Chapter Twenty-Eight
"How's Jonah's arm?" Dan inquired as he began the chore of squaring away the week's accumulated paperwork and opening the mail. Colton looked like one sad puppy as he sprawled in the cracked vinyl chair in front of Dan's desk. Jonah was out in the shop, and Dan could hear the shop vac going strong.
"He's miserable. He has a tear in his rotator cuff."
"Wow, how serious is that?" Dan asked, amazed Colton had made the kid come in to work.
"The doctor said his injury could be repaired with some exercises. He can do most things just fine, but he can't throw a ball or swing a bat for a few weeks. He gave Jonah a shot of cortisone to help the inflammation, some elastic bands to work out with, and some pills. By the time his arm gets better, though, the season will be over."
"What did Lila say?" Dan asked. Lila had a way with the kid none of the De Marcos did. Dan chalked it up to her experience as a mother.
"Lila wasn't there by the time we got the diagnosis, D. She's mad at me. She tried to get me to pull him off the mound last night and I wouldn't. Jonah might not even be hurt if I'd read the information she gave me weeks ago." Colton looked across the desk, misery etched all over his face. "She hasn't answered her phone all day either," he added. "Jonah's more upset about Lila leaving last night than he is about his arm. We're going over there after the shop closes. But he asked to come and work today, so here we are."
Dan sat silent, his brows cocked. He didn't think Colton was done talking. Colton opened and closed his mouth several times. "I fucking love her, D. I'm crazy in love with the woman," he finally burst out.
Dan grinned broadly. "I knew that."
"You stupid bastard."
Dan and Colton both stared at Eric who was suddenly standing in the doorway, his face twisted with anger.
"How could you?" he yelled at Colton. "How could you let that kid get attached to her? To her, of all people? Miss High-and-Mighty Walker would never really consider a
life
with you, little brother. We aren't good enough for the likes of her. She's used to a guy that wears a suit to work, not one that comes home with grease on his clothes. Lila's just slumming with you because of the size of your dick."
Colton jumped out of the chair, rushing Eric. The pair slammed out of the doorway and landed against the hallway wall, already throwing punches.
Dan thought about breaking up the fight, but this one had been coming for some time, so he kept opening the mail. He'd throw a bucket of water on them when he finished, if they were still going at it.
"You don't know a damn thing about her," Colton grunted as he planted his fist in Eric's solar plexus.
Eric countered with a hard left to Colton's jaw. "I don't need to know her, C. I know her friends. She runs with Sharon at the bank and with Pam Taylor, has for years. Those women both have sisters I've dated, and they're all just slumming. They'll fuck a mechanic, but they want a bank executive to marry."
Colton stopped dead in his tracks, rubbing his jaw while he stared at his brother. "What? When did this become about marriage?"
"I see your face when you talk about her," Eric yelled. "But I see the kid's face too, and you keep forgetting that if you fall for her and she doesn't return the favor, you'll survive, but how about Jonah? Hasn't he lost enough? Lila's gonna end up with some rich asshole like Van Westbrook, who by the way turned down my loan application, not that you bothered to take your head out of Lila's ass long enough to ask me about that."
Dan stepped out into the hall, wedging his body between the pissed-off pair. Slapping an envelope against Colton's chest, he growled, "This ain't something I'm gonna deal with." He slapped Eric in the chest with another envelope. "Eric, you keep your mouth off his woman. It's none of your business."
"I don't want him to get hurt," Eric argued hotly.
Dan shook his head sadly. "He's already hurt, fuck up. He loves her, can't you see that? He's hurt every damn time you say something mean to her or about her."
"What about the kid?" Eric demanded belligerently.
"If we're talking about the same Lila, she'd cut off her hands before she made that kid feel she didn't care about him, dumbass." Dan rubbed his chin as he narrowed his eyes at Eric. "So you get the hell off her, E. I don't know if you're trying to protect Colton from being hurt, or if you're afraid he might be happy while you're miserable, but I do know it's your fucking day to go drop off the bank deposit. Hurry up, they close at noon."
