Chapter 15
The idea of friendship meant different things to different people. For Lainie and Aaron, friendship meant walks to the park in the afternoons, barbeques at the firestation, or raking leaves into piles only to do it again after an impromptu game of “You’re It.”
As the weeks of October passed by and Halloween drew closer, Lainie discovered an abundance of friends. After volunteering at the twins’ preschool one morning, she found out that their teacher, Ms. Dee, was the sister-in-law to her good friend, Tracy, from high school. After attending a fund raiser for the fallen heroes of the Fire Fighters Union, she learned that Aaron kept in contact with most of their high school buddies. And of course, after Dusty came to visit her that one day, the two of them got together on a regular basis, whether it was to go shopping or just hang out at Starbucks for a quick caffeine hit.
There wasn’t a weekend that went by in which her, the kids, and Aaron wasn’t together. They attended birthday parties, Little League football games, church functions, and school carnivals, or Lainie dropped the kids off at her mother’s house for the occasional Girls’ Night Out.
She was exhausted…and she loved it.
It felt so good to have a life again, away from home and her tedious job. It felt so good to be with other adults, who weren’t her mother, and it felt wonderful to laugh and smile again. Aaron was especially good at making her do that. He played Legos with Chris in the evenings while Lainie read The Frog Prince to Chloe. He dressed up in pink, frilly tutus and sat down with Chloe for her tea parties. He erected a clothes line in their backyard, cursing and muttering under his breath the whole time, when her dryer decided to crash and burn.
And during this whole time, it was only the rare moment when she saw him gazing at her and the children with such raw yearning that it scared her a little. But he kept his promise. There were no more secret kisses in her hallway. He seldom so much as held her hand or placed a guiding hand on her lower back.
Yet, with every touch, a zing of awareness shot through her body. Friendship was good. It was great, grand, and wonderful. However, there were times – mostly late at night when she couldn’t sleep – that she wished for more.
Unfortunately, more she couldn’t handle right now. The author, Mr. Xavier Quitman, of the non-fiction she’d been editing continued to complain about her corrections, saying that she wasn’t giving him the feel that he needed for the book. Which wasn’t her job. So, Lainie took the matter to Quitman’s agent, Marsha Townsend, a woman that Lainie had always admired for her no-nonsense attitude and quirky personality.
“I’m sorry, Marsha,” Lainie said over the phone one morning, “I can’t do much more with the manuscript without completely rewriting it. And if I do that, it won’t be his words, they’ll be mine.”
Marsha sighed heavily. “I know what you mean. I’ve read the thing, and I totally agree with you, but Xavier’s brother-in-law is one of our biggest clients. If we lose this deal, then we’ll lose Marcus.”
“Then have another editor do it. Maybe then, he’ll see that it’s not the my fault, but his,” Lainie countered.
Marsha hummed into the phone. “I suppose I can have Sheryl Montgomery look at it. She’s Marcus’ editor. If she says it’s crap, then they’ll have to realize that it is.”
“I appreciate that.”
Two days later, Xavier called her to fire her. Like she cared, but that meant she would only receive her retainer fee from the publisher rather than the whole amount. At this rate, she wondered how she could pay her rent, especially since the realtor dealing with the sale of her marital home was still dragging his feet.
When Aaron stopped by the next day and saw her pouring over her checkbook with a glum expression, he asked what was up. She felt she needed to talk to someone about it. Her mother only ragged on her to stop doing someone else’s work and write her own story. That was no help. When would she have time to do that? The five spare minutes she had before picking up the kids from preschool?
“I think your mother is right,” Aaron said when she spilled out her heart and tossed aside a pile of overdue bills. “You used to love to write. You won all kinds of contests in school. Why can’t you write your own stories?”
Lainie threw her hands up in the air on the verge of tears. “What am I going to write about? The mound of laundry you just stepped around? Or about the meatloaf I nearly burned last night because Chris and Chloe decided that markers looked great on my dining room wall? I don’t have the time, Aaron. The kids take up all my free time when they’re at home, and when they’re at school, I’m rushing around trying to catch up on chores and the grocery shopping and the numerous birthday parties and still volunteering at their preschool so I’m not one of those moms that just drop them off every other day for someone else to deal with.”
She dropped her head to her arms on the table and stifled the round of sobs that crawled up her throat. Aaron scooted a chair around to sit next to her.
“Lainie…look at me.”
She peeked at him through a curtain of her hair. He smiled, amused at her.
“You’re a great mom, and everybody sees that. Do I think you need to shirk your parental duties to pursue a career? Hell, no. Do I think you need to stop doing someone else’s dirty work because they’re too lazy to use the spellchecker on their computer? Absolutely. So, I guess the real question is, what do you want to do, Lainie Moon? What would make you happy?”
You…in more ways than I can have you.
“I want my kids to be happy,” she started to say, but as soon as she said the word kids, Aaron frowned at her and glared.
