The Road Home Read online

  “No.” He sat up against the headboard. In order to beat back the nightmares, he’d written, pounding out the pages of the thriller he was working on until four in the morning, and it was…he squinted at the clock…just barely seven now.

  He couldn’t function on so little sleep, he just couldn’t. If he wasn’t so stubborn, he might have taken one of the sleeping pills his doctor had given him after his accident, but he had a healthy fear of drugs, so he suffered the nightmares and the lack of sleep, and reminded himself that at least he was alive.

  “Morning,” Rose said cheerfully. “You awake?”

  Yes, because of her.

  Just as he was alive because of her. And in return, all she wanted was this favor…. “Ah, hell,” he said again.

  Rose just smiled. “Don’t worry. The parrot’s easier to handle than Bob. I’ll meet you at the front door.”

  JASON SAT in Dr. Melissa Anders’s waiting room, squeezed between an old man holding an even older looking dog, and a teenage girl cradling a hamster. The old man and dog were napping, heads back, mouths open. The teenage girl was chomping a big wad of purple gum and staring at the scar down the side of his face.

  In the six months since the accident, he’d gotten used to the stares, sort of. “What’s the matter with your hamster?”

  “She has an abscess.” She stroked the little rodent, who in return, wriggled its nose at her. “Dr. Anders fixed Brownie’s sister so I’m hoping she can fix Sprinkles, too. Do you think she can?”

  He looked into the earnest face with the hopeful eyes, the sweet freckles conflicting with the myriad of silver hoops up one ear. “I think your hamster is safe with Dr. Anders.”

  “Yeah. She’s new, but she’s the best. Rose says so. She’s my ballet teacher.”

  Jason thought about Rose’s plea. She was desperate to get to know the daughter she’d given up, and yet afraid, too. He knew that Rose could fully understand, and even justify Melissa’s standoffish attitude toward her. That, however, didn’t stop Rose from yearning to set things right between them.

  Jason had no idea if Melissa was open to giving Rose a second chance. Right now he just wanted to fulfill his favor. “Ouch!” Jason grabbed his ear and turned his head to glare at the parrot. “If I liked the taste of feathers, I’d bite you back.”

  He’d have sworn the bird smirked.

  The old man woke up with a snort. “A bird makes a bad pet, son. You need something that naps a lot.”

  They both looked at the dog on the floor at his feet who was snoring. Loudly.

  “Maybe Dr. Anders can take a look at your face while you’re here,” the teenager said softly, eyeing his scar again. “Does it hurt?”

  He got that question most. “No—”

  The door to the middle patient room opened, and Melissa appeared in the doorway. She saw Jason sitting in her waiting room, and then she saw the parrot and lifted a brow. “Problem?”

  Yep, I like looking at you. “I have a bird that needs your attention—ouch!”

  He slapped a hand to his poor, abused ear in tune to the parrot’s happy screech, and also something else. He looked at the teenage girl next to him. “Did you just laugh at me?”

  She laughed again. “You scream like a girl.”

  Melissa put a hand to her mouth, her eyes twinkling, and shook her head. “Don’t tell me, another pet problem?”

  “Yes. I’m afraid of this parrot.”

  “Uh-huh.” Melissa turned to the man next to him. “Mr. Tyson, I can see you now.”

  The old man got up and patted Melissa on the back. The dog, woken by the tug on his leash, licked her.

  Melissa appeared to be a little flustered by the pat, but accepted the dog’s licking with a genuine smile.

  After a few minutes all three reappeared, and then it was the teen’s turn. “Rose says to tell you hello.”

  Melissa’s smile faltered, but the girl never noticed as she walked toward the patient room.

  And then it was his turn. Melissa led him inside a patient room and stood close to him. Just when he was about to make a flirtatious comment, he realized her proximity had nothing to do with him and everything to do with the carnivorous bird perched on his shoulder. She made a kissing noise.

  The parrot made it back.

  She nodded her head.

  The parrot nodded back.

  Smiling now, Melissa reached out.

  “I wouldn’t,” Jason warned. “She likes the taste of flesh.”

  “No, she likes the taste of your flesh.” She coaxed the parrot onto her finger. “What seems to be the trouble?”

  “Um…” He looked at the parrot and tried to remember what Rose had said to him this morning. I know it seems obvious using my pets as bait, but I’m at a loss here. Nothing else has worked. Get Melissa to trust you. Get her to talk. “Well—”

  “Rose,” said the parrot from her new perch on Melissa’s finger.

  Melissa went still and stared at the bird. “What? What did she just say?”

  Ah, hell. “She said she wants a rose. She likes to eat them. We’re here because she…” He’d forgotten what he was supposed to use as an excuse. Maybe it was Melissa’s fathomless green eyes, or maybe it was the heartbreakingly endearing way she’d tried to keep her patient’s owners at arm’s length…or maybe because he’d been half-asleep when Rose had dropped off the damn parrot.

  “I think she ate a twig,” he said brilliantly. “And I’m not sure that’s good for her. I just wanted to have her checked out before I start work for the day.”

  “Ten o’clock in the morning is pretty late to be starting the chores a farm requires.”

  Farm. He lived in an old farmhouse, yes, but he was a writer, not a farmer. Then he remembered the form he’d filled out yesterday. She’d seen his address and assumed he farmed for a living.

  Wouldn’t she be surprised to know that for years he’d been a misplaced city rat, not so unlike herself. “I set my own hours.”

  Melissa gave him a long look, then silently checked out the parrot. “She appears to be fine. And if you stop antagonizing her, she’ll relax.”

  “Me antagonize her?” He laughed. “Oh, baby, have you got that wrong. Check out my poor ear.” Before he could think about what he was doing, he’d shrugged his hair away from his face and turned toward her, exposing his ear. And his scar. He remembered almost instantly, and stiffened, but before he could move back, Melissa put her free hand on his shoulder, holding him still. Her soft, warm breath fluttered over his skin and he was torn between mortification and an age-old stirring of his body.

  “I have good and bad news,” she said.

  Lifting his head, he managed to look her in the eyes.

  “The bad news is that she did indeed get a good chunk out of you. The good news is that you have another ear.”

  He stared at her, waiting for the inevitable, for her to mention his scar, to ask questions….

  Instead, she lifted her eyebrows in a royal gesture. “Is that all? Because I probably have more patients waiting. And you probably have to get to work.”

  “Maybe I’ll find another animal that needs you.”

  Her pretty, glossy lips quirked. “I’m going to charge you every time you do. Is it really worth it?”

  She thought he was coming here to flirt with her. Did she think he wanted a date? Wanted to kiss her?

  Unexpectedly it hit him. He really did.

  But his being here wasn’t about him. It was about Rose, and suddenly that put a sharp twist of guilt in his gut. He’d been concentrating on just being alive, living day to day, enjoying every single second. But not only had he begun a deception he didn’t know how to get out of, he did actually want what Melissa thought he wanted.

  A date.

  A kiss.

  “Goodbye, Jason,” Melissa said quietly, with a finality to her voice that made him blink.

  Goodbye. Damn. He’d had a lot of goodbyes in his life. His parents had died five years ago