Colton looked at the envelope Dan had given him, then unfolded the contents with a snap. "I'm gonna fucking spank her ass," he growled, glaring at the papers. "I'm gonna turn her right over my knee and spank her."
Eric snatched the papers from Colton's hand. "Wow," he finally uttered. "She's worried that you fixing her truck took money out of my and Dan's pockets?" Dan saw the disbelief on E's face as he looked at the check Lila had mailed and read her brief note. "It's not true, but hey, at least she's not needy."
"It's fucked up, is what it is," Colton growled with exasperation. "She won't let me do a damn thing for her. Drives me up a fucking wall. The woman's too independent."
The anger melted from Eric's face as he stared in surprise at Colton while Dan chuckled silently. Colton hadn't picked a quiet, easy woman, that was for sure. He based his opinion on the way she'd gutted Reggie the night before.
"You and the kid want a burger or tacos?" E asked, finally.
"We want burgers from Ike's." Jonah stood at the end of the hallway, his chin leading the way as he glared at Eric. "And we're gonna eat ours with Lila. Come on, Uncle C, I'm all done here, let's go wash Lila's truck."
Dan laughed loudly. "That's a helluva job, kid. Y'all call me if you need some help. I'll bring my pressure washer over." He gave Eric a final glare, daring him to say another negative thing about the woman his brother and nephew so clearly adored.
"With cheese or without?" Eric muttered, shoving the deposit envelope in his back pocket.
"You get some of everything they got. You get some for Lila too." Jonah's voice cracked, and Eric cracked up, throwing an arm around Colton, scrubbing his knuckles against his head.
* * * *
Her garage looked oddly bare without the huge cabinet, Colton thought as he walked through the unlocked garage door and into her house, calling for her as he placed the two containers of night crawlers beside the tub of margarine in her refrigerator. He wasn't really expecting an answer. He'd been calling her ever since he and Jonah had slept off their hospital hangovers, but the sight of her truck in the driveway had given him hope she was home. After glancing into all the downstairs rooms, he took the back steps to her den two at a time, but a fast trip through her house showed he had his hopes up for nothing. Still, her doors were typically unlocked and he hoped that meant she was at least still in the county even as he gritted his teeth at her carelessness over her own safety. The delicious aroma coming from her oven said she wasn't far away.
If he hadn't been coming down her front stairs, he'd probably never have considered answering her front door, but he responded like Pavlov's dogs to the sound of the bell, automatically reaching out to turn the knob and jerk open the recalcitrant door.
A woman wearing Sunday clothes on Saturday stood on the front porch, clutching an envelope in one hand and an ink pen in the other. Colton suppressed a groan, prepared to tell the strange lady he wasn't interested in attending her church.
"Oh, hello there," the well-dressed woman said, inspecting him avidly. The gold band on her left hand gleamed dully as she dropped her gaze to his package, and then brought it slowly back to his face. Why was it always the sinners that tried to convince you they were the saints? "Are you Lila's… son?" the woman asked.
Colton knew damn well he didn't look that young; he had almost a decade on Charlie. He narrowed his gaze at the would-be-missionary, crossed his arms, and moved his head slowly from left to right. "No, but if I'm a real good boy, Lila lets me sleep with her," he informed the nosy wench, delighted when her face turned the shade of the fuchsia crepe myrtles beginning to bloom along the side of Lila's house.
"Ah, my apologies, she, um… well, she mentioned a son… I had no idea," the woman tripped over her tongue, to Colton's not-so-secret delight. "Anyway, is Lila home?"
Again, he moved his head from left to right silently.
Pulling herself together, the woman drove her pen into the light brown hair above her ear and stuck out a hand. "I'm Mina Richards, Lila's realtor. I brought her listing contract back, and if you could please ask her to sign it in the places with the bright red arrows, I'd sure appreciate it. It's kind of important, I already have people scheduled to come and view the house."
