A New Forever (11 page)

She had captured her sister perfectly; the light from within, the humor, the fey cast about her eyes that said you never knew what she was going to do or say next, but it was probably going to be a lot of fun... it was all April. Clay felt like he was standing in front of his wife again, for the first time in five years.

His eyes filled with tears that flowed down his cheeks as his heart nearly burst in his chest. His hand reached out, automatically, wanting to touch her, then it fell, lonely and unused to his side.

He didn't know how long he stood there, lost in intimate, soul shaking memories, but when he finally came out of it, his heart ached worse than it had since about two months after the accident had happened. When you lose someone you love abruptly, the worst isn't when you're told about it, or the funeral, or even coming home after the funeral, like a lot of people say. The worst hits a month or two later, when you've stopped looking up avidly every time someone comes in the door, or jumping for the phone because you're hoping it's them, that it's all a very, very bad mistake.

That's when the realization really hits that they're gone, and you'll never, ever see them again. Never make love, never fight, never laugh, never cry with them. Ever. And all you have left to remind you of them are your pictures and your memories, and God help you if you didn't live every second you had with them as if you knew that Godawful day would come.

Clay stumbled into Elodie's bedroom, realizing with a sad smile that it looked just as he'd expected it to look—like a nun's cell in an old Irish convent: barren and stark, the comforter old and threadbare. There were three stuffed animals on the bed, and several family photos on top of a dresser that had seen much better days. Thankfully, there were no portraits here.

Taking himself firmly in hand mentally, trying to shake off the melancholy that portrait of April had inspired in him, he rummaged in the top drawer of the dresser and came up with some perfunctory cotton briefs, deciding against a bra because he didn't want her to wear one, rather than figuring she might want one. Nightgowns—also probably older than the hills—were in the next drawer, and he took two. Once they'd ruled out problems with the concussion, she'd probably be released.

He piled the clothes on the bed then turned to the closet, opening the bi-fold door to look for some sort of small suitcase. As luck would have it, there was one just inside the door... in front of a second, framed portrait. Of him.

Clay ignored the suitcase in favor of the painting, tugging it out of its hiding place gently to bring it out into the light. He sank down on to the protesting bed with it still in his arms.

It looked like something that belonged on the cover of one of those bodice buster romance novels. All he needed was a hook and patch. It was practically pornographic, even though he was fully clothed. The look in his eye—how had she gotten that look in his eye so right when he'd never so much as kissed her in anything but a brotherly way until a few months ago?

When had she painted this, anyway? He began searching the bottom corners of the picture, looking for her artist's signature. There it was, bottom right. She'd painted it over ten years ago.

Walking over to set it up against the wall, Clay found he couldn't take his eyes off it. That painting was as obviously a labor of love as the one of April was. Only this was mixed with a heavy dose of lust. Elodie wanted him. Had apparently wanted him for years, and had kept it completely to herself.

She'd never once, ever, let on that she had feelings for him other than that of a sister for a brother-in-law. Clay felt bowled over, and almost ambushed by the knowledge that she'd been in love with him for so long. He also felt stupid for not picking up on it somehow, in some way—not that he would ever have done anything about it. He wasn't that kind of a man. He'd loved April too much to ever hurt her in that way.

But Elodie must have slipped up somewhere along the line, and he'd missed it. Was he that stupid? Or just that oblivious to anyone's feelings but April's and his own? He had to admit that it was probably the latter rather than the former. When he was married to April, he barely saw anything around him but her and his land, in that order. She had been his life. The ranch was a means to a better life. Everyone and everything else had been secondary, including poor Elodie, who had obviously sublimated her feelings for him for decades.

No wonder she'd been so adamant about not wanting to get too close to him even after April was gone—it had become force of habit and, knowing Elodie, she must have been carrying around a thousand times more guilt about her feelings than happiness. She must have been doing penance all this time just because she loved him.

Clay stared at himself blindly. He'd found out more about Elodie in the past half hour than he'd learned in all the years he had known her combined. This was her life. This was where she lived, this dank little apartment. All alone with her paintings, and very little else.

He didn't know exactly what he'd thought about how she lived, beyond recognizing the fact that she was poor. The stark reality of her apartment hit him upside the heart like a two by four. He wasn't the type to snoop deliberately, but he did look in her kitchen, just to see what she kept around to eat. There was a shitload of Ramen in her cupboards and some cans of spaghetti sauce. And that was it. Her fridge had some hot dogs and badly shriveled celery. Other than that, it was spotless.

The phone rang just then, and Clay had to remind himself that it probably wouldn't be right for him to answer it. But as he was heading back into her bedroom to pick up the suitcase he'd packed, a voice filled the apartment from her archaic answering machine. A male voice. "Hey there, kiddo, it's Joshua. Are you up? Are you supposed to work today? I can never keep your schedule straight. I tried your cell but got no answer." The man paused there, as if waiting for her to pick up, then resumed again. "Okay, well, I guess you're not there. I might be in today for something to eat, but I might not. I don't know. Depends on how things at work go—I'm on my cell on my way home from a buying trip. I'll call you from home tonight. Kiss kiss."

