‘HELLO?’ Cassie called through the back door as kittens clambered over her feet. ‘Anyone home?’
The day before yesterday she’d have waltzed straight in, calling for Alec, but not today. Not when Sol was living here. What if he were one of those people who walked around their house naked?
After all, it was hot.
Heat that had nothing to do with summer temperatures surged through her. She really didn’t want to walk in on a naked Sol. She fanned a hand in front of her face, trying to cool down. She really didn’t. Honest. Though half naked would be nice. She wouldn’t mind seeing him without his shirt, just to see how much he’d changed in ten years. Just to see if his shoulders promised—
Arghh. Can that thought right now, Cassie Parker. You don’t fantasise about near-naked men.
‘Wrong. I quite obviously do,’ she muttered, wondering at the political correctness of such an admission.
‘Do what?’
Sol loomed on the other side of the screen door, and for a moment all Cassie could do was stare. ‘Uh, make a sterling scratching post,’ she gulped. She bent down to detach a kitten from her leg. When she straightened, she prayed her face wasn’t red.
Alec wheeled up behind Sol. ‘You’re early again,’ he grumbled.
‘Yes, I am.’ Alec still had the kitten on his lap. It curled up there as if it never meant to leave. ‘Well, aren’t you going to let me in?’ she demanded, as both men stared at her. Sol shook himself, then pushed the door open. ‘Have I got something on my face?’ She scrubbed a hand across her face as both men continued to stare. Sol sent her a lop-sided grin that had her stomach falling all over itself.
He pointed. ‘On your head.’
‘My Santa hat?’ She twirled on the spot. ‘Do you like it? I wore it specially.’
‘Humph.’ Alec backed up and wheeled away.
‘It looks hot,’ Sol said.
Her eyes narrowed. Man, did this place need some Christmas cheer or what? She followed him into the kitchen. ‘It certainly captures the spirit of the afternoon.’
Both men swung around to stare at her suspiciously. She beamed back at them. ‘We’re putting up your Christmas tree.’ She held up one hand as they both opened their mouths to argue. ‘I have my heart set on decorating your Christmas tree, and don’t forget that I’m the town’s favourite widow and only blackguards without scruple would disappoint me.
‘Furthermore,’ she added when they both opened their mouths again, ‘if you don’t play along, you—’ she glared at Alec ‘—will get nothing but salad for tea tonight. And you—’ she glared at Sol ‘—won’t get invited to my place for dinner tomorrow night.’ Both men chewed her words over for a moment, then subsided into silence. ‘Fabulous.’ She dusted off her hands. ‘Okay—Alec, you organise the drinks and you, Sol, can drag the Christmas tree out of the hall closet.’
She walked through to the living room and chose her spot—smack-bang in the middle of the front window, so everyone who drove by could see it. Not that many people drove out this way.
The curtains fluttered in the breeze. She lifted her face to it. Sol’s doing, she’d bet. For the life of her she didn’t know why Alec kept everything so shut up.
Yes, she did. Alec kept his house shut up the way he kept himself shut up. It was a simple as that.
And as complicated.
‘Where do you want me to dump this?’
Sol stood in the doorway, a large box in his arms, and a strange pulse fluttered to life in her throat. His arm muscles bulged as if he was used to manual labour. She gulped. Ten years ago—
He shifted the box. ‘Have I got something on my face?’
She blinked, then made herself grin. Pushing the coffee table to one side, she pointed. ‘I’d like you to place the box there.’ He chuckled at her stress on the word, and, oh, heavens, there it was again, that warm hot chocolate glow. He glanced at her strangely, so she shook herself and said, ‘Show me your hands.’
He immediately held them out, palm upward, like a little boy proving he’d washed his hands before dinner. She took one of them between her own and traced the calluses with her fingers. His hands matched his arms. Big and masculine. The kind of hands a woman could imagine holding her. Tracing and caressing and—
She dropped the hand and shoved hers behind her back. ‘I thought you were an architect.’ The words rapped out of her like bullets. ‘I mean, I thought you designed houses, not built them.’
