Chapter 27
McCoy
cursed in the darkness, reaching for the pants he had left on the floor beside
the bed. For the second time in a month he had been wakened out of a sound
sleep by someone knocking on his door. He was sure Mrs. Getz, the elderly woman
from the down the hallway, was responsible yet again. She had a habit of
allowing her Pekinese out to do his business in the wee hours of morning and
the little beast had taken to running away from the old woman. Whenever it
happened she inevitably came to McCoy, frantically begging him to help her
give chase. It wasn’t that he didn’t like dogs. He just had an aversion to
running down the sidewalk in the dark at two or three in the morning after an
animal that he was sure could find its way home if left to its own devices.
He pulled
on a tee shirt as he stumbled from the bedroom and turned on the desk lamp,
wondering how long it would take him to catch the troublesome pet. But his
mental tirade ended abruptly when he opened the door – and found Morgan standing
on the other side.
Her hands
were stuffed into the pockets of a windbreaker and she hadn’t bothered to put
on socks with her running shoes. At the surprised look on his face she
shrugged and said, “I couldn’t sleep.”
Caught
completely off-guard, he could only stare blankly for a moment. Then, reaching
out, he took hold of the sleeve of her jacket and pulled her inside without
saying a word.
After he
had closed and locked the door, he took her by the hand and silently led her to
the bedroom, turning off the lamp on the way. When he reached the far side of
the bed, he stopped.
“Take off
your shoes and get into bed,” he commanded gently.
After
hesitating for only a moment, Morgan sat down on the edge of the bed without
protest and took her shoes off. McCoy made his way around to the other side and
checked to make sure the alarm was set on the bedside clock. Out of the corner
of his eye he caught site of her slipping off her sweat pants. Wearing a
long-sleeved tee shirt and boxer-style shorts, she quickly climbed into bed.
He had
intended to keep on his own sweatpants, for propriety sake, but quickly changed
his mind. Shucking them, he left them on the floor, then turned off the light
and got back into bed.
Once his
eyes had adjusted to the darkness, he looked over to find Morgan lying as close
to the far edge of the king-sized bed as possible. He moved toward her and slid
his arm under her shoulders, then laid back, carefully pulling her with him so
that her head was resting on his shoulder.
After a
minute he asked quietly, “Do you want to talk?”
“No,” she
answered simply.
McCoy
reached to smooth her hair, then turned his head to whisper against it, “Just
close your eyes and relax.”
Despite
his suggestion, Morgan’s shoulder beneath his hand remained tense. Even though
she made no effort to move away from him, it was obvious to him that she wasn’t
entirely comfortable either. Her arms were tucked tightly against her body in
the space between them so that only her head was actually touching him.
Deciding that the best way to make her feel more at ease was to simply do
nothing, he kept as still as possible, hardly even daring to breathe.
He was as
surprised that she had willingly gotten into his bed as he was at her showing
up in the first place, and expected at every little movement that she had
changed her mind. For what seemed like an eternity he laid motionless in the
dark, waiting for her slight movements to cease. But it wasn’t until she grew
completely still and he could feel her breath become slow and steady against
his neck that he took a deep breath of his own and relaxed somewhat. He waited
several more minutes to make sure she was indeed asleep, then shifted slightly
so that he was in a more comfortable position. Morgan barely stirred beside him
before growing still again.
After
several seconds he became aware that his shoulder where her head had moved
felt cooler than normal. Reaching to touch it, he found a damp spot on his
shirt. Frowning in the darkness, he cautiously lifted his head until he could
see her face. Even in only the street-lamp light filtering through the
curtains, he could see that her eyelashes were matted and wet.
McCoy
laid his head back and let out a sigh of exasperation, feeling as though he had
let her down somehow. He should’ve realized that she had been crying and
offered comfort instead of worrying only that she was going to leave. He
wondered how he could’ve been so unobservant.
It was a
long time before he finally drifted off, hoping that his simply being there for
her had been comfort enough.
***He awoke only one time in the night, to the
almost forgotten feeling of another person stirring in his bed. When he opened
his eyes Morgan was lying with her back to him, moving restlessly in her
sleep. He rolled to his side and whispered to her softly until she grew still
again without ever having fully awakened. Then, with his arm draped across her
stomach and the scent of her hair to soothe him, he fell back into a peaceful
sleep.
***By the sounds coming from the street beyond
the bedroom window he knew it was nearing the time he had to get up. Morgan
was curled beside him, her breath soft against his shoulder, and he lay
perfectly still, not at all eager to move. Finally easing himself up on one
elbow, he watched her for as long as he dared before rolling over to turn off
the alarm. With six minutes to spare, he carefully got out of bed and pulled
the blanket up over her shoulder, then headed for the shower.
