Chapter Eight
Early the next morning, Rachel finished her chores in record time, then headed into the shower to get ready for the meeting she’d scheduled later that day with her lawyer. Every time she caught sight of Dyuvad, languid heat stole through her, warming her inside and out. Last night had been fun, even the manhandling. Truth be told, she would’ve liked a little more of it besides his arm draped around her shoulders and that one fireman’s carry.
Maybe he would’ve worked up the nerve to sneak a kiss if sometime during Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones saving the world from an alien attack, she hadn’t fallen asleep on him. She’d woken that morning alone in her own bed wearing a clean t-shirt, a pair of panties, and not a stitch more.
Rachel turned her grimace into the water streaming down around her. What kind of woman fell asleep on a man like Dyuvad? A plum crazy one, that was what. Dyuvad had taken the time to put her to bed proper like after she’d gone and besmirched his manners, and he hadn’t taken advantage of her, either.
Why, he hadn’t even crawled into bed with her the way she’d half expected him to do since him and Fate had knocked a hole in the wall between their bedrooms.
Nope. He hadn’t hardly touched her since the night he’d pinned her to a blanket beneath a million stars and kissed her senseless, right where God and everybody could see.
She squirted shampoo into her palm and scrubbed it briskly into her hair. Maybe she was a little disappointed that he hadn’t tried again. It wasn’t like he hadn’t had plenty of opportunities, was it? Even with both of them busy from daylight to dusk, they passed each other every half hour or so on the way from one chore to the next. And the girls weren’t up all day, were they? There was plenty of time after they went to bed for alone time, if a man wanted to make a move.
Not that she’d made it easy for him.
Rachel tilted her head back and rinsed out the shampoo, grimacing over thoughts of her own ineptness. Where men were concerned, she’d never much bothered to show interest. Juan had been it for her since she’d figured out what a man and a woman’s parts were for. Sure, she’d dressed up for him now and again. A woman liked to feel pretty, didn’t she? Pretty and admired and desired.
And maybe that was part of the problem here. She was so used to being alone on the farm with just the girls and Fate and Yasmin for company, she’d forgotten how to act around other people. Would it kill her to put on mascara and lip gloss every morning and do something with her hair besides yank a brush through it? And in the evenings after supper was made and cleaned up, it wouldn’t hurt a’tall to take her shower then instead of waiting for bedtime.
She twisted the water off with a disgusted snort. Get her around an attractive man and look what happened. Her brain turned to mush. Dyuvad had seen her at her worst long before their first kiss. Dressing to the nines wouldn’t do a darn thing to change his opinion of her.
But that morning, Rachel dressed with a care usually reserved for weddings and funerals. She slathered on her best lotion, a Christmas gift from Yasmin imbued with a light, sensual fragrance. While her hair dried loose around her bare shoulders, she painted her toes pale pink to match the Peter Pan collared shirt she’d picked out to wear with a dove gray fitted skirt. It was her best outfit, a real figure flatterer, and about the only thing in her closet suitable for a business meeting.
That the shirt showed off the honey color of her skin wasn’t a consideration. Men didn’t notice things like toned arms and painted toenails.
Not that she wanted anybody in particular to notice.
She crossed her fingers against the small fib and finished getting ready around Kelly poking her head in asking about advice on lunch’s menu and Tiny tottering in with a dead tadpole she’d found in a mud puddle.
Rachel smiled as she flushed the poor critter down the toilet, then washed her youngest daughter’s hands. She’d only been half right last night. A woman’s work was never done, but when love entered the picture, work was a joy a woman should hold on to as long as possible.
She shooed a somewhat cleaner Tiny ahead of her down the hallway toward the low male voices rumbling from her kitchen, and found Fate at the table leaning back in a chair and Dyuvad propped against a counter, his long legs crossed in front of him.
Tiny scrambled into Fate’s lap and promptly began recounting a tale in her made up language about someone named Degar, absorbing her uncle’s rapt attention.
Dyuvad’s mouth lifted in a slow, sensual grin as his gaze slid down her body and landed on the open-toed, gray slingbacks she wore. He crossed his arms over that broad, bare chest of his, and darned if his tattoo didn’t lighten from coal black to midnight blue right on into spring leaf green.
Hunh. Maybe dressing to the nines really did work on a man. Who would’ve thought?
Rachel scooted around Tiny and Fate and opened the refrigerator, rooting through it as much to cool her heated skin as to get out the lemonade. By the time she turned around, Dyuvad had set five glasses on the counter, and that tattoo had transformed into a colorful array of yellows and oranges.
She thumped the lemonade jug onto the counter, thankful for the lid holding the sloshing liquid inside, and patted a hand over the butterflies dancing in her stomach. Lordy, nothing made a woman feel beautiful like knowing a man wanted her, nor did anything rattle her more.
Dyuvad twisted the lid around and poured lemonade into a glass. “You should eat before you go.”
Rachel nearly snorted. Eating was the last thing she needed to do. Besides, between the butterflies and the nerves, her stomach was full. “Maybe later. Thanks for helping Fate watch the girls.”
“I enjoy them.” He handed her a glass full of lemonade, trapped her hand and it between both of his, and his smile softened. “Beauty.”
“I’m not,” she murmured.
“You are.”
His gaze dropped to her mouth, lingering there. He leaned toward her, and the butterflies in her tummy leapt and twisted. This was it. He was gonna kiss her again, and she wanted it so much, wanted to feel his mouth on hers, just for a moment. Was it wrong to want him that way? Was it wrong to be attracted to a man like Dyuvad, strong and kind and wickedly sensual?