‘I do.’
His eyes settled on her, and awareness shot up her backbone.
‘But I like to get involved in all stages of my projects. I’ve even built my own house.’
‘From scratch?’
‘Yep.’
‘All on your own?’
He shrugged. ‘I had plumbers in to do the plumbing and electricians in to wire the house.’
‘But the rest you did all on your own?’ Her mouth opened and closed. ‘But that’s amazing.’ She couldn’t imagine Brian—
‘Nah, it’s not.’
But he looked pleased all the same, and as their eyes met that awareness arced between them again. Cassie found her palms suddenly damp. It was the heat, she told herself. Summer day heat. She wiped her palms down the front of her skirt. ‘Then this—’ she pointed to the box ‘—should be a cinch for you.’
Alec wheeled into the room with both tray and kitten perched precariously on his knee. Cassie’s jaw dropped. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ She pointed to the tray. It held two cans of beer, a jug of homemade lemonade and three glasses. Wasn’t it only yesterday she’d bragged to Sol that Alec hadn’t had a drink in two years? And yet here—
‘Keep your hat on.’ He scowled. ‘The beers are for you and Sol. The boy can’t be expected to live on my lolly water, now, can he?’
‘I suppose not.’ Though Alec’s lemonade was delicious.
‘And I thought, seeing as you’re all set on this Christmas spirit thing, that you’d join the boy in a drink.’
‘A beer?’
‘Anything wrong with that?’ Sol asked.
‘No.’ She drew the word out slowly. It was just that nobody ever offered her beer. Ever. Wine and soft drinks, yes, but not beer.
Her lips twisted. Brian could still exert his influence, even from the grave. He hadn’t liked her drinking beer—hadn’t thought it was ladylike. So she hadn’t drunk it. Just like that. It was crazy to give up your freedom so easily, but she had. Without so much as a whimper. And now she lived in a town that thought she didn’t like beer.
‘Cassie?’
She lifted her chin. ‘I’d love a beer.’ She seized one and popped the top. Further, she was going to drink it straight from the can. Sol and Alec wouldn’t mind. Heck, they probably wouldn’t even notice.
‘Cheers.’ She raised the can in salute, then took a long swig, savouring its strong flavour. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and beamed at the two men.
Sol grinned, as if her enthusiasm amused him. ‘Good?’
‘The best,’ she vowed. ‘Now, chop-chop. Haul that thing out of its box.’
‘Heavens, Alec,’ she breathed later, as she and Sol set about erecting the tree. ‘How tall is this thing?’
‘Nearly seven feet.’ An idle hand stroked the kitten.
He didn’t strike Cassie as the kind of man who went in for Christmas trees—especially not enormous seven-foot monstrosities. But then she hadn’t thought he’d take to a kitten either.
‘Sol’s mum,’ he said, as if he could read the question in her face. ‘She got some freak in her head.’
‘As was her wont,’ she heard Sol mutter under his breath. She understood. Pearl Adams had been one erratic woman.
‘She decided we had to have a Christmas tree, and of course, with Pearl, it had to be the biggest.’ He took a slug of lemonade. ‘It only got put up once.’
‘Twice,’ Sol corrected, then looked as if he wished he hadn’t.
An awkward silence enveloped the room. Cassie looked from one man to the other, both with their closed and shuttered faces. She took another swig of beer and revelled for a moment in her newfound sense of freedom. ‘Third time lucky, then. Isn’t that what they say?’
Sol and Alec both looked charmingly nonplussed.
‘Ooh, look—you’ve even got lights.’ She pounced on them, then winked at Sol. ‘We don’t need a qualified electrician to wire up a tree. Come on—you start at the top. I won’t reach. And here—’ she handed Alec a box of red and green balls ‘—you start with these.’
