Chapter 8
CHAPTER EIGHT
Noa
M rs. Stalinski takes the news of her new roommates with grudging acceptance.
I have the sense that with her son here, she’s more amenable to changes she’d otherwise resolutely deny.
Stone softens her in the same way she unexpectedly softens him.
It’s amusing to watch them try to out-manipulate the other into doing what they want, considering she’s the only human on the planet who can get away with calling this intimidating, polished man honeybear.
I catch myself smiling when Stone tries to hand Mrs. Stalinski a coffee without sugar after she rustles awake midmorning.
She’s suspicious the instant she cups the warm drink, wrinkling her nose and sniffing it before shoving it in my direction. “I don’t know what California’s done to you, son, but Noa understands how I like it.”
“Almond milk and collagen peptides have proven benefits, Ma.” Stone watches the cup exchange hands like he’s witnessing the loss of his most important client.
“I’ve taken my coffee with cream and sugar since before you were a seed in my belly,” Mrs. Stalinski says before gesturing to me with a hurry up and fix it motion.
With a subtle laugh, I shut my patient logbook and slide off the countertop’s barstool. “If it’s the last thing I do before I leave, it’ll be to get you a perfect cup of coffee.”
“I like that sound.” Stone angles his head as he watches me round the kitchen island.
“What sound?” My brows furrow as I glance at him.
“Your laughter. I haven’t heard it until now.”
My grin wilts, its petals lying dry against my tongue. “You’ve been here half a day and one night.”
The idea of him thinking I’m depressed or unhappy while stuck in Falcon Haven while he lives it up in Los Angeles grates me the wrong way.
“It wasn’t meant as an insult,” he says, straightening and heading for the hallway. “Will you both be okay without me for a few hours?”
I open my mouth to retort, I’ve lived ten years without you just fine, when my brain catches up and shuts it before I make the gaping wound he left behind that obvious.
“I’ll be fine,” Mrs. Stalinski says, rolling her eyes in my direction. “Most I get up to these days is reading and sitting in the garden, and I’m fairly certain I can be successful at both activities without your brutish form hovering.”
“My job is to assess problems and solve them.”
I wonder if it’s just me who catches the painful shard of glass in his eye before he says that.
“Do you remember the harvest dance, Noa?”
I jolt. Against my better judgment, I respond, “How could I forget?”
Mrs. Stalinski tsks at the two of us. “I couldn’t get you two off each other without resorting to chemical glue remover.
Sue me for thinking that showing embarrassing baby pictures of you both while you were being crowned harvest king and queen would humiliate you enough to un-stick yourselves and scramble to take them down. ”
“A mortifying acceptance speech by my mother would’ve been better than that,” Stone says.
Mrs. Stalinski’s lips spread into the widest smile I’ve seen in months. “The one of you pooping in the bathtub and holding it up with pride was my favorite.”
“All right, Ma. That’s more than enough.”
“You brought it up.”
"That was because…” he drifts off at the same time his eyes drift to me. “Because your laughter brought that memory forward. Crowning you harvest queen and sharing a dance.”
“It was an enjoyable night,” I hedge, shaking off the intuition that Stone is searching for something more.
Is he wondering if he’s dredging up feelings from me? If so, he couldn’t be more wrong. No sweet memory of ours will ever make me love him again.
My chest constricts at the thought. What a conceited way to think. There’s no reason Stone would want to be with me again, either. He has everything. Why would he be interested in a small-town palliative care nurse?
Mrs. Stalinski goes on as if Stone and I haven’t just gone through unsaid turmoil. “It was during your potty-training days. I couldn’t get you to relieve yourself on the toilet, but squatting on the floor and in the bath? Good to go.”
“ Mother. ”
Mrs. Stalinski catches my attempt to swallow my laughter.
“Don’t think your days of running butt-crack naked through the backwoods were any better, Noa,” she says to me. “Thank goodness your mother was just as eager to publicly humiliate her child as I was.”
Stone’s rumbling acknowledgment fills the air. Familiar and contagious. “I forgot about that. You wore mud pie hats for a while there if I remember correctly. How’s your mother doing, by the way? Does she still make that prize-winning cherry cobbler?”
I straighten, my hands sliding off the counter and going for my bag on autopilot. “I’d better go. I’m going to be late for Mr. Childs.”
The lines around Mrs. Stalinski’s lips soften. “Off you go, dear. I’ll be here when you get back.”
Nodding, I squeeze her shoulder as I pass and take a wide berth around Stone.
