Wendy and Adam’s interview was brief. Adam wasn't rude or difficult to get along with during the session. He simply sat in his chair and stared mutinously out the window, refusing to speak.
Emilie had spoken with the school band instructor. He’d refused to even consider making an exception for the troubled boy.
"If he's so troubled," Mr. Foster told her bluntly, "I don't want him. It takes discipline to play an instrument. He could cause my whole class to lose focus."
Annoyed, Emilie went to Mr. Howard and threatened to go to the superintendent to get Adam into the band. Knowing that the school review was coming out in a few months was in Emilie's favor. Raises in salary for principals and teachers were tied to the school's performance. Turning around a child like Adam could mean a feather in both their caps.
"I'll talk to Mr. Foster," he agreed. "But we're only talking a trial here. If the boy doesn't show improvement, there’s nothing else I can do."
Emilie nodded. "I know. Thank you, Mr. Howard."
"By the way," he stopped her as she would have walked out the door, "what instrument does the boy play?"
She chased back in her mind to her conversation with Nick that day. "I don't know. I'll find out and get back with you."
Her heart leapt when she saw that there was a message from Nick on her cell phone when she left the school that afternoon. He was bringing her car back that evening.
She told herself that she was only excited about his visit because she needed to talk to him about Adam. She left him a message on his phone, asking him to come to the house before he left. He didn’t reply. What if he didn’t see the message in time?
She waited, like a child, at the front window to watch for the headlights coming up the drive. She’d already cautioned Joda that he was coming. Her jaunts in the moonlight were frequently accomplished naked, even in the middle of winter.
Emilie knew Nick had seen the older woman when he'd dropped her off at the house and didn't want a repeat performance. Not that she could do really anything to restrain her aunt. She could try to be sure that they were alone on the estate before she shed her clothing and ran outside.
Joda was Joda, she sighed. She'd never learned to drive. Never used a telephone. She'd outright refused to use the microwave.
Her aunt didn’t mind allowing herself to be driven places. Emilie smirked, looking out the dark, cold windowpane. She didn’t mind asking Emilie to use the phone for her either.
Headlight beams lit the end of the driveway and Emilie pulled on her jacket and hurried out into the night. She didn’t want to miss Nick. She was careful on the stone walkway between the kitchen door and the garage. She didn't want him to have to pick her up off the ground.
Nick opened the side door to the garage as Emilie reached the building. The light from the interior shone full on her face like a spotlight.
"Hello!" She moved out of the path of the door.
"Hi." He looked away from her bright eyes to get his bearings.
"So you brought the car back," she said, "repaired."
Was that a sentence? She wanted to hit herself in the head. Was something wrong with her?
"Yeah," he agreed. "It's ready to go."
"Thanks," she answered, trying to be brief but coherent. She dug her freezing hands into the pockets of her coat. “Did you get my message about Adam?”
“No.” He frowned. “Is something wrong?”
She explained that his nephew had seen the counselor with no real interest and that she was almost certain Adam would be able to join the band.
“What instrument does he play?”
Nick thought about it. He hated to admit it, but he didn’t know. “I’ll have to ask him, I guess. Sorry.”
“That’s fine. Just let me know.”
Silence dropped between them like a curtain for a few minutes.
Finally, Nick said, "Could I use your phone?"
"Sure. You’ll have to come in. I left my cell phone inside." It was a lie. It was right there in her pocket. She wanted him to come inside for a few minutes. She looked beyond him into the garage. Only her Mercedes was there. “Do you need a ride back to the shop?"
"Yeah. Randy's waiting to come out and pick me up," he lied.
Randy was probably home watching football with a beer in one hand and the television remote in the other. He was going to be surprised if Nick called him.
"I could take you home," she offered sweetly.
He'd argued with himself all day. He was taking the car back to Emilie. Usually, Randy drove the tow truck out with him and they came back together. That was how it always worked.
Nick wanted to talk to her. About Adam, he explained rationally to himself when he told Randy goodnight and that he wouldn't need him to go out to the Ferrier's house.