Realtor. Colton blinked.
Oh, shit.
His heart hit the hardwood in her foyer as he realized Lila was selling her house, and he had just been unbelievably rude to her sales agent.
He tried to repair the damage. "I'm Colton De Marco. It's a pleasure to meet you." He shook the proffered hand. "I'll be sure she gets the contract, Mrs. Richards." Mina didn't offer to budge from the porch and he knew he should try to make some kind of amends. "Sorry to be so blunt, sometimes Lila complains of the solicitations she gets to go to church, and—" He was now as flustered as Mina had been moments before.
"No problem," Mina laughed, still holding onto the envelope, "it was a stupid thing to say. You're too old to be her son, of course." Her smile became wide and genuine. "And no need to apologize, if I was sleeping with a guy as good-looking as you, I might rent a billboard. It would be faster than telling the world one person at a time."
Colton had to laugh as he tugged the envelope from her hand, thinking of the old joke his dad used to make about the three fastest ways to tell the word something, telegraph, telephone, and tell a woman.
People could go straight to hell if they thought Lila hadn't grieved for Pete long enough, but he was through waiting. She was his and today, he planned to make sure she knew that. He'd be delighted to tell the world they were together one person at a time.
Mina Richards turned to leave, but she stopped at the bottom of the steps and looked back at him. "Remind her she promised to get that ramp dismantled as soon as possible. Is there any chance it could be gone before tomorrow?"
"There's every chance," he assured Mina, whipping his cell phone out of his pocket and hitting the speed dial on his phone. He needed to get in Lila's good graces before she heard this story, never mind the damage control he had to do from the night before. Her check was in his back pocket, and while they were gonna have words about that, there was no way she could object to him and his brothers doing some manual labor.
Before he closed the front door, he returned Mina's friendly wave as she finished planting the "For Sale" sign in the center of Lila's front yard. "Get hold of Eric, have him meet us here at Lila's and bring a couple of drills and a socket set along with that pressure washer," he barked at Dan.
He hadn't gotten to the kitchen before the doorbell rang again.
He was laughing as he jerked open the door, wondering what Mina had forgotten to say, but his smile faded. The man in the three-piece suit held a dozen roses. He checked out Colton's jeans, boots, and white tank top with a disdainful look while Colton tried to place the familiar face. "Oh, I see the rent boy is here."
Colton never thought twice as he drove his fist solidly into the face of the smug bastard who'd turned down Eric's loan application. "We're changing banks first thing Monday morning," he grimly assured Van Westbrook as he drove his shoulder into the man's generous middle. They rolled into the grass and Colton straddled his chest, driving his fist into the banker's face again as Mina's sedan came to a full stop in the road in front of the house. Another punch, this one to the gut, powered with his pent-up frustration from not being able to hit Reggie, with his anger about judgmental people who felt a blue-collar guy like him wasn't good enough for Lila, with all those who dared judge Lila for the length of time she grieved over Pete. "For your information, Lila would rather have pink roses, you fat fuck." He rolled off the banker and stood up, glaring angrily as the man spat blood and threatened to sue as he doubled up and got to his knees. "Get the hell off Lila's property before I have you arrested for trespassing."
"Yep, we're changing banks, all right." Colton whirled to see Eric planted like an oak tree in the grass beside him, anger painting his brother's expression into a dangerous landscape. "C, you need some help taking out the trash?"
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Lila's heart began to beat hard as she recognized the trucks lining her driveway. Flinging open the car door before Amy came to a full stop, she struggled to grab her flea market goodies from under her feet. "The red one is Colton's," she answered Amy's quizzical look, grinning broadly as Amy crowed her "I-told-you-so's." The black one with the dark tint on the windows and the camper cover belonged to Daniel. The sporty silver four-wheel drive backed up on the grass behind her house was Eric's, but she had no idea why they were here. Music blared from Eric's truck. Lila dodged the wide assortment of side mirrors as she wound her way through the frozen traffic in her driveway, while Amy popped her trunk to get the watermelon.
