A chenille throw covered her knee-length full skirt and long-sleeved T-shirt, warding off the fog's chill. For a moment she considered tucking the soft fabric around Griffin and then encouraging him to drift into real sleep.
"Are you going to just stare at me in longing all night?" he asked, his eyes still closed.
Her sympathy evaporated, and the residual wooziness disappeared. "You wish," she replied, her voice brisk. "For your information, I was considering calling an embalmer. Frankly, you look ghastly."
"If you're phoning the undertaker, wouldn't that be 'ghostly'?"
Even his wisecrack sounded tired. "Don't you sleep?" she heard herself ask.
At the question, he opened his eyes, then shifted into a more upright position. "Hey, it's not my fault your snoring registers decibels louder than a power mower."
"I do not snore."
"I can't tell you how many soldiers were convinced of the very same thing, honey-pie. But sure enough, come rack time they'd be sawing logs on the bunk beside mine."
She tilted her head. "How did you ever get any rest?"
"Pills. Prescription sleeping pills," he said, stretching his arms along the back of the love seat and closing his eyes again. "Don't look so shocked. Armies have always offered relief to soldiers in combat zones. General Washington gave his guys at Valley Forge rations of rum in an attempt to keep them calm and well rested."
She hadn't realized. "Are you still taking them?"
"No." His eyes opened, and then his gaze shifted away. "Not after - not anymore. Now I count grains of sand."
"Well, that's a task destined to keep you up all night," Jane said. She knew he had the TV going in his room that long, anyway. Since staying at his beach house she'd noted its low drone never subsided from when he went to bed in the evening until he went for coffee in the kitchen the following morning.
Obviously she hadn't been sleeping all that great either. Images kept popping up to disturb her. Griffin in his pirate gear. Griffin jumping off the cliff. His mouth as it descended toward hers in the laundry room. His hands on her in the storeroom at Captain Crow's. That same touch in this very room yesterday.
After that near-kiss, she'd run to No. 8 and played with Tess and the kids until sundown, while a series of warnings ran over and over in her mind. Don't get involved with the client. It's bad for business. Don't get involved with the client. It's bad for you. Then this morning, after giving herself another stern talking-to, it was Griffin who'd left, claiming an appointment he couldn't miss.
"But enough about me," he said, starting to rise.
Reaching over, she clamped a hand on his knee to push him back down. "Nice try. We can at least map out some page goals. Let me call up a calendar." Keeping one hand on him, she lifted her laptop from the side table and set it on her lap.
"Could you move up your hand a little bit?" he asked politely.
Already tapping on the keyboard, she didn't look away from the screen. "Sure - " she started, then she broke off and yanked her hand from his leg as if it was on fire. "Stop that."
He was trying to look innocent. "But you had this cute little frown right above your cute little nose. I was only trying to get a cute little hand job - you were so caught up you wouldn't even have noticed."
"Oh? You're that small?"
"Now you're just being insulting."
"So?" He was trying to run her off again, or at the very least distract her from her purpose. "What are you being when you pull stupid stunts like that?" Without waiting for an answer, she scooted closer, tilting the laptop so he had a better view of the screen. "Here's the next few weeks. Why don't we set targets - "
"I can't do this, Jane," Griffin said.
Anxiety gripped her stomach, which did not do good things to the margaritas still sloshing inside. If he came to the point where he flat-out refused to work instead of just doling out excuses, she'd have to face that she'd failed yet again. The flat of her palm pressed her roiling belly. Word would get around, would get back to her father, would have Ian Stone spreading icing on the cakes that were the stories he'd already told about her. "C-can't do what?"
"Can't look at the calendar on the screen. The angle's wrong and the light's crappy."