Right Brother (13 page)

His head jerked up and his gaze locked with hers with the same concentration he'd devoted to the screen.

“No need. I was still here.”

“That's not what you told me. You said when I was alone I should have the alarm on.”

“Yeah, well…” He hitched his uninjured shoulder. “You should.”

Before she could respond to that slight—and totally unapologetic—emphasis on the pronoun, he continued. “You okay?”

“Fine. Why wouldn't I be? Oh—because I missed the appointment. I'm so sorry about that.”

“I'll survive.”

“Yes, but now we're behind. And it's my fault. I don't know when we'll go over that application before the meeting tomorrow.”

“In the morning,” he said with a careless shrug.

“I'm scheduled from the minute I get in, and I can't get in earlier, because I'm not dropping Ashley off at her friend's house until nine.”

“I'll bring doughnuts to your place in the morning and we'll do it then.” She had no time to protest—and really no reason to protest, except doughnuts were not the most healthful of breakfasts—before he continued. “I heard you had a visitor. Your brother, right? Unexpected?”

She sank into the chair beside his desk and expelled a breath.

“Yes, it was my brother. And unexpected isn't the half of it. He's never come to see me. Ever. And now…this…”

She closed her eyes, remembering cathartic truth telling.

“What does he want from you?”

She opened her eyes, nearly as surprised by the edge in Trent's voice as she'd been by her brother's arrival.

“What makes you think he wants something from me?”

“Because you haven't had much contact with your family, and usually when people show up suddenly like that, they want something from you. And frequently it involves money.”

She couldn't argue with his logic. Yet she had a sense of something else behind his words. Had he experienced something similar?

You could ask him.

She heard the words as if spoken in her head.

No. She wouldn't ask him. They had gotten along surprisingly well so far, but as business associates. Two people rowing the same boat. No sense in rocking it with personal questions.

“He does want something from me. But it's free—advice.”

He leaned back, crossing his hands behind his head, looking from beneath his dark eyelashes. “Yeah? You going to give it to him?”

“Aren't you surprised he wants my advice?”

After her initial pique, she'd been astonished. Her brother, always the darling of their family, coming to
her
and asking for advice.

“No.” He left it at that, without giving her any idea of what he meant.

“Well, I was.” Although she needed a stronger word—shock, maybe, or better yet, stupefaction—for her brother coming to her for advice and listening to her. Eventually. “His wife's kicked him out. He asked my advice to get her back.”

“Maybe he's not as stupid as I thought.”

She gaped at him a moment, before a giggle bubbled up from somewhere so deep in her she had forgotten it existed.

“Yes, he is.” She giggled again. “He didn't think of it. Amy—his wife—told him to ask me how to make things right.”

“Okay. He's still stupid. What does Amy want you to tell him?”

“I told him I didn't know. But he wasn't satisfied with that. He was so desperate… He really does love her.”

His upper and lower eyelashes nearly came together as his light-colored eyes pinned her, seeming to see inside her.

Only when she saw that did she realize she'd sounded like a starving urchin with her nose pressed against the bakery window when she'd said, “He really does love her.” Pathetic and needy. And she'd vowed never to let herself be that way again. Never to allow herself to need a man's approval so much that she'd fall into that trap.

“Don't you?” Trent said.

Lost, she blinked at him. “Don't I what?”

“Know what Amy wants you to tell him. Seems to me it would be related to your childhoods. You're one of the few people around from his childhood that his wife would know.”

Her brain was buzzing. With how he'd zeroed in on it. But also with other thoughts. Thoughts about his childhood. About his relationship with his family.

Why did he never talk about them?

The hell with it, she
would
ask him.

“What about your family, Trent?”

“What about them?” His lack of reaction didn't ring true. He at least should have reacted to the out-of-the-blue question.

“You so rarely talk about them. I can't believe you aren't hearing from your father.”

“Hearing from and talking to are two different things.”