Lila stepped down onto the back walk, eager to find out whether Colton had brought his brothers fishing or perhaps had decided to organize a barbeque. She was equally anxious to hear what Dr. Ellis had said about Jonah's arm. Turning the corner, she skidded to a stop, her eyes rounding more with shock than surprise behind her sunglasses.
Daniel knelt at the top of the ramp, shirtless in the late-May heat, a sheen of sweat highlighting his sculpted frame. His upper arms were huge and corded as he efficiently worked a drill that looked like a toy against his massive chest. Eric had his back to her but had ditched his shirt also. A drill dangled from his right hand as he tilted a beer can to his lips with the other.
"Dear Lord, what a view." She heard Amy sigh lustily as she felt the watermelon hit her in the back, but not as hard as the sight of what Colton and his brothers were doing.
Colton's lips moved as he mouthed the words to the song that was playing. He too, was bare-chested. A chrome-plated ratchet flashed in his hands as he worked on the bolts that held the handrail onto the ramp. Jonah stood in the back of Eric's truck, stacking the boards against the truck cab as they were handed to him.
This was wrong.
Lila raised her voice to be heard over the music and the drill. "Stop! Please, everybody stop. I can't let you do this."
Colton's expression was as dark as the storm clouds beginning to gather over the pond as he sat back on his heels in the grass, but the drill in Dan's hand fell mercifully silent. Eric stood closest to her at the foot of the ramp. Lila glared down at the bright orange cooler on the sidewalk even though she felt Colton's angry gaze as he rose to his feet.
"It's bad enough I have this damn check in my pocket we need to discuss, but now you're telling me you don't need my help to take this ramp apart?" Colton's anger lifted his voice so she had no trouble hearing him above the blaring country music.
"Gonna put the watermelon right here on the sidewalk," Amy said hastily. "Call me later."
"It's not some party. You're ripping apart something of Pete's."
Lila knew this was bad, to tell the man she'd just realized she loved he couldn't help her. But he couldn't help her. She had to do this alone. Easing the bag with her flea market finds to the ground beside the melon, she muttered a good-bye to Amy. Jerking open the door to Eric's truck, she leaned inside to turn off the music, trying to figure out how to make him understand.
She straightened and had eyes only for Colton as she began to speak.
"I picked out Pete's casket and the suit he was buried in, and I stood in the cemetery until the last wreath was placed over his grave, regretting I wasn't in the ground by his side. I agonized over what to put on his marker and which one to buy, and months later, as I knelt to brush the dirt from the bronze the day it was installed, and I wished it was my name engraved instead of his. A month after that, I gave away his clothes, but I inhaled his scent and I cried as I drove them all the way to Greenville to donate, so I wouldn't be blindsided by some strange man wearing one of Pete's suits or one of his ties, because by then, I thought I just might survive his loss, but only if I didn't have too many unexpected reminders of him."
She swallowed hard as she noted the way his jaw was working. "I've done it all, in the name of moving on, but taking apart this ramp feels like the last step I have to make in order to take apart my life with Pete. I don't know if that makes any sense to you, but this is important to me." And, before she chickened out, she added, "I love you for wanting to help me, but I have to do this alone." She dared to say more, begging him with her eyes to understand as she pushed her sunglasses to the top of her head. "I can't let you do this. My hand to God, Colton, I'd do the same if it were something of yours, if the worst happens and you—"
The broad chest she was suddenly pressed against wasn't Colton's.
How could Eric look so much like him and yet smell so different?
She wondered inanely as he squeezed the breath out of her.
"After Dad died, I must have punched out every mechanic we hired and put in his bay, for no reason. And for months I yelled at these guys if one of them so much as dropped one of his tools," he muttered into her ear. "Lila, I hear what you're saying, but ask yourself this. If taking down this ramp is a part of burying him for you, well, we liked Pete, to the last man, every one of us did. Can't you think of us as pallbearers? Making your back ache won't ease the one in your heart, honey."