“I’m not talking about Chris and Chloe. What about you?”
She averted her gaze, staring at the wood grain patterns of her dining room table. “I don’t know,” she muttered, a complete lie. To write. There was a time when she had more stories wandering around in her head than she had paper to write them down on. But over time, like her marriage, her aspirations took a backseat to her children. It galled her to know that the two most beautiful, tiny persons in the world changed her world…her life, her dreams, her ability to love a man again.
Why couldn’t she have all that and still be the mom she was today? Other women accomplished that in their lives. What was wrong with her to not be able to do the same?
Aaron leaned over and rested his face inches from her own. “You do know,” he said softly. “Do you want to write, Lainie? Are there any brilliant ideas up there anymore? Or has your creative juices run dry?”
Lainie snorted, but she smiled back at him. “I suppose I’d like to have a career in writing stories, but I just can’t think of a way to do that. I can barely pay my rent right now.”
Something sharp and guarded crossed his features. “Has your rent gone up?”
“No,” she sighed. “But I didn’t get my total editing fee from this last project, so I’m a little short. I’ll just have to call Mom and ask for another small loan, as much as I really hate doing that.”
“How much do you need?”
Her eyes fastened to his. “No…don’t even think about it, Aaron. I might have an issue borrowing from my mother, but that’s nothing compared to borrowing from someone else not of my family.”
He smirked at her. “Not even your best friend?”
“Not even him,” she answered tartly, but added a gentle smile.
“Okay, fine,” he huffed, rising back up to look down at her. She lifted her head and leaned back in her chair. “You won’t take my money; then at least let me help you in other ways. What else can I do?”
Lainie sighed. “I appreciate your offer, Aaron, but my main problem is time right now. I’m a single mom—“
“And a damn good one.”
She rolled her eyes at his interruption. “Unless you’ve got a time machine in your pocket, I don’t see how much you can help me. The kids go to preschool three days a week. Those are the times I get caught up on the chores, and I can’t afford to put them in five days a week even if I wanted to. I love having them here with me. Next year, they’ll be off to kindergarten, so I want as much time with them as I can. There’s just no way around it. That’s the reason I’m freelancing for the publisher. So I can spend more time with Chloe and Chris before they’re off to big school and forget all about their mama.”
“They’ll never forget about you,” Aaron declared. “How could they? We spent all those years apart, you and I, and I never forgot about you.” He tugged on a strand of her hair. “You’ve got one of those faces…unforgettable.”
“And you’ve got one of those mouths…full of it,” she retorted, but inside, she was immensely pleased with his flattery.
Aaron slapped his palms on the table. “I’ll tell you what. I’ll babysit. Since I’m just across the street, they’ll be close to you and can come home if they get to missing you bad enough.”
Lainie blinked at him. That’s so sweet… “No, I couldn’t ask you to do that. Besides, that defeats the whole ‘I want to spend time with them’ argument.”
“One day a week,” he compromised. “I’ll keep them busy for a couple of hours one day a week and see how that works…only if you promise to spend that time working on your own stories.”
She shook her head at him. “You’ll be giving up your days off for that. I just can’t allow you to do that, Aaron.”
“I already spend my days off with you,” he pointed out with a teasing grin. “So, I’ll be alone with two four-year-old hellions…how hard can that be?”
Lainie laughed out loud. “Just for that, I’m tempted to take you up on it.”
He stuck his palm out. “Shake on it. Tomorrow I take the kids for a few hours and you write. And I’ll be asking to read it, just make sure you actually do it, instead of folding that mound of laundry over there.”
She glanced at the pile on her sofa and groaned. “If I don’t get them folded today, I’ll have to iron the whole lot, and that’ll take up more of my time.”
Aaron scooted his chair back and stood. “Then I suggest we get started on it.”
Lainie balked at that offer, too. Not because she didn’t need the help, but she clearly remembered that part of that mountain of clothes held her underwear and bras and other unmentionables. Aaron was at the couch, sorting articles of clothing before she could open her mouth.
And wouldn’t you know it, the first thing he picked up was her black lace thong – the only one she owned – and raised an interested eyebrow at it.
Lainie was out of her chair in a flash. She snatched the scrap of panty out of his fingers and hid it behind her back. “I think it’s better if I take care of this.”
Aaron stuffed his hands in the front pockets of his jeans. “Okay…but I’ll be here around ten tomorrow morning to get the twins. No backing out, okay?”
Anything to get him out of her house right this moment. “Okay.”
He tipped her a grin and a wink, cast a wondering eye at the thong behind her back and sauntered out the front door…whistling Thong Song, a tune she knew well due to Gary’s obsession with R&B music. Lainie buried her flaming face in her hands.
