Bedroom Secrets

He sat up, salivary glands tingling in anticipation.

Bacon. It was definitely bacon. And despite the fact that he’d gotten less than six hours of sleep, he was out of bed and heading for the shower in a heartbeat. Within ten minutes he’d showered, shaved and dressed, and was pounding down the stairs to the kitchen.

Tina stood at the stove, poking at something in a frying pan with a wooden spoon. She saw him standing there and flashed him a bright smile. It had been close to one-thirty in the morning when he’d gotten her settled in the one bedroom flat above his garage, but she looked well-rested. Her dark hair was damp and pulled back in some sort of clip thingy, but tendrils hung loose around her face. In jeans, tennis shoes and a pink sweatshirt, she didn’t look a day over seventeen. And cute. She looked damned cute.

He hadn’t broken out in a cold sweat at the sight of her there and his heart rate was steady and normal.

So far so good.

“Good morning,” she said. “I hope you don’t mind that I let myself in. I wanted to get started on breakfast.”

“Works for me,” he said, taking a cup down from the cupboard and pouring himself coffee. “How’s the flat? Are you comfortable?”

She breathed a blissful sigh. “It was heavenly. I haven’t had a good night’s sleep in days.”

He stirred creamer into his cup and took a sip. Not too strong, not too weak. She brewed a hell of a pot of coffee. He was really going to like this arrangement.

“There wasn’t much in the fridge so I had to improvise,” she said. “I hope you like omelets.”

“I’ll eat pretty much anything. When you have a mother who cooks like mine, you either starve or develop an iron stomach.”

Her eyebrows rose a notch. “She can’t be that bad.”

“She’s worse than that bad. But she means well.”

She looked as though she didn’t believe him. “I made up a menu for you to approve, and I’ll need some supplies.”

He had figured she would just cook whatever, and he would eat it. He had no idea he would get to choose, or that she would take this so seriously. “I’m sure anything you make will be fine and after work today we can stop at the market and pick up whatever you need.”

“Have a seat, it’s almost ready.”

He watched from the table, practically drooling in anticipation as she rearranged the food on a plate—omelet dripping with melted cheese, strips of crispy bacon, golden fried potatoes. When she placed his plate at the kitchen table and he took his first bite, he felt like the luckiest man alive. “This is fantastic.”

Her smile positively beamed with pride, and he realized just how important it was to her that she’d please him. She had no idea.

When she didn’t join him at the table he asked, “You’re not hungry?”

She shrugged. “I had a little something before you got up. I didn’t want to impose.”

“It’s not an imposition. The only thing worse than my mother’s cooking is eating alone. Just ask my sister. I’m always mooching meals off her and her fiancé.” He gestured to the empty chair across from him. “Cop a squat, keep me company.”

Almost shyly, she lowered herself into the chair, propping her feet on the edge of the seat and tucking her knees under her chin. She was close now, only a few feet away. He caught the faintest scent of soap and shampoo, and felt the slightest quickening of his pulse.

Think of her as a sister, he reminded himself.

“So, Tina DeLuca, tell me about yourself. Where are you from?”

“I grew up in Philly,” she said.

“With your aunt?”

“Yeah, after my mom got sick. When she died two years later, Aunt Louise became my permanent guardian.”

“How did your mom die?”

“She had ALS—Lou Gehrig’s Disease.”

He put his fork down. “I’m sorry.”

He looked truly saddened by it. What saddened Tina the most was that so many memories of her mother had faded over the years until all that was left were vague impressions. “Aunt Louise was really good to me. That’s why, when she had her stroke, I wanted to help take care of her. I was only twelve, but I started cooking and cleaning. When I was seventeen she had her second stroke and needed round-the-clock care. I dropped out of school to stay with her.”

He took a sip of coffee, then picked up his fork and returned to his breakfast with gusto. He ate with the enthusiasm of a man who hadn’t had a decent meal in months. To say she was flattered was a major understatement. She was just glad she could do something nice for him. He’d practically saved her life, giving her a job and a place to stay. She shuddered to think where she would be right now if not for Mae’s kindness and Ty’s good nature.

“Did you ever finish high school?” he asked.

“I never went back, but I got my GED, and I took some on-line college courses in my spare time. For several years the Internet was my only outlet to the outside world. My cousin Ray promised me that when Aunt Louise died, he would give me the house and half of the money. I didn’t do it for the money, though. She did so much for me and my mom, I wanted to give that back to her.”

“But he lied,” Ty said.

She nodded. “Two weeks after she died there was a for sale sign in the window, and he was asking me to be ‘nice’ to him.”

“Sleazy bastard,” he muttered.

“I told him no way, and he told me I didn’t have a choice, I belonged to him, and he was going to take what was rightfully his.”

“Did he…?”

“He tried. But I…stopped him.”

“Stopped him?”

She caught her lip between her teeth. “You’re going to laugh.”

“I swear, I wouldn’t laugh about something like that.”

“I, um, hit him over the head. With a frying pan.”

The corners of Ty’s mouth twitched.

“A cast-iron frying pan,” she added.

He was trying really hard now not to smile.

“He was chasing me around the house, but he’s really fat so I was a lot faster than him. I ran into the kitchen, grabbed the pan off the stove, and when he barged in after me, I clobbered him. The pan made a loud bong against his head and he landed so hard the whole house shook. It was kind of like something out of a Road Runner cartoon.”

The amusement that had been tugging at his lips disappeared. “I guess it does sound funny when you think about it, but I’m sure it wasn’t at the time. You must have been really scared.”

