Chapter 4
Ethan sat with his head in his hands in the surgery waiting room at Children’s Hospital. Even with his eyes closed, the glare from the overhead lights burned his retinas. The bulbs buzzed too, a hive of bees that seemed to hover over him.
The quiet tones of a medical professional speaking in an adjacent room almost pushed him over the edge. He wanted to leap up and speak in his outside voice, wave his arms around, throw stuff. Anything to scare all this anxiety away.
Approaching footsteps caught his attention. He glanced up, saw it was Charlie. She slipped into an adjacent chair. “I gave Skye the update. She feels terrible, of course.”
“I wish she wouldn’t,” he said wearily.
His old friend had still had her eyes on his son when Wells left his sand sculpture and started playing around at the bottom of the bluff with some other boys. Climbing the big rocks there wouldn’t have seemed particularly dangerous. It was only when he’d reached to catch a Frisbee that someone else flung toward him that he’d lost his footing and fell, breaking his wrist upon landing.
“She wants another report after he gets out of surgery,” Charlie said.
Upon consultation with his regular pediatrician, they’d driven Wells to the children’s hospital located between the cove and Malibu. There, the orthopedic surgeon had delivered the news—the tricky break required surgery to install some metal hardware that would stabilize the bone. Wells had been disappointed to find out he would have bandaging and a plastic splint afterward instead of a cast. Ethan had been somewhat reassured by his son’s lack of alarm at the idea of going “under the knife” as Wells put it.
“I heard them say it like that on TV,” the boy said when Charlie had sucked in an audible breath.
She’d been big-eyed and mostly silent the entire time, but had held on to her usual calm through getting Wells prepped for the procedure. After he’d been wheeled away, she’d disappeared, only to return now.
Leave it to his butler to have the presence of mind to make the soothing phone call to Skye. If only she had some magic power to make his own rising tension abate.
He grabbed up a weekly current-issues magazine. Three months old. Tossing it down, he got to his feet and stalked to the counter which held a coffeemaker, a basket with dried creamer and sweeteners, and a stack of cups. Though the dark brew smelled as vile as he was beginning to feel, he poured himself a few ounces.
Charlie looked at him askance. “You drink some of that,” she said, “and they’ll admit you to the hospital.”
In response, he dropped it into the trash untouched, then flung himself back into his seat. Down the hall, a door clicked shut with a snick, but he jerked like it was the report of a gun.
Charlie stared at him as if he was a dangerous convict. “Do you want me to get you some fresh coffee from the cafeteria?”
“No.”
“A book or magazine from the gift shop?”
“No.”
She glanced to a corner of the room. “I can turn on the TV—”
“No.” Then he winced, aware his maddening sense of helplessness was turning into bad temper that he was directing at his butler. “I’m sorry, Charlie,” he said. “Forgive me?”
“Only if you let me work on my Monopoly game,” she said, pulling out the deck of cards-version from her purse. The game was one of Wells’ favorites, and the little shark took after his granddad and dad, loving the thrill of the real estate hunt.
Two rounds didn’t distract Ethan, however, though he let Charlie win to make up for his earlier boorish mood. When she gathered them together a third time, she returned them to her purse.
“Sorry,” she said. “I thought the distraction might help.”
“It’s not you. The fact is, I’m shitty company,” he said flatly. “I hate hospitals.”
Charlie nodded. “Did your…did Michelle spend a lot of time in one, or was she at home with hospice?”
“That obvious, huh?”
“Nobody enjoys being at the hospital,” she said, shrugging. “Unless the outcome is a baby, of course.”
That sent Ethan’s thoughts careening in the opposite direction, back to the day they had been called by their lawyer. It was time to collect their son. Michelle had been rosy-cheeked and full of energy, still completely unaware of the cancer gathering in her body. Wreathed in smiles she’d accepted the precious bundle the nurse placed into her arms.
“We wanted Wells so much,” he murmured. “That day we took him home, the sky was so blue it almost hurt to look at it.”
He glanced at Charlie to see there was color in her face too, and her eyes were a brilliant sapphire, as if shined by tears. “Charlie?”
“I’ve seen skies just like that,” she said.
Then gloom tumbled over Ethan again. The blue skies hadn’t remained so bright. “Michelle fought so damn hard,” he muttered, looking down. “Sometimes I thought she tried too hard.”
