Single in Suburbia (28 page)

“No kidding.” Candace’s entire body felt heavy with failure. “She just can’t seem to see you as anything but a threat.”

“I’m afraid I’m not the biggest issue here, Candace; I’m just a symptom. You need to find a way to make your mother respect your choices.”

“Oh, I don’t think it’s really a lack of respect. She’s just lonely and…”

“From what I can see, Hannah is living her life exactly as she pleases.” Dan kissed her good-bye and reached for the doorknob. “Don’t you think she should let you do the same?”

chapter
24

T
hat same Friday night, Amanda and Meghan arrived at the James’s thirty minutes before the party was supposed to start. Fido greeted Amanda with his usual enthusiasm. Hunter and Samantha were also glad to see them, but showed a little more restraint.

“I don’t know what it is, but that dog has a real thing for you and Solange.” Hunter gave her a light hug and took the containers of appetizers from her, setting them on the counter. “Don’t you think it’s odd?”

“That he’s so attracted to my crotch? Absolutely. And I’m thinking about having a talk about it with him.”

He laughed. “I meant isn’t it odd that he does the exact same thing to both of you and no one else?”

Amanda walked past him to the counter where she began to arrange the appetizers on the trays she and Meghan had brought. “I guess so,” she said carefully. “Maybe we wear a similar perfume or something.”

The girls left with their heads bent together, the whispers and giggles already started. Looking at them, Amanda was reminded of Rose White and Rose Red, Meghan’s long dark hair and Samantha’s blonde curls tilted so prettily toward each other as they practically skipped out to the pool.

“Red or white?”

She looked at him, surprised, thinking he’d somehow read her mind—which would not necessarily be a good thing—and saw the wine bottles he held aloft.

“I’ve got a Chardonnay and a Merlot.”

“Oh. I don’t know. I didn’t think we’d drink. We really need to stay on top of things.”

He laughed. “I’m not planning to overindulge, believe me. I just don’t think I can handle all the raging hormones we’re about to encounter without softening the edges a little bit.”

“Good point.” She finished filling the first tray of hors d’oeuvres and started on another. “So we’re going for slightly desensitized but not completely anesthetized.”

“Exactly.” He held up the bottles again, and she pointed to the white. “Relaxed, but upright,” he agreed as he removed the cork from the chosen bottle.

Finished with the trays, she took the proffered glass and clinked it against his.

“OK,” he said, setting the bottle in a wine cooler on the counter. “You’re in charge here. I’m going to go outside and get the girls to pick music for the sound system. Then we can get some rock and roll cranking out back.” He rubbed his hands together in anticipation. “It’s a good thing the Smiths are out of town and the Wadells are in their eighties and hard of hearing. I warned the Carlyles across the street, and I promised we’d keep the kids on our property.”

Amanda took another sip of wine and let his enthusiasm wash over her. Other fathers, Rob included, might have helped their daughter give an end-of-year party, but few would have been as ready to throw themselves into it as Hunter appeared to be. They would have been there out of a sense of love and duty, would have smiled and taken pictures and done whatever they were directed to do, just as they had at the earlier birthday parties at Chuck E. Cheese’s and Celebration Station. But it was unlikely that it would have occurred to them that they might actually enjoy it.

She puttered around the kitchen, setting things up, dumping the cans of soft drinks she found into an already iced cooler. Fido eyed her occasionally, but kept his nose to himself. She felt good, she realized, as she gave the counters a final swipe, happy almost.

True, the growing stack of bills was never completely out of mind, but deep down where it mattered most, she was beginning to believe that she had what it took to protect herself and her children; that she was a fighter and survivor; that she had real value that had nothing to do with being somebody’s wife, or somebody else’s mother.

The music snapped on outside followed by whoops of laughter. The front doorbell rang and Roses Red and White, out of breath and flushed with excitement, speed-walked through the kitchen and made a beeline for the door.

“Oh God, it’s starting,” Meghan said to Samantha. “Can you believe it?”

And then Samantha’s equally breathless, “I hope it’s Joey and Brent. I
so
want them to see us before our hair gets all wet.”

And then there was more excited babble, and a steady stream of teenagers traipsing through the kitchen with waves and nods, on their way out to the pool.

Squaring her shoulders and affixing a smile to her lips, Amanda kicked into parent/hostess/chaperone mode. Outside, at his station in front of the grill, Hunter James did the same.

Sometime after ten
P
.
M
. Amanda’s energy began to flag. Wandering out to the pool, she found a vacant chaise and lowered her weary body into it. It was a perfect night; the dark sky was littered with stars and a sliver of moon dangled in the midst of them. Music still played, but the selections were quieter now, more reflective; the booming rhythms of Green Day and Bowling for Soup had been replaced by the haunting melodies of Norah Jones and Michelle Branch.

A handful of kids stood in the shallow end of the pool talking. Others lingered in the shadows of the deep end in that eternal teenage quest for privacy. The majority had changed out of their swimsuits and headed down to the basement where Hunter had been staked out for the last hour.

Amanda tilted her head back and stared up into the stars, the words of the song twining itself through her thoughts.
Don’t know why I didn’t come…

“How are you holding up?” As if summoned by her thoughts, Hunter dropped down onto the lower end of the chaise near her feet. The moonlight glinted off his hair and threw his face into shadows.