*****
That evening, Aaron went into the station for a staff meeting, sporting a semi-erection ever since seeing that black lacey contraption and imaging Lainie in nothing but that. He couldn’t get the mental picture out of his mind. For weeks, he cooled his heels with Lainie, being only the friend that she needed and wanted, but today almost sent him over the edge.
So, as he sat down at the long table in the dining room, he almost missed the reluctant expression on Dusty’s face. Dusty was never even remotely hesitant about anything.
“What?” he demanded.
She sighed and said, “It’s Eric. He broke his leg this morning…mountain climbing accident. I need to take some time off again.”
“Hell, Dusty,” Brody scowled, “you just got back. Who’s going to cook for us?”
Dusty shot him a you-know-where-you-can-go look, and Sean threw an ink pen at the younger fireman. “I don’t control the acts of God,” Dusty said sourly.
“Acts of God,” someone snorted. “Eric may be a good man, but he’s hardly a god.”
“Cool it, all of you,” Aaron intervened when Dusty rose up from her chair to hit someone, and from the glower in her eyes, she didn’t care who.
She dropped down again. “I’m sorry guys, but with Eric laid up and the baby still having colic, I’m swamped. I’m needed at home.”
“Dusty, Halloween is a few days away,” Aaron said. “It’s one of our busiest nights of the year, with keeping the kids safe and all the pranks and bonfires and crap. We’ll need you. We can’t cut back on our staffing right now. Can’t you stay on until the end of the week?”
Dusty gave him a grim smile. “I’ve already got that part figured out. Eric said that one of his part-time EMT’s is looking for more hours, and she’s willing to transfer. Her name is Teresa, and I’ve met her. She’ll be perfect to fill in for me while I’m gone.”
“Can she cook?” Brody asked. More pens flew, and a few notebooks too. “Hey! I’m just asking,” Brody cried. “I’m a growing boy, I need food.”
“Shut up,” Aaron told him and turned to Dusty. “What’s Teresa’s last name and how much experience does she have?”
“Adams, and she finished her coursework a year after me.”
What choice did he have? He didn’t have the time to send out feelers to other stations or hospitals for another qualified EMT. And he refused to take less than the best he could get. “Fine, I’ll give her a call and have her come in for a meet-and-greet.”
Dusty checked her watch. “No need. I already called her. She’ll be here in an hour. But I’m warning you now…she’s not your typical emergency medic.”
He didn’t need to hear that. “Why not? What’s wrong with her?”
His current female EMT grinned mischievously. “Oh, nothing’s wrong with her…nothing at all.”
“So, what’s the problem?”
She bit back a laugh. “You’ll see.”
And Aaron did see. When Teresa Adams showed up, his jaw dropped to the floor and he had to hustle her through the main housing areas to his office before James and a very-married Ernest mauled her.
Tall, blond and sexy as hell, Miss Teresa Adams could grace the cover of Playboy, and she had that come-hither smile down to an art. He was screwed.
There was no way he could allow Teresa to work around all those hormone-driven males out there. Dusty held her own, but that was because she was mostly reminded the men of their sisters. No man in his right frame of mind could look at Teresa and think of his sister.
But after discussing the general schedule and work duties to the alluring woman, Aaron actually grinned. This could get interesting.
Teresa had no awareness of the male species, what-so-ever. The first words out of her mouth when he asked about her family were, “My parents disowned me when I came out.”
He blinked at her, and she said she’d rather keep that fact a secret. It had caused her problems in the past, among co-workers. Aaron asked that if she didn’t want anyone to know, could she handle the attention she would be getting?
Teresa grinned, her red, pouty lips curving upwards in a delicious arc. “Dusty tells me the guys here are prone to pranking each other. Is that true?”
“It has happened.” Aaron admitted. “But I’d rather not have a sexual harassment issue on my hands right now, if you know what I mean?”
“I read you loud and clear. I won’t stand for it myself.”
“Good,” Aaron said. “You start tomorrow.”
“I’m looking forward to it.”
On her way out, and though she claimed to be lesbian, Aaron’s eyes automatically flew to the sway of her backside. She looked over her shoulder and said, “Dusty also tells me that you’ve got a little female problem of your own. If you need help with that, let me know. I’m not above a little game of jealousy…if you get what I mean.”
Then she was gone. Aaron stared at the closed door. Did she just say what he thought she just said? Use Teresa to make Lainie just jealous enough to incite some kind of more-than-friends reaction?
And why the hell was Dusty talking to people about his personal life? I swear, he thought angrily, that woman! When she married Eric, Aaron hoped the man would tame Dusty's wild spirit. But his EMT was just as fiesty as ever. Now he had to deal with a sex-pot, practical joker who wanted to help him out of a jam with Lainie.
Aaron sighed and rubbed his temples.
It was something to consider anyway. Nothing else was working. He’d finally stooped to using her kids to get close to her. He wasn’t proud about it –however, he looked forward to watching the twins in the morning – but some outside help wouldn’t hurt either.
Would it?