Sleeping with Beauty (36 page)

He pushed his hands into her hair. “No more secrets.”

Her laughter faded, but her eyes were still lit up like twin beacons. “No. No more secrets.”

He bent down, kissed her. She wrapped her hands around his neck, held him closer.

“Your hand okay?” he murmured.

“Mmm,” she managed. “You’re a good kisser, you know that,” she told him as he bit his way along her jaw.

“I’m inspired.”

She laughed. He took that laugh with a kiss, then rolled to his side, taking her with him as he nudged her mouth open and took the kiss deeper.

Their laughter faded, and suddenly the air was charged with a completely different kind of energy. He let his hands trail down her arms, cupping her hips, drawing her leg over his hip.

She was pulling at his shirt. He took the hint and pulled her sweatshirt over her head. She shook her loopy roller curls loose, then gave him that lopsided grin. “Is this going to get weird? Getting naked with each other?”

“Not weird so far. You?”

She shoved him on his back. “Nope. You’ll let me know if that changes for you?” She flipped the snap on his jeans.

“Yeah,” he said, groaning. “You’ll be the first.” She tugged his zipper down, and from that point on, all rational thought went on hiatus.

Minutes later, he had Lucy Harper naked and beneath him. “Can I tell you something?” he said, his breath already coming in pants.

“I have the NASA bra, if you want cleavage,” she told him.

He laughed. “No, no. I love your body. It’s just, I think I’ve revised my opinion on the fake-tan thing.”

She grinned. “Oh yeah?”

“I’m all for both as it turns out.”

“Who would have guessed we’d find détente over smooth skin and tan lines.”

“Or the lack of them.”

She laughed and wrapped her legs around his hips.

He moaned and arched his head back. “If this is all really a dream, please don’t let me wake up for at least another hour.”

“An hour?” she queried. “Lucky me.” And then she dug in her heels and he was buried deep and she was moaning, too.

L
ucy blinked her eyes open some unspecified period of time later. Groggy and trying to figure out where her nightstand clock had gone to, she tossed aside a pair of hose, one skirt, and two blouses. Then her hand landed on something furry, and it wasn’t Grady. She dragged the six-foot-long ostrich out from under the blanket, not even wanting to remember how or why it got there in the first place.

Admittedly, things had gotten rather spirited during that second round.

It was pitch-dark now, that was all she knew. Judging by the steady breathing, Grady was passed out beside her. She reached out until her hand met his bare . . . leg? What?

She lifted her head and looked around. What was her clock doing behind her? Then she realized she was facing the wrong way on her bed. And that it was almost six in the morning. Crap. Then she remembered it wasn’t a school day. Saturday. She slumped back on the bed.
Thank you, God.

Grady rustled then, probably because her hand had slipped up the back of his thigh. He had an incredibly nice ass, as it turned out. Who knew racquetball was such a great workout?

With a grunt, his hand came out and landed on her arm. Another grunt, and he was rolling to his side and pulling her close. More than willing, she shifted around and let him tuck her next to his body. Still sleeping, he let out a deep sigh and buried his face in the back of her hair.

She lay there, staring into the dark, and tried to comprehend all the incredible ways her life had changed in the past handful of hours. Not only had Grady kissed her . . . they’d gotten naked and had world-class sex. Several times! Again she wondered why in the hell it had taken so long for them to figure this out. It wasn’t even remotely weird, either. In fact, it had all seemed almost startlingly normal. Imagine. She knew him so well, and he her, there hadn’t been any of the traditional first-time awkward moments couples usually have. In fact, they’d had a downright blast exploring . . . everything. She sighed, and realized she was grinning like a mad Cheshire cat or something.

Their compatibility in life had translated to a kind of compatibility in bed that it would have taken eons to build with another person. He’d teased her and aroused her, oh yes, indeedy . . . but he’d also made it fun. God, she’d never laughed her ass off harder than she had while making love with Grady Matthews. She’d been in bed with him less than one night and already she couldn’t imagine being with anyone else.

