Simply Irresistible (17 page)

“First of all,” John interrupted, “the little girl you keep referring to as
your
daughter is in fact just as much mine as she is yours. Second, don’t make me out to be the bad guy here. I wouldn’t have mentioned lawyers if you hadn’t made it very clear to me that you weren’t going to let me see Lexie again.”

Georgeanne felt her resentment stir and took a deep breath. “Well, I’ve changed my mind.” She couldn’t afford a fight with him, not yet anyway. Not until she got a few concessions.

John sank farther down in his chair and hooked his thumbs in the front pockets of his jeans. His gaze narrowed and distrust pulled at the corners of his mouth.

“Don’t you believe me?”

“Frankly, no.”

On the drive over this evening, she’d run through several if-he-says-this-then-I’ll-say-that scenarios in her mind, but she’d never thought he wouldn’t believe her. “You don’t trust me?”

He looked at her as if she were crazy. “Not for a second.”

Georgeanne figured they were even then, because she didn’t trust him either. “Fine. We don’t have to trust each other as long as we both want what is best for Lexie.”

“I don’t want to hurt her, but as I said before, I don’t think we will agree on what is best. I’m sure it would please you clear down to your southern toes if I died tomorrow. However, that wouldn’t please me. I want to get to know Lexie, and I want her to know me. If you think I should wait to tell her that I’m her father, then okay, I’ll wait. You know her better than I do.”

“I have to be the one to tell her, John.” She expected an argument and was surprised when she didn’t get one.

“Fine.”

“I have to insist that you give me your word on this,” she persisted, because she wasn’t convinced that a few months down the road, John wouldn’t change his mind and decide that being a daddy cramped his style. If he abandoned Lexie, after she knew he was her father, it would break her heart. And Georgeanne knew from experience that the pain of abandonment from a parent was worse than not knowing at all. “The truth has to come from me.”

“I thought we didn’t trust each other. What good is my word?”

He had a point. Georgeanne thought about it, and having no other alternative, she said, “I’ll trust you if you give me your word.”

“You have it, but just don’t expect me to wait a long time. Don’t jerk me around,” he warned. “I want to see her when I get back into town.”

“That’s another reason I came here tonight,” Georgeanne said as she rose from the chair. “Next Sunday Lexie and I are planning a picnic at Marymoor Park. You are welcome to join us if you don’t have plans.”

“What time?”

“Noon.”

“What should I bring?”

“Lexie and I are providing everything except alcoholic beverages. If you want beer, you’ll have to bring it yourself, although I’d prefer you didn’t.”

“That’s not a problem,” he said as he stood also.

Georgeanne looked up at him, always a little surprised by his height and the width of his shoulders. “I’m bringing a friend along, so you’re welcome to include one of your friends also.” Then she smiled sweetly and added, “Although I would prefer that your friend wasn’t a hockey groupie.”

John shifted his weight to one foot and scowled at her. “That’s not a problem either.”

“Great.” She turned to go, but stopped and looked back at him. “Oh, and we have to pretend to like each other.”

He stared at her, his eyes narrowed, his mouth in a straight line. “Now, that,” he said dryly, “might be a problem.”

Georgeanne tucked the floral-print comforter around Lexie’s shoulders and looked into her sleepy eyes. Lexie’s dark hair fanned over her pillow, and her cheeks were pale from exhaustion. As a baby, she’d always reminded Georgeanne of a wind-up toy. One moment she’d be crawling across the floor, and in the next she’d lie down and fall asleep in the middle of the kitchen. Even now, when Lexie was tired, she went out fairly fast, which Georgeanne considered a blessing. “Tomorrow we’ll have our tea after we watch
General Hospital
,” she said. It had been over a week since they’d found the time to catch an episode of their favorite soap opera together.

“Okay,” Lexie yawned.

“Give me some sugar,” Georgeanne ordered, and when Lexie puckered her lips, she bent to kiss her daughter good night. “I’m a sucker for your pretty face,” she said, then stood.

“Me, too. Is Mae coming to tea tomorrow?” Lexie wiggled onto her side and rubbed her face against the Muppet blanket she’d had since she’d been a baby.

“I’ll ask her.” Georgeanne walked across the floor, stepped over a Barbie camper and a pile of naked dolls. “Cryin‘ all night, this room’s a pigsty,” she declared as she tripped over a baton with purple streamers hanging from the ends. She glanced over her shoulder and saw Lexie’s eyes were closed. She reached for the switch by the door, turned out the light, and headed down the hall.