“She had people she loved to battle for,” Charlie said. “I can’t imagine a mother of Wells doing any less.”
He glanced up to see her make a face. “I shouldn’t comment,” she continued. “It’s none of my business.”
“He didn’t get to see her at the very end,” Ethan said. “Wells, I mean. I wasn’t against hospice, and they were in place, but I did worry about the effect that being a part of the final moments would have on him.”
Charlie stared at him, her expression full of sympathy and sadness.
“One day we came to the hospital for a treatment and she…she just didn’t make it home.” Michelle had been only a husk of her former self by then. It had taken very little, a whisper, a breath of a breeze, to blow out her last flicker.
“You cared for her very much,” Charlie said.
“The love of my life,” he agreed. “I think what we had was something rare. Special.”
“Perhaps…” Charlie ventured, her voice soft. “Later. Another woman…”
“I won’t ever expect that kind of love, that deep of a relationship,” he said. “When you struggle to bring life into the world together, are gifted with it in another manner, and then struggle toward death with a person…it’s a kind of bond that can’t be replaced.”
God, he felt like shit, and from the look on Charlie’s face, he’d just dragged her into his lousy mood. He closed his eyes, trying to think of something else to talk about besides his current worry over his son and his languishing ache over his wife’s death.
“Did I mention I make horrible company?” he said eventually. “Maybe we can converse about the worldwide rate of hunger or the resilience of cockroaches in a nuclear apocalypse.”
A half-smile twitched her pretty mouth. “I can share with you some of the facts about wildlife scat that Wells shared with me during zoo camp this summer.”
He shook his head. “Too close to estimating the number of species that will go extinct in Wells’ lifetime. That’s what he shared with me. I worried he wouldn’t sleep that night.”
Charlie frowned. “Maybe we should rethink zoo camp.” From her purse, she fished out a notebook and jotted something down.
“You always have one of those,” he said, curious. “And what is that language you use to write in it?”
She closed and tucked the notebook away. “It started in high school. My friends and I made up our own form of shorthand. We had a blank book that we traded around where we wrote down our typical teenage girl thoughts.”
“Which were always a mystery to me.”
“Teachers we liked, other girls we disliked, boys who made dud dates.”
“But you still have your little books. In which you write…”
“Recommendations for restaurants. The best drycleaners. The landscape service that someone tells me deals well with rose rust.”
“Our roses have rust?”
“You don’t have any roses. But I file away the information for another time.”
“For another employer?” he asked, surprised by the sudden sense of betrayal. “Are you planning on leaving us, Charlie?”
She shook her head. “But you never know what the future will bring.”
“Yeah,” he said, though agreement felt like shards of glass in his throat. “You’ll likely meet Mr. Right real soon and end up running off to get married to him and have your own kid.”
Instead of looking at him, she fiddled with the contents of her purse, re-settling her wallet, a pack of tissues, that damn notebook. “I don’t see marriage in my forecast.”
“What?” Ethan stared at her. “Not ever?”
“I don’t date well.”
“You were out with Roland Finch just yesterday.”
“As he dropped me home, I gave him Merry’s number,” she said wryly. “At her request.”
“That’s one time.” Someone so young should have a rosier outlook on romance. “One guy.”
“My first boyfriend was a disaster. The men after him didn’t touch my heart…and I’m pretty glad about that actually.”
“Charlie…”
“My parents couldn’t stay together. My father’s defection made my mother unhappy and unpleasant. I prefer not to throw my hat in that ring.”
“Never?”
“Maybe I’d entertain some other kind of partnership…but one more practical than romantic.”
“What does that mean? Are you going to make some sort of bloodless arrangement that gives you a level of companionship but not love?”
She shrugged. “That sounds okay to me. If the right companion comes along.”
Frustrated, Ethan scowled at her. What a waste of everything about her that would make her some man’s special and rare.
Then the memory of their kiss came roaring back. The events that had come after had pushed aside any consideration of that scorching moment they’d shared at Beach House No. 9, of the way she’d fit in his arms. She’d called the cove “almost paradise,” but that had been the taste of her in his mouth, the way she trembled at his touch, the drag of her small breasts against his chest.
