MIKE’S HANDS CLENCHED the steering wheel as if someone might try to rip it away from him. He couldn’t remember ever being so angry, or so frustrated. What could he have done differently in that damn hardware store? Nothing. He’d tried to shut his father up and get him out of there as soon as possible. But it hadn’t worked….
“You’re grinding your teeth,” Josh said, riding in the passenger seat of Mike’s truck as they drove back to the ranch.
Mike didn’t answer. He didn’t want conversation. Josh might be more forgiving toward Lucky than their folks. But Mike still didn’t want to discuss her with him. Too many conflicting emotions roiled inside him—split loyalties, compassion, guilt, a desire to be fair.
“At least now you know she’s as bitter as Mom and Dad have said.”
“Bitter?” Mike echoed.
“Yeah. Didn’t you see the way she looked at us?”
Incredulous, Mike stared at his brother. “Dad attacked her,” he snapped. “She could’ve leveled him by telling him about me, but she didn’t.”
“I’m just saying there’s nothing to be upset about,” Josh said. “It was unpleasant but nothing big. She doesn’t care what we think of her or she probably would’ve told him.”
Mike chuckled humorlessly. Josh was either delusional or trying too hard to make him feel better. And if he was trying to make him feel better, it wasn’t working. Mike had wounded Lucky, and he knew it. He’d drawn blood simply by allowing that incident at the hardware store to happen.
She hadn’t even tried to defend herself….
“Let it go,” he told Josh.
“Mike—”
“What?”
“She’s a big girl. She’ll be all right.”
“I know,” he said so Josh would shut up. But he couldn’t accept such flimsy solace. Lucky wasn’t nearly as big as he was. And she had no one on her side.
CHAPTER TEN
THAT NIGHT MIKE tried to distract himself from thinking about the incident in the hardware store by calling Gabe. Dealing with his best friend and the handicap that had changed Gabe’s life suddenly seemed the easiest of several difficult situations, and Mike needed to resolve something. He couldn’t remember ever being at odds with so many people or feeling so uncomfortable in his own skin.
But Gabe didn’t answer. After three rings, his machine came on. “This is Gabe. Leave a message.”
“Answer the phone, Gabe.” Mike felt fairly certain Gabe was at home. He rarely went out, and it was getting late. “Gabe?”
Nothing.
“We’ve got business to discuss. I’ve arranged a few meetings for you.”
Still nothing. Maybe he’d already gone to bed. Or he had a saw running and couldn’t hear the phone.
Mike hung up and called again.
This is Gabe. Leave a message.
“Call me,” Mike said, then slammed down the phone. So much for resolving the ill feelings between him and his childhood friend.
Frustrated and tense, he pushed away from his desk and wandered out of his office. He wanted to go to bed and forget the events of the day. But when he reached his room, he couldn’t think of anything except the white lace panties he’d shoved into his underwear drawer so the housekeeper wouldn’t find them. Lucky’s panties.
Pulling them out, he toyed with the small scrap of silky fabric, remembering the sight of Lucky standing before him wearing nothing else. It was a beautiful image, one that instantly tightened his groin. Only it was quickly followed by the memory of the hurt that had flickered across her face at the hardware store today.
All evening he’d been recounting her sins, fighting the urge to go over to her place and apologize. Lucky had thumbed her nose at them for years. She’d refused to sell him the house he loved and left it standing vacant so long it was falling apart. She’d gloated, at times, over the fact that she’d managed to supplant him in Morris’s affections. She hadn’t even returned for Morris’s funeral after inheriting so much of his money. She’d rambled around the country as if…as if…
As if she were lost, he realized.
Sinking onto the bed, he picked up the cordless phone on his nightstand and called information for new listings. Calling wasn’t the visit he would’ve preferred, but he wasn’t sure he could trust himself to show up at Lucky’s door, apologize and leave it at that. As conflicted as he was about her, he knew two things. One, she hadn’t told a soul about them or she would’ve told his father today. And two, the satisfaction he’d achieved that night at the motel wasn’t nearly as long-lasting as he’d hoped it would be.
He was craving her already.
LUCKY JUMPED when her phone rang. Except for the movers who’d delivered the furniture she’d rented from a place in Boise, the contractors who’d given her bids and the bank that had made her the loan, no one had called her since she’d received telephone service. She had acquaintances all over America, but no one she considered close, except maybe her brothers. She knew she’d hear from them at Christmas, but she hadn’t even passed on her new number. It wasn’t Christmas yet.
So who was calling her at nearly eleven o’clock?
She used the remote to turn down the TV and leaned over the end of the couch to reach the phone, which sat on the floor because she had nowhere else to put it. She’d rented only essential furniture—a bed and dresser for the smallest of the bedrooms upstairs, a couch, a TV and a few lamps for the living room and a kitchen set. She didn’t want a lot to move when she painted or replaced the carpet, and this way she’d have less to return when it came time to leave.
“Hello?” she said hesitantly. After her confrontation with Coach Hill in the hardware store this morning, she feared there might not be a friendly voice at the other end of the line. Her homecoming had obviously stirred up as much anger as she’d anticipated.
“Lucky?”
“Yes?”
“It’s Mike.”
Lucky pulled the blanket she’d curled up in more tightly around her. “What can I do for you, Mike?” she asked, as if they’d never so much as kissed.
Then she remembered his father’s words: Just leave….
Wincing, she clung even tighter to her blanket. The Hills didn’t have to worry. She would leave—as soon as she found her father, finished the house and figured out which food bank or Red Cross branch needed her most.