The Street Where She Lives

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

ONE NIGHT shortly after Emily’s blowup they played Scrabble, just the three of them. Rachel sat on the couch in the living room, with Emily and Ben on the floor around the coffee table. Patches lay asleep on Ben’s feet.

Emily, tongue between her teeth, holding back a smile, carefully laid down the letters D-A-D, then beamed at Ben.

With a grin, he added the D-Y, making the word daddy.

Rachel looked down at her letters, the ones that seemed to dance around and mock her with their uselessness. “How come I always lose at this game?” she asked as she put E-S to Ben’s Y, making the word yes.. “Woo-hoo, look at me get the points.”

“It’s all in your attitude,” Ben said.

Emily nodded in agreement and used the S in yes to spell bestest.

“That’s not a word,” Rachel protested.

“See, negative attitude.” Emily tsked and added up her points.

Ben laughed. “Sweetness, are you cheating?”

“She always cheats.” Rachel glared at her daughter. “It’s why she always wins.”

“Fine.” Emily took away the E-S-T and left best. “Happy?”

“I will be if I win,” Rachel teased.

Ben sprawled on the floor and smiled up at her. Beside him, Emily was positively glowing, happier than Rachel had seen her in a while.

The moment was so good, so bittersweet, she wanted to freeze-frame it. A perfect snapshot in time, with everyone’s hearts light and happy.

Ben cocked his head, then sat up and put a hand on Rachel’s arm, looking into her eyes. “You okay?”

“I am,” she said, and it’d never been more true. “I really am.”

He smiled again, and went back to the game.

But left his hand on her arm.

AT THE END of the week, Ben was still there and Rachel didn’t know whether she was sorry or relieved. They’d had coffee together every morning. Lunch, too, at the house if she didn’t have a therapist or doctor appointment, or at a café if she did. They had dinner together as well, with Emily, the three of them somehow finding things to talk about.

Or argue about.

But things were never dull. She’d gotten rather used to his presence, shockingly enough, to listening to him talk, laugh, watching his tall, lean form play basketball as if he were sheer poetry in motion, hearing him mutter to himself in his darkroom, seeing him with Emily. Every part of having him live in the house was both a comfort and a nightmare.

When he left, her life would go back to “normal,” to what she’d built for herself and Emily, and it was a great life. She had her daughter, her house, her career…well, maybe not her career, but even so, she had no real regrets.

And yet, when it came to personal relationships…she’d be alone. She was alone now, no doubt. But with Ben’s presence she could almost imagine how it would be if he ever settled down and stayed in one place.

The weekend arrived, and per her usual Saturday morning routine, she sat in the kitchen with a cup of tea and the newspaper. Her leg ached today, so she had it elevated with cool packs. She sat there telling herself it was okay with her that Ben had managed to get her lazy daughter out of the house at dawn for a hike.

She told herself she enjoyed the peace and quiet of the empty house, but the truth was…she would have enjoyed the hike more.

Even if she didn’t have the strength for it.

But neither of them had asked. She held her cup of tea and looked around her, as always in quiet moments like this, experienced some lingering uneasiness about Asada. She hated that she still felt the urge to peek over her shoulder, and chastised herself for her paranoia.

The FBI had reassured them over and over that with every passing day their chances increased that Asada wasn’t ever going to make a move. Which meant Ben was in all likelihood free of any obligation.

A good thing, Rachel decided. A very good thing.

Suddenly the door opened and Melanie bounced into the kitchen with unaccustomed energy for a Saturday morning. Shocked, Rachel stared at her. “Hey.”

“Hey.” Mel tossed her keys on the table and plopped herself down. She was made up and dressed to kill with a leather skirt, halter top and do-me heels. “Thought I’d visit.”

Rachel eyed the difference between the two of them-she in her loose, gauzy, shapeless sundress, hair undoubtedly wild, feet bare, no makeup-and had to laugh at the two extremes. “Last I checked, it was a Saturday. A day you traditionally reserve for sleeping past noon, getting a manicure and catching a movie.”

“Oh. Well, maybe I’m all movied out.”