His palms itched, wanting to feel the press of her hard nipple in the heart of his hand. He abruptly stood, trying to redirect his thoughts before he had an inconvenient and uncouth hard-on in a hospital waiting room. He paced toward the window that looked over a parking lot and little else. At least the conversation had momentarily distracted him from concerns about Wells.
They hit him again, hard now, and he gripped the sill, his knuckles turning white. His boy, who’d looked so small and so vulnerable on that gurney. The hospital gown had been printed with faded cartoon toy trains and tiny cars, passions that Wells had long outgrown—which had only served to twist Ethan’s heart more.
Ethan would have to buy him a new dinosaur model. They could make it together as he recuperated, which he would start doing as soon as he got out of the god damned surgery. His fist pounded the metal surface for each word.
His mind drifted to another small figure in another bed. Michelle, looking exhausted even as her grip was firm on his hand. “You’ll take good care of our boy. Maybe you’ll even find him another mother.”
Ethan closed his eyes, sadness sucking at him like a wave being drawn back to the sea. There will never be another you.
Then Charlie was beside him, her small hand on his back, bringing him into the present.
“It’s going to be okay,” she said. “I know it won’t be long now.”
He turned to face her, just as he caught sight of the surgeon striding into the room, a diminutive woman in purple scrubs.
She smiled. “Mr. Archer? Wells did great. He’s in recovery now. Would you like to sit beside him until he wakes up?”
Relief was a euphoric singing in his blood. He felt his smile break over his face, and then he swept Charlie into his embrace, sharing with her all he felt.
“God,” he whispered against her hair. “God.”
It felt so great to have her in his arms. So right. He basked in it for a moment, letting everything else fall way at the sensation of this woman again in his embrace.
“Charlie,” he murmured.
“I’m here,” she whispered.
With a final squeeze he set her aside, now eager to follow the doctor toward his son. But at the doorway of the waiting room, he glanced back. His butler stood watching, her eyes bright with tears. Their gazes connected, and then she smiled at him, making a little shooing motion with her fingers. He smiled back then obeyed, even as a new sense of disquiet settled in his chest.
Perhaps he shouldn’t have kissed Charlie.
But he couldn’t find it in himself to regret it.
Charlie thought it was past time to leave the hospital. Wells had come through the surgery with flying colors, and Ethan had been at his bedside for a couple of hours now. One of the nurses said he’d been moved from recovery to a regular room, his father still glued tight. The boy had everything he needed.
But as she forced herself to a stand, she felt a new burn of tears in her eyes.
“Charlie.”
At Ethan’s voice, she whipped around.
“What is it?” Anxiety tightened her throat. “What’s happened to Wells?”
He held up both palms. “Nothing. All’s fine. I just came by to see if you’re still here.”
“I’m on my way out.” She didn’t want him to know she’d been lingering in the room, fingering her concerns over Wells like rosary beads. It didn’t seem…professional. “But first I made a few calls—to Skye, to Sara, and Emmaline—and, well, it was peaceful in here, so I stayed a while.”
Coming closer, he narrowed his eyes. “You think a hospital waiting area is peaceful?”
If only he wouldn’t look at her with such…such intensity. “It’s quiet.”
“You didn’t want to leave without hearing further news,” he said, as if stating a fact.
She gathered her composure around her like a cloak and lifted her chin. “Is there something wrong with that? I am charged with his well-being. It’s what you pay me for.”
“Sweetheart, I see traces of tears,” he said, his voice low. He rubbed one away with his thumb.
“A sappy commercial,” she said with a steel spine and gestured to the TV.
They both glanced at the blank screen.
“It was on a while ago,” she said.
“Charlie.” He shook his head. “Why don’t you want to admit how much you care?”
Because too much caring could blow up in her face. “You say everything’s fine? Really?”
“Yes.” His gaze ran over her. “But you’re still trembling.”
“The air conditioning. I’ll warm up as soon as I go.”
Without warning, he gathered her into his arms.
“Charlie,” he said, as she put up a token struggle, “let me hold you.”
“Ethan—”
“I could use the creature comfort again myself.”
She heard the rough emotion in his voice, and her arms circled him of their own accord. As she turned her cheek to his chest, his heart beat strongly there, and she closed her eyes, breathing deep as the chill encasing her body began to thaw. Without speaking, they stood for long minutes, sharing more feelings of relief and reprieve.
