Not Quite Dating (13 page)

Jack turned off the water and stepped out of the shower. Grabbing a towel, he dried himself off.

Too late. Jack had it bad.

Then there was Danny…Lord, that kid had grown on him. How his real father could walk away and never look back ticked Jack off.

He wrapped the towel around his hips and ran his fingers through his wet hair. “Be patient,” he told himself in the mirror.

Patience was entirely overrated.

Jessie jumped whenever a pickup truck pulled into the parking lot at work. Disappointment ran high when Jack didn’t emerge from any of them.

She’d worked
a couple of extra hours each morning for one of the day-shifters to make it easier on Monica, who was schlepping Jessie back and forth to work since they were down a car. Her car would be out of the shop in a couple of days, but boy did the extra expenses bite into Christmas.

Danny deserved much more than she could provide.

A man like Brad might have been able to provide some financial means, but he would have come up short on the emotional ones.

What was worse, she wondered, a man who cared with all his being who would only be around a short while? Or a man who didn’t care at all?

Would the money last longer than the memories?

Would the heartache last longer than the money?

It was midnight on her first night off since the disaster date with Brad. Jack didn’t call, didn’t stop by. Monica had finished her semester and was enjoying a long-overdue break by going to Big Bear, where the snow had come down in feet rather than inches. Monica didn’t ski, but she took pleasure in the snow and the guys who flocked to it.

Jessie stared up at the ceiling in her room, unable to sleep.

Danny had gone to bed early with a small cough.

Slipping out of bed, Jessie tossed her robe over her shoulders and shoved her feet into her slippers.

On her way to her kitchen to try some warm milk to help her sleep, she heard Danny coughing in his room.

She pushed open his door and noticed that he’d pushed off all his covers. She stepped in and went to cover her son up. The sweat on his forehead stopped her. Placing the back of her hand to his face, she realized how hot he was.

Danny started to cough again, and this time his eyes opened, glossy and unfocused.

“Hey, handsome.”

Danny’s little eyes
instantly watered. “I don’t feel good, Mommy.”

Jessie lifted him into a sitting position and he started to cough even harder. Under his pajamas, his skin burned with fever. “Wait here,” she told him before rushing to the bathroom to find the thermometer.

“Here, buddy. Let’s see where you’re at.”

She stuck the gauge between his lips and under his tongue. He coughed around it while she stripped the hot pajamas from his tiny body. The coolness of the room had him shivering, but Jessie remembered Monica talking about the kids who arrived in the clinic ill.
“It’s not cruel to strip a burning kid down to his underwear. It’s much worse to let the fever stay high and keep all that heat in.”

Danny kept coughing, only it didn’t sound like he was bringing anything up. He even had a squeaky noise when he pulled in a breath.

Inside, Jessie started to panic. Outside, she smiled and stroked Danny’s head. Her car was in the shop and Monica was out of town.

It was late at night, and the only place open was the emergency room at Upland Community.

Jessie pulled the thermometer from Danny’s mouth and tilted the glass tube until she saw the red line: 104.2.

Now it was time to panic.

She hurried to the bathroom and found the chewable children’s Tylenol and glanced at the box to see how much to give him. The weight chart said two tablets, so she poured two in her hand and hurried back to Danny’s side.

Danny whined when she handed him the medicine, his body shook, and his coughing never stopped. “Here, baby. Take these.”

“Do they taste bad?”

“They’re good, try ’em. They’ll make you feel better.” But 104.2 wasn’t good. She had
to get him to a doctor. The cough worried her even more than the fever.

She wished her sister were there helping her.

Jessie ran to her bedroom, grabbed a cordless phone, and dashed back to Danny’s side.

Her mother was too far away.

Her fingers flew over the numbers, never hesitating.

Jack answered on the first ring.

“Jack, thank God you’re there.”

“Jessie? What’s wrong? Are you OK?” There was panic in Jack’s voice, and her own heightened in response.

“It’s Danny.” Danny started to cough again. “He’s sick and my car’s in the shop. He needs a—”

“Stay calm. I’ll be right there.”

“Hurry.” But he’d already hung up the phone.

Jessie tossed a T-shirt over Danny’s head and propped him up on a few pillows on the couch. In her room, she stepped into the clothes she’d worn the day before and grabbed her purse from her dresser.

Back in the living room, she unlocked the door and then had to wait. Danny’s eyes kept drifting shut between his fits of coughing. Jessie had never felt more helpless in her entire life.

She rocked her son back and forth while he clutched Tex to his side. Jessie did her best to ignore his shaking body. This part of parenthood really sucked. Why couldn’t she be the one to get sick? Why Danny?