“I’m still kicking,” she said. “I’m just not kicking quite as high as I was a few hours ago. I don’t think the Energizer Bunny has anything to fear from me.”

“I know what you mean.” He sighed. “I don’t normally feel particularly old, but I haven’t been around this many teenagers at one time before. I’m feeling like Father Time.”

Amanda laughed. “Yeah, there’s nothing like twenty-five fifteen-year-old girls in bikinis to make a middle-aged woman’s life pass before her eyes. I can barely remember being that young.”

“Well, I can. And that’s what’s keeping me on my toes,” Hunter said. “I caught two boys eyeing the liquor cabinet, one couple trying to sneak into the downstairs guest room, and I had one girl give me her mother’s phone number.”

“You’re kidding.”

“No. Lucy Simmons seems to think her mother would be perfect for me. She wanted to write the number on my hand in permanent marker.”

Amanda laughed again. “Poor man. You must be so tired of women throwing themselves at you.” She smiled and shook her head. “But I guess it’s understandable. There aren’t a lot of single men in the suburbs and most of them don’t look like you. And, of course, as it turns out, you
are
famous.”

His lips turned up in a smile. “Yeah, but dating in the suburbs is kind of like high school. All the ones you’re not interested in are hot on your trail. And the one you want?” He speared her with a look that left no doubt who he was talking about. “She doesn’t give you the time of day.”

Amanda studied Hunter James. In the moonlight, just like in the light of day, he was wholly masculine and completely attractive. He was also kind, considerate, and easygoing, but with that sharp bite of humor that kept things interesting. And, of course, he was busy dealing with his responsibilities, not trying to escape them.

The way he was looking at her made her want to give him way more than the time of day. If they weren’t surrounded by teenagers they were supposed to be chaperoning, she’d hand him her entire watch, fob and all. Why she might even allow him to reset her second hand or ask him to check her battery.

“So what time is it?” she asked quietly.

“I wish it was time to take you upstairs and show you my etchings,” he said.

Amanda felt a brutally swift kick of desire, which she attempted to fight off.

“But I’m afraid it’s actually time to make another swing through the basement. I can hardly wait to hear their groans of annoyance when they catch sight of me.”

Amanda smiled and told herself she should be glad she wasn’t about to view Hunter’s etchings or anything else. “If you help me up,” she said, “I’ll go torture some kids too.” She put her hand in his and he pulled her out of the chair and set her directly in front of him.

Their bodies were close, too close. She could feel waves of heat pulsing between them. Before she could stop herself, she was imagining his arms wrapped around her with all those hard planes and angles pressed tight against her.

“All righty then.” She removed her hand from his and drew a deep breath as she waited for him to step back. But he continued to look down at her, their faces so close they wouldn’t even have to move for their lips to meet. “I guess it’s time to go check on the kids.”

Neither of them moved. But something completely visceral passed between them.

“This party can’t last forever,” he whispered. “Midnight is only”—he glanced down at his watch and back up into her eyes—“an hour and a half away.” He rested his hands on her shoulders.

Amanda knew she should step away and pretend not to notice the current surging between them. The trouble was she didn’t
want
to move and neither did Solange, who seemed to be trying to stage some sort of takeover.
Think of all you’ve been through,
that inner voice said.
After all the hurt and rejection, don’t you think you deserve
one
night?

“That’s ninety minutes until midnight,” she finally said. “Why is that starting to feel like an eternity?”

They spent the next sixty seconds of it staring into each other’s eyes.

“I say we synchronize our watches and do our best to get everybody out the door by twelve-oh-one,” he said.

His eyes were dark and bottomless. Above his head the stars still glittered and the moon still hung, suspended in the night.

She felt suddenly sexy and sure under his regard and uncharacteristically bold. And she no longer cared which one of her was in control.

“I’m with you.” Her gaze still locked with his, she went up on tiptoe and pressed a kiss to his lips, just a small opening salvo in a campaign she couldn’t wait to wage.

“It’s ten thirty-three,” she murmured against his lips. “Only eighty-seven minutes to go.”

For Amanda, the rest of the party passed in a rush of anticipation. Where the first two hours had, in fact, stretched out into infinity; the last hour and a half telescoped and flew. And through every moment of it, she was completely aware of Hunter James.

He handled the boys with a casual acceptance that puffed their chests up with pride, and flirted with the girls in a nonthreatening way that made even the least attractive of them preen. He stayed so calm and attentive, so completely in the moment for Samantha, that Amanda would have thought he wasn’t counting the minutes like she was. Until she’d look up and catch his gaze on her, an incredibly sexy smile hovering on his lips, his eyes sparkling with promise.

He made her feel like the most attractive woman in the world; made her aware of her body in a way she hadn’t been in too long to remember. She wanted to do a happy dance and a striptease at the same time. Her mind practically shouted,
You’re going to have sex! This Greek god, who could have any woman he wants, wants you!
And Solange added,
Admit it, Amanda, you know you want him too!

She wanted him all right, so much that it scared her. Her fear dredged up the evil and insidious what-ifs: What if she didn’t remember how? What if when he saw her naked he changed his mind? What if they had mind-boggling sex and she never heard from him again? What if Meghan noticed what was happening between them and freaked out?

The Greek god who wanted her sent her a saucy wink across the room and the what-ifs scrambled for cover.