“So, what, you gather around a piano and sing carols?” He raised a skeptical eyebrow.
“Yes.” She realized belatedly that there was music coming from inside the pool house. She’d never heard him playing music before. “What are you listening to?”
“A band Esme turned me on to.”
“Wait. What?”
“She told me this band had a grumpy lead singer with a PhD who wrote, and I’m quoting here, ‘pretentious but stupidly compelling songs.’ She said I’d like them.” He shrugged. “She was right. I have to say, I think music criticism might be exactly her thing.”
Blair didn’t know whether to be tickled or annoyed that her kid and her surly literary genius houseguest were communicating without her as an intermediary. She decided not to worry about it, to quit while she was ahead. “Well, OK. I’ll see you Friday, then.”
“Come in and watch the last episode ofThe Bearwith me.”
“Now?”
“Yes.” She hesitated, and he added, “Come on. You’ve left me hanging for weeks.”
“About that…”
“It’s OK. You’ve been busy.”
She had not been busy.
“Come in, though. Let’s finish it off.”
What harm could it do? It was well after dinner. There would be no dishes to worry about. What was the worst that could happen? She might refold a quilt or two?
“You could have watched it without me.”
“I would never do that,” he said, and something in her chest fluttered.
“You just need me as an excuse to watch TV.”
“Yeah, yeah.” He reached out and towed her inside. When his hand made contact with her forearm, the chest fluttering ramped up. But it was a good kind of fluttering, not the kind of fluttering that heralded the cyclone. His hand was so warm.
“Do your hands ever get cold?”
“No.” He tugged a little more, and they were over the threshold. “Come and watch TV with me and I’ll warm you up.” He froze in place for a moment before letting go of her. “I don’t mean that like it sounded.”
She cracked up. “Don’t worry. I’m still stuck on the first part of what you said.TheJack Branksome begging me to…” She lowered her voice as if imparting a great secret. “Watch TV with him.”
“I wouldn’t saybegging.” He closed the door behind her.
“Pleading.”
“Suggesting.”
“Beseeching.”
“Proposing.”
“Entreating.” She had missed himsomuch. Missed bantering with him. Missed this feeling of… unkinking she got when she was hanging out with him.
He laughed. “You win. Blair, I amentreatingyou to come inside and watch TV with me.”
They’d been standing in the entryway. In a parody of noblesse oblige, she said, “If you insist,” and laid her hand on his forearm as if she were a queen gracing him with her favor.
He winced. “Jesus, woman, do you have ice water in your veins?”