Colton was moving now, pulling her away from Eric, hugging her fiercely, but seeming to get that this wasn't the time for declarations. "Let us get this done before it rains, Delilah." He kissed her, just a touch of his lips to hers, the look in his eyes tender now as he tucked a stray curl behind her ear. "Then, we'll talk. We'll talk all night if you want. Jonah needs some quality time with his uncles anyway."
Her world went a little sideways as his arm suddenly went under her knees, lifting her into his arms. He made the few steps to the back of Eric's truck and sat her down. His thumb brushed away the tears she hadn't known had fallen.
While she sat there debating, because it felt as if there was still something wrong about taking their help, Daniel rose to his feet, his handsome face solemn. Picking up his shirt off the rail, he pulled it over his head then began tucking it into his dark green work pants. A small gesture, made large by the sweltering late-afternoon heat and the pressing humidity from the brewing thunderstorm. Silently, Eric poured out his beer and put away the cooler, tossing Colton his shirt off the side of the truck before jerking his own over his head.
She nodded, too choked up to speak, as Jonah knelt by her side while Colton shrugged his t-shirt on. The kiss Jonah pressed to her cheek was as awkward as it was sweet.
She kept her vigil, her arm around Jonah, from the tailgate of Eric's truck, tears softening her vision as she watched the De Marco clan dismantle Pete's bridge to the world.
* * * *
Lila turned her attention to dinner preparations after she signed the real estate listing contract, pleased to have finally taken the step she'd so often contemplated in the last couple of months. She eyed the recipe for peach cobbler as she peeled and sliced the fresh peaches from the flea market. She followed the recipe carefully and placed the dessert in the oven to bake, double checking the freezer to be sure she had ice cream, smiling as she listened to the sound of the power washer scouring the mildew off the steps that had been hidden from the sun for so long.
Just as she got the table set, hungry males tromped in through the back door, each one careful, she noted with amazement, to wipe their feet before stepping onto her kitchen floor.
Her eat-in kitchen wasn't a small room, but it seemed to shrink from all the massive bodies hovering. "Sit down," she begged. "It's ready and you're underfoot." She enlisted Jonah's aid to fill the glasses with ice and place them on the table, noting he immediately filled his own with sweet tea, no longer bothering to whine for soda.
* * * *
Colton tried to enjoy the meal. It was delicious, he was sure, but thoughts about the check in his pocket prevented him from appreciating it as Jonah and his brothers were doing. He wanted to wring her pretty neck as badly as he wanted to kiss it. And, he had no idea what she'd say when she heard about the fight, much less what he'd said to her realtor.
Mostly, he disliked the fact she felt she needed to pay him back. Even the meal was a sort of payback.
Why was she so damn independent?
He stewed as he ate, noting the amused glances he kept getting from Eric, as well as the confused ones Lila sent him.
Even the hot, homemade peach cobbler and ice cream didn't soothe him, but it had Eric and Dan groaning as Lila set the bowls before them, though he noted they didn't turn the dessert down.
"How are we supposed to stay awake in the movie now?" Eric demanded, mentioning the plan Jonah hatched after hearing he was spending the night with E. "Come on, squirt, let me and your poor Uncle Dan off the hook tonight. We'll go to the movies tomorrow afternoon. I'm so full I'm going to fall asleep the minute the lights go down."
"No way," Jonah said, his face falling as he tried to decide if Eric was serious. "You both promised." He looked anxiously from Eric to Dan.
"You're going to the movie, Jonah," Colton assured him with a speaking look to Daniel and E. "Just elbow them if they start to snore. Whatever they miss, they can see later on DVD."