The sounds of the sloppy kisses that man aimed at his Elodie made Clay want to retch. Instead, he clenched his jaw so hard that a muscle started to twitch along the side. Who the hell was Joshua? He wanted to know. And when she was feeling better, he intended to find out. And for that matter, who the hell was ahead of him on her emergency call list? Was it this joker?

Fairly seething with all of the new information he'd gleaned about Elodie, Clay carefully locked the door behind him as he left her apartment. He spent the drive back to the hospital trying to piece together what he'd seen and heard, and come to grips with how unbelievably jealous he'd gotten as soon as he heard whoever it was on her answering machine.

Clay knew that his relationship with Elodie had progressed nicely into the wonderful intimacy they had experienced before she had her accident. They were taking it slow, she wasn't balking too badly at anything... but still, he remembered how he had felt when the cop had asked him if he'd known an Elodie West, and he'd reached over to feel the cold sheets.

She'd gotten up and left him instead of sleeping all night with him. Was it that she was having a hard time dealing with what had happened between them? Did she not like the bed, or him, or was being in the house that he had shared with April too much, what? He wished he knew what had been running through her mind when she had walked out the door. But more than that, he wished she had dropped something loudly enough to wake him up, so that he could have convinced her—one way or the other, he frowned at the thought—not to leave at all.

With a start, he realized that she was important enough to him that if it was the house that bothered her, he'd be perfectly fine with selling it and building another on another piece of his land. God knew he'd had enough of it. That house had been a reflection of April's tastes, and was very much a part of them as a married couple. But if it caused problems between himself and Elodie, then he would start construction on a new house the two of them could share.

Regardless, one way or the other, he was going to get her the hell out of that apartment.

And away from that damned Joshua, whoever the hell he was.

When he got back to her room, she was awake, but just barely. She came to full alertness, however, when she saw what he had in his hand.

"You—" Elodie swallowed the boulder that had suddenly lodged in her throat. "You went to my apartment?"

Clay didn't address her immediately. He stowed her things in the cabinet nearby so that she would be able to get to them if she wanted them, then tucked the suitcase into the utilitarian closet. "Yes, I did."

Elodie's heart was trying to thump its way out of her ribcage. If she was going to have a heart attack, and it looked like she was, this was the place to do it, she thought. He had been to her apartment. He must have seen her work. The picture of April.

He had her suitcase.

He had been in her closet. Chances were pretty good he had seen the portrait of himself.

Why, oh why, hadn't she burned that damned thing instead of practically praying to it every night and obsessing over it endlessly? It had become her icon, her idol—and it should have been smashed to pieces long ago. Instead, Clay had seen it, seen himself through her eyes, and her naked desire for him played out in his own features.

Eager to be deferred from the topic that was seething between them like a chasm full of hot lava, Elodie asked the first question that came into her mind. "How did you get into my apartment? I don't remember giving you a key..." Then she answered her own question. "I didn't realize you'd kept the one I gave April."

Clay's eyebrows rose automatically in surprise at that simple answer, but then he pasted a blasé look on his face, saying in an overly casual way, "Oh, yeah, I kept it."

*****

He approached her and kissed her as gently as a soft breeze, then took up his usual residence—the subtly torturous hospital chair.

Before he delved into what he wanted to talk to her about, he asked quietly, "How are you? Is there anything I can get you? When did you have your last pain meds?" He wasn't about to let her be a brave little soldier about being in pain, even if he had to give her the shots himself.

"They just gave it to me. I was hurting, and I asked for it."

"Good girl," he praised. "At this point, you're healing and you don't need to be in pain. If—when—they make you do P.T., then you'll have to shake hands with it."

"Yeah, I know."

A relatively comfortable silence fell between them, until Clay said, "You're a fantastic painter."

Elodie drew a deep breath. "Thank you."

"You have enough canvasses. You should have a show."

She was shaking her head, very slowly, very carefully, back and forth.

"Why not?"

"No interest. I paint for myself, not anyone else."

"No one says that has to change."

"I don't want a show."

Well, he would come back to that eventually. "Who's Joshua?"

Elodie frowned. "How do you know about Joshua?"

Clay watched her reaction carefully when he had said his name. She looked surprised and puzzled, but not alarmed in any way. If he was someone she was involved with, then she should have looked a lot more worried.

A lot more worried, because Clay was going to kill him.

"He left a message on your answering machine." Clay couldn't get his voice above an angry growl.

Elodie tried to smile, although it looked as if it pained her to do so.

Clay was bamboozled. She was smiling—or trying for a reasonable facsimile thereof. What was going on?

