Watching Amanda (18 page)

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Authors: Janelle Taylor

BOOK: Watching Amanda
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CHAPTER 19
After they left Starbucks, Amanda said she wanted to stop at the supermarket to pick up a few things for tonight's dinner.
With Paul Swinwood, the father of her child.
And though the supermarket was the last place on earth he felt like being, Ethan wasn't about to let her go alone. Not while they still were no closer to figuring out who'd attacked her than they were when it happened. He would have preferred they'd use the time some other way but Amanda swore it would only take a half hour.
A half hour! In the supermarket. The most Ethan had ever spent in a grocery store was ten minutes, and that was to load up his cart for a blizzard warning up in Maine.
Anyway, he was very aware that she needed a break, needed something relatively mindless to do, and so five minutes later they were in the Food Emporium. And of course she asked him to push the stroller while she pushed the cart, and as much as he hadn't wanted to, he did. Pushing the stroller wasn't so bad; the baby faced away from him, after all. He didn't have to look at Tommy's face, hear his coos, his try at words.
And he wouldn't have to wonder if his own baby would have laughed that way or been such a banana addict.
Ethan Black, Jr., if it's a boy
, Katherine had said.
And Alissa Black if it's a girl, after your mother.
He was so overwhelmed by sadness, by a bottomless pit of loss, that he was honestly afraid he might break down, right there in the produce aisle. This was how he'd felt on a daily basis in the months after Katherine was killed. Every minute of every day, pitch-black emptiness, quicksand-like, pulling him down further and further into despair. Guilt. Anger. Sadness. Pain like he'd never known. If he thought he'd ever been hurt before, they were mere scrapes.
Woman after woman pushing a cart or carrying a basket smiled at the baby and then up at him. He hadn't been smiled at so much in his entire life as he had been in the few minutes he'd been in the grocery store. So far.
This is what it would have been like
, he thought. This is what it felt like to have a family, a normal every day family, shopping for groceries like everyone else.
But he wouldn't have been like everyone else, and he knew it. He wouldn't have been in the supermarket for five seconds. He wouldn't be pushing a stroller down the street, in the park, or wherever it was babies went. He would have been at the office or his study, as usual.
“All done!” Amanda said brightly. “See—only twenty minutes. That gives me ten minutes to stop at the bakery on Columbus Avenue for a pie. I definitely won't have time to bake.”
Ethan could only nod.
 
A half-hour ago, Amanda had been covered in gook and gunk and little bits and pieces of what she was making for dinner, which smelled delicious. Ethan had no idea what she was cooking, but his nose had told him it was chicken-related and elaborate. He'd poked his head inside the kitchen and found her hovering over a mixing bowl, blowing a strand of hair from eyes as she read a recipe and stirred something that was apparently requiring muscles.
She was certainly going to a lot of trouble for dinner with the man who'd abandoned her and her child.
He'd watched her for a moment, then left when a funny sensation hit him, almost overwhelming him. He liked seeing Amanda in the kitchen, her attention on cooking. Ethan was no chauvinist; but he liked seeing her engaged by something that she clearly enjoyed, something that didn't involve figuring out who'd tried to stop her from breathing on a permanent basis.
Actually, that wasn't completely true. Yes, he'd liked seeing her in the kitchen. But the overwhelming part, the funny, yet strange part, was that he liked the domesticity of it. That was new. Brand new. Katherine had actually graduated from a culinary institute and had whipped up the most amazing meals in their kitchen, which was beyond state-of-the-art. But something about Amanda, wearing her food-stained apron, her hair half up held in by a pencil, deep in concentration, moved him.
Shit
, he'd thought, heading upstairs to take a fast shower. He had to stop being moved by her, had to stop letting her affect him. He had to stop looking at her, obviously.
And then he'd come downstairs, and she'd just been dashing up the stairs to shower herself, and when he saw her again, she was standing at the top of the stairs, Tommy on her hip, at seven o'clock.
He stared, frozen for a moment. She was stunning.
So much for not looking at her.
She wore a dress. It was a casual dress, nothing glamorous, but she literally took his breath away. It was a wrap dress, a pale gray, and the thin wool material outlined her figure in a way that had every sense in his body alert. He couldn't take his eyes off her breasts, those amazing large creamy breasts that he'd explored every inch of. And the way the material clung to her hips and legs ...
She also wore a little make-up, he realized. Not much, but he noticed her eyes were more luminous and her lips a bit redder and glossier, her cheeks more flushed ...
She looked as she had while he was making love to her.
When she came down the stairs he noticed she'd put on perfume, a light, clean, musky scent.
The dinner, the make-up, the dress, the perfume. For Paul Swinwood.
Was she still in love with the guy? he wondered. Paul was good-looking, anyone could objectively see that. Tall and muscular. Nicely dressed. And he was Tommy's father. With all that was going on with Amanda and her feelings about her own father, Ethan could understand how important it was to her for Tommy to have his own father in his life.
The doorbell rang, and they glanced at each other.
“I would appreciate it if you didn't treat him like a suspect,” Amanda said, smoothing her hair.
“Did I treat anyone else like a suspect?” he countered.
She ignored that and went to the door.
“Amanda, I'm speechless,” Ethan heard Paul say. “You look amazing. Just gorgeous.”
“I thought you were speechless,” Ethan muttered under his breath.
“Wow,” Paul said, coming into the foyer. He held a bouquet of flowers. “This is some house.”
“I can hardly believe I live here,” Amanda said, taking his coat. “I'm still getting used to it.”
Ethan watched Paul glance around, taking in the expensive art on the walls, the rugs on the floor, the sculptures. And then the man's gaze landed on Ethan and his entire face changed—hardened was the word for it.
“I'm sorry, I forgot your name,” Paul said to Ethan.
Ethan stepped into the living room. “It's Ethan Black.”
“I think I might have already told you this, but Ethan was retained by my father's estate as caretaker of this property and my father's will as it relates to me,” Amanda said.
“So you come with the brownstone?” Paul asked lightly and smiled.
Ethan searched for tightness or worry in the man's expression but found none. “I guess you can say that.”
“Well I guess the romantic evening for two I had in mind is shot,” Paul said, winking at Amanda. “Three is sort of a crowd,” he added to Ethan.
“You mean four,” Ethan corrected.
“Pardon?” Paul asked.
“You forgot Tommy,” Ethan explained.
Paul looked momentarily horrified, then regained his composure. “And where is my big boy? Ah, there you are!” he said, reaching for Tommy, who sat with his touch-and-feel book in the playpen. “May I?” he asked Amanda.
Amanda nodded, and Paul picked up Tommy and held him close. “How ya doing, big guy? Yeah, I know. Things are great because you have such a great Mom. That's right. Your mommy and I go way back.”
Less than two years was hardly going way back, Ethan thought.
“Who'd like a drink?” Amanda asked.
“I'd love a scotch on the rocks,” Paul said.
“Ethan?” Amanda asked.
“No thanks,” Ethan said.
“One drink won't hurt you,” Paul said.
Ethan ignored him. “Well, I'll let you two enjoy your reunion.”
“There's plenty of food,” Amanda said, “if you'd like to join us.”
“Thanks, but I've got a ton of work of do,” he said, and with that he turned and headed upstairs.
Ethan paused at the top of the stairs before opening the door to his bedroom, where he planned to watch the evening's events on his wristwatch screen. He settled in for what he was sure would be a very uncomfortable couple of hours.
 