“I can’t help thinking it could have been so much worse,” he said, as if reading her mind.
“They should have a name for it,” she said, lifting her head to look at him. “Like schadenfreude or tartle.”
His mouth kicked up, and he gave her a quizzical glance. “Schadenfreude I know. But tartle?”
“I learned it from an instructor at the butler academy. It’s a Scottish word that describes that awkward hesitation when greeting someone or introducing someone, and you can’t recall their name.”
He smiled, clearly amused.
Charlie smiled back. In her most cherished dreams, this was the relationship she wanted with a man. This partnership, this sense of shared understanding. Companionship.
She could give up passion and all the havoc it might wreak just for this.
Then Ethan’s gaze dropped to her mouth and his embrace brought her inches closer. The warmth of friendship morphed in a single second to something hotter. Wilder. Untamed and undomesticated.
Everything Charlie had never wanted.
And, of course, could never have, especially with Ethan Archer.
Perhaps sensing her mood, his arms unlocked as she took a big step backward.
“I’ll be going now,” she said.
“Without seeing Wells?” he asked, frowning.
She hesitated.
“He’s asking for you.”
So, of course, Charlie followed Ethan to the boy’s room. Even though the beds were sized for children, he looked too small in it, she decided, hurrying forward.
But the smile that broke over his face upon catching sight of her was larger than the entire universe.
“Charlie!” he said. “Where have you been?”
“My fault, pal,” Ethan put in, coming up behind her. “I was a little overwhelmed with all the tubes and machines hooked up to you, and so I left her back in the waiting room.”
“That’s okay,” Wells said. “She woulda cried more buckets than now.”
“I’m not crying,” Charlie said, swiping away tears.
Wells’ gaze cut to his dad’s. “She’s mushy.”
Charlie couldn’t stop her hand from sneaking out to stroke his hair from his forehead. “I don’t like seeing you hurt.”
“I’m going to have a scar,” he said, looking at his bandaged arm, propped on a pillow beside him. “Like Frankenstein.”
Alarm clutched at her. “No, you won’t.”
“Yes. And we have to watch the wound for redness and pus and other yucky stuff oozing out of it.”
Charlie ignored the churning in her stomach. “We’ll keep a close watch on it.”
“And I’ll remind the nurses that Wells likes to play possum,” Ethan murmured. “He might look asleep, but…”
“Speaking of animals.” She dangled the gift shop bag in front of the boy. “Feel up to a present?”
He snatched the bag with his good hand, letting her know that the pain meds must be working just fine. In a quick second, he fished out a stuffed animal that came attached to a book of facts.
“It’s a duck-billed platypus,” she said. “The species comes from the same country as koalas.”
“Good choice,” Ethan said, and she felt the fleeting warmth of his hand run along her hair.
“I love him.” Wells brought the animal’s bill close to his own nose. “What’s his name?”
“Why don’t you think about it?” Charlie reached into her purse for a small pair of scissors which she used to remove the tags and separate the book from the animal. “Better yet, maybe if we tuck him close to your ear and you pretend to sleep like you do, he’ll whisper it to you.”
Wells instantly closed his eyes, settling his head deeper into the pillow.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, Charlie slipped the toy between the boy’s chin and shoulder. Then she lightly stroked his hair, watching over him as he fell into a true sleep.
Releasing a long breath of air, she glanced at Ethan, who occupied a chair on the same side of the bed where she sat. “Pus and redness?”
He nodded. “Yucky stuff. But I think it most likely will heal with no problems at all.”
“We’ll see to it.”
They sat in silence, their attention re-focused on the small boy.
“You’re wonderful with him,” Ethan said, low-voiced. “I’ve had a handful of caregivers, and you should know you’re by far the best.”
She swallowed. “Thank you. He makes it easy.”
“You’d make a wonderful mother.”
Her jaw ached as she held back the emotion welling inside her. She stood and looked around for her purse.
“He’s asleep. I’ll go back to the house and gather some things to bring back for the both of you. I’m assuming you’re spending the night with him?”
“Yes.” He looked down at his chair. “They said this folds out into a sort of cot.”
She drew out her notebook. “Phone charger, electric razor, a change of clothes for you both. Wells’ word puzzle book and a game or two.”
