Her Gentle Giant Page 4

  There was one other person, but she was loathe to ask him. Very loathe. But, in the end, she realized she didn't have much choice.

  There were other considerations that were on his side, though. She had really liked how he'd treated Emmy the two times he'd met her. And then there was how definitively complimentary the girl behind the counter had been about him, too. He must be downright wonderful if a teenage girl went out of her way to correct a stranger's mistaken opinion of him. Still, it took her most of an afternoon to screw up her courage.

  Hoyt couldn't have been more surprised when his phone rang and he could see that the call was from Arianne. He couldn't imagine why she would be calling him.

  "Hello?"

  "Mr. Chandler?"

  "Hoyt, please, Mrs. Messier."

  Now why would him saying that, in a perfectly normal tone of voice, make her blush? She was glad he wasn't here to see it—she had a feeling that he was the type who didn't allow much to get by him.

  "Then you must call me Ari."

  "Arianne."

  He pronounced it with some foreign accent that made it sound terribly melodic.

  "Okay. I know I have no right to do this, but I don't really know anyone here yet, and I wondered if I might impose on you to do me a small favor."

  "What kind of favor?"

  His tone did not sound inviting, which added to her stress. "I—uh, well, I just need…" It was no use. She couldn't do it, and she sighed heavily. "Nothing. I've changed my mind. I'm sorry to bother you—"

  Hoyt cut off her rambling apology, "Stop. If it's something I can do for you, I will. Ask me, Arianne."

  This time, he sounded firm, but kind. It was the type of voice that made her think she probably wouldn't want to get caught disobeying him. Not that she thought she could ever be comfortable with that kind of relationship, as much as she had wanted to be in one for most of her life. She and Matthew hadn't gotten into that kind of thing, but as much as she still might want it—the yearning for it never really having gone totally away, despite what she'd been through—she couldn't imagine trusting any man enough to allow him to discipline her in any way. That was just one more thing that Matt had ruined for her.

  Her mind flashed on Hoyt making that errant comment, though, about having her over his lap if she kept talking that way—insulting herself, he'd meant—and how it had made her ache in a way she hadn't in longer than she wanted to remember. Still, it was never going to happen, and, considering his size, she was damned glad it wasn't!

  She paused, biting her lip.

  "Arianne."

  Again, a little sterner, but not a trace of anger.

  Matthew would already have been screaming at her—or worse.

  "I-I finally got an interview—"

  "Good for you!"

  She almost laughed. "Well, it's not the greatest job, but it'll bring in something, anyway. I have an interview on Friday at two, but I have no one to watch Emmy."

  "Say no more. I'd be glad to entertain her while you go get yourself a job."

  "I don't know if that's going to happen, but I would greatly appreciate you doing me this favor. I don't know how I could return it—"

  "Don't worry about that," he assured smoothly.

  "Do you want to come here about one or so? I want to give myself time to get there and find the place, plus, I'm compulsively early, and I think that looks good."

  "Speaking as a former boss—well, commanding officer, anyway—it does."

  Oh—he'd been in the military. Of course, why hadn't she thought of that before?

  "Thank you for your service," she said automatically.

  That distracted him a little, but he managed to say, "Thank you. I'd prefer it if you'd bring her to me, if you don't mind. I don't generally go out much, and almost never in the daytime." He paused. "I'm sure you understand why."

  "Of course, of course. Whatever works for you. Thank you very much, Hoyt. I really appreciate it enormously."

  "You're very welcome. Drop her by any time after noon on Friday, and I'll have the house all childproofed by then."

  "Thanks again, Hoyt."

  When she did so, on Friday afternoon, he met them at the door, scooping the little one up and putting her on his shoulders, which made her squeal with glee and clap her hands, taking things out of her mother's very overloaded hands as she schlepped enough stuff into his house that it must've looked as if Em was moving in, not just staying for an afternoon.

  "What's all this?" he asked.

