The Trouble with Andrew Read online

  Oh, God! But she was losing it.

  “Katie,” he said softly. “I would be delighted—no, I insist that you make my home your own. And as I’ve said, I’ll be happy to leave, if you deem it necessary.”

  His voice was husky. Low. Masculine. As sensual as his smile.

  Yes, leave. One of us needs to, she thought.

  She was being an idiot.

  “Fine,” she said. “We’ll stay—until we can leave, of course.” She realized she was still hunched down, gathering up shoes. She was very close to him. She could inhale that very pleasant and subtle scent of man and soap and after-shave.

  She stood quickly. “I’ll put these upstairs, out of the way,” she told him.

  “Fine,” he said.

  Katie turned and ran up the stairs, opening a closet to dump the shoes.

  The closet was empty.

  Well, perhaps he didn’t have a live-in girlfriend.

  Idiot, Katie told herself. If he did have a live-in girlfriend, she’d probably be living in his room!

  She slipped into Midge Holloway’s loafers and found them a reasonable fit—the shoes were very narrow, which helped make them tighter. Now she was dressed—a borrowed bathrobe and borrowed shoes.

  She came downstairs. Jordan still slept on the sofa.

  Katie walked to the door and opened it. The rain had stopped again. The sky remained battleship gray, but the wind seemed to be dying down again.

  Across the fallen trees in the center of the cul-de-sac, she could see her house very clearly. Suddenly, the urge to see exactly what was inside it was very strong.

  She should find Drew Cunningham and tell him where she was going.

  She should wake Jordan and tell him.

  But when she walked to the sofa, her son was sleeping so peacefully that she didn’t want to waken him. And Drew had disappeared somewhere.

  And after all, she had agreed to stay here. She hadn’t made him her lord and master or anything.

  Her child was sleeping on his sofa.

  But she was very confident of one thing. Jordan was certainly all right in the man’s house.

  She hurried to the door, promising herself that she would take a quick look and come right back.

  She started across the street, noting that Drew Cunningham was right—you couldn’t even drive a car around the cul-de-sac, there were so many trees down.

  She walked—then climbed—her way across the street and came to her house.

  The front door was banging open and shut in what remained of the wind.

  She stepped into her living room. The carpeting squished beneath her feet—there was a good inch of water in it.

  Midge’s shoes were ruined. She made a mental note to replace her neighbor’s shoes with a new pair Midge would love.

  Then she looked around.

  Her furniture was soaked, and bits of plaster lay all about. In the hallway, the whole of the roof was down.

  She walked into the living room and threw off one of the curtains that had landed on the edge of the sofa. She inhaled, startled to find one of her cameras—dry, untouched by the water and wind because the drapery had somehow managed to fall and protect it.

  She checked quickly. High-speed film, perfect for the gray day. And thirty exposures left.

  She started to set the camera down, then slipped the strap over her shoulder. She wasn’t leaving this camera now—not for a second. She wasn’t going to take any chances.

  At least she could capture something of today.

  She turned, anxious, still checking.

  If she wanted to capture a piece of Andrew, she could start right here. Her beautiful draperies were sodden, discolored lumps on the floor. Curtain rods hung in disarray. Her chairs were soaked and battered; a large croton bush—dirt and roots included—had slammed against her coffee table. Glass was everywhere. The living room was demolished.

  And yet…

  Strange things had remained. The camera on the couch had been just fine. And across the room, she could see a little rosewood wall stand that contained some of her small porcelain miniatures.

  Not one of them had even moved.

  And there, just down the wall from the stand…

  She hurried across the living room, amazed to discover that the picture of her and Terry and Jordan as a three-year-old still hung in place.

  The windows were gone, the roof was half caved in, and still… Her picture remained. It was so strange. In the midst of such destruction, strange and somewhat delicate things remained. She started to reach for the picture.

  “Katie! What in God’s name do you think you’re doing!”

