
longer, Mara got up from the couch, planted her knees on either side of
one muscled thigh, settled her butt on his knee, and dug her elbows into
his shoulders. Staring into her breasts shut him up.

“I learned from Irving, and the second time around, I
married someone who liked what I had to say and how I handled business.
Sid
appreciated
me. He just thought he could shut me up in the closet when he didn’t need me.
I
took care of that. You don’t need to.”

TJ scowled and locked his hands around the chair arms
rather than her. “He’s still too stupid to live. I’m not. What do you
need me for?”

She pressed a kiss to his nose, then licked it. He bucked
in the seat but refused to grab her. She wiggled her rear on his knee
and her Wonderbra-less chest nearly rested on his. “I don’t need you for
your money or your connections, TJ. Are you going to listen or do I
have to munch your ears?”

He took a long time thinking about it. She narrowed her
eyes at him, and he relented. “You’d better talk quickly,” he muttered,
“because the position we’re in right now is dragging my brain
southward.”

She chuckled and returned to the couch. “Despite all his
faults, I learned from Sid. I know how to hire good people. I learned I
hate being management. I like designing sets, and I love working on the
scripts, but let’s face it, I’m a creative flake and not executive
material.”

“You’re organized, efficient, hardworking, and far more
logical than anyone else I’ve seen out there. You’re damned good
executive material.”

Mara adored TJ’s loyalty, but sometimes his Hulk hormones
made him just a little dense. “Just because I have the brains to do it,
doesn’t mean I
want
to do it,” she corrected. “I can do anything I damned well want to do, but all I’ve ever done was what I
had
to do.”

She waited for that to sink in before continuing. “If I
have
to, I’ll run the studio, but I don’t
want
to. I need the money to pay for around-the-clock nursing for my mother,
but if I bring her to live with me, then I won’t need so much. Or if I
live somewhere else besides L.A., I’ll have enough to pay for both
nursing care and my own home. Life is about choices.”

She watched TJ’s Adam’s apple bob up and down as he
absorbed all the implications of her words. The man wasn’t slow by a
long shot. He just needed time to grapple with his place in the scheme
of things.

“What do you
want
to do?” he asked carefully.

She beamed at him, her heart swelling with joy and pride.
She got up and planted herself in TJ’s lap properly this time. Wrapping
her arms around his shoulders, feeling his instant arousal, she nibbled
on his ear. “I want to write screenplays,” she whispered against the ear
she nibbled. “And maybe sometimes design sets. I want to make a home
for you, TJ, and take care of you. You need someone to look after you.”

“Take care of
me
?” he asked in incredulity. “You want to—”

She bit his earlobe, and he shut up. “I can take care of
you far better than you can take of yourself. I can make a home for you.
If the company makes money, I can pay for my mother’s nursing care. She
doesn’t have to live with us, just somewhere I can visit. I don’t know
about children, though,” she said with familiar sadness, but even that
eased a little as TJ rocked her with his arms around her waist.

“I can afford you and your mother and anything else that
comes along,” he said, “unless you have a penchant for expensive jewelry
and yachts and that kind of thing. But if I tell you I can take care of
you, I figure you’ll hit me.”

She laughed into his shoulder. “Probably. I’m taking care of myself these days.”

He nodded, as if that answered his question. “I’m fine
with that. I want to hear you singing and laughing and throwing things
at me. I want your arms around me, telling me I’m alive and real and not
bad company.”

She tightened her arms around him and kissed his whiskery cheek. “No finer company anywhere,” she murmured.

“I don’t know what to tell you about children. Until these
past few days, I never thought about having them. I’m terrified I may
be too much like my father and forget they’re there, but I like the idea
of having kids. If you want them, I figure you’ll help me be a good
father..”

TJ stopped rocking to catch Mara’s face between his hands.
“But if what you’re worried about is the future of your mind, don’t.
You’re the sanest person I know. If you want children, we’ll have them.
Life doesn’t come with guarantees.”

She broke down and cried again, and let him rock her like a
baby. Even the sound of a helicopter overhead didn’t deter her, though
her crying slowed as the rocker did.

A whistle and a splat hit the roof.

Mara’s head jerked up as TJ shifted into instant alert.

Another whistle and a splat, followed by the low roar of the helicopter, then a hail of splats against the roof.

“Is the colonel bombing us?” she asked more in wonder than fear. TJ’s arms gave her the courage she didn’t naturally possess.

“Not from a helicopter.”

Something suspiciously yellow and egg-like slid down the side window exposed to the elements.

“What on earth?” Jarred out of her tears, Mara tried to peer out the window without leaving TJ’s lap.

“Remember how I used to avoid Clay and Jared by sneaking
out the back door and over the pool fence?” TJ inquired, carefully
returning her to her feet so he could rise.