Unexpectedly in Love Read online

  “We separated last year,” I admitted, then came down to move the ladder again. Why did it still hurt to say that out loud? We hadn’t just separated. We were divorced. Officially.

  Steve’s calculating blue eyes met mine, and I lashed out, saying, “And are you still with any girl who’ll smile at you?”

  The way his lips danced with amusement while he looked at me in that direct way of his stole my breath. There was something about him that challenged me, made me feel alive, unhinged and... irritated.

  I went to move the ladder, but he was holding it in place, still watching me with amusement.

  “How’s that fast lifestyle working for you?” I jerked the ladder from his loose grip.

  “Fine. How’s yours?”

  “I like my life.” I snatched the string of lights from his grip and stormed up the ladder.

  “I’m sure you do,” he replied mildly.

  “I have the important things, and it’s rewarding.” A plastic clip for the lights broke, sending it flying into the snow. Wordlessly, Steve reached into the sack of extra clips hanging on the ladder, and seconds later handed me a new one.

  “So is volunteering. You should try it.”

  “It’s called my current job,” I muttered, thinking of how Tonya had managed to snag more hours at Little Comets than I had over the holiday season.

  “You volunteer? Where?”

  “I was kidding. But I do volunteer at Max’s school in—”

  “Mom!” The panic in Max’s voice made me clutch the ladder and snap my head in his direction.

  “What’s wrong?”

  He was holding his green mittens under his bleeding nose. His gushing nose.

  Lots of blood. And oh so red…

  My head got light just like it had in biology class when I was seventeen. I clung to the ladder, trying to steady myself as I stumbled down the rungs.

  “You’re okay, Max,” I said, trying to soothe him as my vision began to narrow, like headlights dimming on a dark winter’s night as the battery began to die.

  Not here. Not now. Not in front of Steve. And definitely not in front of Max.

  “I’ve got you,” Steve said, and I let out a breath of relief. At least someone could help my boy.

  I jolted when Steve’s large hands landed on my waist, before he helped me down the last step, then gently directed my head between my knees. I found myself almost wishing I would pass out so I could skip over this humiliating moment.

  “You’re okay,” he said calmly. The presence of his hand on my back was soothing, and my vision slowly returned.

  Obi was barking, jumping around us.

  “It’s okay, doggy. Yeah, just helping Joy,” Steve said, his voice rich, calming. Obi-Wan pranced about, his tail whacking me in the leg, his nose nudging me at intervals.

  “It’s okay, Obi,” I said. “You’re okay, too, Max. Just keep holding your mitten to your nose. It’ll stop soon.”

  “Hey, buddy, you got a tissue?” Steve asked Max.

  “Mom! I’m going to bleed to death!” Max’s voice was edged with hysteria and the dog left my side. I heard Max hit the snow with a “No, Obi-Wan Kenobi! No!”

  “He senses a disturbance in the force,” Steve said, his voice lifting in amusement at the dog’s name. And he’d made a Star Wars reference. Max was going to love him. “He’s using his Jedi skills to protect you.”

  “I don’t like it!” Max yelled.

  I scrambled to get the dog off him and the world swirled. Steve’s grip on me tightened.

  Why couldn’t Max have his first real nosebleed on Calvin’s watch? Or at school? Somewhere other than here and now?

  I forced myself to stand upright so I could take charge. My vision was gray, but I could get Max to the house, pretend I was fine, then take it moment by moment. And not faint. Definitely not faint.

  I took a few steps toward him, the tunnel vision returning. I bent over.

  “Frosty punched me! He punched me and now I’m bleeding. I have to go to the hospital. Mom! Mom!” Max’s voice was high, panicked.

  “Let’s get inside,” Steve said in a soothing command. He’d left my side. “Keep your mitten against your nose. It’ll all be okay. It’s just a blood vessel that broke and it’ll fix itself in seconds. These things are normal.”

  “But I’m bleeding!”

  “Does it hurt?” Steve asked.

