A Place Called Home Page 36

  Mitch’s cheeks puffed slightly as he exhaled. “Yeah.” He finger raked his hair. “She said that to me, too.”

  “And did you tell her she was too young?”

  Had he? “I don’t know. I might have said something about the age difference.”

  “I think she’s heard a lot of that.”

  “It’s a fact,” Mitch said. “More fact than your feeling stuff.”

  “Feeling stuff?” Thea bristled. “You weren’t sitting with her last night while she sobbed into her hands. You didn’t watch her go through the motions of getting ready for bed on autopilot. Her heart’s breaking, Mitch. That feeling stuff is as real as it gets.”

  Mitch set down his coffee cup and held up his hands, palms out. “All right. It’s real. But so is the age difference. For cryin’ out loud, Thea, when I was seeing her, she didn’t know Don McLean’s “American Pie” from American Pie the movie.”

  “Well, don’t just sit there!” She pointed upstairs. “She’s in the guest room. Take her out and shoot her.”

  Sighing, Mitch slid forward in his chair, stretching his long legs under the table and jamming his hands in his pockets. He shook his bowed head slightly. “Okay, I don’t believe I said that either.” He darted her a sideways glance, his sheepishness not feigned. “You’re not packin’ heat, are you?”

  Thea held up her index finger, cautioning him. “No, but the steak knives are within easy reach. Don’t tempt me.”

  He nodded. Mitch pushed his heels against the ceramic tile floor and tipped his chair back on two legs. “What do you think I should have done when Gina told me, Thea? I take it that’s where we are right now. You have some opinion of what I was supposed to do.”

  “Yes,” she said, “I think you should have told me.”

  “Even though she asked me not to say anything to anyone. Did she tell you that?”

  “I got that impression.”

  “It was not an impression that was given to me,” he said, dropping the chair back to all fours. “It was a clear request to keep a secret and I gave my word.”

  Thea was silent for a moment. “I know,” she said quietly. “But can you appreciate what it was like hearing it from her?”

  Mitch’s brow creased. “It’s Gina’s news,” he said, watching Thea closely. She had the oddest expression on her face. The anger she professed to have didn’t appear to be in danger of exploding at all. She had it perfectly contained, ready to implode on her. What in God’s name had she been telling herself? “Why shouldn’t it have come from Gina?”

  Thea’s smile was slight. “Because I wasn’t prepared to hear it.” She walked over to the table and finally sat down in the chair closest to him. “And because she wasn’t prepared to tell it in a way that made any sense. I didn’t sleep much last night, thinking about our conversation, trying to give what I’d heard some sort of logic or rationale. Maybe if I had been able to talk to you before I sat down with her”—Thea shrugged—“that might have helped. You might have said what I needed to hear to put the pieces in place sooner.”

  “I tried to explain about that, Thea. I’m sorry you couldn’t reach me or that I didn’t—”

  She waved his apology aside. “I know. You don’t have to be connected to me, Mitch. That’s not what I’m asking from you. We’ve gotten so used to the Net and cell phones and immediate accessibility that self-reliance is an afterthought, not the first choice. At least I have. I realized some of that when I had to make the presentation at work in front of my father. I tried Rosie. You. I called my counselor. None of you were available. I had a Valium in my hand that I found in my desk drawer and I was thinking I was a smart woman who knew her limits and why not take it with a whiskey chaser.”

  “Oh, Thea ... you never said—”

  She couldn’t quite meet his eyes. “Yeah. Well, I was ashamed by how close I’d come and I was afraid it would scare you off.”

  Mitch leaned forward in his chair and took Thea’s hands in his. “I told you before, there’s a difference between scaring me and scaring me off.”

  She nodded, swallowing hard. “I’m starting to get that part.” She lifted her eyes to him again. His hands made a pocket around hers. They were warm and strong and Thea didn’t make an attempt to slip free. “I didn’t take the pill, Mitch, though it was a narrow thing. I ended up asking Mrs. A. to call my dad in and I gave it to him, along with a piece of my mind.”

  “And?”