The brothers thanked her profusely for the meal. She gave them a wistful smile and thanked them for their help with the ramp, then said, "In all the years I was part of the Walker clan, I never got to establish my own family traditions, and everyone went out of their way to let me know I could do cleanup instead of making a dish to bring. If you guys are brave enough to eat my cooking on a regular basis, maybe we can do this more often?"
All three brothers stared at her, then each other. Hell, they didn't have any family traditions, certainly none centering around a woman who wanted to feed all of them on a regular basis. The woman who should have done that walked away without a backward glance, and their sister, stuck with the chore as the only female in the household, had followed on her heels as soon as possible. Their idea of Christmas dinner was throwing steak on the grill together.
Colton felt his anger shrivel to nothing as he saw the stunned looks on his brothers' faces. "I doubt you could keep them away, Lila."
"Well, I damn sure ain't coming back," Daniel said calmly. "Not if you really expect us to deposit your check, Lila." Colton took the cue and began his objections about her payment.
Eric started laughing. "Just shut up and somebody tear the thing in half. I'll play guinea pig any time you want, Lila. You're a good cook in my book. And for the record, none of us had a problem with what Colton did to your truck on the company time and dime, if that's what you were thinking."
"I just didn't want to be a problem," she explained. "I'm an only child, so I was kind of surprised by some of the ways family fights got started with the Walkers. Taking something for free was a great way to go through some real misery after the fact. Half the time, paying was just as bad. It's important to me not to cause a problem between you three."
"All we had growing up was each other, Lila," Colton added, truly touched she'd been worried about coming between him and his brothers and not trying to prove her independence, as he'd feared. He didn't miss the olive branch Eric had extended, or the way she'd accepted it. "Something like that isn't going to come between us." Bolder now, he added, "They'd never have a problem with me taking care of my woman." He sighed. "But you might have a problem when you hear about the way I punched out a visitor you had today."
"That insufferable bastard," Lila cried, her blue eyes flashing angrily when Colton finished the tale about Van Westbrook and his damn roses. "I tried to get his advice on how to invest the insurance money, and he dragged me off to lunch under the pretense of talking investments, when all he really did was look down my shirt while he asked me to play golf."
Colton grinned at the way she said "golf," using a tone he'd have reserved for crotch crickets. Van and his red roses knew nothing about the woman he loved.
"I helped," Eric added. "I put his roses in the trash after I put him in his car."
"Movie," Jonah reminded his uncles, oblivious to the undercurrents in the room. "Starts in twenty minutes. Can we go now?" Before Colton could reprimand him, he added, "Sure was good, Lila, thanks. Let's go, huh?"
"We got cleanup next time, Lila," Daniel assured her gruffly as the three of them stood to leave.
"I thought that was what kids were for," Lila said with a wink to Jonah to soften the blow, earning a big laugh from all three brothers at the way their nephew turned in his tracks to see if she was kidding. Colton couldn't swallow his last bite when he saw the kid throw his arms around her. Lila returned the fierce hug, and she kissed the top of his head.
"If I got to sit through this movie instead of finishing off that cobbler, he gets my turn too," Eric taunted, ruffling Jonah's hair when Lila let him go. E looked at Colton hopefully. "Don't suppose you're planning on saving us any leftover cobbler?"
"Not a chance, bro," Colton shot back triumphantly as he stood to start clearing the table. "I plan to have the rest of it for breakfast." Hopefully, in bed with Lila.
"Let's take it to your house, then," Lila said as the door closed behind them. Thunder rolled as the first drops of rain began to strike the window behind her kitchen table. "It's supposed to rain all day tomorrow, too. I was thinking how nice it would be to read on your patio or maybe set up a jigsaw puzzle the three of us could do, since my usual Sunday activity will be a rainout."
She was taking that last step, he realized joyously, volunteering to stay overnight and hang around when Jonah was home, the final "outing" of their relationship she'd avoided. He decided to push his luck, and to stall having to tell her about what he'd said to the realtor. "I'll clean up the kitchen. You get stuff together for two nights, stuff you can leave at my place. I'll bring you back Monday morning."