Viability: capacity for germination.
THE flight to San Antonio on the following Monday was uneventful, but the visit to the specialist wrecked all that. The internist, Dr. Simon, was alarmed at Abe’s condition and concerned that his physician in Cupid hadn’t been able to make a diagnosis.
“We need to admit your father to the hospital and do extensive testing,” Dr. Simon recommended. “He’s seriously malnourished.”
“The only thing he’ll eat are the sweet potatoes from his garden,” Pierce explained. “He asks for other foods, but when we get them for him, he won’t eat.”
“I love sweet taters!” Abe spoke up.
They spent the next several hours getting Abe settled in the hospital and hiring a private duty nurse to sit with him. Pierce had to admit that Lace was a lot of help in navigating the medical environment. While her doctorate was in plant science, she knew a lot about anatomy and biology and all those Latin terms. She also had a way of looking at nurses to get them to hop to their jobs, especially when they were lavishing more attention on Pierce than on their patient.
He stood in the doorway looking at his dad, a dead weight in his stomach while the private duty nurse plumped Abe’s pillow.
Lace reached up and rubbed Pierce’s shoulder.
She seemed to have an instinct for when he was feeling low and her touch lightened his load. He might have manipulated her into coming with him, but he was damn grateful to have her here.
“Let’s call off the shopping spree,” she said. “Spend the day with your dad.”
“Oh no,” he said. “You’re not getting out of it that easily.” Truth was, he needed the diversion from worrying about Abe’s condition, and being with Lace was the sweetest distraction he could think of.
She grinned. “Had to give it a shot.”
“Most women would love to have a man with a full wallet taking them shopping.”
“Honey,” the private duty nurse interrupted. “Listen to him. Most women would kill to have Dallas Cowboy quarterback Pierce Hollister take them dress shopping. Better get along before some of the gals in the nursing lounge start sharpening their claws. Don’t worry about things here. I’ll take good care of your father, Mr. Hollister.”
Once they were outside the room, Lace said, “Did you pay her to say that?”
“Which part? About taking good care of my father or women killing to go out with me?”
Lace cut her eyes at him. “Let’s just get this over with.”
“You don’t like shopping?”
“Hate it.”
“Mostly just catalog order from L.L. Bean, huh?”
She screwed her mouth up. “What’s wrong with that?”
“You have too much plaid in your wardrobe.” Not that he really minded her in plaid. He liked her in anything. It’s just that he wanted to see her in something that would really show off that rocking body of hers. But if he were being honest, what he really wanted to see her in was her birthday suit. “C’mon, let’s start with Nordstrom.”
PIERCE HAD RENTED a car at the airport when they’d arrived, and thirty minutes later, they were in the “occasions” section of the women’s department at Nordstrom. Once the saleswomen recognized him, they were inundated with help, but he’d held up a palm and told the clerks that if they wanted to make a sale they needed to back off and give them some breathing room. The women scattered, but they kept peeking surreptitiously around dress racks at him.
“How do you put up with that constantly?” Lace asked.
He shrugged. “Comes with the territory. You get used to it.”
“I never would.” Lace crossed her arms over her chest, feeling completely out of her element. “Maybe that’s really why your girlfriend dumped you. She hated dealing with all the women who come on to you.”
“I seriously doubt that,” he said. “She took up with my replacement, remember. She knew that when I’m with a woman, I’m with her. Too bad I couldn’t say the same for her.”
“Maybe she didn’t believe you. I mean, c’mon . . .” Lace gestured to one saleswoman craning her neck from around the mannequin she was ostensibly dressing. The woman lost her balance, stumbled, and fell off her wedge heels. “Who wouldn’t be intimidated?”
“You.”
Shows what you know. “So tell me, just how many women have you dressed?”
“Do you really want to know?”
“I figured undressing women was more your style.”
His grin could have lit up the Vegas strip. “You’re right about that. You’re my first.”
“The first woman you’ve ever bought a dress for?”
“Yep.”
“That surprises me. Confident as you are in the ladies’ department, seems like you would have outfitted hundreds of women.”
“How many women do you think I’ve been with, Lace?”
“You’re a football player. I couldn’t even begin to guess. Less than a thousand?”
“Be serious.”
“I was.”
“Guess again.”
“Three hundred?”
“Not even in the ballpark.”
“Give me a hint. Higher or lower?”