“Uh-huh.” Rachel narrowed her eyes. “What are you really up to, Mel?”

“Me?” Mel dumped three tablespoons of sugar into her tea, then after a moment’s hesitation, went back for a fourth. “Just wanted to see how you’re doing, that’s all.”

“You just saw me last weekend, plus you called three times this week.” Rachel cupped her fingers around her tea, still needing to be warm all the time in order not to stiffen up. Her life had forever changed, there was no doubt of that, but she refused to let others change their lives because of what had happened to her. Leaning in, she put a hand over her sister’s. “Mel, you don’t have to give up your life for this. For me. I’m doing fine.”

Her sister shrugged. “Maybe I don’t believe you.”

“Why?” Rachel had to smile as she lifted her arms. “Don’t I look fabulous?”

“No.” Mel didn’t smile to soften the blunt word. “You look miserable. Like you’re hurting, and I don’t mean physically.”

“That’s ridiculous.” Rachel stared down into her tea and lied. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Yeah, that’s because we’re discussing you. If we were tearing apart my life, which we’ve done often enough, then you’d know exactly what I was talking about.”

“Mel-”

“Look, I know I’m a screwup, but I don’t expect it of you.”

“And just what am I supposedly screwing up?”

“Seen Adam much lately?”

“A little.”

“Because of his busy schedule?”

“Uh…no.”

“Because you’ve been ignoring him?”

Rachel looked at her fingers. Specifically her fingernails. Which were ragged and hadn’t seen a nail file or polish in months.

“You know, before the accident, I’d have sworn you were this close to sleeping with him.” Mel held up fingers only an inch apart. “Maybe even considering marrying him.”

“The accident changed everything.”

“The accident did…or Ben?”

Rachel’s gaze jerked up to Mel’s before she could stop herself. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

“Is it ridiculous that you never sleep with anyone? Is it ridiculous that if you did, you’d fake an orgasm rather than tell them they’re totally inept with the female anatomy…or that you can’t seem to relinquish that last little bit of control?”

“Mel-”

“Admit it, sis. You don’t know how to let someone be that close to you.”

“Like you know!”

“Hey, I know how to climax.” A smug smile crossed her well-glossed mouth. “Often.” She flashed a look to the man who’d just let himself in and was now leaning back with lazy ease against the doorjamb, unabashedly eavesdropping on what Rachel figured to be her most embarrassing moment. She wanted to crawl in a hole and die- Right after she killed Melanie. “Where’s Emily?” she asked, striving for cool, calm and collected.

“Bathing Patches, who seems to have a thing for jumping in puddles.” With a wry smile, Ben lifted his leg to examine the bottom of his jeans, which were mud splattered. Then he leveled Rachel with one of those classic Ben looks that made her pulse scramble and her skin feel too tight. “Don’t let me interrupt.”

“To not interrupt you’d have to be on the other side of the closed door,” Rachel muttered.

Melanie grinned. “Talking sex makes her grumpy.”

“Not me,” Ben offered.

And Mel, still grinning, nodded. “Me, either. So Ben…we’re taking a survey…do you ever fake your orgasms?”

“No, ma’am.”

“Me, either.” Melanie cocked her head. “It just seems like if someone was going to fake it…then they’d fake it the other way. You know, like they didn’t get one.”

Given Ben’s wide grin, he agreed.

“That way, you’d get another,” Mel reasoned. “Maybe even two, depending on how fast you can come.”

“I’m with you.” Ben looked at Rachel and the temperature shot up in the room to boiling point. “Orgasms are good.”

Melanie laughed. Laughed. “Yeah. Well, if Ms. Prude here would get off her duff and call Adam over here, maybe she’d figure it out.”

Ben’s smile faded at that.

Not noticing, or maybe not caring, Mel jumped down off the counter and headed for the door.

“Where are you going?” Rachel demanded of her sister.

“Off to watch my niece bathe a puppy. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t, sis.” A sly smile crept over her features. “Oh wait…I don’t have to tell you that, you won’t do anything.”

“Come back here-” She let out a breath when Mel let the door shut behind her. “Traitor.”