“Oh.” It made her sad. Sadder than she would have expected. “I'm sorry you don't have a good relationship with your family. I know, I know, that sounds weird considering I haven't seen much of mine, either. But…”

A flicker. No more than that. But something crossed his face. Trouble was she had no idea
what
had flickered.

“Oh, I get my fix of family. Just not my family. Linc calls me a family parasite.”

“What!” Outrage overrode her suspicion that she was being detoured. “How dare he. How—”

“Whoa, Jen.” He laughed. “He was only agreeing with me.
Actually, I suggested the term family vampire and he said it was too harsh, because I don't suck the life out of other people's families. I just don't contribute.”

She felt chilled. Chilled to the heart.

She stood. “I'd better go. But… Thank you, Trent.”

“No problem, Jennifer. No problem at all. Good night.”

“See you in the morning,” she said, heading out the door. “And turn on the alarm after I leave.”

She heard a chuckle behind her. It's what she'd intended, so the sense of success had to be the reason she felt so warmed by the sound.

 

The doughnuts smelled mouthwateringly sinful when Jennifer opened the door to Trent the next morning. Her resolve to have only grapefruit slid away unmourned.

“It's such a nice morning, we'll eat on the balcony,” she said.

She'd decided to have breakfast outside after considering how she and Ashley bumped and brushed when they sat at the counter to eat. And Trent was a considerably larger presence than Ashley. Jennifer had awakened especially early and finished in the bathroom early so she'd be certain to be ready before Trent arrived, no matter how early he was.

“Sounds great. I've been wanting to see this balcony. Where is it?”

“The far end of the apartment, which isn't very convenient for the kitchen.” She shrugged, guiding him down the hall. “They took space from the second floor of each of the stores, so the apartment's long and skinny, with the hallway winding around.”

“I smell guacamole,” Trent said as they neared a turn in the hallway.

“Guacamole? I don't have any guac—”

At that moment, Ashley emerged from the bathroom.

Jennifer took in the situation in less than a heartbeat, which put her way ahead of the other two. But then she had an advantage—she was female, and she wasn't in shock.

At least not as much shock as her daughter.

Trent gawked. But give him credit, he did clamp his mouth shut almost immediately. Ashley, on the other hand, could have used this jaw-dropped, eyes-starting, hands-to-heart pose to audition for any horror movie ever made—and she'd get the part.

Green goop covered her face except for a strip of orangish red down her nose and bare circles around her eyes, explained by green disks held in hands slathered in white. Her hair hung in slimy hunks on a shawl-wrapped towel over her old chenille bathrobe faded to the color of dust.

Clearly, Ashley had used the extra bathroom time made available by Jennifer's early rising to try out remedies culled from the most recent stack of beauty magazines from the library.

“Ahhhggg!” Ashley's squawk was strangled, probably because the green goop appeared dry enough to keep her face from moving.

It didn't stop the rest of her from moving, however. Jennifer grabbed Trent's arm and pulled him against the wall to keep from being run over as Ashley made for her bedroom.

The door slammed behind Ashley, and Trent jumped.

“What on earth…?”

“Beauty regimen,” Jennifer said, pushing open the sliding-glass door to the balcony.

There went her hopes that Ashley and Trent might be edging away from the tension that had seemed to exist between them from their first meeting, and toward a true niece-uncle relationship. Ashley would redirect her embarrassment to anger, and she'd divide it between the witnesses to her embarrassment, Jennifer and Trent.

Jennifer sat wearily, then poured Trent's coffee.

“She smelled like…like a salad.” Trent still sounded shocked.

He sat opposite her, his knee brushing the side of her leg as he settled in. The contact sent a shiver of shock through her, like static electricity from rubbing a carpet during the winter.

“Avocado facial mask, tomato and lemon to bleach freckles, mayonnaise to condition hair and cucumbers to treat eyes.” And now Jennifer understood Ashley's willingness to do the grocery shopping lately.