“Much lower.”
“Seventy-five? No wait, don’t answer.” She clamped her hands over her ears. “I don’t want to know.”
“Because you wouldn’t feel special if it was a lot?”
“Because I don’t care.”
“It’s—”
“Shh! Don’t tell me.”
“Ah.” He shook a finger. “I know why you don’t want to know. You don’t want to compare numbers. Because if I tell you how many I’ve been with, you’re going to feel—”
“No, really, I do not care.”
Pierce picked through the rack of cocktail dresses. “What size?”
“I’m not telling you my size. I can pick out my own clothes, thank you very much.”
“I’ve been to a million of these fund-raisers. When I first joined the Cowboys they hired an image consultant to show me how to present myself for maximum impact. Trust me. I know exactly what you need.”
I know what you need.
His words wrapped around Lace, both irritating and enticing. “I do not need you to control my image.”
“Do you want those sponsors to open their wallets?”
“I’m not Eliza Doolittle and you’re certainly not Professor Henry Higgins,” she snapped. Yes, she was being touchy, but she knew she was on the verge of rapidly losing control of the situation.
“Audrey Hepburn was hot in that movie.”
Lace rolled her eyes. “I’m talking about Pygmalion, not My Fair Lady.”
“Pig what?”
“Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw. From whence the characters of Eliza Doolittle and Henry Higgins sprang.”
“So My Fair Lady is a remake?”
“I guess you could call it that in jock-speak. More accurately, My Fair Lady is an adaptation.”
One eyebrow inched up on his forehead and a smile plucked at the corners of his mouth. “Jock-speak?”
“The language of the Homo sapiens jockularus.”
“And what do you speak? Homo sapiens geekularus?”
She laughed.
The corner of his mouth plucked back as if an invisible harpist played his face, and he sent her an appraising glance. “Size fourteen?” he guessed, shifting back to the topic she’d sought to avoid.
She felt naked under the heat of his appraising gaze. “How did you know?”
He shrugged. “Fourteen is my jersey number.”
“So it was just a lucky guess?”
“It was synchronicity.”
“What do you know about synchronicity?” she asked.
“What? Homo sapiens jockularus is too dumb to know such words?”
“That’s not what I said. It just doesn’t seem like a word that you would use.”
“While you were getting your degree in something useful like plant science, I was trying to skim by with what I thought were easier courses. My BA is in social psychology.”
“Synchronicity. That’s Jung, right?”
“A series of meaningful coincidences. You’re a size fourteen. My jersey number is a fourteen. It’s gotta mean something.”
“I was fourteen when I wrote that stupid letter to Cupid about you.”
“That too. Synchronicity.” He smiled mildly and handed her a simple black cocktail dress.
Or she thought it was simple until she turned it around and saw the cutout in the back. “No. I couldn’t wear a bra with that.”
“I know,” he said in a low, throaty voice.
“Put it back on the rack.”
“If you’re going to be difficult about this, we’ll be here all day.”
She sighed and took the black dress just to shut him up, but she was not about to buy it. “So what does Jung have to say about synchronicity?”
“There are some things that science just can’t explain.”
“Psychology isn’t a science.”
“It’s a social science.”
“I rest my case. Not real science.”
“You’re killing my romantic overtures here.”
She grinned.
“As was clearly your intention. Here, go try this one on.” He handed her a purply blue silk sheath dress the color of Lupinus texensis, Texas bluebonnets. “The color matches your eyes.”
It was a romantic thing to say and got her to thinking about how good kissing him had felt. “The hem is too short.”
“Trust me. Go try it on.”
“I’ll look like a whale in this.”
“Don’t put yourself down. You’ll look like a goddess.”
She seriously doubted that, but if it would shut him up, she’d try it on. She headed for the dressing room, while he took a seat outside near the three-way mirror.
“Want me to hold your purse?” he offered.
“I’ve got it.”
“It will be easier trying on the dress without having to worry about keeping up with your purse.”
“I’ll hang it over the hook on the back of the door. No big deal. Believe it or not, I’ve—gasp—shopped for clothes on my own before.”
“Scared I’ll go through your credit cards, steal your identity, buy an ATV under your name, and then use it to take another woman four-wheeling in the desert and run over some rare fragile plant life?”
“As much as that nightmare situation keeps me awake at night, desert plants aren’t fragile. That’s why they thrive in the desert.”