Before Georgeanne entered the living room, she could feel Mae impatiently waiting for her. Earlier when Mae had come to sit with Lexie, Georgeanne had briefly explained the situation with John to her friend and business partner. And while they’d sat around waiting for Lexie’s bedtime, Mae had seemed ready to burst with questions.

“Is she asleep?” Mae asked barely above a whisper as Georgeanne entered the room.

Georgeanne nodded and sat on the opposite end of the couch from Mae. She reached for a pillow embroidered with flowers and her monogram, then she dropped it on her lap.

“I’ve been thinking about it,” Mae began as she turned to face Georgeanne. “And a lot of things make sense now.”

“What things?” she asked, thinking that with Mae’s new shorter haircut, she looked a little like Meg Ryan.

“Like how we both hate men who are athletes. You know that I hate jocks because they used to beat up my brother. And I always assumed you didn’t like them because of your boobs,” she said as she cupped her palms in front of her chest as if she were holding a pair of cantaloupes. “I always figured you must have been groped by the football team, or something equally hellish, and just never wanted to talk about it.” She dropped her hands to her thighs, bare below her jean shorts. “I never imagined Lexie’s father was a jock. But now that makes sense, too, because she’s a lot more athletic than you.”

“Yes, she is,” Georgeanne agreed. “But that’s not saying much.”

“Remember when she was four and we took the training wheels off of her bike?”

“I didn’t take them off, you did.” Georgeanne looked into Mae’s brown eyes and reminded her friend, “I wanted them left on in case she fell.”

“I know, but they were all bent upward and didn’t even touch the ground anyway. They wouldn’t have helped her.” Mae dismissed Georgeanne’s concern with a wave of her hand. “I remember thinking then that Lexie must have inherited coordination from her daddy’s gene pool, because she didn’t get it from you.”

“Hey, that’s not nice,” Georgeanne complained, but she really didn’t take offense; it was the truth.

“But never in a million years would I have guessed John Kowalsky. My God, Georgeanne, the man is a hockey player!” She pronounced the last two word with the same horrified disdain usually reserved for serial killers or used-car salesmen.

“I know that.”

“Have you ever seen him play?”

“No.” She looked down at the pillow in her lap and frowned at a brown smudge on one corner. “Although occasionally I have seen sports clips on the evening news.”

“Well, I’ve seen him play! Do you remember Don Rogers?”

“Of course,” she said as she picked at the spot on the linen pillow. “You dated him for a few months last year, but you dumped him because you thought the amount of affection he afforded his Labrador was very peculiar.” She paused and looked back up at Mae. “Did you let Lexie eat in the living room tonight? I believe there is chocolate on this pillow.”

“Forget about the pillow,” Mae sighed, and ran her fingers through the sides of her short blond hair. “Don was this incredible Chinooks fanatic, so I went to a game with him. I couldn’t believe how hard those guys hit each other, and no one hit harder than John Kowalsky. He sent one guy somersaulting through the air. Then he just kind of shrugged and skated off.”

Georgeanne wondered where this was going. “What does that have to do with me?”

“You slept with him! I can’t believe it. Not only is he a jock, but he’s a jerk!”

Secretly Georgeanne agreed, but she was becoming slightly ticked off. “It was a long time ago. And besides, being that you reside in a glass house, let’s not throw stones at each other, shall we?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means that any woman who slept with Bruce Nelson has no right to judge anyone else.”

Mae crossed her arms over her chest and sank back farther into the couch. “He wasn’t that bad,” she grumbled.

“Really? He was a wormy little mama’s boy, and you only dated him because you could push him around—like all the guys you go out with.”

“At least I have a normal sex life.”

They’d had this same conversation many times. Mae considered Georgeanne’s lack of sex unhealthy, while Georgeanne felt that Mae should practice saying the word “no” a bit more often.

“You know, Georgeanne, abstinence isn’t normal, and one of these days you’re just going to explode,” she predicted. “And Bruce wasn’t wormy, he was cute.”

