SEALed With a Kiss: Even a Hero Needs Help Sometimes... (24 page)

"I don't
know."
Her curls made a bolt for freedom from the restraint of the clasp. She swiped at them, mussing them further. "The boundaries in this situation are getting so blurred I don't think I could find them with global positioning. I'm lost and I'm getting more lost by the second."

"Boundaries, huh? Is that therapist talk?"

"Don't insult your own intelligence," she snapped. "You're an officer in a group using a team model within a strongly hierarchical organization. You must deal with boundary issues, and probably extremely subtle ones at that, all day long. You know what I'm talking about."

"You're right. Let me ask the question so that it is perfectly clear to both of us. Do you think that if I buy the bed, I will expect sex in return?"

"The thought crossed my mind."

What the hell did she think of him? It made him mad, insulted him that she looked for ulterior motives. He had been so proud to think he was offering her something that would please her. He didn't give women gifts to get sex. He didn't need to.

He thought briefly of scraps of silk and lace. That didn't count. He already knew what was going to happen before he bought them.

No, he had only thought that she was sweet, and gentle, and kind, and very generous, and he had liked to think she would get some pleasure from the gift. It galled him to have it thrown in his face with his motives impugned.

If she couldn't accept it because there might be strings attached, then he'd make sure she understood that there weren't any strings.

"Okay, let's set a boundary and agree on it. It's important to Tyler to have a bed. That's why I want to get it and that's the only reason. When we leave here the bed is yours to keep or get rid of. But either way the bed is
for my son.
Get it? Since it's going in your house it might as well be one you like. But you don't owe me a damn thing."

Something that might have been pain shadowed her eyes briefly, but was gone instantly, replaced by her calm, direct gaze. She had a way of looking at him, just looking, that made him feel like they were the only two people in the universe. It gave him the oddest feeling of peace. It made something go quiet inside him.

"Getting this bed for Tyler is deeply important to you, isn t it?

Yeah, it was important, but Jax had learned early not to expect others to care what mattered to him. When Corey died, the brief period during which others had cared to learn about his wishes was over. The only thing he had ever wanted as an adult was to be a SEAL.

Danielle had seemed to want so many things: beds and chairs, clothes and cars, dinners and dancing. He had felt suffocated by the sheer meaningless profusion of her unending desires. Whether she had them or not was immaterial to him. She could spend days looking for exactly the right shade for a lamp, or the perfect pair of shoes.

At first he had tried to feign interest, but if he expressed a preference Danielle could usually explain why this chair or that color wouldn't work. After a while he didn't pretend to care. He only asked how much it would cost and then they would argue about money.

This whole argument confused the hell out of him. Danielle would have leaped at his offer. Now Pickett had shifted what they were talking about again. He wondered if his chances were better if he admitted the bed was important or denied it.

Pickett had a way of seeing into what was going on. She already knew. He went with admitting it, though he felt a tiny clutch as he did so. "Yeah. It's important."

"Okay."

"Okay, what?"

"You can buy the bed. For Tyler." Pickett glanced at the clock. "And if we're going to get to Isabel's shop before she closes, we'd better hurry."

The sign out front notwithstanding, Pickett knew that only the most generous assessment would call the dim and crowded junk shop an antique store. Rusted bicycles were piled beside bedpans. Dusty dolls with patchy hair sat amidst cracked saucers, and ragged books, and broken implements. The air was thick with the mustiness of items that had arrived dirty, and gone downhill from there—and thick with smoke from the omnipresent cigarettes of Isabel, the owner.

The dismantled bed was in a small back room. Isabel, squinty-eyed against the smoke from her dangling cigarette, used a broom to dispatch the cobwebs that tethered it to the wall, displacing a large amount of dust in the process.

Jax's face, impassive since Pickett had directed him to pull the Cherokee into the sagging building that proclaimed itself Topsail Treasures, Antiques and Stuff, had taken on the appearance of stone. Pickett suspected that he was horrified at the bargain he had made. Looked at through his eyes, the bed was not impressive.

The bed, while certainly not a Stickley but a machine-made copy, nevertheless had the honest lines and sturdy simplicity of the arts-and-crafts movement. It was solid oak, darkened with age, and battered. None of the slats of the headboard or footboard were missing though, and the rails were intact.

"Where's my bed, Pickett?" Tyler, who had been happily unearthing treasures from underneath tables, had already acquired a layer of grime.

"This is the bed." Since he was looking right at it Pickett realized the boy couldn't visualize it assembled. "It's in pieces, see? We'll put it together when we get home."