“Night, night, little guy,” Paul whispered into Tommy's crib as he laid the sleepy baby down.
Tommy looked right at Paul and then closed his eyes, pressed his little fist against his temple and flopped over onto his stomach, his tiny butt raised in the air.
“He's not going to fuss?” Paul asked, looking at Amanda in wonder. “I thought babies were supposed to scream their heads off when you put them to bed.”
“Tommy does that too,” Amanda said, smiling. “But sometimes he's just good and tired and ready. And you put him in just right, too.”
Paul smiled, that genuine I-am-so-happy smile that used to melt Amanda's heart. “Thanks for letting me share in this, Amanda. It means a lot to me.” He reached into Tommy's crib and gently caressed his cheek. “I missed so much,” he said in a very low voice. He shook his head and stared down at the floor. “What a jerk I've been.”
“Hey,” Amanda said, touching his arm. “Let's just stick to the present, okay? It's all about baby steps.”
Paul smiled and glanced around the room. “I'm surprised there isn't an extra bedroom for a nursery in a place this size.”
“There is,” Amanda said. “Right down the hall. But I like having Tommy with me.”
As they were leaving the room, she wondered if she should mention the break-in earlier this week, to gauge his facial reaction as Ethan would do. To watch for signs of nervousness or guilt or whatever else you were supposed to look for. But what really could Paul's motive be for trying to kill her? It made no sense.
To get his hands on the money he thinks your father left you. To get his hands on the brownstone he assumes Tommy will inherit in the event of your death. If you die, Tommy gets what's yours. And you have a multi-million-dollar brownstone ...
Great. Now she was hearing Ethan's voice in her head as clearly as if he were whispering in her ear.
She was beginning to understand how he thought, what made him tick. Ha. That last bit was a joke. She knew nothing about what made Ethan Black tick.
“Amanda?”
She started and realized that Paul had been asking her a question. “I'm sorry, what did you say?”
Paul smiled. “I was offering a penny for your thoughts. You looked like you were a million miles away just then.”
Actually, just a few feet away ...
“I was just thinking that we'd better get downstairs to dinner before it burns,” she said.
“I wouldn't mind staying here for just a minute more,” he said softly, reaching out his hand to caress her face and run his thumb over her lips.
Just like old times, his touch, voice, and manner aroused her. When they were a couple, he could just look at her a certain way and, as if under a spell, she'd remove her clothes, slowly, the way he liked. He would sit in a chair and she would stand before him and undo the buttons of her shirt, very slowly, and then even more slowly pull apart the sides to reveal her bra. He liked lace and frill, the sexy-looking cheap kind, which was all she could afford. As she'd pull open her shirt he'd stare, his mouth parting slightly, his tongue running over his lips at the sudden dryness as he waited to find out what bra covered her breasts. His favorite, a gift from him, was a see-through fuchsia bit of lace with tiny sequins barely covering the cup center. The moment his eyes feasted on the bra she knew what was coming next, an act that had embaressed her the first time. He would unzip his pants and his hand would disappear inside as he watched and waited. She'd slowly remove her skirt, always a skirt for their dates, to reveal matching see-through thong panties. He'd stare for a few seconds, his hand working before he shoved down his pants. He'd grab her to him, pushing aside with his finger the scrap of lace between her legs and then thrust inside her. He'd move her up and down, back and forth on top of him until she couldn't see straight and would climax.
“You're thinking what I'm thinking, aren't you?” he whispered, a finger lifting her chin. “I can see it in your eyes, Mandy.” He ran his gaze over breasts and down her body, then slowly back up. And when he reached a hand to caress one heavy breast, his eyes never leaving hers, she allowed it for one second before stepping back and shaking her head.

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