Three Rivers (24 page)

"Yes. He's with Carol tonight. She likes to have him spend the night at least one night a week. I try to let her be with him nights that she's not working at
Viola
so she won't get lonely or sad in that big house by herself."

"Okay, how about we go to Silver?"

"Oh wow, I read about that place in Bon Appétit! I've tried to go for months. But it takes forever to get in there and I can't go dressed like this," Althea said pointing to her clothes.

Griffen leaned over and kissed the corner of her mouth. "You look beautiful, as always, and come on, it's Pittsburgh, a fancy restaurant just means you need to pull out your dress Pittsburgh football jersey."

"Ha ha, that doesn't change that we won't be able to get in."

"I'm old friends with the owner from high school. Don't worry."

"For someone that left over ten years ago you sure know a lot of people."

"Pittsburgh's a small town dressed up like a big city. I'm starting to realize that when this is your hometown, you never really leave it."

"I get that. I'm so far from where I grew up, but I can't imagine leaving." Her smile dropped and Griffen squeezed in closer. He was starting to read her well enough to know when she was about to shut down, so he asked her something to keep her in the moment with him. "I was wondering about that actually. Why didn't you leave Pittsburgh after Jack died? You don't have family here. Are Jenna and Aubrey from here?"

"No, they aren't. They moved here for me."

"Wow."

"I know. I really shut down after Jack died. My life was work and Johnny. Work was the only thing I allowed myself to do separately from Johnny. His mother helped and David came around all the time, but I cut out anything that didn't directly relate to my memories of Jack. Even with all those sacrifices, I was so lonely and overwhelmed. The girls gave me some space for a while, but when opportunities came along that let them move here, they did."

"That's pretty awesome of them."

"Well, for Jenna it was no hardship. The sports medicine and orthopedic surgery groups here are some of the best in the world, and Aubrey can be a freelance photographer anywhere. She does a lot for the local magazines but she travels all around the world for shoots."

Althea glanced down for a minute and paused. When she looked up again and her eyes met his they were wet with tears. "I was lost when Jack died. Totally lost. And without them — Carol, Jenna, Aubrey, David — I don't know..." Althea breathed deeply and Griffen could hear the catch in her throat. "Point is — if it takes a village, they're the folks in my village." She paused and he watched her chest rise and fall as she regained her composure. "So, are you gonna go wine and dine me now or what?"

"You better believe it gorgeous," and he couldn't deny how warm it made him feel that he was the reason a huge smile spread across her face.

As she grabbed her purse and finished pulling down her skirt she asked with a pout, "Will it be a problem that I'm not wearing panties at dinner, Professor Tate?"

He groaned and smacked her waiting bottom soundly.

She inhaled deeply when he brushed her hair from her neck and whispered in her ear, "No problem at all Ms. Taylor. Maybe you can get some extra credit under the table while we're there."

With a nip he opened the door for her, but he was pleased to hear that now
she
was the one groaning.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

The remainder of the week together flew by and it was Saturday night before they knew it. Althea and Griffen had fallen into a nice almost routine. Griffen would come by after he was done with his classes and writing for the day. Then he would help Althea with dinner and practice football with Johnny and whichever of his friends that wanted to play with his cool "Uncle Gwiff" that day.

Griffen was even coaching Johnny's local youth football team. They would eat together, read to Johnny and tuck him in. Then she and Griffen would make love, talk, laugh, and enjoy each other’s company. Althea was loving this time they had together and doing all she could not to think about how much it highlighted her own loneliness during the last several years.

Johnny was changing into his pajamas so Griffen took the opportunity to slide his hands around Althea's waist, pulling her in close so her back was flush with his chest. She sighed and curled her head back toward him so he could brush aside her hair and kiss along her neck until she shivered.

"Mmm," he groaned. "I should back off or I'm going to have a raging hard-on I can't do anything about during dinner."

She turned and smirked. "Serves you right for getting me all worked up."

"Don’t I always have that affect on you?" he asked, stroking her neck again and rubbing his thumb across her jawline. As his other hand gripped her hip, his fingers traced figure eights across the fabric of her pencil skirt. He loved her sexy librarian work clothes and she was more than happy to oblige — adding stockings, garters and sexy underwear underneath to drive him extra crazy.

"Cocky bastard."

"Only for you," he whispered and turned her face to his to kiss her. Pulling away he looked over her shoulder. "What's for dinner?"

"Mac and cheese and broccoli for Johnny. Moussaka for us."

"Mac and cheese huh? Where's the box? I need to know if you're a Kraft or Velveeta woman."

She scoffed and let her latent southern accent come through. "Damn Yankee.
Boxed mac and cheese? Blasphemy!
I'll have you know I'm a good North Carolina bred woman. No boxes for our macaroni and cheese. It's in the oven bubblin' with buttah and cheddah right now."