“No, I was more disgusted than anything. I was scared after I hit him. At first I thought he was dead. When I realized he was still breathing, I knew he’d be really mad when he woke up. He’d call the police and they would probably take his side. I stuffed a couple of things in my bag, grabbed what money I had saved and got out of Dodge. I had a couple of leads on my father and figured it was the time to look. But the money went a lot faster than I thought it would. And here I am.”

“And all your stuff is still in Philly?”

“I’m sure if I try to go back and get it, he’ll have me arrested for assault.”

“After sexually assaulting you, I doubt he’d be dumb enough to file charges against you.” He balled his napkin and dropped it on his empty plate. “Breakfast was really good. Thanks.”

He smiled at her and she went all warm and mushy inside. She wondered if he knew how gorgeous he was.

There was no way he couldn’t know.

“You’re half Italian,” he said. “What’s the other half?”

“My mom said my father was Hispanic.”

“You never met him?”

“He doesn’t even know about me. My mom met him while he was on leave after boot camp. They only spent a weekend together, but she said she loved him enough for a lifetime. She said he gave her the most precious gift in the world. Me.”

“She told you all this?”

“No, I read it in her journal after she died. When she got sick, she started writing every day about her life, so I would never forget her. She gave it to my aunt to give to me when I turned thirteen.”

“What did you say your father’s name is?”

“Martin Lopez.”

He stood, carrying his plate to the dishwasher. “And you say you traced him here?”

“I found a Martin Lopez. I just don’t know if he’s the right Martin Lopez. All I know is his name, what year he was born, that he was born in Texas, and he was in the army and finished boot camp nine months before I was born.”

Ty refilled his coffee cup. “That’s a lot to go on.”

“You would think so, but you wouldn’t believe how many men are named Martin Lopez.”

“If he was in the army, can’t you find him through old military records?”

“The army isn’t exactly free with the information. You would have thought I was a Russian spy or something. But after two years of research, I narrowed it down to three possibilities. The first two weren’t him. The third looked promising, but the address I had is an old one. Someone different lives there now and they said the Lopezes didn’t leave a forwarding address, but they were pretty sure they live nearby. I looked in the phone book, but he’s not listed. That’s as far as I’ve gotten.”

Ty leaned against the edge of the counter, one foot crossed over the other, looking like a blond god. His jeans were relaxed fit, his flannel shirt on the loose side, but she knew first-hand the sculpted physique all that fabric hid. She’d thought about it a lot last night after she’d settled in. She’d lain in bed, staring at the ceiling, thinking about Ty. She felt godawful for using the pepper spray on him, but she remembered the way his arms had felt wrapped around her in the shower. Solid and sure, but not intimidating. The memory of his hand cupping her breast had caused little tingles in the pit of her stomach.

But he was older and so much more sophisticated than her. To him, she was just a kid. Experience-wise, she was light years behind him.

“I’m going to make some phone calls today, see what I can find,” Ty said.

She shook her head. “I don’t want you calling your detective.”

He dumped the last of his coffee and set his cup in the sink. “I won’t need to. Real estate is my business. If your father owns a house, there has to be a deed. It shouldn’t be that hard to find him.”

“How long would that take?”

“A day. Two tops.” He said it casually, like it was no big deal.

To her it meant everything.

In a day or two he might bring to an end a search that had spanned over two years and brought her hundreds of miles from her home. He might find the one person left in the world who could possibly care about her. Be her family.

It was official, Tyler Douglas was her hero.

It was nearly four o’clock when Ty parked his truck in front of his rental house. He walked up to the porch, a spring in his step. He was about to make Tina one very happy woman.

Girl he reminded himself. He was definitely better off thinking of her as a girl—too young and naive. And he was old enough to know better.

He unlocked the door and stepped inside, rubbing warmth into his chilled hands. “Tina!” he called, to alert her to his presence. No way he wanted another run-in with her pepper spray.

“Back here,” she answered. “Cleaning the tub.”

He followed her voice through the house, noting her progress. The kitchen was spotless, and when he popped his head in the fridge it no longer smelled as if he’d been storing a corpse in it. The carpet had been vacuumed, the blinds and windows polished, and when he stepped in the bathroom, the tile was so gleaming white it nearly had him reaching for his Ray-Bans.

Kneeling next to the tub was Tina, bent over, jeans snug against her swaying backside, vigorously scrubbing the drain.

A sudden tug of arousal was answered by a stab of apprehension. If he didn’t get a grip he’d be breaking out in a cold sweat any minute now.

He was caught off guard, that’s all. He could control this.

“Everything looks great,” he said, looking anywhere but her curvy behind.

Tina looked up at him over her shoulder and smiled. “Thanks. I’m almost finished.”

Her cheeks were rosy, her eyes bright. Damn, she was pretty.

She turned the faucet on and rinsed the scouring powder down the drain. Her sweatshirt sleeves were pushed up to her elbows and yellow rubber gloves covered her to her forearms. When she was finished, she stood, wiping her forehead with her sleeve. Several spirals of hair fell across her forehead and she blew them out of her eyes. “All done.”

He pulled a wad of cash out of his pocket, peeled three twenties off and handed them to her. “I figured you’d prefer cash to a check.”

She stripped the gloves off and dropped them in the bucket at her feet. “I thought you said minimum wage.”

Yeah, that was when he was trying to get her not to want the job. “I said almost minimum wage. I paid my last cleaning woman seven dollars an hour.”

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.