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“There aren’t any changes occurring in my living situation.” Elaine frowned then stared at him hard. “Are there?”
Mitch hesitated, his assurance beginning to waver. Something told him his news was not going to be quite as graciously received as he’d originally thought.
The furrow between Elaine’s brows—the one she was going to Botox come Monday—deepened. Mitch had tucked Maggie’s card in her hand, and she’d used the referral because she knew she needed the good deal he had said Maggie would provide. She had a nest egg—half the proceeds from the sale of the house she’d owned with Kevin—but that was in savings, and her thirty hours a week at Dr. Gussman’s didn’t stretch very far. She’d been looking for a new job, but the market was slim in Portland. The cheap rent here had turned out to be her saving grace, so— Oh, no.
“The new owner wants to raise the rent,” she deduced. “Maggie told me she was certain he wouldn’t raise it for at least a year.” She made no attempt to check the panic coursing through her. Welcome to the perfect end to her perfect day: special delivery notice of a raise in rent. There wasn’t enough ice cream in all of Portland to make this news go down sweetly. With her lower lip pushing hard against her upper, she went ahead and glared at Mitch even though it wasn’t his fault and she’d been darned grateful to him for turning her on to Maggie in the first place. Stubbornly, she crossed her arms over her chest. Screw logic. She wasn’t in the mood. And then suddenly it occurred to her.
“So that’s why you came out here.” Her eyes widened. She put a hand on her forehead. “And that’s why you were mowing my lawn. It was a pity mow!”
“Your rent is not being raised. I came out here—” Mitch paused for a moment and stared. “A pity mow?” He shook his head. “I came out here to tell you the duplex has been sold.”
“Sold.” It took a protracted moment to process that information. Mitch wore a small smile, as if he considered this good news. “Sold? Sold is worse than the rent being raised,” she told him as if she were explaining why we don’t bite to a stubborn five-year-old. Lord, she was exhausted. She had lost too much; she was not losing her run-down duplex with the tilting ornamental cabbage. “They can’t do this. No way! I…am not…going…anywhere.”
She grabbed a dish towel—anything she could harmlessly wring to within an inch of its life—and used it to point around the kitchen. “Do you see those walls? I painted those walls. I did it. I went to classes at Home Depot for a month to learn how to glaze. I’ve invested something here. Time, energy, expectation.” She flung out an arm. “I gave my youth to those walls! One person cannot just waltz in and stomp all over another person’s dreams.”
“That wall is your dream?”
“Yes,” she said, but that sounded pathetic, so she backpedaled. “No. That’s not the point.”
“What’s the point?”
He asked gently, like he’d asked her a lot of things during the divorce, and those damn ready-to-roll tears threatened again. She took a breath. “The point is I have a lease. I’m not going anywhere. I’ll get a lawyer.”
“You’re one tough cookie, Elaine.” Amusement shone in his eyes, but not only humor. There was appreciation, too. He wagged his head. “Stop glaring at me a minute. I think you’re right. You shouldn’t let anyone get in the way of what you want. And you do have rights. If you’re not satisfied with your current lease—for any reason—we can draw up a new one to keep on file with the rental agency.”
Elaine’s confusion showed plainly in the furrow of her brow. “‘We’? You’re a divorce lawyer.”
“Yes.” Mitch cleared his throat. Now was a good time to tell her the rest of his news. She’d worked herself into a pretty good froth over a misconception. He was about to bring comfort and relief. Though most people didn’t think of divorce lawyers in this way, bringing comfort and relief was part of the job description. He was tying up loose ends so Elaine could feel safe and secure in her home, and he could put an end to the guilt that had been gnawing at him. Then he could stop thinking about Lowry vs. Lowry and get on with life the way he knew it.
Holding out his hand, he introduced himself as if for the first time. “How do you do? I’m your new landlord.”
The door on Mitch’s newly purchased Toyota Tacoma slammed with a satisfying crunch.
He attempted to start the vehicle, realized the key wasn’t in his hand, dug it out of his pocket and shoved it into the ignition. Grinding the gears, he backed out of the driveway.
Elaine had been slightly less appreciative for this turn of events than he’d anticipated. Her exact response, in fact, when informed that he had purchased the duplex and intended to give her a five-year lease guaranteeing her current below-market rent had been, “No, thank you. I’m moving.”
