Season of Gifts (Neighborly Affection #8)

78. Jay

Chapter seventy-eight

Jay

J ay waved until the sleek black SUV dropped out of sight. Couldn’t tell if Eddie and Gabe were waving back, because Henry’s brother had tinted windows on his fancy ride. Didn’t matter, though; they’d still see him waving.

“Hey, stud.” Alice reached for him from the doorway.

He clasped her hand. Tried to pull his back, because for once he was colder—standing on the porch without a coat or gloves—but she tugged him closer, over the threshold and into the house. Nobody behind her. Henry and Mom had been there in the hug line a minute ago. “Mom okay?”

“She’s good.” Alice toed the door shut, and he pushed it tight for good measure. “Wanted to show Henry something in his dad’s den.” Stepping backward down the hall, Alice led him with her. “How about you? This whole week is usually pretty family-heavy, right?”

“Usually, yeah.” Noisy and hustling from sunup to sundown and a good while after. Henry’s Christmas had a slower pace. “S’weird, because this place is way more formal than the farm, but it’s also more relaxed.” They slow-turned into the music room, almost like dancing. “Does that make sense?”

“When I was a kid—” Alice stared at the short couch, then swept the pillows off the front and sat on the floor in the pile. “C’mere, relax with me.”

She didn’t have to ask him twice. He cozied the nest and lay on his back, resting his head on her thigh. She smiled down at him with her pink-bow lips and flattened one hand on his chest. Threaded the other through his hair. Couldn’t get much better than that fully dressed. “When you were a kid?”

“It was mostly just the four of us—Ollie, me, Mom, and Dad.”

Her forehead got the notch in the center, but he rubbed her forearm slowly, and the rough thoughts smoothed out. At least, that’s how he described it to Danny when it happened to him. “No big gathering?”

“Grandparents when I was really small, and sometimes my aunt and uncle if the roads weren’t bad. But they never had kids, so no cousins. Pretty quiet.” Alice blinked, and her focus returned to his face instead of staring through him. “I’d call it relaxed. And after Dad—well, after , we didn’t have relaxation in the house anymore ever. Just tense and jumpy and waiting for the next outburst. So when you say it’s more relaxed here, that’s what I think. Is that what you mean?”

Her dad had better get with the program. If that guy disappointed Alice and Ollie and their mom again, hurt them one more time—Jay wrapped his arm around Alice and squeezed her hip. Being able to touch her, to sprawl across her and have her full attention, that was relaxation right there. “I think so. Something like it. I’m not anxious here. Especially now that we know Mom’s not gonna be alone and Henry can come home with us.”

“That was a hell of a surprise she dropped at breakfast. I hope Henry’s feeling okay about it.” She crooked her neck, trying to see over the couch behind them, and twisted her lips. “I want us to ask him today, all right? Just check in and see where he’s at. Not let it slip under the rug.”

“No rug slippage.” He nodded wholeheartedly, his shoulders pressing against her leg. “All the anxieties out in the open so we can deal.”

“That’s the assignment.” Fingers gentle, Alice combed his hair back and traced his ear. “You get to help me stay on track with it, too, because my record’s not the greatest.”

“That’s a worthwhile one.” She and Henry didn’t invent jobs for him. Their tasks came with a purpose, and if he didn’t understand the why, he could always ask. “That’s part of it, too. Being relaxed, I mean. I love being helpful, but here I don’t feel like I gotta run straight back to Henry for a new assignment every time I finish one. Peggy always had a million things, like annual chores just got stored up until the end of the year for me to do.”

Alice twitched her whole face like she’d smelled rotten milk.

“Yeah, okay.” He laughed at himself. With a little distance, it was funny-sad how much he’d not noticed or made excuses for. Bet Alice knew that kind of funny-sad too. “I feel—my body feels—less in danger here.” And wasn’t that a shitty thing to say about his childhood home. “I mean—”

“Me too.” Sighing, Alice shifted her legs but held him tight when he tried to move. “Stay. You’re not cutting off my circulation. I like you just where you are, sweetheart. Where I can have my hands on you and neither of us is jumping out of our skin waiting for shouting any minute.”

“I like that too.” Almost made him drowsy, her relaxation fueling his relaxation in one of those virtuous feedback loops Henry had described to him over and over again back when they breathed together through the aftermath of Jay’s nightmares. “I kinda told Becky yesterday…”

An overstep, maybe, because he’d blurted it into their text string without asking Henry or Alice. But if his niece needed to call in the favor, they’d understand.