Stone calls behind me, “The guest room will be ready by the time you return, Noa.”
His statement forces me to turn around and acknowledge his sacrifice. “Thank you.”
I focus in his direction long enough to see Mrs. Stalinski lift her coffee to her lips while her eyes ping between us both, sharp and assessing.
“Fate better be on my side,” I mutter to myself as I open the front door, “because I refuse to allow two weeks of living with that man to get under my skin.”
My regular patients are easy and unproblematic, giving me plenty of time to head home for lunch and pack for my stay at the Stalinskis’. If I were a superstitious woman, I’d think the town was hatching a plan to return me to Stone as seamlessly as possible.
Not that he wants me. He obviously doesn’t.
The town is split on the benefits of Stone’s presence.
He’s been here less than a day and strange cars have popped up, likely hiding a camera behind their reflections.
Falcon Haven welcomes strangers, except for those who unjustifiably pry into town residents’ business.
The key word there is unjustified. The town can pry into the town’s own at will.
It’s impossible not to overhear tidbits of conversation as I’m running errands.
A cluster of girls at the bus stop fawn over one of their phones after she took a picture with Stone unaware in the background.
It’s clear the younger generation will forgive any transgression after Stone commits to a reluctant, dimpled smile in their direction, whereas the elders of the community grumble over their chess games and coffee about his poor choices in life and debate whether the corporate world has poisoned his soul and his mind.
I’m debating where I fall. Emotionally, I’m in the elder camp. Physically, my body betrays me whenever he’s in my proximity, and I become a hormonal millennial.
Moo is in the third camp. After bribing, pleading, forcibly prying off my couch, then giving in and drugging Moo to get him into his carrier, I stop at the Merc for a couple of sandwiches to take to Mrs. Stalinski in case she’s feeling peckish.
Getting Moo to transfer away from his favorite spot on my pillow and into the type of confines he only gets when he goes to the vet made me burn enough calories to eat Mrs. Stalinski’s share if she doesn’t want it.
Maisy rings up my order of two turkey sandwiches with the smooth movements and a watchful eye consistent with being fully aware of my temporary housing situation.
“Got everything you need, doll?” she asks, dripping with sweetness.
I sigh, envisioning the conversation I’d have to endure if I don’t give in now. “You better add a third sandwich. For—Stone.”
“Already in the bag.”
Shaking my head at her not-so-subtle assumptions, I lift the paper bag off the counter.
“Threw in a couple of cups of coleslaw, too, in the off chance you’re hungrier than normal.”
The bag freezes in mid-air. My vision slits. “Why would I be hungrier than normal?”
Maisy tries to cover her sly expression with an offhand shrug. “I hear he’s a handful, is all.”
“Maisy.” I plop the bag back by the register. “I’m not there to rekindle anything with Stone. I’m staying over to take care of Mrs. Stalinski, and I hope you’re telling anyone who asks exactly that.”
Maisy flutters a hand near her heart in mock horror.
“I know that. I’m not contesting your wonderful care of Judy.
You’re the best nurse she could’ve ever hoped for.
” Maisy lowers her arm and rubs my hand.
“But I understand how it can get frustrating and lonely. All I’m saying is, if you need to unload some of that baggage, there’s now a handsome young man, one you’re vastly familiar with, who could help you loosen an overworked muscle or two with no strings attached. ”
I press my lips together, then puff them out with a long exhale. “That I’m receiving this kind of advice from my best friend’s mother should give you some pause, Maisy.”
“Why should it?” Maisy raises a brow. “He has to go back to the city at some point, right? Why not take advantage?”
I lift the sandwich bag one last time in farewell. “Caretaker, Maisy. That’s the only Stalinski label on me you’ll find.”
“Mm-hmm.”
I feel her eyes on me as I walk out, no doubt coupled with a crafty grin.
Moo meows his displeasure for the entire drive. I cajole him while watching through the rearview mirror, but he’s having none of it, and continues his horrifying wail all the way into Mrs. Stalinski’s house.
“Good lord,” Stone says as he comes down the stairs. “Is he dying in there?”
I place the carrier on the floor and bend down alongside it. “He doesn’t like small spaces and voices his opinions. Loudly.”
“I’ve commissioned the most high-end security in the world at my home, when I should have just had that sound echoing throughout my house and terrified all the criminals away.”
Did he just make a joke? I glance up at him, debating a retort. Too easy. Instead, I unlatch the carrier door and say, “Get ready.”