  Arianne barely heard what he said—her senses were being assailed by the utterly delicious smells coming from his kitchen. She was getting damned sick and tired of eating Ramen every night. Her stomach rumbled loudly—and he either didn't hear or was too polite to comment.

  Her eyes finally skittered to his questioning ones, then away.

  "Oh, uh, just stuff I thought you might need—toys, stuffies, extra clothes, snacks, pull ups, sippy cup."

  "Wow. Okay." He took all of the stuff and secreted it in one of the back bedrooms.

  Her mouth ran away with her, and she couldn't keep herself from asking, "What am I smelling, if you don't mind my asking?"

  He seemed surprised. "Oh, that? It's just a veggie broth I've got on the back burner. But I bought ingredients for homemade macaroni and cheese. I read something online that kids like macaroni and cheese."

  She wasn't going to disappoint him by saying that meant the neon orange stuff out of the blue box. He'd find that out himself when he tried to feed it to her. Luckily, their last container of "easy mac" was among one of the things she'd packed.

  "I have French bread for garlic bread, too."

  Damn! She wished she could stay for dinner—she'd appreciate it a lot more than her daughter would! But she didn't say that.

  "Good luck on your interview."

  He was standing distractingly close to her, and he could tell that it made her feel uneasy, so he took a step back, which seemed to relax her a bit.

  "Thank you. I really do appreciate you looking after Emmy for me."

  He smiled, or most of his face did, anyway. "It's the neighborly thing to do."

  No matter that no one ever asked him to do that kind of thing, fearing he would scare their children, he assumed. No one asked him to do much of anything since he'd come home. He made them uneasy, and he understood that.

  "Emmy, come say bye to me," she called, her hand on the doorknob.

  After a quick kiss and a hug and an admonishment to be good for Mr. Chandler—during which her daughter was already clinging to him as if she was the stranger—she went on her way.

  Chapter 4

  It was less than three hours before she returned.

  Hoyt had seen her drive in and didn't bother to get the door, merely calling loudly, "Come in!"

  Ari did as he asked and was immediately confronted by a dog that was roughly the dimensions of a small horse.

  She recognized the breed, too. It was a Rottweiler, and it probably weighed more than she did.

  Hoyt rose as quickly as he could—wishing it wasn't so damned awkward for him to do, especially in front of her, and trying his best to suppress the need to groan in pain as he did so. He was kicking himself; he should have thought about how the dog liked to greet everyone at the door.

  Arianne was standing there, staring at him. Luci didn't have a tail, so he was wagging his entire considerable back end.

  "Are you afraid of dogs?"

  "Only ones that look like they'd enjoy ripping my throat out for fun and profit."

  Emmy bounded past him, intent on throwing herself into her mommy's arms, but then the dog carefully placed himself between Em and Ari, reaching back to slurp Emmy's entire face in one wet lick.

  Emmy giggled. "Move, Luthi!" She took hold of the big collar, and the dog moved for her immediately, then she ran into her mother's arms.

  "How was your day, Teensie? I hope you were well behaved," she said, lifting her into a hug then putting her down
again as she immediately began to wiggle to get free.

  "It wath fun, Mumma!"

  Hoyt corralled the dog and moved a little away from Arianne in order to give her some room and hopefully make her feel more comfortable.

  "She was an angel."

  Arianne grinned, not looking at him, but at her daughter. "Well, now I know you're lying."

  He almost chuckled, himself. "I mean it, but come sit down."

  This man disturbed her more than enough that she really didn't want to do that. She'd been hoping to just collect her daughter and head on home, but she could hardly be impolite to someone who had just done her a big favor, so she knew she was going to have to.

  She looked hesitant, and he simply remained still, as if she was a wild bird he was trying to coax to his hand. When Ari finally settled down on the couch, he took a chair across the room from her, although he wanted to sit on the couch with her and her daughter. "We spent an hour or so in the back yard playing with Luci, here." He scratched the dog's ears, and he looked as if he was in Heaven. "He was chasing his favorite soccer ball, Em was chasing him, and I was chasing her."