He leaned back against the chair, interlaced his fingers, and cupped the back of his head in his palms. “And that’s the part of the crazy scenario you latch on to?”
“Hey, you’re the one who came up with the crazy scenario.”
“Only because you are acting so paranoid.”
Lace screwed her mouth up. “I’m not paranoid.”
“Then just leave your purse with me.”
“Look here, I’m not one of those girly-girls who enjoys having a guy act like her lapdog. I don’t need my door opened or your hat tipped in my direction or for you to hold my purse. Got it?”
“I know that,” he said. “That’s one of the things I admire about you. Your independence.”
Lace gulped.
“But every now and then, all women enjoy a little extra attention. There’s nothing helpless or weak in wanting to be taken care of once in a while.”
“Not me,” she muttered. “I don’t want extra attention.”
“Why not?”
Why not indeed? Well, for one thing, receiving attention required something of her. Something she might not be able to give, and admitting that would mean she was lacking. She didn’t want him to think her lacking, even if she was.
“It’s ja . . . just . . . um . . . I . . . I . . .” Frigging flytrap! She was stuttering.
He held out his hand. “Purse.”
“Fine. Here. Take it.” She thrust the handbag at him.
He chuckled.
Once inside the dressing room, she tried on the black dress. The back was cut all the way down to her hipbone. No freaking way.
“How’s it going?” he asked from outside the door.
Lace crossed her arms over her chest. “Why are you in the ladies’ dressing room?”
“Relax, there’s no other customers in this department.”
“Get out of here. Go back to your chair.”
“Please don’t make me go back out there. Although I can’t see them, I can hear the saleswomen breathing down my neck.”
“Oh, poor you. I thought you got used to it.”
“Everyone has a tipping point. Which dress do you have on?”
“The black one.”
“Can I see?”
“No you may not.”
“Dips too low in the back?”
“Any lower and I could qualify to repair plumbing.”
He laughed out loud.
Lace couldn’t help smiling that she’d made him laugh.
“How about the blue one?” he asked.
“I haven’t tried it on yet.”
“What are you waiting for?”
“For you to go back to your chair.”
“I’m going, I’m going.”
She wriggled out of the black dress and slipped the blue one over her head. The material was luxurious, refined. Really nice. Hmm, how much did something this comfy cost? She flipped over the tag. $699.99. Holy organic fertilizer! Seven hundred dollars for a dress? Surely it was $69.99 and she’d looked at it wrong. Nope. $699.99. Insanity. She could buy a year’s worth of her regular wardrobe for that price, underwear included.
She reached back for the zipper, got it halfway up before it stuck. She contorted her body, struggling to find an angle that would allow her to tug more firmly on the zipper, but the damn thing wouldn’t budge. The teeth must have gotten caught on a chunk of material. Her impulse was to yank, but the dress cost seven hundred freaking dollars. If she ripped it . . .
Terrific. Maybe she could slip it off over her head. She grasped the hem, bent at the waist, and wrestled the skirt of the dress up to her rib cage, but there it stopped, and refused to budge an inch farther. The way her arms were crossed created a straitjacketlike effect and she could move neither up nor down. Houdini couldn’t have gotten out of this. Don’t flip out. Take a deep breath and calm down.
Except that she could not take a deep breath with the material wrapped around her lungs, and with her head upside-down she was starting to feel light-headed.
What to do?
Fighting back the panic pushing into her esophagus, she cleared her throat. If she called for help, would Pierce be able to hear her from the chair where she’d shooed him back to? “Um, hello?”
“Yes?” His voice rumbled from just beyond the door.
If she hadn’t been so relieved that he had not gone back to the chair, she would have taken him to task. Instead, she merely said, “Could you call a saleswoman in here?”
“What do you need?”
“Just call the saleswoman,” she said and because desperation was closing in, added, “Please.”
“I’ll be happy to help.”
“Then I beg of you, go get a saleswoman.” Her breath was coming out in uneven seesaws as if she’d just lugged a two-hundred-and-ten-gallon tree tub loaded with a full-grown Benjamin ficus up three flights of stairs, and the light-headedness swiftly shifted into full-fledged dizziness. Her arms had caught in the material of the skirt of the dress, and the garment had essentially become Chinese handcuffs; the harder she struggled to get out, the tighter the material constricted.