“Cute? He was thirty-eight years old and still lived at home with his mother. He reminded me of my third cousin Billy Earl down in San Antonio. Billy Earl lived with his mama until she took her final journey, and believe you me, he was as twisted as a piece of taffy. He used to steal reading glasses just in case he developed astigmatism. Which, of course, he never did, because all my people have perfect twenty-twenty vision. My grandmother used to say we should pray for him. We should pray he never developed a fear of cavities in his teeth or people with dentures wouldn’t be safe around Billy Earl.”

Mae Laughed. “You’re full of it.”

Georgeanne raised her right hand. “My lips to God’s ear. Billy Earl was a nut ball.” She looked back down at the pillow in her lap and ran her fingers over the white embroidered flowers. “Anyway, you obviously cared for Bruce or you wouldn’t have slept with him. Sometimes our hearts do the choosing.”

“Hey.” Mae patted the back of the couch with her hand to get Georgeanne’s attention. When she looked up, Mae said, “I didn’t care for Bruce. I felt
sorry
for him, and I hadn’t had sex in a while, which is a really bad reason to go to bed with a man. I wouldn’t recommend it. If I sounded like I was judging you, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to, I swear.”

“I know,” Georgeanne said easily.

“Good. Now, tell me. How did you first meet John Kowalsky?”

“Do you want the whole story?”

“Yep.”

“Okay. Do you remember when I first met you, I was wearing a little pink dress?”

“Yes. You were supposed to marry Virgil Duffy in that dress.”

“That’s right.” Years ago Georgeanne had told Mae of her botched wedding plans to Virgil, but she’d left out the part about John. She told Mae now. She told her all of it. All except the private details. She’d never been a person to talk openly and freely about sex. Her grandmother had certainly never discussed it, and everything she’d learned, she’d learned from a health class at school, or from inept boyfriends who either hadn’t known or hadn’t cared about giving pleasure.

Then she’d met John, and he’d taught her things she hadn’t thought were physically possible until that night. He’d set her ablaze with his hot hands and hungry mouth, and she’d touched him in ways she’d only heard whispered about. He’d made her want him so much, she’d done everything he’d suggested and then some.

Now she didn’t even like to think of that night. She no longer recognized the young woman who’d given her body and her love so easily. That woman didn’t exist anymore, and she didn’t feel there was any reason to discuss her.

She skipped over the lurid details, then told Mae of the conversation she’d had with John that morning and of the agreement they’d reached at his houseboat. “I don’t know how things are going to work out, I just pray Lexie doesn’t get hurt,” she concluded, suddenly feeling exhausted.

“Are you going to tell Charles?” Mae asked.

“I don’t know,” she answered as she hugged the pillow to her chest, leaned her head against the back of the couch, and stared up at the ceiling. “I’ve only been out with him twice.”

“Are you going to see him again?”

Georgeanne thought of the man she’d dated for the past month. She’d met him when he’d hired Heron’s to cater his daughter’s tenth birthday. He’d called the next day and they’d met for dinner at The Four Seasons. Georgeanne smiled. “I hope so.”

“Then you better tell him.”

Charles Monroe was divorced and one of the nicest men Georgeanne had ever known. He owned a local cable station, was wealthy, and had a wonderful smile that lit up his gray eyes. He didn’t dress flashy. He wasn’t
GQ
gorgeous, and his kisses didn’t set her eyebrows on fire. They were more like a warm breeze. Nice. Relaxing.

Charles never pushed or grabbed, and given more time, Georgeanne could see herself becoming involved in an intimate relationship with him. She liked him a lot, and just as important, Lexie had met him once, and she liked him, too. “I guess I’ll tell him.”

“I don’t think he’s going to like this news one bit,” Mae predicted.

Georgeanne rolled her head to the left and looked at her friend. “Why?”

“Because even though I abhor violent men, John Kowalsky is a stud boy, and Charles is bound to be jealous. He might worry that there is still something between you and the hockey jock.”

She figured that Charles might get upset with her because she’d told him her standard lie about Lexie’s father, but she wasn’t worried he’d be jealous. “Charles has nothing to worry about,” she said with the certainty of a woman who knew for a fact that there wasn’t even a remote possibility she would ever become romantically involved with John again. “And besides, even if I were so delusional as to fall for John, he hates me. He doesn’t even like to look at me.” The idea of a reunion between herself and John was so absurd that she didn’t waste any brain power giving it a second thought. “I’ll tell Charles when I have lunch with him on Thursday.”