Ben sauntered his way toward her. “Interesting topic of conversation.” He walked around the back of her, trailing a finger over her shoulder and bringing a set of goose bumps to the surface of her skin. “Orgasms.”

Did that require a response? Suddenly, she could hardly breathe, much less think of a brilliant way out of this particular topic. “H-how was your hike?”

“Fun.” Then he leaned in over her shoulder, putting his mouth right beneath her ear, against the sensitive skin there. “Is it true, Rach?”

“Is wh-what true?”

His breath was soft and warm against her skin, his jaw rough with a day’s old growth. The contrast liquefied her bones. “Do you fake your orgasms with your lovers?”

“I-” His fingers trailed upward, over the back of her neck and she fought to keep her eyes open.

“Rachel?”

She closed her mouth. “I don’t want to discuss this with you.”

“I bet you don’t.” Shifting around so that they were face-to-face, he ran a finger over her cheek. “So let’s cut to the chase.”

“Ben-”

His hand slid around the back of her neck to cup her head, holding her gaze steady with his. “Did you fake with me?”

Trying to pull away did no good, he was strong and, though his hold was gentle, he couldn’t be budged. “We were seventeen!” she said, exasperated on all counts. “We had no particular skills in that area and you know it.”

He brought their faces even closer together. “I did the best I could back then, but yeah, we were young. Young and inexperienced. I’m sorry if I wasn’t any good for you.”

Remembering what they’d shared brought a flush to her cheeks. Truth was, inexperienced or not, it stood unrivaled to this very day as the hottest, most erotic, most touching experience of her life.

And he was apologizing for it.

“But I promise you,” he said softly, still holding her gaze prisoner. “If you sleep with me now, I’d prove there’s no need to fake anything.”

She stared at his mouth, wide and firm, and yet she had reason to know it felt soft and tasted like pure heaven.

“Rach…?”

She actually leaned toward that low, sexy voice making promises she thought she just might be interested in. Then she thought of the actual physical action required to do what he was suggesting.

He’d get naked. No problem there.

Then she’d have to get naked-big problem there. He was perfection, and she… “No.”

Ben let out a soft, rude noise and dared her with both his eyes and his voice. “Chicken,” he taunted softly.

“Just being realistic.”

Another man would have conceded defeat and walked away. Another man would have hidden his thoughts.

Ben stood there, right there, only inches away, and let her see everything he felt. Annoyance. Heat. Frustration.

Heat. “You’re really not going let me prove it?”

“No.” She looked away. “I’m not interested.”

“Ten minutes,” he promised silkily. “I could rock your world in ten minutes.”

“Go away, Ben.”

No big surprise, he did.

BEN SHOVED OUT the front door, slowing down only to lock it behind him. Asada was long gone, everyone kept telling him that, but he couldn’t break the old habit of watching his back.

And Emily’s.

And Rachel’s. Damn her.

She’d kicked him out. Nothing new. Stepping out the front gate, he joined the early Saturday morning shoppers, of which there were many, and lost himself in the streets. They were as different from the mean, hustling, dangerous streets he’d gotten used to as they could get. These were clean and tantalized with mouthwatering scents from the cafés. They were busy, but also easygoing and safe. No need for this terrible tension and aggression, and no outlet for those feelings, either.

Stalking along, blindly window-shopping, he was torn between wishing he was on the other side of the world, and wishing Rachel would have let him fulfill his promise. It would kill them both, of course, being together like that again. Or at least it would kill him, but-

“Ben!”

Oh, and now he was hearing things. Rachel’s soft voice above the crowd. As if she’d be chasing him down, as if she could-

“Ben, wait!”

Whipping around, he stopped short in shock. Rachel, in her loose, gauzy sundress and sandals, using her cane as she chased him down at an alarming speed. She was going to stumble and take a fall, was his first heart-stopping thought.

She looked frantic to catch him. Him, Ben Asher, the man she’d just shoved out her door.

“I’m sorry,” she rushed, still coming at him. When she was within two feet, he held out his arms, completely without thought.

She walked right into them and fit like she belonged there.