Moving. Two seconds after she’d just insisted she’d fight tooth and nail to stay!
Punching the steering wheel, he expelled a slow hiss of air. Who the hell could figure out people? Did she have any idea that he’d lain awake nights wondering if she could swing more rent right now in the event a new owner raised it, not to mention wondering how long her money would last and whether she was investing wisely? Then he’d got the idea to buy the duplex. According to the real estate agent he’d consulted, it was a sound investment—well-priced property in an up-and-coming area. Mitch figured he’d work a little less than he normally did on the weekends and become a handyman for a couple of months, getting his exercise here instead of at the gym. It was supposed to be simple.
He’d anticipated Elaine’s relief, her pleasure and, dammit, yes, her gratitude. He had not imagined she would look at him like he’d come to tell her he was putting a freeway through the family farm. He was offering her an updated, rent-controlled duplex, for crying out loud, in a city that had no rent control. And with him as her landlord, she could trust him to keep an eye on things. But following her initial shock had come a look of profound resentment.
The hell with it. He’d tried to make amends. The lady wasn’t interested? Fine.
“Stick to what you’re good at.”
The new-car smell in the cab of this pickup reminded him that he’d bought a truck and gardening tools with the expectation that he was going to be a landlord for a long time…but the hell with that, too. Abusing the stick shift as he came to a stop sign, Mitch realized he had no desire to go home to an empty apartment. He did, however, have to find someplace in his complex to stow the gardening tools, then shower and change. A glance at the digital clock in the dashboard and a quick calculation told him it would be approximately seven-thirty by the time he was done. Seven-thirty on a Friday evening. Between now and then he had plenty of time to find a dinner companion. A rare-steak dinner at Jake’s, a scotch and some logical conversation was just what he needed to forget Elaine Lowry.
Chapter Three
“So let me get this straight.” Gordon Shapiro, Elaine’s best friend since they’d studied for their bar and bat mitzvahs together over two decades ago, gazed curiously across a green Formica-topped table. “Your new landlord is your ex-husband’s divorce lawyer, and you may have slept with him—the lawyer, not the ex—but you’re not sure.”
Elaine nodded. “Right.”
“Hmm.” Gordon shook his head. “I feel terrible then.”
“You do. Why?”
“In high school I voted you ‘Most dull.’”
Elaine plucked a Splenda packet out of a ceramic dish on the kitchen table and threw it at her old friend. “I always suspected you were the one who put me over the top.” At six feet one inch and two hundred pounds, Gordon looked like a handsome linebacker, but he commiserated like a big, cuddly teddy bear.
Laying her head on the table, Elaine groaned. “What am I going to do? I can’t stay there if he owns it. And I’ll never find a two-bedroom in a great area with that kind of rent.” She thumped the table with her fist. “Damn him.”
Reaching for the latte he’d made Elaine and which she hadn’t yet touched, Gordon carried it to the kitchen counter.
“So tell me,” he said, fiddling with the controls of his new cappuccino machine, “if you’re not even sure you slept together, why are you so angry with him?”
“Because he offered me five years of guaranteed rent control!”
“Ah, right.” He nodded. “That bastard.”
Elaine sat up and shook her head. Gordon Shapiro had loved her through braces and Retinol A, through bad hair and bad jobs and through Kevin. He knew her as well as anyone, better than most. She leaned far over the table to explain. “Mitch Ryder thinks I’m going to be alone for five years. He slept with me, and he thinks I’m going to be alone that long.”
“You don’t know for sure that he slept with you.”
“Well, according to the evidence we know he saw me naked.”
“Right.” Gordon frowned. “That’s not good then.”
Elaine slumped over the table again. While Gordon made fresh lattes, she rose, crossed to the kitchen window and stared out.
She’d always loved visiting Gordon on Friday evenings. He lived three blocks from a large synagogue in the northwest section of Portland. Come twilight, families would pass by Gordon’s window, walking to shul together—mothers, fathers and children attractively dressed yet relaxed and happy as they started the Jewish Sabbath by strolling together.