He'd wanted her to offer him a lift home. That's what it came down to, he considered, looking at her soft skin and delicate cheekbones. Despite all his good sense, he'd wanted to be alone with her for a few minutes.
He could say 'no, thanks', call Randy, and that would be the end of it. He could, for once, listen to his saner side telling him that he didn't want to be alone again with Emilie.
"Thank." He held the door open for her to enter the garage. "I'm sure Randy will appreciate it."
Chapter Four
They climbed into the still warm Mercedes and Emilie started the car.
"That's great about the band,” he said when she was backing up. “I appreciate your help.”
"I know we can help, Adam," she told him enthusiastically as she drove down the driveway to the slush-covered streets. "The music and the counseling. There's going to be a world of difference in him in no time. You'll see."
Nick didn't speak. He didn't need to because she kept talking regardless of whether he answered. The woman was hopeless. And beautiful. She smelled like the deep woods on a spring morning. She wore sadness like a veil that he wanted to see through, knowing she was someone else on the other side.
There were Christmas decorations on every street corner in town. Ferrier’s Mountain went all out for the holiday. Roaming bands of Christmas carolers serenaded late-night shoppers and the huge tree in the square was alive with thousands of twinkling lights. Even though the weather was cold, there was an air of magic on the town streets.
“Do you like Christmas?” Emilie asked when they paused at the red light closest to Nick’s garage.
“I liked it better when I was a kid,” he replied honestly. “It’s not so much for an adult.”
She nodded, not really agreeing. She loved Christmas. “It is a little better when there are children around.”
The garage was on a side street. It was quiet, very little traffic even during the day. Emilie pulled beside the cement-block building. She didn't turn off the engine.
"The car runs great now," she told him. "Thank you for your help."
"Sure." He tried to build up the courage to say something to her, maybe ask her out. He felt like an idiot sitting there, staring at her. "Look, Emilie—"
She held up her hand. "You have to go. I understand. Your wife is probably waiting for you."
He looked at her hand. It was bare in the car's pale green interior light. No wedding band. No jewelry of any kind. Without thinking, he reached out and slid his hand across hers until their fingers meshed.
“I’m not married.”
She gasped and her gaze flew up to meet his in the car's closeness.
“That’s what you wanted to know, right?”
"I-uh-I don’t know."
“Are you married? Engaged? Seeing someone?”
She briefly thought about Alain. He didn’t qualify. “No.”
He leaned a little closer to her. "I've never met anyone like you. You keep your word and you care about people. I don’t understand what’s wrong with the people here. They don’t know you at all, do they?"
“We are Ferriers,” she whispered. “When I was a child, my parents made it clear that we shouldn’t mingle with other people who weren’t of our stature.”
“So you’re politely telling me to take a hike?”
Emilie swallowed hard on her fear. “No. I don’t want you to take a hike, Nick. I wish—I wish you’d put your arms around me, like you did in the truck.”
"God, Emilie." He let go of her hand and pulled her close to him. "You're a mess, but you’re all I can think about.”
"I know."
It felt so wonderful to be held. He was warm and smelled like soap. His heart was beating steadily against her ear. His arms were strong and certain around her.
"Are you always like this?" he wondered out loud.
"No." She sat up a little. "No. Actually, I'm a rock. Everyone depends on me. I can take care of any crisis. I don’t need anyone.”
“Everyone needs someone.”
Nick held her close. The effects of her body on his hadn’t been a one-time thing. He breathed in and the scent of her raced through him. He shifted his hip to one side and she followed, filling the space that had occurred between them.
Her coat opened and her breasts pressed against his arm. It was one of the hardest things he'd ever done not to move his hand the few inches it would have taken to hold that softness in his grasp.
Emilie wasn't sure when she started to feel something more than comfort from his touch. Her hands were on his chest. She could feel his heart beating under her fingertips.
She raised her head to look at him, the streetlight outside the car creating a dark mask that hid his eyes. It made him appear dangerous . . . and intriguing.