  That got her to laugh, which was a sound he instantly decided that he wanted to hear much more of from her.

  "Well," he corrected, rubbing his leg with his other hand, "I was lumbering after her, anyway. Then we came inside and had a little nap, then we had a snack. We munched on the baby carrots you brought and some golden raisins I had in the cupboard."

  "Raisins? She won't eat raisins for me, of any kind!" She sounded almost insulted at that.

  "I told her they were fruit candy, and she gobbled them down." He shrugged, and she noticed, when she snuck a peek at him, that one shoulder—the one on the untouched side of his face—rose higher than the other as he did so. "We were just about to have dinner. Why don't you join us? There's more than enough, and you can tell me how your interview went."

  He didn't sound as if he was going to take "no" for an answer, and frankly, considering how wonderful the house smelled, Arianne really didn't want to turn him down, either. At least her stomach didn't, and it, plus her sense of politeness and courtesy seemed to be conspiring against her wariness and inherent distrust of him such that the moment to have been able to gently decline his invitation passed very quickly.

  Hoyt rose to go check on dinner and saw her cringe away from his sudden movement at the same time he chided himself for having made it.

  But he didn't call it to her attention, and he watched her force herself to unwind just before he continued into the kitchen. She was one strong woman. She had to be to be raising a child by herself.

  He'd asked around town, and no one had seen any trace of there being a "Mr." Messier, and Hoyt found himself hoping that there was no such animal, as much as he knew he shouldn't. Not that that was necessarily an indication one way or the other, but he had noticed she wasn't wearing any kind of rings on that particular finger, although there were indications there that she had been at one point.

  When Ari appeared in the doorway, he was even more impressed. Emmy, of course, bolted into the room, although he cautioned her quietly not to come near the stove, and Luci went as far as to take her wrist in his mouth and gently guide her away.

  "Is there anything I can do to help?" she offered, watching—not a little fearfully—as the huge dog with sharp teeth led her daughter around with her arm in his mouth.

  "You can relax. He's no more capable of hurting her than I am of hurting you."

  Her eyes collided with his and he got a load of her pure disbelief at what he'd said—at least about himself, he sensed—before she went back to staring at the floor.

  "He? I thought he was a girl, with that name."

  "Not 'Lucy' with a 'y', but Luci with an 'i'. As in short for Lucifer."

  That did not make her feel any better about the dog in the least.

  She was so obviously uncomfortable around him that he seriously considered telling her that he didn't need any help, but then decided that she wouldn't become accustomed to him if she didn't spend any time around him. Eventually, she would learn that there was nothing whatsoever to fear from him, he hoped.

  And then he'd get her to tell him who had instilled that fear in her in the first place, and he'd have to talk himself out of killing the man, he was quite sure.

  "Well, far be it from me to turn down help! How about if the two of you set the table?" He reached into the cupboards and brought out a stack of plates then piled silverware on top of it on the snack bar that separated the kitchen from the dining room, as well as napkins.

  Arianne darted in and out of the kitchen, finding butter, salt and pepper, and pouring milk into Emmy's cup.

  "What would you like to drink?" she asked, looking at the glasses in the cupboard rather than at him.

  "There's wine in the fridge if you'd like some, soda and sweet tea, too. There's also coffee if you'd prefer it."

  "No, thank you," she answered primly. "I'll just have water. But what do you want?"

  It hit him hard all of a sudden, despite the domesticity of what they were doing. Or perhaps because of it, he didn't know. But he wanted her, which was why he was taking so much time futzing with the casserole. The mac and cheese was done, but he didn't want to turn toward her in his current condition. It was as if he was a sixteen-year-old again, with a totally uncooperative and embarrassing cock with a mind and a purpose all its own.

  "I'll have water, too, thank you, with ice."