  “And he listened to me. He probably only understood a third of what I said or was attempting to say, but he listened, and later I realized I wouldn’t have tried talking to him if anyone else had been available. It wasn’t that I would have just missed an opportunity, Mitch. It was that I wouldn’t have seen one.”

  “Okay,” he said slowly. “And that’s like last night, how?”

  She sighed and gave him a small, half smile. “Boy, I’m really going to have to connect the dots for you, aren’t I?”

  “Only if you want me to have the same picture as you.”

  “All right. Last night, after Gina finished telling me everything she could, in her own jumbled sort of way—and I couldn’t reach you—I had to work it out for myself. I kept thinking about what she’d said. The suggestion of abortion. Adoption. The problem with the age difference. No offer of marriage. Not using a condom. Saying I love you. The timeline of all of it.” Thea pressed her lips together momentarily as she considered whether she’d said it all. Deciding she had, she went on. “Some of it fit; some of it didn’t.”

  “Fit what?”

  Thea connected the last two dots. “You.”

  Mitch pushed backward so hard he almost tipped the chair. It wobbled as he leaped to his feet. “Me?!”

  “That’s why you should have told me,” Thea said, unapologetic. “Then I wouldn’t have thought for even a moment that you were the baby’s father.”

  “Me?!” He pointed at his chest in the event she thought there was some other me in the room. “You thought it was me?!”

  “I don’t think it was you now. I told you, I worked it out. That was my point about not being able to reach you. It forced me to think for myself.”

  “But you thought it was me.”

  “At first.” Some of her exasperation was revealed in her voice. “I’m not proud of it, Mitch. I’ve been thinking that I should have trusted you more.”

  “You should have trusted me. Period.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Maybe?” Agitated, he plowed his fingers through his hair. “Jesus, Thea, I just told you I loved you.”

  “I know. And then I didn’t hear anything from you for more than twenty-four hours—and that was because I called you. It started to feel more like a hit-and-run than a declarative sentence.”

  “A declarawhat? Who talks like that?”

  Her chin came up. “I do.”

  “Well, stop it. I can’t argue if you’re going to get all polysyllabic on me.”

  Thea stared at him.

  He stared back.

  She broke first. A smile lifted the corners of her mouth a mere fraction.

  His grin flashed like quicksilver.

  “You want to sit down?” she asked.

  “Yeah.” Mitch spun the chair around and sat on it backward, resting his forearms across the curved rail.

  Thea inched closer to Mitch and propped her feet on one of the rungs of his chair. Her robe split down the center of her thighs and revealed a lot of bare leg. She was aware of Mitch’s glance and the fact that she was self-conscious of it only in a good way. “Did you ever have a conversation with someone and you think you’re talking about exactly the same thing and you’re not at all?”

  He dragged his eyes back to her face. “I think I just did.” She was wearing little yellow panties and a cropped top under that frumpy robe. That wasn’t right.

  “No, you didn’t.” Her hair swung lightly against her temples as she shook her head. “What you and I just did was nothing compared to what
happened between Gina and me. She talked about the baby and the baby’s father and—”

  “She said I was her baby’s father?”

  “No. That’s just it. She never said who it was. I mean, I think she thought she was telling, but she never did. Not really. And I never exactly explained that I thought she was talking about you. So we just kept on talking about the baby and about the baby’s father and never using any names except a couple of times that confused things more than it helped.” Thea stopped to take a short breath. “It was like this big misunderstanding was unfolding and we had no way of knowing it.”

  “But you know it now,” Mitch said cautiously, feeling his way.

  “Yes! That’s what I’m saying here. What I’ve been saying. I wish it hadn’t taken me so long to figure it out.” She leaned forward and this time when she touched his forearm, she let her hand lie there. “But I don’t have any regrets about the process. It forced me to consider the one thing that I’ve been ducking these last few months.”

  “And that is ... ?”

  “That I’m in love with you.”