Sol wound the lights around the top of the tree, then handed them to her to arrange on the lower branches. She hummed Deck the Halls, and sensed rather than saw the two men roll their eyes at each other over her head.
‘Why are you so into Christmas and all anyway, girl?’ Alec grumbled as the kitten took a swipe at a Christmas ball.
‘Maybe ’cos I never had a proper one when I was growing up.’ She finished the lights and leaned back to survey their handiwork. Not bad. ‘So I guess I’m making up for lost time.’
Alec stared at her for a moment and a shadow passed across his face. ‘You trying to help an old reprobate like me make up for lost time too?’
Sol wouldn’t mind knowing what she was up to himself.
‘Ex-reprobate,’ Cassie corrected.
She was right. Sol had to admit Alec had changed. A lot. And not just physically.
‘That mama of yours, Cassie,’ Alec shook his head. ‘She shoulda…’ He sighed. ‘You was always a nice kid.’
‘Yeah, I guess I was.’ She hung red and green balls on the branches Alec couldn’t reach. ‘So was Sol here.’
Silence greeted her words, then Alec chuckled. ‘As a wee mite, if there was trouble to be found he’d be in the thick of it.’
She turned, hands on hips. ‘He was a nice kid, Alec.’
Alec’s gaze dropped. ‘Yeah, Cassie. Sol here was a nice kid too. I’ll grant you that.’
Sol couldn’t believe his ears.
‘He deserved to have Christmas too.’
‘Yeah.’ Alec shifted in his wheelchair. ‘He did.’
‘And he didn’t deserve to have you beat up on him the way you used to.’
What did she think she was doing? ‘Hell, Cassie,’ he shot out the corner of his mouth, ‘drop it. I thought we were going for Christmas spirit here. Just…’
‘Just what?’
She raised an eyebrow. Somehow it only served to define the lush curve of her bottom lip. Sol swallowed. ‘Just keep your nose out.’
Her eyes flashed fire. ‘It’s because people kept their noses out that I went hungry more often than I should have. I made a promise to myself way back then, Sol Adams, to never keep my nose out.’
How did you argue with that?
‘She’s right, lad,’ Alec mumbled, before shooting a glare at Cassie. ‘You sure know how to make a man feel the lowest of the low, Cassie Campbell.’
‘Parker,’ she corrected.
Alec chuckled. ‘You’ll never be a Parker. They’re good citizens and they mind their own business.’
‘They’re nice people, and you wouldn’t feel ashamed of yourself if your conscience was clear,’ she shot right back at him.
Sol laughed. He couldn’t help it. ‘Surrender now,’ he advised Alec. ‘You’re never going to win against the likes of her.’ He doubted anyone could. ‘When did you go and get all bossy anyhow?’ he asked her.
She tilted her nose and kept on decorating the tree. She tossed him some tinsel. ‘Make yourself useful.’
‘She’s right, though, lad. I should never have whaled into you the way I did back then.’
Sol’s jaw dropped. He half turned from twirling tinsel around the tree, then stopped. Discomfort crawled up his backbone and circled his skull. He didn’t want to have this conversation. Not now, not ever.
‘I’m sorry for what I did.’
Sol kept twining tinsel around the tree. Then ran out of tinsel.
‘I don’t expect you to forgive me. What I did back then—it wasn’t right.’
Sol clenched his jaw. Started rearranging the tinsel.
‘But I want you to know I regret it and…and I wish I could undo it or something.’
Sol’s hands stilled. There was no mistaking the sincerity in Alec’s voice. Silence crept into the room. He could feel Cassie’s eyes on him, but he didn’t know what response she wanted him to give. Even if he did he couldn’t guarantee to give it.
She kicked his ankle. ‘Oops, sorry.’
Eyebrows rose in mock innocence. Sympathy, laughter and gentleness all danced in the velvet violet of her eyes and somehow soothed him. He found himself smiling.