Knight In Black Leather Gail Dayton (classic books for 12 year olds .TXT) 📖

shoulder. The process took longer than she wished because he had his good arm sprawled beneath her all the way across the bed. Once she achieved her goal of not touching him anywhere, she took a deep breath and slipped from the bed entirely, crossing her fingers that Eli truly was asleep.

When the bathroom door shut behind her, Eli opened his eyes and sighed. So much for wishes.

Midweek, Eli had an appointment with the bone doc. He wheeled into the waiting room with high hopes and Marilyn. He walked out with a walking cast and crutch. And Marilyn. He had at least three more weeks before the casts would be completely gone, but he was free of the damned chair.

Out on the street again, he stood straight and took a deep breath of exhaust-tainted air while Marilyn pushed the empty wheelchair to her car parallel-parked only a few slots away.

"Damn, it feels good to be out of that chair. We're heading straight to the rental place to turn it in, right?" He eyed the crutch under his good arm with distaste, wishing he could be rid of it too, but he knew Marilyn would pitch a fit if he tried it. Then he saw her fighting the wheelchair into its folded position and hobbled hurriedly to her side. "Let me help with that."

"How?" She shot a sardonic look at his crutch. "You don't seem to have a free hand at the moment."

"Like this." Pinning the crutch under his arm, he took the keys from her coat pocket, unlocked the car and opened the back door just in time for her to slide the folded wheelchair in. "See? I'm not totally useless."

"Never said you were." She walked around the car while Eli tossed the crutch on top of the wheelchair and got in the front seat.

"Never said it," he replied. "But you're the queen of innuendo."

"Always knew I was the queen of something." Marilyn started the car and waited for a break in traffic to pull out into the street. "So, three more weeks till the casts come off. Do you know where you're going next?"

She could feel his probing gaze on her and kept her attention resolutely on the traffic.

Eventually, Eli spoke. "Is that a not-so-subtle way of telling me my time is up when the casts come off?"

Marilyn jerked her head around to face him, unnerved by the unexpected dismay. "Of course not. I just thought--"

His eyes unsettled her more with their steady gaze. She looked back at the road and swore under her breath when she realized she'd missed a gap in the stream of cars.

"You thought what, Marilyn?" Eli pushed her. "You did say I could stay as long as I wanted, remember? And I promised to stay as long as you wanted. So, is my time up in three weeks?"

"No." Why had she asked that stupid question? Did she really want him to go? Or was it that she was afraid he would?

She saw another tiny gap and swung her barge of a car into it, knowing the other drivers would give her room to protect their shiny new Mazdas and Hondas.

"Then what?" Eli persisted.

"I don't know," she snapped. "Okay? I'm not setting any deadlines. Are you?"

"No."

"Okay, then. Let's just see what happens when the time comes. Okay?"

"Fine." He sounded like a sulky teenager, reminding her how young he was.

Then again, Bill had sounded that way from time to time, right up until the day he died. Maybe it was a man thing.

"Marilyn," he said, after a quarter mile or so of silence. "Are you keeping your promise? Are you thinking about--"

"Your proposition?" she interrupted, afraid of what he might say. She didn't want to hear the word "sex" or any of its synonyms coming out of his mouth.

"Yeah. Are you?"

She couldn't stop thinking about it, much as she wanted to. Wanted both to stop thinking about it and wanted to do it, to give in and dive in and forget about good sense and good morals and doing good, and go for feeling good.

She wanted to wallow in sensuality, indulge in whims, drown in passion. She wanted to say to hell with the consequences. But the consequences scared her half to death.

Except...half to death wasn't nearly as terrified as she'd been a mere few days ago, and if that didn't frighten her the rest of the way to death, she was in deep, deep, deep trouble here. What would happen if she reached the point where she decided the thrill was worth the inevitable pain? What if she agreed to the whole crazy idea?

"Marilyn?" Eli touched her shoulder, calling her back from her thoughts. He shifted position, lifting himself in the seat to pull his wallet from his hip pocket. "I need to give you something, in case you are thinking. Maybe it'll help you make up your mind."

He opened the wallet and took out a battered piece of paper, unfolded it and handed it to her. She set it down on the car seat beside her.

"What is it?" She risked a quick glance down, away from the heavier traffic around her. "I'm driving. I can't look now."

"Keep it. Look at it whenever you have time. I already know what it says. It's a blood test. Mine."

Marilyn's heart pounded. He really was serious about--about what he wanted. Serious enough to give her--oh, she wasn't any good at this sort of thing. It was bound to be easier to avoid men altogether than have to figure out all the twists and turns involved in the modern dating scene. And yet it touched her, his gesture.

"What does it say?" she asked, consumed by curiosity.

"I'm clean. No diseases. Not even flu." He flicked the paper lying between them with a too-casual finger. "It's a couple months old, but I haven't been with anyone since then." He shrugged. "Haven't been with anyone in a while."

She looked at him, but he was staring out the far window. "How long