The screen door slammed, startling her, and she jerked back reflexively. Dyuvad grinned and let her go as Kelly bounced up to them and tugged on the pocket of his shorts, and the moment was broken as quickly as it had come upon them.
Rachel busied her hands with the lemonade, all too aware of Dyuvad’s heated gaze lingering on her skin and the promise filling those deep blue eyes of his. Once upon a time, she would’ve given anything to have a man look at her like that, back in the days when she’d believed Juan was her one and only. And now, here she was on the receiving end of a near stranger’s desire without a clue what to do.
She grinned as she stuck the lemonade back into the fridge. That wasn’t right a’tall. She knew exactly what she wanted to do with Dyuvad, from the top of his close-shorn head to the tips of his bare toes and everywhere in between. Just the thought of all that doing heated her blood as surely as his touch.
But was she ready to fall into bed with him ?
She nudged the fridge door shut with her hip and studied him where he stood leaning against the counter, listening with a half smile to Kelly’s chatter about something she’d read. Dyuvad had blown in on a breeze. Maybe he’d blow out of their lives just as quickly, but while he was here, what harm would it do to practice flirting on him? Lord knew, he was willing enough.
Maybe the next time he put the moves on her, she’d do a little moving of her own, and then she could figure out what was what where her renter was concerned.
Jude Earl’s office was located on a side street in downtown Clayton, a twenty-five minute drive from Rachel’s home. She squeezed her goat-topped van into a free parking spot, checked her makeup in the rearview mirror, fidgeted with her purse. Questions raced through her mind, a tumultuous whirl of indecision. Was she doing the right thing by terminating Juan’s parental rights? Would it really make a difference for the girls? Or was it futile to hope that breaking all ties to him would stop the trouble heading their way again?
What if the girls resented having their father cut out of their lives?
It could happen, especially with Kelly. Tiny had never met her father. Juan had been captured and imprisoned before her birth, and Rachel had never taken the girls to visit him there.
Kelly was a different story. She was old enough to remember him before the bad had overridden the good, and still young enough for those memories and the pure love held in her little girl’s heart to sway her wants. She was the one who’d yearn for her father. She was the one who just might come to hate Rachel for keeping them apart, whether it was for everybody’s good or not.
How could she not?
Rachel nipped her thoughts off before they could spiral out of control. She would deal with any problems the girls had the way she always did, one day at a time. Worrying about the what ifs was only begging trouble. Didn’t they already have enough of that ?
She sucked in a huge, fortifying breath, shouldered the finicky driver’s side door open, and got out. Humid heat slapped at her, wilting the crisp crease in her blouse before she’d made it halfway across the postage stamp parking lot. Heavy, black-lined clouds crowded the sky, threatening to burst. Rain later, likely a bad thunderstorm, but maybe she’d have time to finish her meeting and get home before then.
The law office’s earth-toned interior was crisper cool and a welcome relief. Rachel gave her name to the receptionist, a perfectly coifed twenty-something blonde, then sagged into a leather waiting chair parked between two curtained windows.
Jude stepped out of his office two shakes later, a welcoming grin stretching his homely face plum in two. He was a raw-boned man, gaunt and lanky, and one of the few friends Rachel had kept in touch with after graduating high school. He’d also been about the only person who’d stuck by her after Juan’s mistakes piled too high for him to climb over, or her either, for that matter.
“Hey, Rach,” Jude said. “What’s this I hear about a new boyfriend?”
Heat pricked Rachel’s skin, ending in a blush, and she hunched her shoulders. “Dyuvad is renting the mother-in-law room and helping out with the chores.”
Jude’s bushy eyebrows shot toward the unruly black curls topping his head. “Is that so?”
Rachel twisted her mouth into a frown. “Isn’t it unethical to tease a client?”
“Probably, but where’s the fun in not?” Jude asked. “Come on back. I’ve got some news you’ll want to hear sitting down.”
Her stomach curled into a tight knot. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Well, potentially nothing.” Jude led her into his office and shut the door firmly behind her, then plopped into the chair behind his wide, ruthlessly organized desk. As soon as she’d perched on the edge of a chair opposite him, he said, “Juan’s being moved from the Hall County prison to the local correctional facility.”
Every bone in Rachel’s spine melted. She slumped against the back of her chair and gaped at her attorney. “What? Why?”
Juan spread his hands out, palms up, and shrugged. “Overcrowding. He’s a model prisoner. Keeps his head down, does what he’s told.”
“But he murdered somebody.”
“He’s not getting out of his sentence, Rach,” Jude said gently.
“I’m not worried about his sentence,” Rachel wailed. “I don’t want him near my girls. I don’t want the folks he hangs around with near us, either. That’s why I wanted to talk to you!”
“To have his parental rights terminated.” Jude sat back in his chair and steepled long fingers together under his pointed chin. “It’s a drastic step, Rach. Are you sure you want to do this?”
“As sure as the wind in March,” she said flatly, then briefly explained the events of the past few days, beginning with seeing members of Juan’s old gang at the lake. “It’s starting up again, Jude. My girls have been through enough. I’d be willing to deal with the devil if it keeps them out of harm’s way.”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.” Jude puffed his cheeks out on a long sigh. “Ok, here’s what you can expect.”
Rachel listened carefully while Jude outlined fees and a time table, and tempered her expectations based on his advice. All the while, worry churned in her gut, along with the sure certainty that life was about to get very, very messy.