Once he
had showered, shaved, and dried his hair, he tightened the towel around his
waist and opened the door, using the illumination from the bathroom to find his
way to the closet. After selecting a suit, shirt, and tie, he stopped at the
dresser and rummaged for socks and boxers before returning to the bathroom to
dress.
He
emerged minutes later fully dressed. Deciding to pick up coffee on the way
instead of making his own, he left the bedroom and made his way to the living
room. Turning on the desk light, he took a pad and pen from beside the phone
and wrote a quick note:
“Calea,
I’m sorry I had to leave before you woke up. Help yourself to anything you
need. I should be at the office all day. Call me when you get up.”
After
scribbling his name, out of habit rather than necessity, he returned to the
bedroom and propped it against the clock on the nightstand.
Looking
down at her, he resisted the impulse to brush her hair from her cheek as she
lay sleeping for fear it would wake her. Instead, he quietly slipped from the
room and out of the apartment, locking the door behind him.
Opting to
take his car instead of motorcycle, he joined the other commuters only
beginning to clog the streets and started for
An old
song that he could usually only partially recall ran its course through his mind, one a
girlfriend from his college days had played incessantly. For years all he could
remember was the refrain but, out of the blue, the beginning of the song came clearly to him as he was driving.
“Some
sleepless night,
If you should find yourself alone …
Let me be the one you run to,
Let me be the one you come to,
When you need someone to turn to…
Let me be the one.”
He had
been waiting for months for her to make some sort of move, to give him the
smallest indication that he was becoming as important to her as she was to him.
And for months absolutely nothing had happened. They had spent countless hours
– watching movies, going for walks, making and sharing dinners – in each
other’s company. But at the end of the evening, no matter how well it had gone,
he always ended up alone. He had promised the relationship would remain
plutonic unless she wished it otherwise. She had made sure he kept his promise.
But the
moment he had opened his door to find her standing on the other side,
everything had changed. She had come to him, of her own free will. And she had
slept in his bed, with him in it, without undue influence. Whatever her
motives he was taking her actions as a huge step in the right direction. As
far as he was concerned, she had made her move. The next one was his.
When he
reached his destination he parked in the garage and got out of the car. It
wasn’t until he locked the door and caught sight of his reflection in the
window that he realized he was smiling.
***It was nearing
“Law
offices,” the receptionist answered.
“Hello,
Melissa. This is Jack. May I speak to Calea?”
“Are you
sure you want to do that?” she asked pointedly. “You’ll be taking your life
into your own hands.”
“Oh? Why
is that?”
“She’s
not in the best of moods today.”
“What’s
wrong?” he asked.
“To begin
with she completely missed her first appointment this morning. I had to lie to
the client and tell him she was called to court. After trying her home, her
cell, and her pager with no results, she finally called in and, without any
explanation, told me to reschedule the appointment she had missed and push back
her next two. In all the years I’ve worked for her, I’ve never known her to
come in late. As a result she’s been playing catch-up all morning and has been
snippy with everyone. Personally, I’ve been trying to steer clear of her.”
McCoy’s
mild concern immediately dissipated and he smiled into the phone. “I’m feeling
brave. I think I’ll take my chances.”
“Don’t
say I didn’t warn you,” she admonished. “Hold on a minute. She just walked up.”
After a
short pause the receptionist continued, “Jack, she said she’ll take the call
from her office. Hold for a second and I’ll transfer you.”
Moments
later Morgan’s voice came curtly over the line. “So, you’ve heard about the
kind of day I’m having and you still want to talk to me. Are you a glutton for punishment,
or what?”
“Not at
all. I’m simply unconcerned. I’m several miles away at the moment. There isn’t
much you can do to me over the telephone,” he acknowledged teasingly.
“It’s
your fault, you know. If you had bothered to wake me before you left, I
wouldn’t have been late and I wouldn’t now be scrambling to appease disgruntled
clients.”
“You’re
clients will get over it. You were sleeping so peacefully, I thought you needed
the rest. I doubt that you’ve gotten much lately.”
With a
quick sigh she agreed, “No, I haven’t. But this morning was not a good time to
sleep in.”
“You can
always tell your clients that I’m the one responsible,” he suggested. “That
might get them off your back.”
“Oh,
great idea! That’s all I need – clients involved in my personal life,” she
noted sarcastically.
“You know
me, always ready to help,” he said brightly. Shifting in his chair he asked,
“Did you get the note I left for you this morning?”
She
replied quietly, “Yes, I did.”
“You were
supposed to call me.”
“I
haven’t exactly had time on my hands to socialize this morning,” she pointed
out.
