“Oh, my.” She breathed deep. “I can’t tell you how wonderful that feels. I hadn’t planned to wear this dress for more than an hour and it’s been three.”
His body might respond to a beautiful woman-in fact, he’d worry if it didn’t-but he wasn’t going to do anything about it. “Virgil is an old man,” he said, not bothering to hide the irritation in his voice. “How in the hell did you expect him to pry you out of this?”
“That was unkind,” she whispered.
“Don’t expect kindness from me, Georgeanne,” he warned her, and yanked at several more hooks. “Or I’m bound to disappoint you.”
She looked at him and let her hair slide across her shoulders. “I think you could be nice if you wanted to.”
“That’s right,” he told her, and raised his fingertips to brush the marks on her back, but before he could soothe her skin with his touch, he dropped his hand to his side. “If I wanted to,” he said, and moved from the room, shutting the door behind him.
When he walked into the living room, he instantly felt Ernie’s speculative gaze. John snagged his beer from the table, sat down on the couch across from his grandfather’s old recliner, and waited for Ernie to start firing his questions. He didn’t have to wait long.
“Where did you pick up that one?”
“It’s a long story,” he answered, then explained the situation, leaving nothing out.
“Good God, have you lost your mind?” Ernie leaned forward and about tipped himself out of the chair. “What do you think Virgil is going to do? From what you’ve told me, the man isn’t exactly the forgiving kind, and you practically stole his bride.”
“I did not steal her.” John raised his feet to the coffee table and sank deeper into the cushions. “She’d already left him.”
“Yeah.” Ernie folded his arms across his thin chest and scowled at John. “At the altar. A man isn’t likely to forgive and forget a thing like that.”
John rested his elbows on his thighs and raised the bottle to his lips. “He won’t find out,” he said, and took a long swig.
“You better hope not. We’ve worked too damn hard to get this far,” he reminded his grandson.
“I know,” he said, although he didn’t need reminding. He owed a lot of who he was to his grandfather. After John’s father had died, he and his mother had moved right next door to Ernie. Every winter Ernie had filled his backyard with water so John would have a place to skate. It had been Ernie who’d practiced with John out on that cold ice until they were both frozen to the marrow of their bones. It had been Ernie who’d taught him how to play hockey, taken him to games, and stayed to cheer him on. It was Ernie who held things together when life got real bad.
“Are you going to do her?”
John looked over at his wrinkled grandfather. “What?”
“Isn’t that what you young fellas say these days?”
“Jesus, Ernie,” he said, though he really wasn’t shocked. “No, I’m not going to do her.”
“I sure as hell hope not.” He crossed one callused and cracked foot over the other. “But if Virgil finds out she’s here, he’ll think you did anyway.”
“She’s not my type.”
“She sure as hell is,” Ernie argued. “She reminds me of that stripper you dated a while back, Cocoa LaDude.”
John glanced at the hallway, grateful to find it empty. “Her name was Cocoa LaDuke, and I didn’t date her.” He looked back at his grandfather and frowned. Even though Ernie never said so, John had a feeling his grandfather didn’t approve of his lifestyle. “I didn’t expect to find you here,” he said, purposely changing the subject.
“Where else would I be?”
“Home.”
“Tomorrow is the sixth.”
John turned his gaze to the huge window facing the ocean. He watched several white-tipped waves swell, then curl in on themselves. “I don’t need you to hold my hand.”
“I know, but I thought you might like a beer buddy.”
John closed his eyes. “I don’t want to talk about Linda.”
“We don’t have to. Your mama’s worried about you. You should call her more often.”