She heard Jack’s footsteps running down the hall before her door swung open. He was there, thank God. Jessie wanted to cry in relief.

Jack slowed his steps and reached down to take Danny from her arms. “Hey, partner.” He greeted her son first.

Danny tried to smile, but he coughed instead.

“See, that cough is bad,” Jessie said in alarm.

Jack shook his head. “Shh, I got him. Grab your purse and lock the door.”

“OK,” she said, following his instructions
and taking her place at his side.

The cool air outside hit her hard. Jack opened the passenger door and buckled Danny in the center seat. Jessie stepped in beside him and Jack ran around the truck to the driver’s side door.

“Where is the nearest ER?” he asked.

Jessie gave him directions and Jack drove. There was no small talk, no smiling. Jack looked just as concerned as she felt.

At the hospital, Jack carried Danny inside. The lobby was a quarter full with mostly slumbering people who looked like they were waiting on family members.

“Hello,” the lady behind the bulletproof glass said with a smile as she pushed a sign-in sheet in front of them.

Jessie wrote down Danny’s name on autopilot. “He has a fever over 104, and his cough is making it hard for him to breathe.”

The lady gave a sympathetic look and said, “I’ll get the triage nurse.”

Jessie glanced up at Jack, who hadn’t sat down. Danny coughed on his shoulder.

“What’s taking so long?” he asked, though the woman hadn’t been gone but a minute. When she walked back to the window, another, older lady stood there with a stethoscope around her neck and a pen in her hand. She looked through the window at Danny and motioned with her hand. “Come on back.”

Around the corner, Jessie and Jack were led into the busy ER and placed in a small room. Jack sat next to the desk and placed Danny in his lap. Jessie grabbed a chair and moved it closer.

“I’m Teresa, one of the nurses here. How long has Danny been sick?”

“Only a few hours. He didn’t feel well before he went to
bed, but he wasn’t coughing like this.”

Teresa placed a sensor with tape on Danny’s finger. “How high was his fever at home?”

“104.2. I gave him Tylenol right before we left.”

“Good. Most parents just rush in and don’t think.”

Teresa asked a series of other questions. Danny’s weight, previous illnesses, immunization status. Allergies to medicine. Jessie answered everything while the nurse wrote feverishly.

She unplugged the sensor attached to Danny’s finger from the machine but kept it dangling on him. “His pulse ox is low; it’s a good thing you came in.”

“Is that a bad thing?” Jack asked.

“If left alone,” she confirmed. “Don’t worry, we’ll take care of your little boy.”

Neither Jessie nor Jack corrected the nurse.

“His temperature is still high, 102.5. I’m going to give him some ibuprofen.”

“Is that OK after he had the Tylenol?”

“It’s perfectly fine. Both medications have the same goal, but they work differently. Lots of kids have high fevers, and we bring them down with both medications all the time.” Teresa stood and waved her hand. “Come on, Dad, follow me.” Jack followed the nurse with Danny while Jessie followed Jack.

The nurse led them into
a room where she turned on a monitor and plugged in the oxygen sensor Danny wore on his finger. Jack saw the number—ninety-four—but didn’t understand the significance of it. When the number dipped to ninety-two, the machine started beeping, which he didn’t think was a good thing. At some point, the nurse left the room to find a doctor, and Danny reached for his mother.

Jessie pulled him into her lap and sat on the gurney with him. She swayed back and forth and spoke softly to Danny, who was more awake now and anxious about where he was and what was going to happen to him.

“Are they going to give me a shot? I don’t want a shot.”

Jack paced the room.

“Let’s not worry about that, buddy,” Jessie told her son. She glanced over at Jack. “Hey, did you notice that Jack gave us a ride in his truck? Cool, huh?”

Danny looked up at him. “I like your truck,” he said, glossy eyes and all.

Jack knew Jessie was trying to distract her son. “When you’re all fixed up, we should go mud wampum in my truck,” he said. “That’s lots of fun.”

“W-what’s that?” Danny asked through a cough.

“It’s when we go out in the dirt after it
rains and splash the truck in the mud puddles. In Texas, mud puddles get really big.”

“I’d”—cough, cough—“like that.”

The nurse returned with a doctor at her side. “Hi, folks, I’m Dr. Shields. This must be Danny.”

Dr. Shields asked a bunch of questions while he listened to Danny’s lungs and examined his ears and throat. He glanced at the nurse and said, “Let’s get some Albuterol treatments going. When he’s finished with the first one, we’ll send him to X-ray to have a look.”