She hoped it wasn’t weird later this morning when they got up, she thought, as she dragged his arm higher on her waist and snuggled deeper into his sleeping embrace. She’d just have to make sure it wasn’t. Worst case is, she’d drag him back to bed. The very idea had her sighing in contentment.

She was just drifting off again when the phone rang, making her start and Grady swear when her head connected with his chin. She might have also inadvertently mashed something she shouldn’t have. Which is when she realized the great thing about making love with your best friend was that he already knew you were a disaster. And he’d still made love to her. Twice. Well, three times, if you count messing around in the shower.

She’d climaxed, so as far as she was concerned, it counted.

Scrambling to reach the phone before it woke him all the way up, she got tangled in the clothes on the bed. She’d almost reached it when it rang again. Grady jerked the rest of the way awake and sat up, which dumped her halfway across the bed.

“What? Who’s there?” he said, struggling to be coherent.

“It’s the phone; it’s okay,” she told him.

The answering machine clicked on after the third ring and a second later Dave’s voice filled the room. “Uh, Lucy, hi, it’s Dave. Listen, I know it’s really early. Sorry. I guess you’re probably still out.” He lowered his voice and Lucy crawled closer. “Jana would kill me if she knew I was calling. But, well, she’s in the hospital and, now, she’s okay, so don’t worry, and she didn’t want me to bother you, but I thought she could use a little support.”

“The hospital!” Lucy cried.

Grady came instantly alert and immediately reached across her and found the phone.

“How did you do that?” she said, still trying to adjust to the darkness.

“Excellent night vision. You should know that by now.”

She couldn’t help it, she grinned quite smugly. “Yeah. Right.”

Grady clicked the phone on. “Dave, hi, it’s Grady. What hospital is she in?”

“‘Grady’?” Dave sounded understandably confused. “I, sorry, man, I thought I dialed Lucy.”

Lucy looked toward Grady and felt him shift to look at her.

“Uh—”

“It’s okay,” Lucy whispered. “They’re gonna know anyway.” She hadn’t even thought about Jana, in terms of all this. But then, she’d been a little preoccupied.

“I’m at Lucy’s. She’s right here. Jana’s okay?”

Lucy groped Grady’s arm until she could find the phone. He let her have it. “Hi, Dave, it’s me. Is she okay?”

“Yes. She had a little . . . problem. With the baby.”

Oh no. Oh, God.
Lucy’s heart leapt to her throat. “Is—” She couldn’t get the question out.

“The baby is fine, but she’s—well, she’s feeling—she’s just not herself.”

“Oh, thank God the baby is okay,” Lucy said. Grady began stroking her arms and she relaxed back against him. How wonderful was it to have support just there for you, so easy, so automatic? “Can we come see her?”

“Would you?” He sounded . . . overwhelmed, and not a little lost. “I know she’ll feel better if she could talk to you. Both of you, if Grady can come, too.”

“We’ll be there.”

He sighed in relief. “Thanks. Thank you. I know she’ll feel better when you’re here.”

Lucy frowned with worry. Dave still sounded pretty shaken up. “You sure she’s okay?”

There was a pause, then, “Yeah. Physically, she’ll be fine. She’s going to have to be careful, maybe rest more than some women, but . . .”

“Dave, it’s okay. She’s strong, you know? She’ll be okay.” Of course, Lucy still didn’t know exactly what had happened, but she’d never heard Dave sound so shaken.

There was a sound, almost like a half sob. “She thinks it’s her fault. Because—because she didn’t want it.”

“Oh, Dave!” Lucy instinctively pulled Grady’s arm more tightly around her waist without even thinking. “No, no, of course it wasn’t. She has to know that.”

“The doctor explained it all to her, but she just—” He sounded like he was fighting for control. “Come and be here with her. I know you can talk to her. She’ll hear it better from you than from me right now.”

“Okay, okay. We’re on our way.”

“Thanks, guys,” he said shakily. “Oh, and—” There was a sniff, then another pause while he got his act together. “We found out the sex. It’s a boy.”

