CHAPTER ELEVEN

      JESSICA DID SEEM to be able to feel all those things he had never been able to say, because instead of slapping his hand away, she leaned into it, and then covered it with her own, and closed her eyes. She sighed, and then opened her eyes, and it seemed to him it was with reluctance she put his hand away from her.

      And so they went into the house together and paused in the doorway.

      “Wow, does that stink,” Jessica said. She went and grabbed a couple of dish towels off the oven handle. “We need these over our faces, not that I can tie them.”

      Kade took the towels from her and tied one over the bottom half of her face and one over his.

      “Is mine manly?” he asked. “Or did I get the one with the flowers on it?”

      He saw her eyes smile from under her mask. Now Jessica was in an ugly dress and had her face covered up. But the laughter still twinkled around the edges of her eyes, and it made her so beautiful it threatened to take his breath away far more than the toxic cloud of odor in the room.

      Firmly, Kade made himself turn from her, and aware he looked ridiculous, like an old-time bandito, surveyed the damage to the living room.

      All that was left of the sander bag was ribbons of charred fabric. They were still smoking, so he went over and picked up the sander and threw it out the front door, possibly with a little more force than was necessary. It hit the concrete walkway and pieces shot off it and scattered.

      “That gave me a manly sense of satisfaction,” Kade said, his voice muffled from under the dish towel. He turned back into the room.

      The smile deepened around her eyes. How was this that they had narrowly averted disaster, and yet it felt good to be with her? It was as if a wall that had been erected between them was showing signs of stress, a brick or two falling out of it.

      There was a large scorch mark on the floor where the sander had been, and a black ugly film shining with some oily substance coated the floor where he had thrown the water. The smoke had belched up and stained the ceiling.

      “I think the worst damage is the smell,” Kade said. “It’s awful, like a potent chemical soup. I don’t think you’re going to be able to stay here until it airs out a bit.”

      “It’s okay. I’ll get a hotel.”

      “You’re probably going to have to call your insurance company. The smell is probably through the whole house. Your clothes have probably absorbed it.”

      “Oh, boy,” she said, “two claims in one week. What do you suppose that will do to my premiums?” And then she giggled. “It’s a good thing the furniture is on the lawn. It won’t have this smell in it. Do you think I’m going to have to repaint?”

      “You don’t have to go to a hotel,” he said. “I’ve got lots of room.”

       Son, I say, son, what are you doing?

      She hesitated. There was a knock at the door.

      “Pizza,” they said together.

      * * *

      Jessica contemplated what she was feeling as Kade looked after the pizza delivery. He cocked his head slightly at her, a signal to look at the delivery boy, who was oblivious, earbuds in, head bobbing. He didn’t seem to even notice that he was stepping over a smoldering piece of machinery on the front walkway to get to the door. If he noticed the smell rolling out of the house, it did not affect his rhythm in any way.

      As they watched the pizza boy depart, she felt like laughing again. That was impossible! She’d had two disasters in one week. She should be crying, not feeling as if an effervescent bubble of joy was rising in her.

      Shock, she told herself. She was reacting to the pure shock of life delivering the unexpected. Wasn’t there something just a little bit delightful about being surprised?

      “Of course I can’t stay with you, Kade,” she said, coming to her senses, despite the shock of being surprised. “I’ll get a hotel room. Or I can stay with friends.”

      “Why don’t we go to my place and eat the pizza? You don’t make your best decisions on an empty stomach. We’ll figure it out from there.”

      Other than the fact it, once again, felt good to be known, that sounded so reasonable. She was hungry, and it would be better to look for a place to live for the next few days on a full tummy. What would it hurt to go to his place to have the pizza? She had to admit that she was curious about where Kade lived.

      And so she found herself heading for the borrowed truck, laughing at the irony of him carefully locking the door when all her furniture was still on the lawn. Except for her precious bench, which at the last moment, she made him load into the box of the truck, they just left everything there.

      She suspected leaving her furniture on the lawn was not nearly as dangerous as getting into that truck with him and heading toward a peek at his life.

      His condo building sat in the middle of a parklike setting in a curve in the Bow River. Everything about the building, including its prime nearly downtown location, whispered class, wealth and arrival. There was a waterfall feature in the center of the circular flagstone driveway. The building was faced in black granite and black tinted glass, and yet was saved from the coldness of pure modern design by the seamless blending of more rustic elements such as stone and wood in the very impressive facade.

      A uniformed doorman came out when Kade pulled up in front of the posh entryway to the building.

      “Hey, Samuel, can you park this in the secured visitor area for me?”

      Kade came and helped her out of the truck, and she was aware of the gurgle of the waterfall sliding over rocks. Something in the plantings around it smelled wonderful. Honeysuckle?

      If the doorman was surprised to have a pickup truck to park among the expensive sports cars and luxury vehicles, it certainly didn’t show in his smooth features.

      “It’s underground,” Kade said to Jessica, when the truck had pulled away. “You don’t have to worry about your bench.”

      The truth was she was so bowled over by her surroundings, the bench had slipped her mind.

      Though the incredible landscape outside should have prepared her for the lobby, she felt unprepared. The entryway to the building was gorgeous, with soaring ceilings, a huge chandelier and deep distressed-leather sofas grouped around a fireplace.

       No wonder he had never come home.

      “Wow,” Jessica said, gulping. “Our little place must seem pretty humble after this. I can see why you were just going to give it to me.”

      Kade looked around, as if he was puzzled. “I actually didn’t pick the place,” he said. “The company owns several units in here that we use for visiting executives. One was available. I needed a place to go and we had one vacant. I rent it from the company.”

      She cast him a glance as they took a quiet elevator up to the top floor. He really did seem oblivious to the sumptuous surroundings he found himself in. Once off the elevator, Kade put a code into the keyless entry.

      “It’s 1121,” he said, “in case you ever need it.”

      She ducked her head at the trust he had in her—gosh, what if she barged in when he was entertaining a girlfriend?—and because it felt sad that she knew she would never need it. Well, unless she did stay for a couple of days until the disaster at her place was sorted.

      Already, she realized with wry self-knowledge, her vehement no to his invitation was wavering.

      Maybe that wasn’t so surprising. Kade was charming, and he could be lethally so.