  Stunned, she spun around. Drew Cunningham was standing in her doorway, hands on his hips, his voice that of a shipmaster yelling at a second mate.

  “It’s my house!” she said indignantly.

  “It’s not safe!” he exploded.

  “I have to—”

  “Katie, look up, look out!”

  “The storm is over—” Katie began, but looked up as he had warned her. She could already hear a strange, tearing sound. As she stared at the ceiling, Drew came hurtling across the room, throwing his arms around her and himself upon her as he brought them both down to the floor away from the wall.

  She was beneath him. And even as they landed, a large chunk of plaster came crashing down, the bulk of it missing them, but a corner of it breaking away and landing with a startling thud right on his back.

  “Oh!” Katie gasped in alarm.

  He raised his shoulders quickly without a word or a groan, and the plaster fell to his side. He remained above Katie, and she met his eyes, shaking.

  She struggled quickly for words. “I’m sorry, are you all right—?”

  “I’m all right.”

  “You’re covered with plaster.”

  “I said I’m all right!”

  She might have been killed. He might have been killed. And it would have been her fault for running in here. But the shakes were dwindling to something an awful lot like warm, shooting tremors.

  And she wasn’t at all sure the feeling was coming from the danger of the storm-damaged house.

  All she really knew was that he was half lying atop her, that she could feel the heady fever of his body, the shape and form of it, the warmth and life of the muscles in his thighs and chest…

  “Dammit, Katie—”

  “I said I was sorry!”

  “You can get killed running into dangerous places like this without knowing what the condition is!”

  “You could have been killed, as well!”

  “I, at least, know what the hell I’m doing!”

  “But it’s my house!”

  For a moment, he looked as if he would shout at her again, and she was ready, tense and ready. Somehow, she was afraid to lose this argument, and if she just kept shouting back, she’d be all right.

  But he didn’t shout at her again. He opened his mouth, then fell silent. Then he said softly, “Katie, it’s not safe.”

  It wasn’t safe. Not at all.

  And she wasn’t thinking of her house…

  Chapter 4

  The immediate danger didn’t last long.

  Before many more seconds had ticked by, they were interrupted by a tentative call from outside the house.

  “Mom? Mr. Cunningham?”

  “Jordan!” Katie cried. She set her hands on Drew’s chest to push him away, but he was already up, reaching down a hand to help her up, too.

  They were both somewhat whitened by ceiling plaster, and Katie wasn’t sure whether to laugh or try to apologize again. Before she could do either, her camera swung around from her shoulder and belted him in the ribs.

  He grunted.

  “What now—?”

  “Sorry!” she said again.

  “You came in here for a camera?”

  “I came in here to see what was left!”

  “And you picked up a camera?”

  She gritted he
r teeth. “I’m a photographer. Free lance. It’s what I do for a living.”

  “But—”

  “And I’m good at it and I don’t have a house anymore and I might need what I can make off of storm pictures! Not to mention the fact that this has been something that should be remembered!”

  “It’s still not worth your life!” he told her.

  Of course not. But before she could assure him that she hadn’t meant to put anyone in danger, including herself, she heard her son calling to her again. “Mom? Mr. Cunningham? Are you in there?”

  “Yes!” Katie called quickly. “Don’t come in, I’ll come out.”

  “Mr. Cunningham needs to come, too. There’s a lady on the phone for him. Can you believe it? We’ve barely got a house and Mr. Cunningham’s phone is still working!”

  Drew grimaced, then set his hands on Katie’s shoulders, spinning her around and urging her toward the door, which was hanging open.

  She felt his hands on her shoulders as they walked.

  There was a lady on the phone for him. Well, of course, he hadn’t been spending his life in celibacy, waiting for her.

  Katie was startled by the strength of the jealousy that seemed to pour through her.

  Drew propelled her out of the house. Jordan stood on the porch, watching them with open curiosity. “I was trying to see what was left,” Katie told her son. “Mr. Cunningham stopped me.”