  When the table was set, Arianne went to sit down in the chair next to Emmy, well away from where he was sitting at the head of the table, but he chided her softly, "Ah-ahh-ahhhh."

  She didn't know what she'd done, but it turned out that he wanted her to sit on his other side and to hold her chair for her, too. Then he went around to the other side of the table to make sure that Emmy was secure in her seat before sitting down himself.

  He took Emmy's plate and put a small portion of the mac and cheese on it, as well as some corn with butter and a half a piece of garlic bread, but he didn't give it to her until he'd smushed the mac and cheese into one layer, cut it up with his fork and blown on it to cool it off.

  "There you go, Mischief," he said with a wink.

  Arianne was already steeling herself for her daughter's utter refusal to eat what he'd made and wishing he'd let her sit where she wanted to. She'd be better able to deal with Emmy from there—as if that was her main reason in wanting to sit there. But then she was distracted by both his nearness and the fact that he was holding his hand out to her.

  "What?"

  "Your plate, please?"

  He served her up healthy portions of the pasta and fixin's, then handed it back to her before serving himself an epic amount of both the macaroni and the corn, as well as two big pieces of garlic bread.

  As much as she wanted to appear not to be shoveling the food down her gullet, Arianne was having a hard time not doing just that. "This is excellent! Thank you very much for cooking!"

  He smiled. "You're welcome."

  She kept an eye on Emmy, who, of course, dug into the food just as avidly as her mother did, just to prove her wrong, of course.

  "So. How did the interview go? Good news, I hope?"

  Arianne shrugged. "Honestly, I don't know. There were quite a few people there, so they have their pick, and I'd bet they'll take someone who lives closer. That would be what I would do if I were the boss. But at least someone responded to one of my applications!"

  "I'm sorry you're having such a hard time of it."

  "Thank you."

  "What do you have experience in? Not that I'm much of a social butterfly these days, but I'll keep my ear out and let you know if I hear anything that might work for you."

  She told him what she used to do, although Hoyt sensed that there was a lot she was holding back, which he absolutely understood.

  "May I have more macaronith, pleathe?"

  "You certainly may, baby girl."

  It f
elt funny to her not to be the one looking out for Emmy, but he seemed to do it very naturally, so she let him. It was nice to have a bit of a rest from doing that.

  "Were you always in the military?" she asked then gasped and covered her mouth. "I'm sorry. Do you not want to talk about that?"

  "No, it's fine. I went in as an officer, right out of college. Got my degree in criminal justice and shipped out for Iraq. I've done tours there and Afghanistan, as well as Syria, Germany, Korea…"

  Her eyes were wide, and she looked half her age. "Wow, you've been all over!"

  "Yeah. Twenty years in the military'll do that for you."

  "Were you an MP?"

  "No, but if you don't mind, I don't really want to talk about what I did."

  He said it as gently as he could, but she looked horrified at having asked him anyway and began to apologize profusely, when that was the last thing he wanted from her.

  "Of course not, I'm so sorry to have brought it up. Please forgive—"

  "Arianne. It's okay. You don't have to apologize to me about that." He would have squeezed her hand while he said that, but he managed not to.

  She was almost crying. "Yes, but I didn't mean to bring up something that upsets you."

  He smiled, and she was on his good side, so she saw his mouth go up. "It doesn't, I promise you. The reason I don't want to talk about it is that I'm trying to gather and organize my thoughts about my experiences in the military for a book. So, when I reminisce at the moment, it's for a purpose."

  She looked suitably impressed. "You're writing a book? That's amazing! What a great thing to do!"

  "My sister's been pushing me to do it since I got back, but I had other… medical things that were much more pressing to deal with at the time."

  "I understand." She couldn't really begin to imagine how long he might have had to spend in the hospital, considering the extent of his injuries, and she wondered if he'd had to do all of that alone, which she would imagine would make it just that much harder than if he'd had someone special cheering him on.