“We used to do that,” Elaine murmured, leaning her shoulder against the window frame and her forehead against the glass. “When I was in grammar school, my parents would take Sam and me to temple every Friday night, and the rabbi would say a prayer for families. All the parents would put their hands on top of their kids’ heads and bless them. My dad’s hands were so big he could reach down and tickle my cheek with his pinkie. It was the best feeling in the whole world.”
Watching her, Gordon smiled back. “Better than Wavy Gravy?” He named their very favorite Ben & Jerry’s flavor. “I stocked up.”
She shrugged apologetically. “Yeah. Better than that.” She looked out again. “Even as a kid, I couldn’t wait to be the parent someday.” In an instant she was assailed by the real reason for the ache inside her, and her eyes began to well. “I’m so scared to have a baby on my own, Gordon. I don’t want to be scared, but I am. I’m even more afraid that I’ll chicken out.”
Gordon sympathized, but had little idea how to soothe such a pain. “Maybe you should start dating,” he said.
“What?” It was freakish how quickly her heart started to pound. The memory of falling asleep on Mitch’s shoulder rose instantly to mind. “I don’t want to date.”
“Nobody wants to date. It’s what you do so you can get to the good stuff.”
“Pass. The ‘good stuff’ is highly overrated, anyway.”
Gordon returned to the table with a fresh latte and a bowl of popcorn and sat. “I consider it my personal duty as your best friend to tell you ‘Nuh-uh.’ Honey, you were with Kevin way too long.”
“Yeah, well not so long that I don’t remember dating. It’s not worth the anxiety. All you do between dates is exfoliate and worry. Does he like me? Will he call again? Should I call him?”
“I love wondering that.”
Elaine shuddered. “Not me. Anyway, I’ve got more important things to think about. I’ve got to find a birth partner. I’ve always wanted to try natural childbirth, so I’ll need someone who can go to classes with me and help me breathe and—” Gordon was cringing already. Elaine’s heart plummeted. “Not your cup of tea, hmm?”
Looking up at her, his eyes full of affection and regret, Gordon said, “Sorry, pumpkin. You know how I am with blood.”
“But the miracle of birth—”
Gordon shook his head.
Elaine sighed. She’d known it was too much to hope for, but figured it was worth a shot. Gordon had been surprised but supportive when she’d first related her decision to have a family, but he’d never been that nuts about kids, even when he was one. This wasn’t going to be like the movies, where two single friends raised a child together.
Elaine could feel depression threaten as the dreaded “if onlys” floated through her mind. If only she’d married more wisely. If only she were married now to someone who would rub cocoa butter on her stomach and bring home books on attachment parenting and read aloud from them in bed. If only…
She turned again to gaze out the window. The one thing she had promised herself she would not do after her divorce was stay angry or get stuck in some postdivorce time warp. She’d spent twelve years of her marriage acting like Doris Day on Valium. Happy, happy, happy. The only thing worse would be to turn into Divorced Doris in need of Prozac.
“I’m not ruining this for you, am I?” Gordon asked, concern filling his voice.
She turned toward her friend and had to smile. He looked so guilty. “Nope. Not even close,” she assured him and knew suddenly it was true. The fact was that every stumbling block she thought of only made her want to have a baby more. “I’m going to do it, Gordy. I’ll just take the next logical step and worry about the rest later. I’m through with the picket fence fantasy.” She gave him a huge brave smile. “Come Monday morning, Gordo, I’m visiting a sperm bank.”
After an initial blink of surprise, Gordon nodded. “Now that I can get on board with. I’ll go with you.”
Elaine laughed. “We’ll see, Gordon.”
At 5:00 a.m. Saturday morning, Elaine’s eyes snapped open. She rolled over, burying her face in a pile of cool, soft pillows, but awakened again at five-thirty, six-fifteen and a quarter to seven.
Birds sang outside her bedroom window, the morning light poked around the lowered shade, teasing her, and she was helpless to resist its lure. For the first time in ages she had something more exciting than breakfast to get up for.
Showering quickly, she dressed for a day of running around in weather that was supposed to inch toward seventy. Indian summer. It was amazing, really, what a change in perspective could do. Yesterday, she’d been exhausted, older than her years. Today she felt fit and alive.
Ready and able to make a baby.