  There was a pause as, keeping my head down, I groped my way toward the house, trying to act natural.

  “No,” Max said, his voice lifting with curiosity.

  I needed to get over fainting at the sight of blood. It had completely derailed my life once, and now it was making it impossible to parent my own child when he needed me.

  My vision fogged as I tried to head up the first step to the front door. Steve’s arm hooked under mine, offering support when I wobbled.

  It’s just a nosebleed. Everything’s okay.

  My vision fogged even more.

  I can handle this. It was nothing! Max is fine.

  I stood up, determined to shut off this stupid physical reaction, but my vision went dangerously black. Steve practically lifted me up the steps as he said to Max, “Boots off. Then find some tissue in the bathroom.”

  He settled me on the bench at the door. Before he followed my son to the bathroom, he remarked, “So you’re a mom?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you never did become a doctor, huh?”

  In the kitchen, I gave myself a pep talk, hoping to get rid of that icky feeling in my gut. I hadn’t passed out in front of Steve. That was a win.

  From my spot I could hear Steve laughing at fart jokes with Max in the bathroom. Apparently males never outgrew the joy of body noises. Listening to them laugh shouldn’t warm my heart, especially since Mr. Judgment was not only delighting my son, but had also saved the day.

  But I was a mom—a single one at that—and seeing my son bond with an adult male was equivalent to an aphrodisiac. Anyone who could make my boy laugh and turn the tide on an upcoming freak-out earned a little heart thawing.

  Even Steve Jorgensen.

  There was a thump as small feet hit the bathroom floor, followed by a “There you go, buddy.”

  Moments later Max came ripping around the corner, his socks nearly sliding out from under him on the laminate flooring, his straight brown hair flopping to the side.

  “Mom! Steve put a cold cloth on the back of my neck and pinched my nose and the nosebleed stopped! Did you know it was just broken blood inside me and that my body is already fixing itself?”

  I smiled, remembering that exact same feeling of excitement and awe over the curious and very mysterious functioning of the human body.

  “It’s pretty cool, isn’t it, sweetie?”

  The sound of the washing machine lid clanging shut in the hallway outside the bedrooms, followed by a rush of water, took another thawing chunk out of the ice age-sized iceberg I held against Steve. He was washing everything that had been soiled so I wouldn’t have to even see it.

  If he wasn’t careful he might meet Mrs. Sweet-and-Quiet, Gushing-Over-You Joy, and I had a feeling he preferred my tougher, let’s-duke-it-out side.

  “Steve knows fart and diarrhea jokes!” Max bounded over to the pantry door and flung it open. “Can I have the new cereal?”

  “Sure.”

  “Really?” He eyed the clock on the oven’s console. He knew it was getting close to suppertime. But honestly? Whatever. I felt gross, my body was still working through its own fight or flight—or play dead—chemical reaction to the nosebleed, and I didn’t have it in me to argue nutrition with my son in front of Steve.

  “Just this once.”

  “Best mom ever!” Max yelled, tucking into the task of dishing himself a snack.

  Something cold hit the back of my neck and I flinched. I’d been ignoring Steve, focusing on Max, and hadn’t noticed him approach with a wet facecloth, which he placed across the back of my neck.

>   “Do you have any hard candy?” he asked. He was standing close enough that I could feel the heat from his body.

  “I have candy! Mom says I can have one piece a day. Can I have one now, Mom?”

  “No.”

  “Your blood sugar likely plummeted,” Steve said to me quietly. He was adjusting the cloth, and I wasn’t sure if I liked the attention or not. Calvin and I had evolved into “just friends” during our marriage, and it had been a long time since a man had touched me. Not that Steve was crossing lines. But him being close, smelling like pine and fresh mountain air, somehow had my mind thinking about lines and what it would take to cross one.

  “Can your mom have one of your candies?” Steve asked Max.

  “She likes red. Do you want one, too? I have pink, red, blue and green. I ate the yellows and oranges. They’re my favorites.” Max had his bag of candy out, demonstrating his pure, generous spirit that made me love him all the more.