He held out his hand. “I’ll take Monopoly now.”
As she placed the deck on his palm, his fingers closed over hers. “Thank you. You’ve been a rock.”
She smiled wryly. “A leaking rock.”
“You might be strong, but you’re also just a little bit mushy,” Ethan said, using his son’s word.
“I’m really not. I’m very pragmatic and sensible and down-to-earth.”
“You don’t want drama in your life? Is that the reason you plan to avoid marriage?”
Slipping her hand from his, she hitched the strap of her purse on her shoulder.
“Not the kind of marriage I saw in my childhood, that’s for sure. Flying dishes and slamming doors. After my father left my mother became a bitter pessimist.”
“You know there are good marriages. Romantic and loving relationships like your friends Sara and Emmaline are forging.”
Charlie shrugged. “Maybe I have disaster in my DNA. I’m not willing to chance it.” She started for the door, but then found herself turning around, needing to check on Wells a last time. She moved back to the bed and smoothed the covers, patted the platypus. Then she took another long look at the child, whispered, “My big guy,” and bent lower to kiss Wells on the forehead.
As she straightened, his father spoke up. “Hey, do I get one of those?”
She pretended not to understand. “There’s a whole selection of stuffed animals down in the gift shop. They stay open until nine.”
Ethan rose and walked with her toward the door. “One thing.”
It sounded serious. She stopped, her hand slipping off the metal lever. “What is it?”
He glanced back at his son, then looked at her again. Despite the situation, he appeared gorgeous to Charlie. The rumpled state of his hair, the wrinkled shirt, the slight shadows beneath his eyes only made him more touchable. His austere good looks could intimidate her under some circumstances, but now she just wanted to move in to his body and lay her head upon his chest.
The longing filled her with a reckless heat, and she groped behind her for the door’s handle again, needing to hold on to the cool metal. Damn it, being around the Archer men did make her mushy.
Get out of here before you do something stupid, her common sense said.
Like kiss him, and not on the forehead. Like lay all her cares at his feet.
Or worse, the truth.
Tightening her fingers on the metal, she stared up at him. “What is it?” she repeated.
“Being in the hospital, seeing Wells in pain, my head’s a mess.”
“That’s understandable.”
He shoved a hand through his hair, disordering the disorder. “Shit, Charlie.”
The urge to comfort him was almost overpowering. “We’ll get through this.”
“Yeah.” He dropped his head, and his palm rubbed at his nape.
Charlie swallowed, wanting so badly to do that for him.
“I can’t stop thinking what might happen to Wells if something happens to me.”
“Nothing will happen—”
“None of us can know that.” He took in a long breath. “My parents are too old to take on a six-year-old. My best friend, John, couldn’t raise an alley cat because…well, because he is an alley cat.”
Charlie smothered a laugh. John Packard was an incorrigible flirt and dedicated bachelor.
“Anyway…” He hauled in another long breath. “Before I came to find you in the waiting room, I filled out paperwork that allows you to make decisions for Wells in the hospital if something were to happen to me.”
“Death by cafeteria food?” she asked, trying to lighten the mood.
He didn’t seem inclined to even smile. “I thought you should know.”
“Okay. It’s not a problem for me.”
“Yeah. Thanks. I was sure you’d be fine with it. And that made me think of something else…”
“What?”
Reaching out, he put his hands on her shoulders, then dropped them to his sides. He stared at the toes of his shoes, then hauled in a breath. “Someone should fucking shoot me,” he muttered.
“I thought it was going to be the mac and cheese that would do you in,” she said.
He glanced up, a quick smile flashing across his face. “It’s that,” he said.
She puzzled over the non-sequitur. “Hmm?”
“I want that. Your good sense and your good humor and the way you look at my boy when he’s in a hospital bed and when he’s not, too.”
Charlie’s hand clenched on the door handle. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she whispered.
“Yeah,” he said. “We can discuss it some other time.”
“Okay,” Charlie replied, grasping the lifeline. Her heart was rattling in her chest, and she could sense trouble in the air—or something like it.
Swinging open the door, she turned her back on Ethan.
Of course, she should have known better, because a smart woman never turned her back on danger. A rogue wave could take you out that way.
“Charlie,” Ethan said, in a low, sure voice, “you should marry me.”