The conviction that she could pursue her dream on her own had not waned overnight. Today and tomorrow she planned to do as much research as she could. By Monday morning she’d be ready to get the ball rolling.
Inspired by the idea that she was finally in charge of her dreams, Elaine was too hyped to sit still. She took a brisk walk through the neighborhood then drove to Pappaccino’s for a toasted bagel and a hazelnut latte while she waited for the stores to open.
Come 10:00 a.m., her first stop was Barnes & Noble, followed by the library, where she checked out several books and researched alternative insemination on the Internet until an assistant librarian kicked her off the computer.
After the library, Elaine hit the craft store, Babies R Us, and PetCo to look—only look for now—at the puppies. Eventually she wanted her child to be raised around animals. Thoughts of country homes with space to roam flitted through her head as she laughed at the gymnastics of an exuberant Lab puppy before she made her seventh and last stop before home—the health food store.
Grabbing a basket, she wandered the aisles, acquainting herself with sprouted grains, fermented soybeans and “natural” chickens that, according to the literature they came with, had been raised at a veritable Club Med for poultry. Unfortunately she couldn’t bear the thought of eating something so happy, so she pressed on to the organic dairy case. If she was going to make a baby, she had to prepare her body. Good nutrition was a cornerstone of fertility.
By the time Elaine arrived home, laden with shopping bags and information, perspiration trickled beneath her T-shirt, her limbs felt rubbery and her stomach howled for food. She could have killed for a burger—the kind someone else made and which took three minutes, max, to serve up—but fast food was strictly off-limits from now on. She consoled her tummy by promising to feed it a yummy tempeh Reuben sandwich as soon as she got all the perishables put away.
Low blood sugar was probably the reason she didn’t react strongly when she saw the Toyota truck parked outside the duplex. Mitch was back. Not that she was surprised. He owned the building, after all, and he had said he was going to work weekends fixing it up. What he did with his duplex was his business; all she had to figure out was whether she intended to stay here or not.
Or not would have been ahead by a mile except that Elaine couldn’t imagine being able to afford anything more appropriate given her current job, her savings…and her plans. Which meant, of course, that she was going to have to call a truce with her landlord. She didn’t want his rock-bottom rent; she refused to accept it. Why he considered her his personal charity case, she didn’t know and refused to ponder. Stress interfered with ovulation.
Business, pure and simple—that’s all she wanted to think about where Mitch Ryder was concerned. Decent housing at a fair-to-both-of-them price was the deal she was determined to strike. When she found a better job, she would find better housing. Or, at least, comparable housing with a different landlord.
Hefting two of the grocery bags into her arms, Elaine lugged them up the porch steps, setting them by the front door while she fiddled with her house keys.
The apartment unit next to hers had been vacant since she’d moved in. Today the windows were open for the first time and she heard someone, Mitch evidently, working inside. Rhythmic hammering filled the air.
Elaine quickly decided to unload her purchases and feed herself before she faced him.
He had other ideas.
On her second trip from the car to her front door, she turned with three shopping bags in her arms to find him striding toward her, a scowl of displeasure directed her way. “What do you think you’re doing?”
Surprised, Elaine had to think about it a minute. “I’m carrying my packages to the house,” she said mildly, deliberately meeting his scowl with a frown of concern. “That’s not a violation of my rental agreement, is it?”
Mitch scowled harder. “Funny.” He reached for the bundles, all the bundles, in her arms without asking. “I mean, what are you doing carrying so much at one time?”
After a futile protest, Elaine plunked her hands on her hips and eyed her purloined bags. “What are you doing carrying so much at one time?”
The scowl cleared briefly to make room for surprise. Then his eyes narrowed. “Are you one of those women?” He hitched his chin at her, indicating she should continue moving toward the door. “The kind who wants to believe she can do everything without a man?”
You have no idea. She nearly laughed out loud, but he didn’t appear to be in a laughing mood and the packages were heavy, so she let them in the door without further ado. Mitch followed her to the kitchen.
“Just set it all on the counter, thanks.”
He elbowed the first bags she’d brought in farther back and placed his in front of them. “You were busy today.”
As she nodded, her stomach growled loudly, reminding her just how busy she’d been.
Mitch cocked a brow. “Do you have anything else in your car?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll get it. You start unpacking and make yourself something to eat.”