At the slight tightening of his arms and his lack of smile, hers faded. She swallowed hard. “Oh, Ben.”

The two words spoke volumes and yet didn’t tell him a thing. “Did you want to finish talking about orgasms?” he asked a little hoarsely.

A woman walking by, arms loaded with shopping bags, looked over with a lifted eyebrow.

“Uh, no.” Rachel smiled apologetically at the woman. “I was hoping we could talk about…other stuff.”

“I’d rather give you an orgasm.”

This time it was a man walking his hundred-pound Saint Bernard who overheard, and he shot them a comical second glance while Rachel closed her eyes. “Talk, Ben. Can we talk?”

“If that’s all you’ve got.”

“That’s all you’re getting.” She pointed to a sidewalk café a few buildings down. “Hungry?”

For you. “Sure.”

When they were seated, Rachel ordered an iced tea, set her menu aside, and looked at him across the table.

“What?”

“Don’t brood.”

“Why would I brood?”

“I don’t know.”

He nodded. “Are you sleeping with Adam?”

She sighed.

His heart kicked once, hard. “Are you?”

“You have such a one-track mind.”

“Are you?”

“You know that’s none of your business.”

He answered with a very impolite one-word expletive and she sighed again. “No, I’m not sleeping with Adam.”

She wasn’t sleeping with Adam. Thank God. “You’re right,” he said primly, folding his hands. “It’s none of my business.”

Across the table, she groaned and cupped her face in her hands. “You’re such a jerk,” she said, muffled.

“Yeah, it’s a special talent of mine.” He took in her confusion, and disgust filled him. Self disgust. What right did he have to want her single?

It was possible that by this time next week he’d be gone, so far gone.

The waitress brought the iced teas. To keep them there, at the same table, talking, even if the air was filled with tension, Ben ordered a large brunch.

“Tell me something,” Rachel said, playing with her straw. “What are you in such a hurry to get back to?”

“A personal question, Rach?”

She put lemon and sugar in her iced tea. Took a sip. Pushed the drink aside and looked right into his eyes. “Yes. Maybe it’s because I’m older. More mellow-” She glared when he laughed. “I am,” she insisted, and lifted a shoulder. “I’d really like to know. Tell me why you can’t stand being tied to one place for longer than it takes to do a load of laundry, when there’s no place in particular even waiting for you. No place and no one.”

“Hey, I’ve done my laundry here. Quite a few times. I’ve even done your laundry. I like your pale-peach satin panties, by the way, and that black lace bra…”

She rolled her eyes. “You know what I mean.”

Yeah. Yeah, he did. And because her curiosity was honest and not bitter, because she obviously really wanted to know, he found he could try to admit some of what he thought of as his secret shame, the one thing he’d never told another soul. “Staying in one spot, making roots…it infers you’ve found your home, found yourself.”

“Yes,” she agreed.

“But I don’t even know who I really am. I can’t seem to find myself.”

She sat back, looking a little stunned. “But you know who you are.”

“Who I am is a man with no idea who his parents were or where I came from.”

Her eyes softened. “I didn’t know that.”

“Because I never told you. I couldn’t.”

“Oh, Ben. Were you always in a foster home?”

“Yes. It was ‘Christian duty.’ They liked to say that.”

“That’s so wrong!” Her voice was thick, emotional. “No child should ever feel that they weren’t wanted. I hate that for you.”

“Don’t,” he said a bit harshly, unable to take her pity. “I’m just trying to explain.”

“You were never given any information about your past at all?”

He downed half his glass of tea for his suddenly parched throat. “All I know is that when I was about two days old, I was found in a trash bin in Los Angeles, nearly dead of exposure and starvation.”

She covered her mouth with her fingers, fingers that shook, he noted. No, it wasn’t a pretty story, but she’d asked. “So yeah, I always knew I belonged nowhere, with no one.”

“How cruel! How could a foster parent, someone trusted with a child, do that? Make you feel that way?” she cried.

“Hey. Hey, it doesn’t matter now,” he said, a little surprised, and touched, at the tears shimmering in her eyes. He put a hand over hers. “I’m trying to make you understand, that’s all. Why I don’t like it here.”