  Steve unwrapped a red candy for me. “This’ll get you feeling steadier.”

  “What are you, a doctor?” I asked, a tremor in my voice. He handed me the candy and I popped it in my mouth. It was so sweet it made my cheeks hurt as my salivary glands kicked in.

  “Paramedic.”

  The usual sting of envy hit me in the chest at the medical career choice.

  “I worked in some remote areas for oil companies. Texas, the UK, Canada, Australia, Saudi Arabia, Holland. You get bored, you move on. That’s how it works.” He gave me a smile that looked like it was supposed to reassure me of something. It didn’t. It reminded me once again that he was still the same old guy he used to be. “I gave it up a year ago. You only need to see one major oil and gas disaster before you want out.” He shrugged. “Now I fly helicopters.”

  Adventure. Move on when bored. I briefly teased myself with a quick visualization of what that life might feel like. Exhausting, no doubt. But a little bit cool.

  “Jim Orson’s looking for a new pilot for his business Rocky Mountain Helicopter Tours,” I said.

  Steve smiled.

  Oh. He was Jim’s new pilot. Of course. Steve was a man who answered the call of adventure even if it brought him back to this quiet mountain town.

  “You’re still really pale,” he said. “How are your iron levels?”

  “I’m fine.” I took a deep inhalation, getting a lungful of his aftershave and outdoorsy scent.

  “Pregnant?” he whispered.

  I let out a bark of laughter so abrupt it hurt. He knew exactly why I had almost fainted, and yet here he was, poking and prodding at me and the one weakness that had changed my entire life.

  Steve gave my shoulder a squeeze in support. I hated it. I loved it. Even though I was still wearing my down-filled jacket I could feel the heat from him like it had found a tunnel through the lining.

  I glanced at him and realized with confusion that even though he’d never said a thing in high school, he knew. He knew what had happened on that fateful day in biology class. All it had taken to change my entire life plan was one scalpel. One thin cut into the amphibian victim, and I’d fainted like a lady-in-waiting whose corset had been done up too tight on a hot day.

  Emma Winters had been freaking out when I’d come to in Steve’s arms. Yes, he’d caught me, even though his station had been several over from ours. Because if you’re going to humiliate yourself, you might as well go big.

  I’d immediately begun crying and the teacher had ushered me out of class, assuming I was mortified—which I had been. But it was more than that. I knew that my dream was over. Through the years my tolerance for wounds of any kind had been slipping. And on that day, in Steve’s arms, I realized I was never going to become a doctor, because doctors didn’t faint when faced with the dissection of a frog. They also didn’t get light-headed or dizzy at the sight or thought of blood, like I did. They waded through it all and saved lives without flinching.

  Secretly, I’d spent the next several months trying anything and everything, from hypnotism and self-talk, to watching my hydration and blood sugar levels, to trying the Applied Tension Technique, as well as exposing myself to slasher movies with fake blood squirting everywhere—all in an attempt to alter the biology of my fight-or-flight reaction and save my dream career.

  Nothing worked. If I saw blood or tried a dissection, I got woozy. Eventually I’d had no choice other than to throw in the towel, tip up my chin, block out the pain, and focus on what I had. Calvin. I slowly stopped talking about medical school, and when anyone asked about it I casually said I’d decided I’d rather start a family than spend the next decade in school.

  I thought they would see right through me. But everyone had agreed, saying how much better it would be not to put that pressure on myself or take on the expense. Everyone except Steve, who had been unrelenting in his criticism for giving up on the one thing that would launch me out of this town and into a bigger life. Somehow he’d still believed in my dream—in me—and for some reason that had meant something that I still couldn’t quite figure out.

  “So you’re a helicopter pilot?” I asked Steve, keeping my hands busy with wiping down the counter even though it didn’t really need it.

  “Cool!” Max exclaimed. “Do you do battle with starfighters?”

  “No,” Steve said, his lips twisting into a small smile. “I only take tourists out for rides or heli-skiing. No shooting. No leaving the solar system.”

