“How many more years have I been doing this?” Arms crossed, Claire paced the eight steps to the wall and back. “It means I’m supposed to be here. I’m supposed to do what I’m doing.”
“You don’t look very happy about it. What are you supposed to be doing that’s got you so nervous?”
Dropping onto the end of the bed, Claire picked a tuft of fuzz off the folded Navaho blanket. “Like I said, I need a favor.”
“You’re supposed to ask me for a favor?”
“No. I need to ask you for a favor.”
“Me?”
“Do you see anyone else in here?” Claire demanded, nostrils pinched. “If I could do this any other way, I would, but I need a favor only you, my only sister, can provide.”
“Only me?” The grin became a smirk as she stroked a thoughtful hand down Austin’s back. “In all my life you have never come to me for counsel or help. You have never invited me to be a part of what you do. Now you come to me and say you need a favor.” She stroked the cat again. “Now you call me sister.”
Austin stretched out a paw, and pushed against her lap. “Hey, Godfather, behind the ears.”
“You’re sure you know the number?”
“Always.” Diana poked at the phone.
“That’s too many numbers!”
“Relax and tell me again how I was right and you were wrong.”
“Just dial.”
“I’ve dialed; it’s ringing.” The look on Claire’s face evoked an involuntary smile—which slipped as Claire stood motionless and stared at the receiver. “Hey? Are you going to take this thing from me or…too late. Hi, Dean.”
Dean pushed himself into a sitting position on his cousin’s sofa bed. “Diana?” He slid on his glasses and glanced over at the VCR for the time. The piece of black electrical tape was no help at all. “How did you get this number?”
“If I told you that, I’d have to kill you. There’s someone here who wants to talk to you. Someone who’s very, very sorry she sent you away and…ow! What’s your damage? It sure seemed like you didn’t want to…okay, okay, stop pinching!”
During the pause that followed, he dug for his watch. Two forty-one. a.m.
“Dean?”
Remember to breathe, he told himself as the room started to spin. “Claire?”
Fingers gripping the plastic so tightly it creaked, Claire had a sudden flashback to the hotel room in Rochester.
“Howard?”
“Cheryl?”
And we all know how well that turned out. She swallowed, unable to actually say the words. If Dean had said something, anything, but he didn’t—although she could feel him waiting.
Diana rolled her eyes. Leaning forward, she caught her sister’s gaze and held it. “Tell him, Claire.” The she reached into the possibilities and added the magic word. “Please.”
Resistance was futile. The words spilled out before Claire could stop them. “Dean, I’m sorry. I was wrong to just arbitrarily decide we shouldn’t be together anymore. I should have told you about the danger and let you…” When Diana scowled, she wet her lips and made a quick correction. “…trusted you to make your own decisions. I want us to be together.”
“Why?”
“Why? I…um…Diana, if you please me again, I’m going to smack you!” Having glared down her sister, she took a deep breath.
“If it helps, think of the space between you as an accident site you have to close.”
Moving the phone away from her mouth, she growled, “Would a little privacy be asking too much?”
Diana, secure in the certain knowledge that Claire owed her big time, snorted. “Well, duh.”
Austin ignored the question as it clearly did not apply to cats.
Neither response surprised her. She tucked the phone back up to her mouth and lowered her voice. “Dean, since you left, I’ve felt like there’s a part of me missing.”
She could still feel him waiting.
“Close but not good enough.”
“Look, I love you. Okay?”
She loved him. Over the thundering of his heart, Dean could hear music. It filled the apartment, thrummed in his blood, and just about made his ears bleed.
In the next room, his cousin banged on the ceiling. “It’s almost three o’clock in the freaking morning, butthead!”
“Dean?” Claire frowned at the phone.
“What’s happening?” Diana demanded, reaching for the receiver.
Claire smacked her hand away. “I don’t know. It sounds like Bon Jovi.”
The music stopped.
“Dean?”
She loved him. The words echoed in the sudden silence.
She loved him.
Now what? Was he supposed to say he loved her, too, or would she think he was just saying it because she’d said it even though he did, and had known it since he drove away and left her standing all alone in that parking lot even though he hadn’t realized he’d known it until this very moment?
And then what?
“Dean?”
“What’s the matter?” Diana made another unsuccessful grab for the receiver.
“He’s not saying anything.”
“Give me the phone.”
Claire stared down at the cat. “What?”
“The phone, give it to me.” When she hesitated, he sighed. “Trust me, it’s a guy thing. You need to break this up into bite-sized pieces.”
As the silence from the other end of the line continued, she laid the phone down on the bed beside Austin who cocked his head so that his mouth was at the microphone and one ear pointed at the speaker.
“Dean, you still there?”
That wasn’t Claire. Where had Claire gone?
“Claire?”
Austin’s tail tip flicked back and forth. “She’s here, but right now, we need some answers. Do you love her?”
Dean sighed in relief. That, he didn’t have to think about. “Yes.”
“Do you want to be with her?”
“Yes.”
“Write down these directions.”
He shook his head to clear some of the adrenaline buzz and grabbed a pen off the end table beside the sofa bed. Paper. He had no paper. Pulling the fabric tight over his leg, he wrote the directions on the sheet, repeated them, and hung