“I didn’t
intend for you to call in order to socialize,” he countered. “I wanted you to
call and let me know if you were all right.” After a pause he added softly, “I
think you were a lot more upset when you came over last night than I realized.
I’m sorry I didn’t do more to help.”
“You did
help,” she assured him. “You let me in. It wasn’t exactly fair of me to drop in
on you at one-thirty in the morning.”
“I seem
to remember telling you I was available, no matter what the time.”
“Yes, you
did,” she agreed. “And when you make an offer like that you should expect that
sooner or later some nut is going to take you at your word.”
Smiling
into the phone he said, “If I had known you would take me up on it, I would’ve
offered a lot sooner. Of course, my offer was to come to your place. You
could’ve called. I would’ve come over and saved you from having to get out.”
“Yeah,
well, after staring at my ceiling for so long I was in desperate need of a
change of scenery. And I think the drive helped clear my head a little. Anyway,
I owe you my thanks and an apology for waking you up.”
“You
didn’t hear me complain. You’re welcome to wake me up anytime you like.”
“Well,
I’ll try not to take you up on that again. Despite your assurances, I think it
would get old pretty fast.”
McCoy was
tempted to let her know how wrong she was, but decided against it. “What time
would you like me to pick you up for dinner?”
“Oh, I
meant to call you about that. I can’t go tonight. Something unexpected has come
up with a client and I have some work that needs to be finished for her by
Tuesday morning. Since Monday is a holiday, I gave my assistants a choice of
coming in sometime during the long weekend or staying late tonight. They chose
to stay tonight.”
“How late
is late?”
“I have
no idea at this point. It could be as late as eleven or twelve. I won’t know
for sure until we get some of the research out of the way.”
“I was
really hoping to see you tonight,” he pointed out, not bothering to hide the
disappointment in his voice.
“I don’t
see how that’s going to work out unless you want to come by and have pizza with
all three of us. There’s just too much to do.”
“Pizza,
huh?” After contemplating a moment he suggested, “Why don’t you let me pick
some up and bring it to you? It will save you an interruption and maybe you’ll
finish early enough for us to go for a drink or something later.”
“Are you
serious? You’d be willing to do that?”
“Sure,
why not? Since my other plans have fallen through, it seems I have the evening
free,” he said pointedly.
“I really
am sorry about that. It wasn’t something I planned,” she acknowledged.
“I know.
I’m only teasing,” he admitted. “What time should I come by?”
“How does
sevenish sound? That’ll give us time to get a good start.”
“That
sounds fine to me. What would you like?”
“Something with veggies for Ann and me. Tony is a meat eater, like you.”
“One
pizza with meat, one with veggies. Got it. Anything else?”
“Tea or
soda – something with caffeine to keep us awake.”
“All
right. Then I guess I’ll see you about
“Thanks,
Jack. This is really nice of you. I’ll let the security guard downstairs know you’re
coming.”
***“Thanks for dinner, Jack,” Alvarez said as he
headed for the door of the conference room.
“From me,
too,” Saunders added as she followed him. “And it was good to see you again.”
“You’re welcome,”
McCoy acknowledged, giving the two a smile. He turned back and stacked the
pizza boxes. “Would you like for me to take these with me or leave them here in
case someone needs a
“You can
take them, if you don’t mind,” Morgan replied. “I don’t know how much longer
we’ll be and we don’t have a refrigerator here big enough to put them in.”
“I guess
that answers my next question,” he noted. “It sounds like I can forget about us
getting together later.”
Morgan
sighed. “It’s going a lot slower than I would like. We’re going to be a while
yet.”
“Well at
least you’ll have the long weekend to recover. I’m sure you’re looking as
forward to the time off as your assistants.”
“Who says
I get a long weekend?” she asked, brushing crumbs from the polished table. “I
promised them the weekend off. If we don’t finish tonight before we run out of
steam, I’ll have to come in tomorrow and wrap it up by myself.”
McCoy
followed her out the door and down the hallway toward the reception area. “That
doesn’t sound fair.”
“It’s
what happens when you work for yourself,” she pointed out, coming to a stop in
front of the door that led out of the offices.
With his
free hand, he reached to take hers. “Why don’t you call me in the morning and
let me know whether or not you’ll have to work? If you don’t, we’ll do
something together tomorrow.”
“All
right,” she nodded, opening the door for him. “Thank you for coming by and
feeding us tonight. It gave us a nice break.”
“I
enjoyed it as well. Be careful when you leave tonight,” he cautioned. “Have
Tony walk you to your car.”
“I will.
Good-night, Jack. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“Good-night, Calea.” He smiled as he gave her hand a quick squeeze.
“Don’t work too hard.”