  Max crossed his arms and gave a fake pout. “That sucks.”

  “Hey,” I scolded.

  “Nobody ever does anything cool.”

  This time Steve protested with a “Hey!”

  Max swiped at his milk mustache from drinking the last of the liquid in his cereal bowl when I wasn’t looking. He bounded up to Steve. “Want to see my Star Wars Lego collection?”

  “Put your bowl in the dishwasher, please,” I said. “And maybe later. I’m sure Steve has more unpacking to do. Moving is a big job. Remember?”

  The sugar from the candy was helping me regain my equilibrium, and it was time to get Steve out of here so I could think.

  “We moved here last year,” Max informed him. “Mom and Dad each got their own house. I have two bedrooms!”

  “Wow,” Steve said.

  I put a hand on his arm, happy there weren’t sparks or anything electrical happening from touching him, as was often described in the books I read. He was just a man and I was just a woman, touching without sparks.

  I guided him out of the kitchen and in the direction of the front door. “Thank you for your help.”

  He spotted the piano in my living room as we passed, and asked, “You still play?”

  “Yes.” Which reminded me I hadn’t finished polishing its wood cabinet so the dry winter air wouldn’t be so hard on it. The bottle of polish was sitting there, waiting for me. Just like the Christmas lights still dangling from my eaves.

  “Cool.” Steve stopped suddenly, looking me over. “Do you experience low blood pressure?”

  “You can’t fix me. I am the way I am, and I’m happy that way, too.”

  I knew where he was going to go next. He was going to try to find a solution. He was going to chide me for not trying harder, pushing further and becoming a doctor.

  “What?” Steve gave me a quizzical look.

  I quickly turned from the door to head to the kitchen. “Hang on a second. I have something for you.”

  “For me?” he said, surprise and hope lifting his voice. It made me wish I had something to bring him down—like hooking him to an anchor and dropping him into the ocean. I needed to set him in one spot and leave him there, because he was making me itch with the desire to complain how Tonya at Little Comets Daycare had taken one of my shifts again. I wasn’t even half-time, with the latest reduction in hours. I kept telling myself it was cool, because we were both single moms, and she had more kids and less support from her ex.

  But I had wanted those hours, and somehow just being around Steve was bringi
ng that up, even though earlier I had been mostly fine with the arrangement. Now I wasn’t. The way he could get under my skin meant trouble. Even the pig incident had been his fault. I would never have said yes to the idea if it hadn’t been for Steve making me feel as though my life was boring and predictable.

  And the shift at Little Comets? I didn’t even need it. Calvin took good care of me and Max with his regular support checks, and my mortgage was small-town doable. It was just Steve getting in my head.

  The plastic lid on the container of gingerbread men cracked as I opened it, then yanked several out for Steve. I hesitated, almost putting them in a plastic bag, until I changed my mind and piled them in a reusable container.

  What was I doing? Now Steve would have to come over to return it. Or, more likely, I’d sit over here and fume, resentful when he didn’t.

  I stomped back to the front door. “Here.” I thrust the cookies at his chest. How was a former paramedic who was now a pilot so buff, anyway?

  And paramedic? He hadn’t even been that great at biology.

  “Thanks.” His eyes lit up like they had when he’d opened his Secret Santa pocketknife. “I love cookies.”

  “We made them,” Max said, dancing around Steve.

  “Welcome to the neighborhood. And thanks. For everything.”

  Steve had slipped into his boots. They seemed so big compared to Max’s, which were sitting next to his on the woven blue mat.

  “So if you didn’t become a doctor, what did you become?” he asked.

  “I’m me. Like always.” I gave a tight smile and said, “Congrats on your new job,” while attempting to not slam the door behind him.

  Chapter 2

  “Who is the long drink of water next door?” Cassandra McTavish asked from my front step. My friend was ogling Steve, who was doing something manly with power tools out on his driveway despite the flakes of snow drifting from the gray December sky.