“Why didn’t you ever tell me all this before?”

“I never told anyone.” He could hear the hurt and shock in her voice and for some reason, sought to alleviate both. “I just pretended it wasn’t so bad. And when I was with you, it wasn’t.” He smiled into the face of her tears. “Look, Rach, the point of all this is, I always planned on getting out of South Village, only I couldn’t do it until I was eighteen. My entire childhood and adolescence, I was stuck. Held by circumstance, poverty, disregard, whatever. So the minute I graduated-”

“You got the hell out,” she finished softly.

“I got the hell out,” he agreed.

“You never said. I never knew. I never understood.”

“I wasn’t real great at sharing that side of my life. I was so full of frustration and rage and the need to get out, I didn’t know what I wanted-other than to go, of course-or even what I’d do with myself when I did.”

“But you found out.”

“Yeah.” He thought of all the places he’d been, how in each one he’d learned something new, and had added it to the stack, accumulating experiences and emotions in a way he hadn’t been able to growing up. “I loved it. I still love it.”

Her eyes were immeasurably sad, and yet full of something else too, a new understanding. Finally, she understood him.

Why was that the most bittersweet thing of all?

She turned her hand over in his and held on. “Ben? I want to tell you something. Something I should have told you a long time ago, too.” She bit her lower lip. “I didn’t belong anywhere, either.”

“You belong here in South Village.”

“I didn’t always. You know we moved at the drop of a hat while my father raided and pillaged corporations.”

“Yes.”

“Until we came here, until I found South Village, I never had roots or a real home, either.”

“And yet we ended up on opposite sides of the fence.”

Her eyes filled again. “I never saw it that way before…but how I feel about my home…that’s how you feel about your travels. My God, and all this time I thought we were so different.”

“I know.” His throat felt raw, talking to her like this. Sharing. Feeling it all over again. Chest aching, he leaned forward, wanting to be closer. “Want to hear something shocking?”

That got a short laugh. “After all this?” she asked. “Please. What else would shock me?”

He let out a sheepish smile. “Truthfully? It’s not so bad waking up every morning to view the sunrise from the same porch. Not so bad having a tangible address in a full but clean and happy city leaping with life… I can admit that much, even if I can’t share your love for it.”

One lone tear slowly spilled over, slipped down her cheek. “Oh, Ben.”

His gaze dropped to her lips to watch the words come out.

Her gaze dropped to his lips, too.

“This hasn’t changed, has it?” He leaned close over the table, so that her breath mingled with his, making him shiver in anticipation, awareness. Need. “This physical attraction.”

Her tongue darted out, wet her dry lips, making him groan. “It always was crazy,” she agreed in a hushed whisper. “Always uncontrollable, this…this…”

“Need. We need each other, Rach. It doesn’t change anything about who we are, but damn, I’d really like to hear you say it.”

“What, that I need you more than my next breath, in a way I don’t want?” Her eyes were big on his. “Well, I do. God, Ben, I do.”

“Good.” They were so close it seemed like the most natural thing in the entire world to close the gap between them and capture her lips with his.

With a low sound in her throat, she pushed even closer. Ben shoved the things cluttering the table out of his way so he could get more of her mouth, more of her. It was good, and he angled in for even more, which she gave, until a shattering crash of glass had them both pulling back, blinking like moles coming out in to the daylight.

Rachel stared at the ground at their feet, where one of them had knocked over her iced tea. “Was that us?”

He laughed, but it backed up in his throat when she licked her lips again, as if she needed that last taste of him. “Maybe we should get out of here,” he suggested, thinking somewhere…like her bedroom.

She let out a low laugh that was so innately female, so sensual, it revved his engines all over again. “Oh, no. We’re not getting out of here. This is not leading back to the question of my…” She blushed.

“Your orgasms?”

“Uh, yes.” She stole his tea and sipped. “We’re staying right here. Out of temptation and trouble.”

“For how long?”

“As long as it takes to cool off.”

Great. “More iced tea, please,” he said to a passing waitress.