  Mitch’s heart slammed so hard against his chest that he thought he actually jerked in his chair. He looked down at himself, realized he was in exactly the same position he had been a moment before, and then returned his eyes to Thea. He heard himself say, “All because you thought I was the father of Gina’s baby?”

  “All because I figured out why you weren’t.”

  “Oh.”

  She smiled gently. “You don’t really understand, do you?”

  He shook his head. “No, but as long as one of us does.”

  “Yeah,” she whispered. “That works for me, too.” Thea closed the small distance that was separating them and kissed Mitch on the mouth. His lips were firm and dry. She moved over them warmly. They parted. She caught the upper one and tugged, came back and caught the lower one.

  Mitch’s hand curved around the back of her neck, under feathery strands of dark red hair. He held her to him. Returning the kiss. Hard. Sweet. Heat and tenderness. The corner of her mouth. The parenthetical dimple. He touched those with the tip of his tongue.

  They stood as one. Still holding her, Mitch shoved his chair aside. It toppled to the floor. He cupped her bottom, lifted, and set Thea on the table’s edge. She groped for the coffee cup and pushed it away. Her thighs parted and Mitch stepped between them, still kissing her. Changing the slant of his mouth, first one way, then another. She fumbled with her double-knotted belt. “It’s okay,” he whispered against her mouth. “You don’t have to take it off. Get mine.”

  Thea pulled at the cedar brown, leather weave belt at Mitch’s waist. The buckle opened. She undid the button on his khakis, then the fly. She plunged her hands into his briefs and cupped his cock and scrotum. He sucked in his breath and took hers with it. She drew back shakily, sipping air. He didn’t give her a chance to get much, bringing her right back to him, hard and needy. “Think we can get you out of these panties?” he asked.

  Think? She was counting on it. Thea lifted her bottom while he tugged on the skimpy material. They slid down her thighs. She squirmed, wriggled, and they dropped to her knees. One careful kick later and they were on the floor and Mitch was standing between her parted legs again. “Drop trou, buster,” she told him.

  He did. Thea scooted to the edge of the table. He pressed forward into the cradle she made for him. Her thighs tightened on his hips and her hand slipped between their bodies. She curled her fingers around him. He bent his knees, thrust, and then he was inside her. Thea gasped, caught her breath, then pressed her lips together. Her throat arched. She closed her eyes and her head fell back. Mitch’s mouth was against her neck, sliding toward her shoulder. The sleeve of her robe slipped over the curve of her arm. His hands came up from her waist and slipped under the thin, loose cotton crop top. He kneaded her breasts, made the nipples bud, made her flesh swell, made her bite her lower lip to keep from doing more than whimpering his name.

  The table shook. Neither of them noticed that the shudder was anywhere but in them. The vibrations carried Mitch’s coffee cup to the edge of the table where it finally fell. The crash barely registered.

  “Lie back,” he whispered hoarsely.

  “What?” She couldn’t focus.

  “Lie back.”

  She did. His hands grazed her ribs and abdomen. His thumb brushed her navel. Her skin retracted. He held her hips, plunging into her. Deep. Deeper. The crown of Thea’s head pressed against the unyielding oak. Her back lifted, arched. She found the edge of the table and gripped it with her fingertips. The sense of him inside her made her feel deliciously full. The pressure on her clitoris came and went and came again. There was a dizzying spiral of heat that spread out in all directions from the point of their joining. It widened as it turned, raising a flush that seeped under her skin, ratcheting pleasure up another notch.

  Mitch finally had to brace his arms on the table. He ground into her, pressing his hips hard. He spoke to her in short, rapid bursts, his words rising inarticulately from the back of his throat. “Go on,” he said. “Do it. I want to see you do it.”

  With a frustrated moan, Thea released the table with one hand and let it fall against her thigh. She barely had to move her fingers. He was pushing into her, making her body slide so that she caressed herself with no effort. Her fingertips walked down her inner thigh, then between the moist folds. She could feel the heat of his belly. When she looked up at him it was to find him looking down at them, their joining, her hand cupping herself intimately, her fingers moving, stroking, making herself come.

