it was her doorbell. She had never heard it before.
She moved out of her study. As she descended the stairs, the bell rang again. She crossed the hall and looked warily out the side window—and felt her heart drop. Brendan Cody stood outside on her porch hefting two large brown bags.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Laurel pressed her back against the wall, but he’d already seen her—he grinned through the window and lifted the bags, nodded to the doorknob. She took a deep breath and opened the door. The night air was warm and laced with the sweet scent of honeysuckle.
Brendan cut off all objection with instant self-effacement. “I know, I should have called. But you are going to be so glad I came. When was your last decent Mexican meal?”
Annoyed as she was, Laurel was already starting to salivate … she could smell pico de gallo, and cilantro, and real chile verde wafting from the bags. She had not, in fact, been able to find a halfway decent Mexican restaurant, or even a burrito, since she’d come to North Carolina, and there were some days she thought she would kill for a tamale.
“There aren’t any,” he said, as if he’d read her mind. “Only this one. And I’m not going to tell you where it is, because that would reduce my leverage. We need to talk, Mickey.”
Mickey? she thought, confused.
Before she could respond, Brendan had moved past her into the hall, heading unerringly for the kitchen, where he deposited the bags on a counter and pulled a six-pack of Coronas from one of them.
“Church key?” he queried, and when he tapped the bottle top she realized he meant an opener.
“I don’t think I—”
He was already pulling at drawer handles, finding, of course, one empty drawer after another.
He suddenly abandoned the search and fished keys from his pocket—There was a Swiss Army knife on the chain and he used it to open two glistening bottles. He removed a lime from one of the other bags—“Can you believe what a lime costs, here? And don’t even get me started on avocados …”—and snicked open a blade to cut two juicy green wedges. He garnished the bottles, then handed one to her with a flourish and clinked his bottle against hers.
“Salud,” he toasted, and took a deep drink. Then he was walking out of the kitchen, into the hall.
In the time it took him to cross the hall to the living room it dawned on Laurel how strange her house would look to a stranger. It was still, for most intents and purposes, empty. Not a single stick of furniture in the living room, for example.
She hurried out into the hall and nearly collided with Brendan, who had stopped still in the archway of the living room, she assumed in shock.
He stepped around her and walked the empty room with a poker face. “Love what you’ve done with it.”
“I haven’t been home much,” Laurel started, defensively. Something brushed her ankle and she jumped … looked down to see the cat had appeared to investigate the stranger.
Brendan stooped and held a hand out to the cat, who, annoyingly, came to him in a shot and rubbed her head luxuriously against his hand.
“What’s your name, pretty girl?” Brendan cooed at her.
Laurel shifted, uncomfortable and somehow guilty. “I … haven’t named her yet.”
Brendan stood with the traitorous animal, who was purring so loudly in his arms that Laurel could hear the sound echoing in the room.
“A little problem with commitment here?” Brendan suggested.
“I didn’t—she’s not exactly mine.”
“Cats never are,” he agreed. “No stereo, either?”
Laurel bristled, “No.” She had not been able to listen to music of any kind since the night she’d found Matt and Tracey together. It was too painful.
Brendan sighed dramatically and handed her the cat. “Right back,” he said, and was out of the living room, out through the front door.
Laurel stood with the cat, feeling awkward, invaded, and on the verge of tears. Before she had time to formulate a plan, Brendan was back, with an iPod and speakers, beckoning her outside. “I think on the veranda, don’t you?” he said, exaggerating the drawl.
She followed him through the entry hall in somewhat of a daze, and stood in the front doorway and watched as he deftly set up the speakers on the porch rail and powered on the music. A familiar piano trill sounded, and Laurel sensed the music before she actually recognized it. Van Morrison, of course … what else from a man named