“Lace?” Concern tinged his voice. “Are you okay?”
This upside-down thing wasn’t cutting it. She raised her head, but the movement must have been too quick because her head spun like a carousel and she fell heavily against the wall. “Uh.”
The next thing she knew a big masculine arm was snaking over the top of the door to unslide the lock from the inside.
“No!” she exclaimed, or at least tried to, but she had so little air left in her lungs that it came out, “Na.”
“Hang on.” Pierce was inside the cubicle, his hands on her shoulders.
Mortified. She was absolutely mortified. Held prisoner by a seven-hundred-dollar dress in her bra and panties.
“Easy, easy.” He steadied her by putting an arm around her waist, his bare hand on her bare flesh.
Kill me now. Just kill me now and end the humiliation.
Somehow, miraculously, he untangled her arms from the dress and smoothed it down over her body, his hands touching her in the way she’d once dreamed he would touch her, except this seemed to be the nightmare version. His gaze met hers and his eyes twinkled mischievously. “Love the siren red bra and panties. Never would have pegged you for a scarlet woman.”
“Isn’t that odd, because you’re exactly how I pegged you. Full frontal Neanderthal.”
“Sweetheart, how do you expect a guy to react under the circumstances? Close proximity with a beautiful, shapely woman.” He stepped back as far as he could in the tiny space, tilted his head, and let his gaze graze over her. “That dress . . . well . . . wow! You look like Snow White. The fairest in the land.”
Heat pushed up Lace’s neck to her face. The mirror was behind her, so she hadn’t seen herself in it.
“Turn around,” he said, “and I’ll get your zipper unstuck.”
Not knowing what else to do—she had to get out of the damn dress—she gave him her back and caught sight of her reflection.
The soft silk caressed her curves but did not cling. The color brought out the shades of violet in her blue eyes, and accentuated the creaminess of her complexion against the darkness of her hair. In this dress, she looked like the kind of woman who could hold the attention of a man like Pierce, at least for a couple of minutes.
His head was down, his attention fully focused on the zipper, his breath warm against the nape of her neck, his nimble, callused fingertips gentle against her skin. He freed the zipper and smoothly slid it up. She closed her eyes to keep from shivering and when she opened them again, he was watching her in the mirror.
“Fits you like a glove. Flaunts those gorgeous curves, and the hem shows off just enough leg to get a guy drooling, but not so much as to give away the mystery.” He winked.
Her pulse sped up. Quickly, she glanced away, spied her purse on the floor where he must have dropped it when he’d come in. “You can go now.”
“Use me and toss me aside, huh?” he teased. “I feel like a soiled tissue.”
“I want out of this dress.”
“I want that too,” he said, his voice shockingly seductive.
“Stop it.” She moved as far away from him as the cubicle would allow.
“Do you want me to unzip you before I go?”
“No! And stop grinning.”
He pressed his lips together, compressed his mouth into a straight line, but his eyes were laughing at her.
She pointed a finger. “Go.”
He opened the door, stood half in and half out of the stall. “Just in case you’re thinking of not getting the dress,” he said in an end-of-the-discussion tone, “I’ve already paid for it.”
Lace sank her hands on her hips. “Of all the high-handed—”
He scooted out the door, chuckling and leaving her fuming. She locked it behind him, leaned limply against the door, and blew out a heavy breath. She could deny it all she wanted, but the man got to her, and damn if she didn’t love the dress.
Watch out! Slippery slope.
She reached around for the zipper, but couldn’t seem to reach it. Darn thing. She didn’t want a dress that required having someone around to help her get in and out of. She wriggled and twisted, but every time she had her finger on the zipper tongue, it slipped off. “Harrumph!”
“Need something?” Pierce asked in a sugary sweet voice from the other side of the door.
“I admit it. You win. Now get back in here and unzip me!”
“God,” he said in a dreamy voice. “I love a bossy woman who knows her own mind.”
WHEN THEY RETURNED to the hospital late that afternoon, Abe was asleep. The private duty nurse gave Pierce an update. “The doctor said he should have preliminary reports on the blood work tomorrow morning,” she said. “Will you be here?”