“‘A boy’!”

Grady nudged the phone away from her. “A boy, huh? Dave, that’s wonderful! Congratulations, man. We’re on our way.”

“Great. You guys, just . . . thanks.”

Chapter
28
                                                                                                                                       

T
he ride to the hospital was short but tense. They hadn’t said much, but Grady had kept her hand tucked tightly in his the whole way over.

They stopped by the lobby gift shop long enough to pick up a teddy bear with a blue ribbon around its neck, then ducked into the first available elevator.

“She’ll be okay,” Grady told her, squeezing her hand.

Lucy knew he was reassuring himself as much as anything, and squeezed back. She had told him what Dave had said, about Jana assuming guilt for the situation. He’d been stunned and sad, then immediately assured her that they’d help her through it. “That’s what friends do,” he said.

And she realized in that moment that she was the luckiest woman on the planet. Because her best friend and her lover were one in the same person.

He punched the button for the third floor.

“What are we going to do about this?” Lucy lifted their joined hands.

“Dave might have already said something.”

“I’m not sure Dave put it together. He’s pretty messed up about all this. And it’s not unheard of for you to crash at my place or theirs, for that matter.”

“We’ll just handle it as it happens.” He looked at her; his hair was a wild halo of curls. She didn’t even want to think about what she looked like. As if he read her mind, which she was convinced now more than ever he could, he reached out and picked off another piece of errant facial mask.

“Oh, God,” she said, “I should have looked in the mirror before we left.”

“She’s not going to care.”

Lucy stared at them both in the wavy reflection of the elevator walls. Their clothes were a hurried mess of rumpled wrinkles. As were their bodies, faces, and hair. “She’s going to take one look at us and know.”

The corner of Grady’s mouth curled. “Would that be such a bad thing? I’m pretty sure she’s going to be okay with this. In fact, it might be welcome news right now.”

The door slid open and they hurried down the ward, holding hands, teddy bear clutched under Lucy’s arm. They paused at the nurse’s station long enough to get the room number.

When they got there, Dave was just coming out. His face was a little pale, and his hair looked like he’d slept standing on his head. His smile was weary but heartfelt. “Hey, guys!”

“Hey, yourself,” Lucy said, hugging him. “Is she awake?”

Grady gave Dave the guy backslap hug. “How’re you holding up?”

“Well, I’ve managed to keep my family from boarding the next flight down, so that’s a major feat right there.”

Lucy breathed a sigh of silent relief. Dave’s family meant well, and they were a great bunch, but definitely not what Jana likely needed to deal with right now.

“The doctor says she should take it easy for a while, so we’re going to postpone the trip north until Christmas.” Dave favored Lucy with his famous snaggletoothed hockey grin. “Any chance we can con you into cooking turkey?” He nodded to the door. “She thinks she’s going to be up for that, but if we make plans—”

“You know, I can hear you scheming out there,” a voice called out from inside the room.

Lucy lit up and Dave nodded and opened the door. First she pecked Dave on the cheek. “I’ll take care of Turkey Day, no problem.”

“Thanks.”

Lucy promised herself no matter what she encountered, she was going to do it with a smile. Jana was in the second bed, the first one being mercifully empty. There were flowers already on the windowsill and nightstand. “Hey, we brought you something to keep you company,” she called out.

Jana was propped up in bed, looking paler than usual. Her freckles stood out in stark relief against her skin, her corkscrew curls frizzed beyond belief in a wild red halo around her head. “I told Dave not to call you,” she said, then lifted her arms out to Lucy. “But I’m glad he did.”

Lucy tucked the bear by Jana’s side, then bent to hug her. “Right. Like we were going to stay home.”

“Grady, too?” Jana smiled as she spied Grady behind Lucy. “Wow, is that what a girl has to do to get you guys to communicate? Land in the hospital?”

Lucy purposely didn’t look at Grady, already surprised there wasn’t a neon sign over her head proclaiming “We did it! We got naked together!”