  “The place isn’t safe,” Drew said. The words were quiet. The tension in his voice was nearly controlled.

  Jordan sighed. “Anyone can see that, Mom.”

  Drew Cunningham was behind her. She was certain that he was nodding sagely at the wisdom of a ten-year-old —a child brighter than his mother.

  “Yes,” she murmured, just a little acidly, “Mr. Cunningham has so informed me.” She spun around. “Don’t you think you should run over and answer your phone, Drew?”

  “Oh, yeah, the lady is real worried,” Jordan said. “I told her that you were fine, that you’d gone out to chase my mom somewhere. She was real nice, so I told her that your house was just fine, and she wasn’t quite sure who I was so I tried to explain that our house wasn’t fine. I think I confused her worse.”

  “Maybe you’d better hurry,” Katie suggested sweetly.

  “And I think you’d better follow along with me,” he said, not seeming to be in a hurry to rectify things. “It’s not safe to go into that house.”

  “But—”

  “I know you want to see what you can salvage. If you’ll just wait a few minutes and come with me now, I’ll come back with you and make sure that you sift through the house safely.”

  “How come you can be safe and I can’t?” Kate asked.

  “Because I’m an architect and a builder,” he said flatly. Well, that explained why he had managed to be there every day when they had been working on his house.

  And it would certainly explain how his had stood when hers had not.

  He was watching her digest the information. But he didn’t say anything else to her.

  “Jordan, get your mom. Come on.”

  Jordan seemed to like the man, who could be downright irritating, Katie decided. “Mom, come on.”

  Right. Just what she wanted to do. Walk to Drew’s house and listen to him explain to some mystery woman that he had been saddled with a thirty-something woman and her child since the storm.

  She gritted her teeth. All right. She’d stand right in front of him and make him just as uncomfortable as she could while he made his explanations.

  She followed him to his house but stood in the foyer as he went in. He answered the phone on the cherry-wood table next to the sofa. He had to know she had come in behind him, but he didn’t seem uncomfortable in the least. Katie could hear every word he had to say.

  “Hi! Yes, I’m fine, and this place is fine, but the development isn’t so fine.” He was silent for a moment. “By God, I swear, I don’t know, but I will find out.” A few minutes later, he said, “Something went very wrong. I haven’t had a chance to see quite what yet… I have the little battery television. We’ve seen a lot. We—yes, I have a neighbor and her son here. Her house caved in. Three of them came down, four of them stood just fine.” The woman talked again, and he listened, sitting on the sofa, heedless of the plaster that covered him. He rubbed his temples. “I will find out. Someone was falling off somewhere,” he said. Katie felt herself shiver at the threat in his words. She wondered what he was going to find out—and she was suddenly glad she wasn’t the someone who had been falling off somewhere.

  The woman talked for a few more minutes, then Drew assured her that though the electricity was gone, everything else was okay. She must have told him she loved him, because he said, “Love you, too,” then hung up. He sat there thoughtfully for a few minutes, and neither Katie nor Jordan moved.

  Then he stared across the living room at them, as if just remembering that they were there.

  The battery-operated television was still on, and with the room so quiet, they could hear the news again. More reports were coming in. It was becoming obvious that Broward County had fared well, that even North Miami and downtown Miami itself had survived the storm well enough. The destruction had started in the Coral Gables area, moved southward and had become devastating.

  Homestead Air Force Base had been damaged. The reporter said that for mile after endless mile from the Falls area all the way down to Homestead, there was destruction. People were beginning to wander around. They were warned to stay off the roads. They were advised about shelters. They were alerted about office buildings and stores that no longer existed.

  Listening, Katie found herself moving into the living room with Jordan next to her like a second skin.

  The three of them were staring at the little television.

  She hadn’t realized that half of her county lay in the same condition as her home. Perhaps it wasn’t so strange that her house had fallen—it was stranger that Andrew Cunningham’s had stood.

