Until There Was You(43)

She brushed past Liam, then set the box down. Cordelia wore a flannel shirt and brown Carhartt carpenter pants and looked more like Norm Abrams from This Old House than an actual female. Those boots could do serious damage. She might dress like a man, but there was that nice smell again. Oranges. He couldn’t imagine her using perfume. Maybe it was her shampoo or soap.

An unbidden image of Cordelia in the shower, water and suds streaming over her wet skin, leaped to mind.

She cleared her throat, and Liam, abruptly aware that he was staring at her, shifted his gaze. Okay, that was…odd. Sex thoughts about Cordelia Osterhagen. Well, chalk it up to garden variety horniness and a long drought, and think about something else.

He looked past her. The door wasn’t locked.

Now, intellectually, Liam knew that there weren’t exactly roaming gangs of burglars wandering the streets of Bellsford, and he also knew that the Tates tended to kick the old stress level into the red zone, which tended to bring on flares of OCD, and he knew that just because the door wasn’t locked didn’t mean that some knife-wielding maniac was about to burst in, but the f**king door wasn’t locked. And as much as he really, really would love to not obsess over that, he wasn’t succeeding. Might as well get it over with and lock the damn door, because all he could think about, other than Nicole dying in a fiery Air France crash, was the fact that the door was unlocked, and Cordelia Osterhagen was staring at him warily, and he might as well just lock the damn thing and turn to nicer thoughts. Like Cordelia in the shower.

He reached behind her, and she jumped back a step, as if afraid he was going to hit her. Or grab her. “I’m just locking the door,” he said, the words a little sharp.

“Oh.”

He turned the lock, listening for the satisfying thunk of the dead bolt in the hasp. Then he unlocked it. Locked it again. Unlocked it. Locked it. Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes for a second, then glanced at Cordelia, who was looking at him steadily. Once more couldn’t hurt. Unlock. Lock. Done.

“Problem?” she asked.

“No,” he said. He folded his arms over his chest, vaguely aware that he was being a prick and had barely spoken to her. “Thank you for bringing this over. Whatever it is.”

“Do you want to see it? It’s—”

“No, that’s fine. Just…her bedroom’s down the hall on the right.” He went to pick up the box, but she grabbed it at the same time.

“It’s fragile,” she said.

“I thought you said it was heavy.”

“It is. Heavy and fragile.” She scowled at him, looking like a little kid. Fine. She wanted to carry it, no big deal.

Liam led her down the hall and stopped in front of Nicole’s door. He knocked. “Nic? Cordelia’s here with your thing.”

Nicole’s door opened. “Hi!” she said. “Thank you so much for bringing this! But I thought your name was Posey.”

“My real name is Cordelia, but everyone calls me Posey. Except lunkhead here.”

Nicole laughed, the sound making Liam’s heart squeeze. “Come on in. I can’t wait to see what it is!”

Cordelia put the package on the bed, then reached into her pocket and withdrew a Leatherman, a very helpful tool that Liam had never before seen on a woman. She sliced the tape, then stood back to let Nicole open the box. Nic pulled back the cardboard flaps, pushed aside some tissue paper. “Oh, cool!” she exclaimed.

“Here, let me get it out for you,” Cordelia said.

She pulled the rather large object out of the packaging. Liam recognized it immediately, the memory slamming him in the chest like a fist.

It was a large white clock encircled with a ring of pink neon. Painted on the wooden backing were the words Time for Ice Cream!

“I love it! It’s so retro,” Nicole exclaimed.

Cordelia glanced at Liam, who was staring at the clock. “It’s from Sweetie Sue’s,” she said.

He didn’t answer. Memories of Emma, grinning up at him in her pink uniform as she packed a scoop of ice cream into a cone, the chill of the white metal chairs where he’d sit, waiting for her shift to end.

“What’s Sweetie Sue’s?” Nicole asked.

Liam swallowed.

“It was an ice cream parlor here in town,” Cordelia said after a beat. “Your mom worked there in high school.”

“Really?” Nicole asked.

Liam distantly heard Cordelia’s voice as she explained where Sweetie Sue’s had been, the other things she’d salvaged from the store before it was torn down. An old freezer. The milkshake machine.

“I’m gonna put it right over my bed,” Nicole announced. “It’s so neat that Mommy saw this clock every day, too.” She touched it gently, almost reverently. “Dad? Can we put it up?”

Liam cleared his throat. “Sure. I’ll go get some tools. We can do it right now.”

Nicole hopped over and threw her arms around him for a brief hug. “It’s a great present,” she said. “I love it, Daddy.”

“Thank Cordelia. She picked it out.”

Cordelia was looking at him, chewing on her bottom lip, hands in her pockets, her eyebrows drawn together.

“Well, thanks, both of you,” Nicole said, going back to gaze at the clock.

“I’ll get my tools. Be right back.”