"Like Legos?" Tyler leaned against her leg, one grubby hand circling her knee.

Pickett absently stroked his silken head. "Sort of. You know what? The first time I saw this bed, I thought it was the perfect bed for a boy."

"But you didn't have a little boy so you didn't get it."

"Well, that's part of the reason." Buying a bed for a child she might never have would have been unbearably poignant, even had it been in her budget.

"But now you do have a little boy so everything is just right." Tyler sighed with satisfaction at the story's happy ending.

She didn't have the heart to set him straight. And the bed was being bought now because of a little boy so the facts were correct, even if as an adult she understood them a little differently. Besides, Tyler and his father wouldn't be staying long enough for Tyler to get deeply attached to her. The thought was not as comforting as she wished it was. Quickly, she moved on. "You know what we need to do now? We have to go buy a mattress and springs."

While they waited for Isabel's extremely slow dial-up connection to process the transaction, Pickett had to retrieve Tyler twice from the back of the store where he kept discovering more treasures. The second time she returned him to the counter, he suddenly stopped.

"Look, Pickett," he pointed, jumping up and down. "Fireworks!"

Pickett followed his pointing finger to the front of the counter which was covered with posters and announcements, many tattered and yellow with age. A newer-looking poster advertised fireworks sponsored by Surf City to kick off the fall fishing festival, but she didn't see a picture of fireworks anywhere.

She knelt beside Tyler. "Where do you see fireworks, precious?"

Tyler put a grimy hand on the poster.

Pickett inhaled, then let the breath out slowly. Tyler was four years, ten months. Was he already reading? Keeping her voice casual, she asked, "Can you read what it says?"

Tyler looked at the poster, then pushed a fist at his hairline—just like Jax when he was frustrated. "Not all of it." Then he brightened as if he'd suddenly made a discovery. "I can read words I
like,"
he explained with great dignity. "I like fireworks."

Jax signed the charge slip and handed it back to Isabel. Nothing in his demeanor indicated he'd heard Tyler, but in case he had, Pickett wished she could catch his eye to signal that he should play it casual. If he rapped out a demand for more information the way he sometimes did, Tyler would freeze up. Holding her breath, fists clenched in her pockets, she willed Jax to look at her.

But then one side of his mouth kicked up. He knuckled the top of Tyler's head gently. "I guess we have to get you some books that have words you like."

A look of complete understanding passed between father and son. The little shoulders, so often braced when his father spoke to him, relaxed infinitesimally.

It was only a tiny moment, but when, at last, Jax looked at Pickett with shiny gray eyes, she knew he had felt the change in Tyler as sure as she had. She pulled her fist from her pocket and raised the thumb.

Jax grinned like someone who's just been sent to the head of the class. "Okay! Let's load up."

Refusing assistance, with his usual competence and economy of motion, Jax carried the solid-oak furniture out to the car. When he hoisted the heavy bedstead into the cargo bed of the Cherokee, Pickett shivered involuntarily at the masculine beauty of his action for which male bodies are so suited.

Isabel managed to smile without dislodging her cigarette and chuckled hoarsely. "You been looking at that bed a long time, Pickett. Looks like you finally found a man to go with it."

First her group, now Isabel. Did everyone in Onslow County think of nothing but her sex life? Pickett thought of trying to correct Isabel's impression but let it drop. Anything she said would only add to the story that would be all over Snead's Ferry by tomorrow. Though its population swelled during the summer months, Snead's Ferry was really a very small town, if you counted only the permanent residents. When it came to gossip, only the permanent residents counted. Most of the gossip was friendly interest in the doings of neighbors, but a malicious word or two could conceivably harm her fledgling business.

"Don't worry, honey," Isabel said, correctly interpreting Pickett's silence. "I don't tell everything I know. Not that I know anything. A man with Virginia tags bought that bed. That's all I know."

Pickett threw her arms around Isabel's bony shoulders in a hug redolent of smoke and dust. Behind her smudged glasses Isabel's eyes watered suspiciously. She pushed at Pickett with the heel of one hand. "Oh go along with you! And don't you ever tell anyone how much I sold that bed for."

By the time a mattress had been purchased, delivery arranged and paid extra for, Tyler was cranky with hunger and a surfeit of shopping.

Without asking, Jax pulled into a fast-food chain. Truth to tell, he was a trifle cranky himself. He'd had a surfeit of shopping and of cranky four-year-olds.