  As they watched in silent horror, more and more of the destruction began to unfold. The National Guard was arriving in places hardest hit. Although the tower had blown off the National Hurricane Center in Coral Gables, the downtown area had sustained the storm well. The homes in Gables Estates had taken a beating, and people were already calling Gables-By-The-Sea Gables-Beneath-The-Sea. Still, it was becoming apparent that hardest hit had been Naranja, Goulds, Homestead and Cutler Ridge, with the Falls area—their area—taking a massive strike as well.

  The television crews were out, skirting the devastation, the uprooted trees, the downed power lines. Estimates were pouring in. Tens of thousands of people were homeless. Boats had been swept incredible distances onto the shore—and right into houses.

  Officials worried about the death toll, about digging beneath the crumpled houses. Again, they warned people to be careful of downed wires, to drive with caution when they did begin to drive again. They advised people not to make calls if they didn’t have to, but of course, such advice was ludicrous, for everyone had family.

  “Oh, God! My father!” Katie exclaimed.

  Drew Cunningham’s brooding attention was drawn to her. He picked up his phone, set it against his ear, heard a dial tone and handed it to Katie.

  “They just said not to call—”

  “Make it fast, then. Just tell him that you’re okay.”

  “You don’t know my father. He called at three a.m.—right before the world exploded. And it’s long distance—”

  “Mom, it’s a natural disaster!” Jordan chimed in. “I’m sure Mr. Cunningham will let you pay him for the call later!”

  Drew Cunningham grinned. “I’ll just charge interest. Call him quickly. We don’t know how long the phone will last.”

  Katie dialed, then said, “Hi, Dad!” as cheerfully as she could the moment her father answered the phone.

  She had to pull the phone away from her ear—Ron Wheeler spoke with such passion. “Katie! I’ve b
een worried sick! What’s happened, where are you? Are you okay, is my grandson okay? I’ve been seeing the pictures on television—my God, Katie, where are you?”

  “I’m across the street at a neighbor’s. I’m fine, Jordan is fine. I just called to tell you that.”

  “Then your house—”

  “My house is damaged, yes.”

  “I told you that you should have come up here!” Ron insisted. She knew he was worried, but he also seemed to be forgetting that she was not only over twenty-one, but a few months past thirty-one, as well.

  And he was speaking loudly enough to be heard in the next state, she was certain.

  “Dad, the phones aren’t lasting well. I just wanted to say that I’m fine—”

  “I’m coming down.”

  “Don’t come down, Dad! There’s nowhere to stay.”

  “Then you get yourself right up here.”

  “Dad, I can’t come right away, I have to see about my home, my—my life!”

  She glanced at Drew Cunningham. He was watching her with a certain amount of amusement.

  “Have to go now, Dad. I’ll call again soon. I’m fine, and I can’t leave right away. When I can come up there, I will.”

  She didn’t wait. Ron Wheeler started to say something else.

  “Bye, Dad! Take care!” she said swiftly, drowning out whatever he might have had to say. Then she handed the phone quickly to Drew, and he set it in its cradle.

  “Any other calls?” Drew asked. He was looking at Jordan.

  “My dad is dead,” Jordan said, and Katie realized her son had intuitively known that Drew was suggesting Katie should let Jordan’s father know they were all right, if she was divorced.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” Drew said softly.

  “It’s all right. It’s been a long time now,” Jordan said, but he stood up, straightening his shoulders beneath the too big robe, and asked, “Can I go outside? In the front?”

  “Sure,” Katie said. “I’m coming myself. I want to get some pictures. The house—that poor banyan tree.”

  Jordan nodded and left them. Katie felt Drew’s eyes on her. She wasn’t sure why, but she felt a flush coming to her cheeks.

  She turned to look at him. His gold eyes were intense as he watched her. “I should have known,” he said. “I’m sorry.”