  “Aaaah.” She flung back her head again. “Aaah.” She panted, drawing a sweet breath. “Mmm ... Mitch.” Thea hummed his name and her pleasure at the same time and she thought she might faint.

  “Come with me,” he coaxed. “Let me feel you come.”

  Thea’s hips jerked. Her legs extended, stretched. She reached for him. Her fingers flowered open and she felt tension in his corded muscles. It was there, then it was gone. His shoulders heaved once. His hips moved shallowly. He groaned softly, his body trembling, then he was still.

  It was a couple of moments before Mitch’s breathing calmed. “Holy shit,” he said quietly.

  “Jar.”

  “Hmm?” He leaned over her, bracing his palms flat on either side of Thea’s waist.

  “Pay the jar.”

  “Later.” He bent, kissed her on the mouth, and straightened slowly. “What else are you serving for breakfast?”

  Thea’s laughter came in a staccato burst as she sat up. “Look at us, Mitchell. You just had me on my kitchen table. I’m going to have to buy a new one.”

  He was unrepentant. Stepping back, he pulled up his briefs and khakis, and tossed Thea her panties. “Nothing a little Shine and Shield won’t take care of.”

  “Hah! A lot you know.” She slid off the table. “It’s not for wood products.”

  “No one thought it was for cars either.” He tucked the tails of his shirt and fastened his belt. “So how did it go at Carver? Or can’t you tell me yet?”

  “I can tell you,” she said with a certain amount of sass. Thea smoothed her robe and adjusted the belt. Now that her fingers weren’t trembling she undid the knot and retied it easily. “But maybe I don’t want to.”

  “Hey.” He gave her a swat on the butt as she turned away. “I’m the guy that gave you the lucky shoes. I should get to know if they worked or not.”

  Thea gave him a big, over-the-shoulder grin. “They worked.”

  “No kidding.”

  “That’s right.” She went to the door that led to the garage to get a mop and dustpan. When she returned with both items she handed the mop to Mitch. “I’ll get the broken glass; you wipe up the coffee.”

  Mitch leaned on the mop handle. “So they really liked your ideas.”

  “Yep. I wasn’t expecting to hear one way or the other after we pitched them the ads.” She dropped some of the big shards in th
e dustpan, careful to keep her robe hem out of the coffee. “I thought I’d get some sense of their interest, maybe hear something in a week or two if we were lucky. They got us at JFK before we boarded and said they’d made their decision. Hank and I were working out the details all the way back. The rest of the Blue Team got stupid in business class.” Thea stood, emptied the dustpan in the trash under the sink and waved Mitch into action. “It was showing Carver what we could do with Shine and Shield that clinched it for us. They loved the product overlap. The car manufacturers get to show off their hot models and Carver shines them up. Shared advertising costs. A little back scratching. Everyone wins. Everyone’s happy.”

  Mitch spun the mop around, gave it a little Fred Astaire flourish, and sang, “Shine and Shield is the power I wield. I will never yield my Shine and Shield.”

  “Give it up, Baker. We’re not using it. Even the new stuff.”

  He shrugged. “Your loss.” He carried the mop over to the sink, wrung it out, then took the dustpan from Thea and returned both to the garage. When he got back to the table Thea had a fresh cup of coffee waiting for him.

  Thea opened her mouth to say something but snapped it shut when she heard footsteps pounding on the stairs. The sound was so loud, so deliberate, that there was no mistaking Gina meant to be noticed. Thea’s eyes flew to Mitch’s. “She heard us!” she whispered, tugging on his sleeve.

  It was easy for Mitch to remain unfazed when Thea was flushed from her neckline all the way to the roots of her hair. “She heard you,” he said. “I didn’t knock over the coffee cup or go off like a siren.”

  “I didn’t kn—” she began indignantly, and stopped because she saw he was trying to get a rise out of her. “Ooooh!”

  “Careful. She’ll think we’re at it again.” Chuckling, he swept his coffee cup off the table and pulled it close to his chest before she decided to upend it on his crotch. “Come on down, Gina!” He called back toward the hallway. “Coast’s clear.”