Me Without You. Jessica Bird

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СКАЧАТЬ bedside. Where she’d touched his body. Where she’d watched him move. Where he’d—

      Get a grip.

      Well, she’d sure had one last night….

      Cass shut her eyes, wondering if anyone else in the room had noticed the floor was weaving underfoot.

      “Cassandra, I saw the way you looked at our house,” Frankie said. “You’re perfect for this project.”

      Cass shook herself to attention and sensed Alex’s eyes narrowing on her. She had a feeling he wouldn’t appreciate her working on his family’s home.

      “Why don’t the three of you talk it over,” she hedged. “I’ll go back to my office, check in with my partners, see what the schedule looks like. I know you’re going to want this project to move fast if you hope to open for the season in—when was it?”

      “June,” Frankie said. “If you started around the first of December, you’d have seven months.”

      Sean came back, Vuitton duffel bags and suitcases hanging off him like he was a bellboy.

      “I still can’t believe how much stuff you pack,” he said as he headed to the back door. “Gray, you sure you know what you’re in for, signing on for one of these fashion types?”

      “I’m buying a trolley,” the man said as he tucked his new wife under his arm.

      “Good idea. It’s either that or a back brace.” Sean shot Cass a wink as he went on by. “Now let’s do it, beautiful.”

      The assembled masses filed outside with Ernest leading the way. Libby went with them, no doubt to catch the dog before he tore off.

      Cass stayed behind, swallowing through a dry throat.

      She couldn’t leave without one last look at Alex.

      Lifting her eyes, she met his own. They were what she expected. Cool. Remote.

      “I hope everything goes well for you tomorrow at the doctor’s,” she said.

      He nodded once. “Thanks.”

      It’s you, Miracle. It’s truly you.

      Please. Touch me. Just once more.

      I love you….

      Who is your woman, she thought as she stared at him. And where is she when you’re going through this hell? Why are you alone now?

      She cleared her throat. “Look, I don’t want you to feel awkward about saying no. You know, about me working on your family’s house. I wanted to give you an out, which was why I suggested—”

      “I’m a big boy. If I don’t like something, I’m perfectly capable of letting people know it.”

      “Oh, of course.” As if she needed a reminder that he didn’t like women who mothered him.

      “Something else on your mind, Cassandra?” he said softly.

      The back door opened. Sean put his head inside.

      “Yo, Cass. I’ve got a meeting at Rhodes Lewis this afternoon. We’ve got to move.”

      “On a Sunday?” she blurted.

      “You know me, twenty-four seven. Come on, woman.” The door banged shut.

      When she looked back at Alex, she was glad she was leaving. His eyes had turned dangerous.

      “Better run along,” he drawled. “Your friend’s obviously the impatient type.”

      The word friend was pronounced more like lover, she thought. And his disapproval would have freeze-dried an open flame.

      He obviously thought she was seeing Sean, and that it was way too soon after Reese’s death for her to be with another man, but she wasn’t going to waste time correcting the misconception. Given his tight face, she wasn’t going to change his mind without working him over with a chisel and a hammer.

      “Goodbye, Alex,” she whispered.

      He said nothing.

      As she left the house, she was quite convinced she was never going to see him again.

      Somehow the pain of the loss was stunning.

      Chapter Five

      A month later Alex stared out of the workshop’s picture window and measured the milky sky. Snow was coming over the weekend and it wasn’t going to be the picturesque, flurry variety. This was going to be a shut-in special, the kind of load that would bring out the county plows that were as big as houses and sounded like thunder when they went by.

      God, he loved the north. There was real weather up here.

      He shifted his eyes. The lake down below was the color of a dove, mostly gray with paler blushes on the tips of restless waves. The mountains were likewise subdued, their rock faces revealed now that the leaves were off the trees. December wasn’t so much dour at Saranac Lake as muted, and he liked the rugged isolation of the place. No tourists, no seasonal fruitcakes. Just the hard-core natives and Mother Nature. Bliss.

      He frowned, wondering whether Cassandra would like all the quiet. Probably not. She lived a fast, flashy life in Manhattan, and was always showing up in the New York Times style section and Vanity Fair, or at least that was what Reese had said. A woman like her wouldn’t want to be stuck in a house with a blazing fire and nothing to do but make love and watch the snow fall.

      Alex drove his cane into the floor and limped over to the bathroom. On the way, he picked up a PowerBar, his third of the day. As he got up on his scale, he ripped back the wrapper and took a hunk out of the thing.

      202 pounds. Up from an all-time low in the hospital of 186.

      Good. This was good.

      He grabbed for his cane, not having to reach far for it. The shop’s bathroom was about the size of a closet.

      Stepping off the scale, he gently eased his full weight onto his left leg. The limb responded with a shot of pain and he backed off, looking down at it. The plaster cast had been replaced with a plastic one that had Velcro straps. Talk about improvements in quality of life. Even a half hour without the thing on was heaven.

      He finished the PowerBar and tossed the wrapper.

      A nine-pound gain in four weeks. Maybe his pants would stop hanging off his hips soon.

      At six-four, he liked to weigh in at around 230. His big frame carried that kind of poundage well, all thick muscle, no fat. He figured it was going to take him three months to get back there if he gained two to three pounds a week. Which was doable. Every day, he was sucking back about five thousand calories. It was a lot to ask of the hot plate and dorm-size refrigerator he’d moved into the shop, but he was managing.

      Man, he couldn’t imagine Cassandra putting up with such a rudimentary kitchen. She’d want gourmet food for dinner. СКАЧАТЬ