“Hey, Sunshine,” Grady said, leaning down for his hug. “You doing all right? Not giving the nurses a hard time?” He wiggled his eyebrows. “Chatting up the cute doctors?”

Jana smiled and seemed to perk up a little. “I do what I can,” she said.

Lucy perched carefully on the side of her bed and folded Jana’s hand in between her own. Jana immediately noticed the red knuckles and turned Lucy’s hand around to study it closer. “What the hell did you do to yourself?”

Lucy smiled. “I got in a fight.”

“I’m afraid to ask how the other guy looks.” She immediately glanced up at Grady. “Well, you look no worse for the wear. Thank God.” She looked back to Lucy. “Who’d you sock?”

“Well, this will perk you up,” Lucy said.

“Wait a minute. You were on a date last night with—” Her eyes widened and she gasped. “No!”

“It was that or let Grady beat him to a pulp.” As soon as the words left her mouth, she realized the gaffe.

“‘Grady’? What was he doing on your date?” She looked to Grady.

“Hey,” Lucy said desperately, tugging at her hand, trying to shift the topic, “we didn’t come here to talk about you know who.”

But Jana was still looking at Grady. She had that journalist thing going on with her narrowed eyes and forehead wrinkle. “So, I take it it’s over between you and—”

“Yeah, it is,” Lucy admitted. “But we’re here for you, so—”

Jana looked back at Lucy. “Well, you’ve already made my day. I’m so glad you came to your senses.” She was still sending the occasional glance at Grady. Who was looking far too nonchalant about this whole thing.

Lucy rubbed Jana’s hand. “You doing okay?” she asked gently.

Jana sighed a little and laid her free hand over her tummy. “Yeah. No. I don’t know.” Her eyes welled up an instant later, and Lucy immediately pulled her into an embrace.

“Oh, honey. I’m so sorry you had such a bad scare. I’m just glad you’re okay. That you’re both okay.” She leaned back, then yanked out a tissue and handed it to Jana.

“Might as well give me the whole box. I’m an emotional disaster lately.”

Lucy was undecided on how to approach the news Dave had shared with her on the phone. She decided the direct route was best. “You know this isn’t your fault. You know you couldn’t have prevented this.” She didn’t even know what had happened, but it didn’t matter. Jana might have been an emotional wreck over her pregnancy, but she’d taken very good care of herself and the baby.

“It’s like karma. Really bad karma.” She kept rubbing her stomach. “I was so uncertain about all this. About . . . him.” She gulped and let out another little sob.

Lucy just ripped more Kleenex out of the box, beginning to see why Dave was so at a loss. “You can’t make something like this happen because you’ve had a rough time emotionally. You know that, Jana. I know you do.”

Jana nodded, blew her nose noisily, then crumpled up the next wad of Kleenex Lucy pressed into her hand. “I think what scares me is that I almost lost him, and I never even fully appreciated him or what he will mean to us. I was just so stupidly selfish, you know? It was all about me and my life and my world and what I’ll have to sacrifice.” She looked at Lucy, her face all splotchy, eyes swollen from tears. “It wasn’t until I thought I was going to lose him that I realized how devastated I’d be if I did.” She hiccuped a little, and Lucy felt her own eyes watering.

“But he’s safe. And so are you.”

“It shouldn’t have taken this to shake me up, to wake me up.”

“It doesn’t matter, Jana. This was going to happen if it was going to happen. Look at it this way, for all the fear and terror, you also got a gift out of it. The gift of knowing you love your baby.”

Jana was nodding and crying and Lucy started crying. They were hugging each other and rocking.

There was a suspicious sniff behind them and they both paused, sniffling, and looked at Grady, who scowled. “Just toss me the damn box, okay?”

Lucy threw the tissue box to him, only she missed and it glanced off of some piece of medical equipment that was thankfully not hooked up to her best friend at the moment. “Oops.”

Grady just smiled at her in this amazingly affectionate way and picked up the box. His easy acceptance of her dorkiness, along with the knowledge of how they’d spent last night, made her forget for just a second that Jana was sitting right there. God-only-knows-what kind of goofy smile was plastered across her face.

