A Love Story

10)

Cady's latest plan, something about making a balloon of pudding fly through the air, had succeeded. An hour of scrubbing had cleaned the splattered vanilla muck off of the playroom wall, yet she was still not quite able to grasp how a nearly three-year old could bring together such amazing creations.

She was still learning her ABC's for god sakes! Finally, she climbed off the ladder, grimacing at the pops in her back, and, pushing loose strands of sweaty hair from her face, flung the sponge into the sink, feeling an ache in her arms. If she was honest with herself, and she wasn't this week, she was more stressed from the meeting coming up than the actual cleaning.

Her clothes were already laid out and she'd need to shower again before she got dressed, mostly to wash the gunk from her loosened ponytail. When she entered the living room of the cottage, Cady, sitting in a chair and facing the wall, gave a heaving, wounded-puppy sigh, her little legs swinging. In a light blue nightie, her blonde curls were still knotted from a long night of wriggling around and planning.

Diana rolled her eyes, and Jinxie, at Cady's feet, echoed her sentiments in a heavy, pained sigh, his tail thumping once on the floor. Gina, reading from a romance novel, gave Diana a thumbs-up, beaming, "She's being good now, Ms. Cole… promised never to touch pudding again… I got her now."

"Yes, but are you—"

Waving away Diana's nervousness with a hand, Gina laughed. "Come on, you said the meeting was important, right? Right, so you go and take care of business, have a ball, huh?" When Diana still seemed uncertain, the young woman closed the book, peering at Diana with slightly condescending brown eyes. "I got the munchkin."

Forcing herself up the stairs, she had no way of knowing that Gina and Cady were now creating a new plan… this one involving the recipe for a toffee that would stick longest to the ceiling.

JR had hoped that the tightening in his leg from last night, after running out of the shower, was a passing thing. But, he discovered darkly, the muscles within his leg were tighter than they should be. Finally, he got up from the table where he waited with Vi and, excusing himself, headed to the bathroom; he was able to lock the door but his first wrong move came when he turned half-way.

The pain hit, seizing up the muscles in his left leg, mostly in the knee and calves and he grabbed the sink before it gave out. Fuck, fuck, fuck… hadn't it healed, a year ago? Hell, more than a year ago! Now, all of a sudden, what, it decided to bite him in the ass? Leaning his wait against the sink, he reached down and pulled up the leg of his pants, and began to work the flesh, trying to get the nerves to loosen up.

More than that though, it was frightening to him. His chest was tight with the familiar edge of fear at the thought of ending up with that kind of pain again. It had been difficult to get past that, but the leg had recovered and he'd been fine then, hadn't he? So, in theory, he should be fine now. Except… I'm not okay, am I?

"She's beautiful isn't she?"

Micaela looked up from the picture of Tessa Crane, arching an eyebrow at the blonde, brown-eyed playboy. Somehow, in his jeans and a loose shirt, he still managed to convey how much of the Crane power ran through his veins, despite how one flip-flopped foot sat on the chair at his left. "She looks a bit too much like you, Fox."

A look of dislike crossed his handsome face, a mocking grimace twisted his features and he sighed, patting his thigh. "Yeah, Theresa and I will get to beat little bastards off her with an ugly stick… Doesn't help that any pretty genes she skipped from me she got extra-pretty ones from her Mom…" he paused, slight touch of embarrassment flickered in his eyes as his lips curve into a slight smile. "I had a 'mommy' moment there, didn't I?"

"Just a little one," she laughed, pushing the picture back to him, feeling oddly warmed at his shift from whiny pretty-boy to Mr. Mom. "You sure changed there, Fox-y, didn't you?"

"It's called marriage; children and family… doubt you know the meaning of the words, Kincaide." He sighed again, slipped the photo of his wife and daughter back into his wallet, and putting that away as he dropped his foot to the floor of his office, leaning forward to study her intently. "I seem to remember the last time I asked you about the club… you denied any interest, right?"

"Don't pull this with me—"

"Oh, come on, Micaela; stop lying to another of your kind."

"I'm nothing like—"

"Really, come on, those of us who are forced to call pieces of shit 'mom' need to stick together right?" Though his face is casual, there's the familiar edge of childhood anger there, just beneath the surface. "I mean, Lynette was a piece of shit too, right? At least from what I heard… how many times did Buck get close before she snatched you away again?"

Even as she jumped to her feet, cold and dulled inside, the hand grabbed her wrist, yanked her back a bit, and she found herself thrown back into her seat, and his eyes had softened, the familiar anger drained off. "I didn't mean it like that…"

"Sign the papers Fox, or don't, but if you ever say anything…"

"Give me the papers and retract your claws," he snapped, pulling out a pen, "just stop this melodramatic crap, mm-kay?"

If Zach was upset about the loophole from the Great Chandler of Pine Valley, Kendall was absolutely pissed. Zach didn't think he'd ever seen such fury radiating from a woman. Everything about her alluded to the wrath simmering behind shockingly blue eyes, from her stride to the slim fingers that clutched her bag so savagely that Zach was half-surprised it wasn't already shredded. "That sick… creepy… bastard! I offer him into this deal and he spits in my—sorry, our faces—how dare he? Have you ever heard of such a lack of respect!"

"Kendall, why don't you sit—"

For the fifth time in the last fifteen minutes, she interrupted him, shaking her bag threateningly into his face. He had the strange sensation of feeling like a teenager, having his mother shake her finger at him, ordering him to stay away from that girl down the street. It was a disconcerting feeling and made his stomach lurch in some unpleasant ways.

"Oh, when I get my fingers around his neck!" Still standing right in front of him, her rather loud yell made it a veritable blast into his eardrums; the only thing that kept him flinching was the fact that he knew for a fact that predators can smell fear. "What am I going to tell JR!"

"Maybe he knows already—"

But Kendall, still hyped up, interrupted him, yet again, waving the bag again furiously and he resisted the urge to snatch it and fling it out of the nearest window. "JR? When he finds out about this crap of Adam's, he'll commit patricide! Bloody and grisly and horrible patricide and—Oh… I can sell tickets!"

"Kendall, have you sat down at all since Livia told you about this?" The dirty look was answer enough and, before she could swipe again with that bloody bag, he grabbed her by the arms, despite her twisting and writhing, she found herself unable to break the grip on her arms.

As she found herself dragged into the elevator and out the front door of his office, about to be dismantled if Maxie had her way, she glared furiously at anybody who crossed her path; the force at her back kept her legs moving and, the next thing she knew, she found herself shoved into the front seat of his Rover and then, bam, she was strapped down like a fresh stag. "I'm not a—"

SLAM!

"—child," she finished lamely, her anger startled into non-existence at the shock of someone slamming a door in her face. Before she could build back up her anger, she felt the car wheeled behemoth moving forward. But, when she twisted her head to glare murderously, she found that he glanced back easily, giving her a look of such simple amiability that she was struck speechless.

Drained, doubting that she had the courage to fling herself out of the moving vehicle… especially with Zach's driving ability.