Teresa left the room and Dr. Shields started to explain what was happening.

“Danny’s never had asthma, allergies?”

“No. Not really.”

“He started kindergarten this year?”

“Yes.”

“Kindergarten exposes kids to all kinds of new and fun illnesses, I’m sorry to say. I’m going to give him a breathing treatment to open his airway, make it easier for him to breathe. Once his fever is down, he’ll probably relax and his oxygen saturation will improve. He has an ear infection, which I’ll send you home with antibiotics for, but I’ll want you to follow up with your pediatrician later this week.”

Jack’s head spun. “Does he have asthma?”

“I doubt it, since this is the first time he’s had these symptoms. Different things are blooming this time of year. Spring isn’t the only time allergies can cause issues. The winds that blow here cause havoc on many of us, even those who don’t have asthma. Let’s be safe and have his doctor follow him. We’ll take a chest X-ray to make sure we’re not missing anything and send you home with a copy on a disc.”

“OK,” Jessie uttered.

“I’m jumping ahead. Let’s get
Danny more comfortable. I’ll be back in a little bit, and Teresa will be in here in a few minutes with his treatment.”

Jack held out his hand and shook the doctor’s. “Thank you.”

“My pleasure.”

“Do I have to have a shot?” Danny asked from Jessie’s arms.

“Not this time. Unless you want one,” Dr. Shields said with a hopeful expression, teasing the boy.

“No way.”

Danny’s words made everyone laugh.

Within minutes, Danny held a steaming plastic pipe in his mouth and was inhaling the medicine deep into his lungs.

The tension in Jack’s shoulders eased, and Jessie’s frown and the lines of worry on her face faded.

Soon Danny wanted to sit on the gurney without his mom holding him. Jessie sat him down and took a seat next to Jack. Poor Danny, Jack thought. He must have felt like he was under a microscope with the two of them staring at him, waiting for his next move. Once Danny finished inhaling the medicine in the plastic pipe, the nurse returned and turned off the oxygen.

One of the clerks stepped into the room and gathered insurance information from Jessie, which she handed over quickly. The whole process of documenting her state-funded insurance and the billing for her part of Danny’s expenses was quickly finished up and pushed aside.

By now, Danny had curled up on his side and closed his eyes.

“Thanks for coming, Jack,” Jessie said, sitting beside him.

He glanced down at Jessie’s tired face and put an arm around her. “I’m glad you called me.”

She settled into his arms, much to his surprise.

“Monica is away and I still haven’t got my car back.”

“When did it break down again?” He should have had Max take care of all the issues with her car.

“Remember my
date from hell?”

Like he would ever forget it. “Saturday?”

“Car died on the way home. I walked the last three miles.”

Dammit. He shuddered, thinking of her walking at night by herself. Jack squeezed her closer to him, trying to take away all her misery. “You should have told me.”

She yawned. “So you could come to my rescue again? It has to be getting old by now. I’m not usually so darn helpless.”

“Are you kidding? You feed my ego, lady. There’s nothing better for me to do than to take away all the bad things that happen.”

Danny had fallen asleep, and for the first time since he walked through the door to Jessie’s apartment, the boy didn’t look like he was struggling.

“You do. Take away the bad. Tonight I started to panic. If you hadn’t answered…”

“Hey, I did. We’re good. Danny looks better already.”

Jack settled in and stroked up and down Jessie’s arm until both mother and son were nodding off and falling asleep.

Jack placed Danny into his bed and pulled a sheet over him. Jessie kissed her son and stepped out of the room.

It was three in the morning.

“I don’t know how I’m going to make all this up to you.”

“You already have, Jessie.” Jack glanced around the living room. “I’ll just rest up here on the couch.”

“You don’t have to do that. I’m sure Danny is going to be fine now. The doctor thought he’d sleep till morning without any problems.”

Jack sat on the sofa and toed off his shoes. “If it’s all the same to you, I’m staying. Save me the trouble of turning around and coming back should there be a need.”

Jessie looked as if she wanted to
argue, then shook her head. “OK. The sofa pulls out into a bed.”

“I’m fine on the sofa.”

Jessie disappeared for a few minutes and returned with a pillow and a blanket. “You sure?”

He took his jacket off and winked. “Positive.”

“OK,” she said. “G’night.”

“Good night, sweetheart.”

Jessie smiled before turning and walking to her bedroom.

Jack tossed the pillow on the side of the sofa and unfolded the blanket. Too keyed up to lie down, he sat there for a few minutes and listened to Jessie walking around in her room.