Pierce splayed a hand to the nape of his neck. The shopping trip had been a nice distraction, but there was no escaping his father’s illness. Flirting with Lace was a great way to hide from his emotions, but standing here looking at his father’s pale face and withered frame told him he couldn’t keep running from this. Abe was very sick and no one could tell him why. What was the point in going back to Cupid this afternoon if he only had to turn around and return the following day if the lab tests did indeed reveal a serious illness? He glanced over at Lace, wondering if she would mind staying the night in San Antonio.
“Do we need to stay overnight?” she asked, already two steps ahead of him.
His chest tightened and he tapped a fist against his heart. The woman continually bowled him over. “Would you mind?”
She shrugged like it was no big deal, dropped his gaze. “I no longer have a job to get back to and honestly, Melody is driving me a bit nuts prepping for the fund-raiser. She’s such a perfectionist. Now I have a good excuse to take a break.”
“Thank you,” he said.
“There’s several hotel chains just a few blocks from here,” the private duty nurse said helpfully.
They stayed at the hospital for a couple of hours, but Abe was so lethargic, the nurse suggested they go ahead and check into the hotel. She promised to call if his father’s condition changed.
“Would you like to grab some dinner?” Pierce asked hopefully.
“Thanks for the offer,” Lace said. “But I’m kind of tired. I think I’ll just go to bed early.”
Normally, he might have pressed the issue, but honestly, he wouldn’t have been good company. Besides, he needed to call Malcolm and update him on Abe’s condition.
At the hotel, he got them side-by-side rooms and said good night. She lingered a moment at the door, something unreadable in her eyes, then smiled softly. “Sleep well.”
He called Malcolm and told him what was going on. “What do we do after we get the results?”
“Depends on what the results are. Don’t borrow trouble or count chickens,” Malcolm said.
“What if it’s something bad.” Pierce swallowed. Like cancer?
“We deal with it as it comes,” Malcolm said.
“But we could be in this for the long haul.”
“Don’t worry, your haul won’t be long. Soon as your leg heals you’ll be back in Dallas doing your thing and I’ll be here playing cleanup as always.”
He was used to Malcolm’s snipes, but it still hurt, probably because it was true. He had spent his life being the star of the family while Malcolm was the salt of the earth who had kept everything together. Also, he hadn’t told his brother what Dr. Hank had relayed to him about his chances of returning to football this year, partly because it had been too painful to think about, and partly because he was determined to prove Dr. Hank wrong. If he said the words out loud, they’d have real meaning. Go ahead, make like an ostrich.
“Mal,” Pierce said, “I do appreciate you and everything you’ve done for Dad.”
“I don’t need any thanks for taking care of my own father.”
The backs of Pierce’s eyelids burned. He blinked, pinched the bridge of his nose. “I can’t figure out why he got so much better when he was in the hospital at Cupid, but after we brought him home he started going downhill again. I thought maybe when I came back to the ranch—”
“That the greatness of your presence would heal him?”
“You know I don’t think that.”
“Don’t you?”
Pierce blew out a breath. He knew Malcolm resented his success. Who could blame him with the way his dad had always put Pierce ahead of his younger brother? “I’m sorry for so many things.”
“Yeah,” Malcolm said. “Me too.”
That gave him hope that something good would come of their father’s illness. Mend a few fences.
“If this turns out to be something really serious, we’re going to have to pace ourselves—”
“I was there with Mom, I know how it goes.”
Meaning Pierce had no idea how a bedside vigil went because he hadn’t been there while their mother lay dying. “I want to be here,” he said.
“You’re here right now.” Malcolm’s voice softened. “That means something.”
“I know you’ve sacrificed a lot for our family, delaying starting a family of your own—”
“Please, let’s not go into it. Besides, I’m seeing someone.”
“Hey, that’s good. I’m happy for you and I want to meet her. We need to have a talk. A long one.”
“Gotta go. We have a heifer in labor and she’s prone to breech births.”
“Listen, Malcolm. I lo—”
A dial tone sounded in his ear.
Pierce hung up. He meandered to the window and stared out at the parking lot. Absently, he ran his hand down his left leg.
A car dragging tin cans pulled up in the parking lot underneath the vapor security lamps. “Just Married” was written in white shoe polish on the back window. The fresh-faced groom got out of the driver’s seat, sprinted around to the passenger-side door, and yanked it open. He pulled out a laughing young woman and hoisted her into his arms. He dropped kisses on her face and she flung her arms around his neck.
Pierce’s throat tightened. He rubbed his dry eyes, and turned away from their happiness.