“My God.” He peered at her across the small table. “Did you ever…?”

Well, if that wasn't just like a man. Forcing her into a corner. What did he want her to say? That she'd used every potion and concoction that magazines, her allowance and ingenuity had allowed in pursuit of beauty?

“At that age? Sure.”

His hand hovered over the largest chocolate doughnut in the bakery box he'd opened. “Why?”

He was mean. No two ways around it. He'd take candy from a baby, a bone from a puppy, and the last shred of feminine ego from a woman.

“Because I foolishly cared what guys thought of me then. Now, shall we get started?”

He didn't respond. She had the feeling his thoughts were continuing on a track unconnected to her words.

“At first, I mostly saw how much Ashley looks like you. But she's got Eric in her, too.”

Jennifer stiffened. “I know you have issues with your brother.” He lifted one eyebrow as if to say,
And you don't?
She ignored that. “But I will not have you playing out any sibling rivalry on my daughter.”

“Whoa, retract those claws, Mama.”

In silence, she continued to glare at him.

“I wasn't saying she's a bad kid, Jennifer.” He raised his hands in pantomimed surrender. “I swear not to take out any sibling rivalry on your daughter.”

“Don't look at Ashley and think of Eric,” she warned him. “She's not Eric. No mother could ask for a better daughter.”

“Okay,” he said with enough skepticism to let her know he didn't believe it, but not enough for her to make an issue of it.

Still, she had two satisfactions.

First, he looked positively pained as she handed over the bank papers. Second, she snagged the biggest chocolate doughnut before he could.

 

The sky boiled with clouds. Not a drop of rain had fallen, but wind shook the trees, bending them before its will and shaking loose clusters of green leaves and small branches.

Jennifer stood in the second service bay's open doorway, head lifted, arms at her side. She didn't look frightened. But she didn't move.

The rain wouldn't hold off much longer. They were lucky this front hadn't moved through earlier and prevented their balcony breakfast.

“Hey, you awake?”

“Watching the storm come.” She didn't take her eyes off the sky.

“I can see that. Are you planning on moving when the storm arrives?”

“Probably.”

He stifled a chuckle. She sounded awfully dreamy for a woman talking about getting drenched when they had a meeting at the bank soon.

Wind came tearing in with a prolonged rush that shook the trees so they bent and swayed and shimmied like souls possessed. The blast, still hot, still dry, pushed against them,
flagging their clothes behind them, swirling the scents of old oil, metal and men from the area behind them.

“It's like standing in front of a huge blow-dryer,” he said.

Her only reply was an eyes-closed “Mmm.”

He'd forgotten about midsummer storms in the Midwest. How big they felt. How raw. How awesome. In California they'd been an inconvenience delivered from a realm disconnected from him.

But here, now, he remembered how he'd felt a part of them as a kid. As if he were another element, along with the wind, the lightning, the thunder, the rain. As if he, too, roared and blustered.

“I used to love storms as a kid,” she said quietly. “I wanted to stand out in it and drink it all in.”

Surprised, and something more he didn't examine, he said, “Me, too.”

“You didn't have much choice, did you?”

“Huh? You're going to have to explain that one, Jennifer.”

“Didn't you have to walk places in the rain as a kid?”

“Doesn't every kid?”

“You more than most.”

“Just come out with it. What are you getting at?”

“I saw you running home from practice. In the rain.”

“What? When?”

“Your freshman year. Your father had come to pick Eric up because of the rain, and he was giving me a ride, too. I saw you head across the field, going toward your house. I could have pointed you out to your father, so you'd get a ride, too. But I didn't. I didn't say a word.”

“Don't worry. I wouldn't have thanked you for sentencing me to ten minutes in the car with my father,” he said easily. “Besides, me dripping all over his car? No thank you. Believe me, I much preferred the run in the rain. You did the right thing.”

“Not for the right reasons.”