"Joshua Maddox is a very good friend of mine, and I'd appreciate it if you wouldn't look like you want to throttle him with both hands."

"Just a friend?" he ground out.

"Just a friend. A very, very good, close friend."

"How close?"

She cleared her throat. "I don't have to justify or explain my friendships to you, Clay."

"Why did you leave me last night?"

When he had been talking about Joshua, she'd met him head on, even though hers wasn't in the best shape right now. She stood up to him, quietly, but didn't back down. But when it came to her behavior last night, she turned away from him. He could see her fidgeting with the blanket, rubbing it with her fingers as if she was trying to grind the fabric into a fine pulp.

"Was it that bad?" he asked, only half kidding.

She turned back towards him, too quickly, and winced. "No, no, of course not. It was wonderful. It was fantastic—"

"I'm sorry for falling asleep right after we made love. I shouldn't have. I should have stayed awake and cuddled. I'm better trained than that. But to be honest, I was just exhausted, not that that's an excuse—"

Elodie interrupted his heartfelt mea culpa. "It was fine. I mean, I wouldn't want it to be a continual habit, but I'm not mad or anything."

"So it wasn't that either, then." Clay leaned forward and put his hand on her hip, one of the few places not encased in either plaster or gauze. "Tell me what it was that drove you away from me, out into the night."

She avoided his eyes and compulsively folded the hem of the starched hospital sheet to within an inch of its life. "Nothing in particular."

He didn't say anything for a few seconds, then issued a loud, "Ahem. I'm not buying it. So try to sell me something else. Like the truth."

"April."

"What about April?" he asked, figuring he already had a good idea, but knowing she needed to be prodded into talking it out.

It tore at his heart when he saw her eyes fill with tears. "I just—I just felt like—like I had betrayed her, you know?"

He knew. He knew very well exactly what she was talking about, because he had felt it, too. "You could have gotten me up, and we could have talked about it," he cajoled, "instead of sneaking out on me."

"I didn't feel like it. I wanted to be alone. I needed to work some stuff out."

Although he didn't want to, he did understand what she was saying. "Next time," he growled huskily, "I'm going to stay awake, and I'm not going to let you leave my side all night long."

Clay couldn't see anything on her skin but purple bruises and red scrapes, but he knew that she was blushing nonetheless.

"Now. Back to this Joshua character," Clay said.

"Did I hear my name being taken in vain?" The owner of the voice on her answering machine knocked once on the open door and waltzed in as if he owned the place, running up to Elodie's other side and kissing her loudly on the cheek.

"Oh, honey, I'm so sorry! I came as soon as I heard. Are you okay?"

He hadn't so much as acknowledged Clay with a glance. All of his attention was focused on Elodie, and Clay was seeing red, especially when the man reached out and caressed her hair as if he had every right to.

"She's going to be fine," Clay said as he stood and took his place on Elodie's other side, his hand on her shoulder staking an indisputable claim.

The other man's response to all of what Elodie would refer to as 'macho posturing' was to smile from ear to ear and hold out his hand. "You must be Clay Carver. I'm so glad you were here for her."

It was too much of an ingrained response to take another man's hand when it was offered for him to refrain. Clay shook hands with the man he considered his closest rival for Elodie's affections, noting reluctantly that he had a good, firm handshake. He didn't want to like anything about this man, dammit.

Elodie looked back and forth from one man to another. "Clay, this is Joshua Maddox. He's one of my best friends, and absolutely no threat to you at all. He and I are not romantically involved in any way, so you can put down your caveman club any time now."

His mouth twisted at her depressingly accurate interpretation of his feelings, but he wasn't going to stand down just because of what she said. He intended to size up the stranger himself. Clay did sit back down again, but he also kept his big paw on her shoulder, just in case Mr. Maddox got any ideas.

At least he didn't stay long, and as far as even Clay's narrow definition, he didn't say anything he shouldn't have. In fact, he was very loving and affectionate towards Elodie, but in an almost neutered way. Clay couldn't find an objection to that; Elodie needed all the loving support she could get.

Joshua kissed Elodie goodbye on the lips, lifting his head and winking deliberately at a nonetheless outraged Clay. Non romantic relationship or not, he felt that he should be the only one of the opposite sex who kissed Elodie on the lips.

A nurse's assistant came in with Elodie's lunch, and she sat up more than she had, but she was still disinterested in food. Unfortunately, the guard dog beside her wasn't about to let her skip a meal.

Clay spent her entire hospital stay—three days—with her, night and day. He didn't even go home to sleep, preferring, he said, to suffer instead through his nights on one of those atrocious chairs that converted into some semblance of a bed, although he never looked like he'd gotten much in the way of sleep in the morning. He did everything for her, usually before she even thought of it herself. She had to try to dissuade him from feeding her at each meal. He ordered enough food for an army each time and tried to persuade her to eat it, but ended up eating most of it himself, wincing throughout at the atrocious quality.