“You know,” Jana said, wiping her eyes, then blowing her nose again, “I’m glad you guys are here. Because there’s something I wanted to talk to you two about, anyway.”

Lucy started a bit guiltily as she realized she and Grady were still staring at each other all moony-faced. “What? If it’s about Thanksgiving, then don’t even start. I’m cooking turkey.”

Grady snorted behind her.

“Okay, Grady’s actually cooking the turkey. No need to bring up the basting-fire incident again. It might upset the baby.”

Grady and Jana both groaned. “She’s actually using an unborn child as a defense now,” Jana said, shaking her head, but smiling.

“Not my fault. You drove me to it. Anyway, we’re cooking and you and Dave are going to come over. We’re going to watch football and parades and eat until we explode. And you are going to do nothing but put your feet up and relax.”

“You know, I’ve definitely not been playing this pregnancy thing for all it’s worth. But that’s going to change.” She leaned up and kissed Lucy’s cheek. “Thank you for the holiday hostessing. But that’s not what I was going to say.”

“Okay, what is it?”

She waved Grady closer and reached out her other hand to take his. “We’ve been friends forever, right?”

“Right,” Lucy said, wary now. She knew that intent look. Jana was up to something.

“Well, one thing I learned in the past twenty-four hours was to never take any relationship for granted.” She sniffled again and Grady immediately handed her the Kleenex.

They all laughed a little, but Jana just squeezed their hands more tightly. “I’ve watched the two of you for years.” She glanced at Grady. “I know you don’t want me to do this, but I think you’re making a mistake by not telling Lucy the whole reason behind your retreating of late.”

Lucy and Grady looked at each other, and there was no way to cover the guilt coloring their expressions.

“Um,” Jana said, looking between the two of them. “Is there something else I don’t know about?” A smile began to play around her mouth, and her eyes lit up a little. “Would it perhaps have something to do with why Grady was trying to flatten Jason Prescott?” She looked at Grady. “And nice job, by the way. Wish I was there so I could have helped.”

Grady smiled. “No need. Slugger here took him out with one punch, direct hit right to the schnoz. Prescott might not be so pretty anymore.”

Lucy snorted. “Who are you kidding? I’m betting he had the best plastic surgeon in the country on the phone before he hit the lobby of my apartment building.”

“‘Lobby’?
Your
building?” Jana looked at Grady. “And you were there?”

Grady came to sit on the other side of the bed. “Yeah. I was there. I, uh, well, remember you told me about the date?”

Jana nodded.

“I guess something just snapped inside me.” His smile was wry. “Might have had something to do with that visual image you planted in my brain.”

“What ‘visual image’?” Lucy asked.

Jana smiled smugly. “You. And Jason Prescott. Doing the—”

“Please,” Grady said. “Once was enough.”

“Apparently it was enough,” Jana said, her voice taking on a note of wonder. “So . . .” She trailed off encouragingly.

Grady reached across the bed and took Lucy’s hand. “So I stayed. And we talked.”

Jana looked from one to the other.

Lucy knew her hot cheeks were a dead giveaway.

“‘Talked,’ huh?”

“Lots of talking,” Lucy said.

“So when Dave called you this morning—”

“I answered the phone,” Grady said.

“Hot damn!” Jana hollered, which brought Dave crashing into the room.

“What? Are you okay?” He looked wildly around the room. “I didn’t want to intrude, but—”

“They did it!” Jana said, then hooted again.

“‘Did’ what?” Dave said, calming down now that he realized her scream was for an apparent good thing.

“It!”

Dave looked at the joined hands, apparently added two and two and an early phone call, and went, “Ohhhh.
It!
” A big gap-toothed grin split his face and he strode over to Grady and clapped him on the back so hard it almost sent him sprawling. “All right!”

Lucy and Jana looked at each other. “What is it about guys and sexual prowess, anyway?” Lucy asked.

“Hey, at least he’s not rubbing your belly and getting that smug ‘Look what I did’ smile on his face.”