Elaine was inclined to be grateful. Kevin had stopped helping with groceries so long ago, he’d completely missed the “Paper or plastic?” revolution. On the other hand, she figured Mitch’s authoritative tone and her newly avowed status as one of those women made her honor-bound to decline.
“That’s okay,” she said. “I’ll get the rest of my things and then—”
Grrrrrr. Her stomach protested decisively.
Mitch shook his head at her. “Eat something, Elaine. You have a great body, but your legs are skinny.” Without waiting for or inviting a reply, he turned and strode out of the duplex.
Elaine stared after him speechlessly. For a recently divorced woman with Ben & Jerry’s running through her veins, those words were music to her ears.
Mitch headed for Elaine’s red Volvo to bring in the rest of her purchases.
He’d been hard at work since quarter to nine this morning, surprised to find Elaine gone so early, but deciding it was better that way. No arguing, no verbal sparring. He’d get more work done.
Except that his peaceful morning hadn’t been nearly as enjoyable as his contentious evening the night before with Elaine.
After he’d left her, he’d ended up having dinner with his sister, who had been useless in decoding Elaine’s behavior. To his question, “Why would a woman get so damned riled about a rent discount?” M.D. had replied, “No idea.” Then she’d ordered steak, rare, and a scotch and water from the waiter at Jake’s. Mitch had gotten the picture: If he wanted to know how a woman’s mind worked, he would have to ask someone who thought like a woman, which pretty much ruled out M.D.
In lieu of ruminating about Elaine, he’d decided simply to distract himself. The physical work today had felt good, and he’d been congratulating himself on not wussing out by hiring someone to handle the minor repairs in the vacant unit when Elaine wobbled by the window, lugging the first group of grocery bags. Once again he’d had a nearly instantaneous protective response. Carrying all those heavy bags, he’d thought, can’t be good for her.
Jeez! Was part of his brain misfiring? Had a crucial synapse died? As of last night, Elaine Lowry is only a tenant, he reminded himself.
Reaching into the open rear door of her car, Mitch saw that the remaining bags held books. There were two plastic bags with a bookstore logo and a large canvas bag that had Multnomah County Library printed on the side. Some of the library books had spilled out onto the seat.
Leaning farther into the car to scoop them up, Mitch realized he was curious about what Elaine read and about the sheer quantity of reading material. Come to think of it, though, having a plethora of books seemed to fit her image. Underneath the quirky outspoken feminist lurked a shy, bookish heart. Definitely the quiet evening at home with a cup of tea and fuzzy slippers type. Though the women Mitch dated were happier in sophisticated restaurants and clubs than they were ensconced on their own sofas, Mitch liked that about Elaine. He liked—
What the hell?
He looked more closely at the books on the back seat.
Fertility Nutrition.
Soy Drinks for Hormonal Health.
Dragging the canvas bag closer, he pulled out more books.
Yoga and Your Pregnant Body.
Baby’s First Year.
When he dug into the Barnes & Noble bag, the first book he withdrew was Forty Thousand Names for Baby.
He felt as if steam were shooting from his ears, like a character in one of the Saturday morning cartoons he and M.D. used to sneak into the TV room to watch. What the bloody hell…
Pregnant? Was Elaine pregnant? The image of her womanly body entered his mind and lodged there as he slammed the door and strode back to the apartment with her books.
She was in front of the refrigerator, bending over as she squeezed vegetables into the crisper, her shorts inching up to expose a generous amount of smooth, lightly tanned skin. Had he actually called those shapely legs skinny?
Mitch dropped the book bags to the floor. Elaine glanced over her shoulder and smiled, the first genuine smile she’d given him since he’d shown up yesterday. The curve of her lips was as sweet and sexy as…as her other curves.
Feeling his mouth go dry, Mitch stood uselessly and stared until Elaine requested, “Would you hand me the rutabaga?”
He stared dumbly, making no response at all. She pointed. “The rutabaga. It’s right there by your—”
Mitch took the pointing hand and abruptly hauled Elaine to her feet, ignoring her surprise while his gaze fell immediately to her breasts, her stomach, looking, he supposed, for evidence and trying hard to dismiss the churning sense of…what? Of something acutely uncomfortable in the center of his gut.