"Holy shit woman, that accent is sexy. Now I'm definitely going to need a cold shower before dinner." She laughed and slapped his hand as he reached over to finger a bite of the cooling Moussaka.

"Now, even this Yankee knows that's not southern," Griffen said confidently.

"No. I went to the farmers market at the courthouse after my hearing yesterday. They had eggplants and local lamb. I couldn't resist. I also got fresh berries for a cobbler. That's bubblin' in there real good, too, sugar," she said with a saucy wink and loved the deep groan that came from his throat in response. She was thrilled she'd treated herself to the stop before going back to work. Normally she would have simply hurried back to the office, rushing past the geriatric tour group taking a historic Segway ride around downtown, rather than relaxing to enjoy a moment at a farmer's market.

"Good. Afterward I'll make sure you don't resist me," his cheesy line broke through her thoughts.

She groaned happily, "Nice line stud."

"I'm so hurt. I honestly don't want you to resist me."

"Oh, I believe that. Like I ever could," she teased with batting eyelashes.

"Uncle Gwiff?"

She jumped a bit. They weren't touching but they were close and she quickly skittered away to check on the oven. Griffen's scowl wasn't lost on her as he said, "Hey big man. What's up?"

"Yo mommy…"

"Yo Johnny," Althea answered, averting Griffen's icy gaze on her.

"Uncle Gwiff wants to teach me and Chwis pway action passing."

"In your pajamas?"

"Yep." Johnny grinned at her.

"Put your sneakers on then."

"Okay mommy. So, we'll see ya later! Come on Gwiff." He ran outside and Althea looked back at Griffen.

"Thanks for playing football with him. I would probably break my neck," she said softly, feeling guilty about pushing him away just moments before.

"I love it," he said with a smile, though she could tell it was forced. "It's fun to get to show off all my mad skeelz," his words were light but his eyes still looked guarded.

Althea kissed his cheek and whispered, "All right all star. But I do appreciate it, I mean, the football, playing catch, teaching him how to fish this morning. Sometimes I wonder if Johnny is missing out being raised by a gaggle of women, so I really am grateful."

"I'm happy to do it."

She looked out the window and saw Johnny out back getting ready to knock over Chris and added, "Um, coach, I thought they weren’t really supposed to tackle each other? Why don't you get out there before he knocks out his best friend. I'll finish dinner."

He pulled her tightly to him so she was pressed against him and said, "Sounds good, but since we’re alone again..." He leaned forward and kissed her neck slowly when his phone buzzed. Althea turned to see him look at the screen and his face closed off suddenly, becoming fraught with tension.

"Griffen, what is it?"

"It's, uh, nothing, just something about my book." He turned to her, "I need to take this, then I'll be right out to help Johnny, okay?" he said on a swallow.

Althea watched as he walked away, suddenly feeling a sense of anxiety she couldn't place. This was just one of many times a call or a text to Griffen had interrupted them. Each time it would change his mood and he would either leave to deal with it or be closed off for the next several minutes. It was a constant reminder that she knew so little about this man.

Is he hiding something? Is that a girlfriend or something? No, Aubrey would have read about something like that — his whole life is on the internet. You're just paranoid after Jack's secrets. She knew he was definitely a playboy when he wasn't with her, but she felt confident he was honest when he said he wasn't attached to anyone. The calls were upsetting to him, but she didn't know why.

Althea tried to shake her unease, but to no avail.

All the more reason not to fall too deeply into this. Stick with the plan
, she reminded herself.

"Trey, what's up? What have you found?" he whispered as he walked out of earshot of Althea.

"I unlocked a file of some handwritten notes that were saved about a week before Jack died."

"What? Like they were scanned? Why not just keep the hard copies?"

"Hard copies are dangerous, just more to be found or lost. Jack clearly wanted everything together."

"What do they say?"

"They're of more military contracts with those same kind of notations indicating that there were specific ones the Chinese wanted. But on these there's also amounts of money written down in Chinese Yuan, with different amounts for specs, versus full coding and robotics plans. Check your email and see if you can tell me if you recognize the handwriting."

"Sure, give me a minute. I'll check it out and call you back."

He hung up and quietly walked through the house. When he arrived to the study, he yanked open some drawers and looked in the closet. Finally, he landed on a shoebox of cards Jack had sent Althea. His heart twisted at the words of love and devotion. On a swallow he opened Trey's email on his phone, quickly looking at the downloaded attachment when his heart sank. The handwriting was clearly Jack's.

He replaced the card and closed the closet door, his heart rate racing into his throat.

"Griffen?"

He jumped, turning to see Althea.

"What are you doing in here? Are you done with your call?"

"I was just looking for a pen. I need to write down a note from my publisher." The lie burned his tongue.

"Okay, well, help yourself. Johnny's getting anxious, though."

"You got it," he answered on a swallow as he tried to avoid her suspicious gaze.