The dark Christmas tree was nearly as bare as it had been a week ago. It was wrong. The lush one that sat in his penthouse suite at The Morrison was what Jessie and Danny deserved. He was starting to forget why he kept his disguise as a poor dreamer. All his half truths and bald-faced lies were getting too carried away.

Tonight while Jessie slept in his arms and Danny snoozed on the gurney, Jack realized how much he’d fallen for her. For both of them.

All of the signs of falling in love were there. For some strange reason, the “L” word didn’t worry him in the least. Perhaps with a different woman he’d feel closed in, trapped, but not with Jessie. The way she looked at him, called him when she needed him. She laughed at his jokes and listened when he needed to talk. The gentle sway of her hips and toss of her hair fired his blood with want.

Even now, Jack heard her tossing in her bed in the other room. He should just go in there and tell her the truth.

Jessie
, he’d say.
All my life all I ever wanted was for a woman to want me for me. For who I am and not my name or the money I make. Then I walked into your diner, and you took my breath away. I had to know that you would love me for me. I can’t let you go on thinking I’m some
dreamer who couldn’t make you happy if you gave me half a chance.

How hard could those words be? They sounded good to him, and he’d been fantasizing about saying them for weeks.

Jack heard the coils in her bedspring squeak and he stood.

Get it over with.

Yet the closer he moved to the door of her room, the more his stomach twisted.

The door was open. Probably so she could hear Danny if he called out.

She shifted on the bed and punched her pillow.

Jack watched her do this a couple of times and smiled. At least he wasn’t the only one having trouble getting to sleep. Jessie shifted again and then tossed her covers off. “Dammit,” she whispered.

“Trouble sleeping?” he asked, his voice low.

She turned and noticed him standing in the doorway. She clicked on a bedside lamp and illuminated the room with a soft glow.

“This is crazy,” she whispered.

She tossed back the covers, revealing a long T-shirt with a snowman eating his nose. The image shouldn’t have been sexy, but it was. Then again, the way Jessie lifted her frame from her bed, and the sultry look in her eyes when she approached him, knocked his brain clear away from his head. Cognitive thoughts fled as his pulse lunged into high gear.

Standing toe-to-toe, Jessie pulled him into her room and closed the door behind him. He’d come in there to tell her something, but he couldn’t remember what.

Her perky breasts pushed against the snowman; her nipples poked against the thin fabric. Jessie ran a hand up his arm and back down.

“What are you doing, Jessie?”

“If you have to ask, I’m losing my touch,” she said with a smile. Hadn’t he used a similar line on her not so
very long ago?

“But you don’t—”

She silenced him by placing her finger over his lips. “No more talking. I’ve talked until I’m blue. I want to feel, Jack.” She stepped back, crossed her arms over her shoulders, and tugged her nightshirt away from her body.

She stood in pink lace panties and nothing else. The heat in her stare shot straight to his groin, and his heart started to sing hallelujah.

Her porcelain skin dipped and swelled in all the right spots. Jack actually felt in awe of being next to her like this. Reaching a hand out, Jack gently touched her shoulder before letting his hand slide over her arm. He watched his fingers trace over her skin and noticed when Jessie visibly trembled at his touch.

Jack felt as if he’d waited a lifetime to touch her, to taste her. Their two kisses had sated nothing and fueled everything. His fingers lingered on her elbow before reaching for her waist. He fanned his fingers and touched as much of her skin as possible but still didn’t have enough. Jack allowed his other hand to follow the curve of her soft, welcoming hip. Real gooseflesh rose on his arms. When Jessie sucked in a tight gasp of pleasure, Jack glanced into her hazel eyes, eyes that darkened when she was aroused as she was now. She stood there, enjoying his touch and demanding nothing.

Her lips parted when he followed up the curve of her waist and touched the underside of her generous breast with his knuckles. Her nipples hardened into aching pebbles of flesh asking to be touched.

“I want to be everything for you,” he found himself saying.

Jessie reached up to his shirt and undid the buttons, slowly. With shaky hands, she managed to push the last piece of round plastic through its hole and brush his shirt off his chest until it pooled at their feet.

Her fingers spread over his chest and buried
into the light dusting of hair she found. One tantalizing thumb rubbed over his nipple and provoked multiple firings of nerve endings that had sat dormant for a very long time.

They hadn’t even kissed and already his erection strained against his pants.

No matter how much he wanted her, he wouldn’t rush this moment.

No, this moment was meant to explore, feel, touch, taste, and experience with his whole being.

Bending his head, Jack pressed his lips against her neck and found her pulse beating hard. He nibbled, licked, and kissed a path to her collarbone until he felt Jessie mold her body to his.