"I should go." She realized her position. She was pressed against him from chest to hip, the curves of her body filled by his hard muscle.
He smiled. She saw the movement of his lips in the dim light and was fascinated by it. She knew that she was staring at him. She couldn't make herself look away.
His lips moved closer to hers, still not touching. “I want to kiss you, Emilie."
His hand slid inside the neck of her coat, warm and caressing. He brought her mouth to his. His kiss was too short, and devastating.
A tiny whimper escaped her throat when his lips left hers. He groaned and kissed her again. The pressure of his mouth changed, no longer hesitant or undecided. His mouth slanted across hers while his fingers moved up from her throat to cup her head.
It was like drinking peach brandy. His touch sang through her veins until she could feel it in her toes. She was hot and fluid, answering him with her lips and tongue, drinking him in as though his kiss could quench that sudden fire in her.
Nick kissed her again and again. His tongue played with hers as she hesitantly, gently, slid her tongue the length of his and back. Her touch was soft and careful as if she were afraid that she might hurt him.
He could never get enough of her, he thought brokenly, wishing there were fewer clothes between them. He could get lost in her.
It was that thought that sobered him and made him set her away from him with a firm hand.
"I'm sorry, Emilie," he said flatly. "I-I can't do this. Not right now. I wasn’t expecting . . ."
"Nick—" She barely recognized her voice.
"Goodnight, Emilie." He slid from the car, closing the door behind him.
"Goodnight," she said quietly to his retreating back as he entered the garage.
She sat in the car with her hands on the steering wheel for a few minutes. She had to force her body and mind to cooperate. She didn't want to be sitting out there in her car when he came out again. That would be too far past the humiliation she was already feeling.
Emilie drove home slowly, ignoring the Christmas decorations this time. She wasn't sure when exactly she'd become attracted to Nick, or how she'd crossed that line between being attracted and actually allowing herself to kiss him.
Not just kiss him, she reminded herself, replaying the last few minutes in her mind. She’d been consumed by him.
Shivering, she pulled into her drive and parked the car in the garage. She sat in the quiet, gathering cold for a long time. The darkness surrounded her like a thick blanket.
It had been ten years since she'd felt anything like that for a man. Ten years of assuring herself that it wouldn't happen again. It was frightening to think that it had all been for nothing. It could just as easily have been David in the car tonight.
The cold took her breath away and made her leg throb painfully as she walked to the house.
When her marriage to David had ended ten years before, she'd promised herself that she wouldn't be so gullible, so deeply affected. It had been an easy vow to keep—until she'd met Nick.
That's all it had taken. The right man. She’d suddenly stopped thinking with her brain and her hormones had taken over.
She'd made that mistake before. She almost didn't recover from it. It couldn't happen again. She wouldn't let it happen again.
"You're white as a sheet, child!" Joda opened the door as Emilie put her hand on the knob. "Is something wrong?"
"N-no," Emilie lied. Her stomach twisted as she thought of telling her aunt that she had come so close to making the same mistake again. "I'm not feeling well. I'm going to bed now."
The older woman stepped to the side to allow her niece into the house. She shook her flowing white mane when she saw her eyes. Emilie was a terrible liar.
Still, the torment she saw there was too deep to demand an explanation. Time enough for that later.
"Goodnight, Emilie,
mon enfant
." Joda kissed her forehead and looked deeply into the eyes that matched her own. "Tomorrow, we will go out and eat something festive and drink too much wine, hmm?"
Emilie managed a wan smile and held her cold trembling hands together tightly. "Maybe so. Goodnight."
#
The next morning was sunny and warmer. The sky was blue and clear. Icicles had already started forming on the long length of gabled roof along the front of the house.
Emilie had received a text from Nick saying that Adam played the flute and had his own instrument. He didn’t go into detail. She didn’t ask.
Composed, ready to face the world, Emilie drove the short distance to school. She walked into the principal's office and informed him that Adam played the flute and yes, he had his own instrument.