Alice twined her fingers in his henley, lightly scratching his chest. “Told her what?”

“Said if she needed anything—if any of the kids needed anything—that I’m still their uncle, and they can still count on me.” Not that he figured on Peggy kicking out any of her kids. But she might, if any of them turned out anything like him. “If they need a place to go, you know?”

Alice curled herself in half hugging him. Put her breasts against his cheeks, which felt plenty soft and warm, and he sneaked a few kisses against her shirt. That made her laugh, and things started jiggling as an added bonus.

“I love you.” She whispered right in his ear, her lips brushing his skin. “All the wonderful ways that you are you. There’s just one Jay in the entire world, and Henry and I get to keep him for the rest of his life, as long as he wants us to.”

“For always, then.” Tipping his head sideways, he sought out her mouth and dotted her with kisses, nudging for the real deal. They should take this upstairs if things were going any farther. No telling when Henry’s mom would be back with him.

Alice took his offer and sealed their lips. She swiped his tongue with hers, daring him to chase her. Her hands knotted, one in his shirt and the other in his hair. Good as a jump start, jolting him with energy. That kind of fun could be relaxing too. She purred at him, rumbly and inviting. “What say we—”

A bicycle bell chimed twice.

“Uhh…” Alice palmed his chest and pushed herself upright. Even her eyes were laughing. “Do you have a bike in your pocket?”

“Kinda.” Snorting, he fished for his phone as it chimed again. “That’s Carrie. Must be something going on at dispatch. She wouldn’t call if she could handle it herself.” His finger hovered over the green button.

Alice waggled her eyebrows at him. “Take it, stud.”

So he was full-on laughing as he picked up. “Hey, Carrie, what’s going on? You have a good holiday?”

The whole staff had the twenty-fourth and twenty-fifth off, but they’d have been back at it this morning.

“I did, yeah. Had a call come in for a new contract just now, though, and I…” She clicked her tongue. “I want to run it by you first.”

Carrie could handle any standard contract herself, with nothing but his eventual signature. “Is it bigger than we can manage? Outside the regular delivery area?”

“No, neither of those. It’s just—” Carrie sighed, and her voice softened. “It’s for Tuesday mornings. For you, specifically.”

Mrs. Eickhoff’s slot. No reason he couldn’t fill it, except he wasn’t ready to. Not that wallowing would help him get past the loss. Or that he should call regular grieving wallowing . Danny would ask whose voice that was telling him to get over it. Jay wormed his fingers under Alice’s shirt and touched real skin, the softness just above her hip, at the edge of her underwear. Slow and steady breathing. “What’s the job?”

“Same address—there’s a Mrs. Murray in the building?”

“I know her.” She had the seat across from Mrs. Eickhoff every Tuesday for gin rummy. And she’d let him stay to make his final delivery when the building manager would’ve kept him out. “Another health contract? Did she hurt herself?”

“Don’t think so—she wants the same service her neighbor had, only she’s calling herself the CEO of a consortium of four ladies. She insisted it had to be Tuesday mornings, all together, except they can only afford the cost for one weekly contract, and that’s just—”

“Tell her we’ll take it.” His feet flexed, toes alternating. “No more than three store stops per week before delivery, but they don’t always have to be the same three. And I bring everything to her apartment.”

That rule would last about five minutes, right up until one of the gals asked him if he wouldn’t mind carrying just one bag over to her place.

“If you’re sure.” Doubt sounded an awful lot like a cheer. “Starting next week?”

“Yeah. Put it on my schedule.” He must’ve been grinning like a fool, because Alice had mystery-solving eyes and a broad smile. “Thanks, Carrie.”

“Merry Christmas, boss.”

“Merry Christmas.” He ended the call and tossed the phone on the rug. “Where were we? Going upstairs?”

“Ohh no you don’t, mister.” Alice laid her hand over his and teasingly peeled his fingers back from her hip. “Not until I know what put that smile on your face.”

He buried his face in her stomach and peppered her with kisses through the shirt. She grabbed hold of his chin, just a dash of control holding him still. A giddy joy heated him up. His fingers and toes curled. The star at the top of the Christmas tree glittered.

“I think I might be the rummy club’s official unofficial grandson.”