That’s it?”
“He probably has another name but I don’t know what it is. He was a stray that just sort of moved in on me and he didn’t have a collar on or anything.” Closing the refrigerator door with his elbow, he asked, “You want a glass?”
“No, the bottle’s fine.” There was already a collection of unwashed dishes on the tile counter and Kim didn’t want to add to the clutter. “How long ago did he show up?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Three or four years ago, I guess.”
She stifled a laugh. “And you still just call him Cat?”
“That’s what he answers to.” He handed her the beer.
She took it firmly in her grasp so he’d know she had hold of it, and her fingers brushed his in the process. An electric warmth skittered up her arm in the instant before he released his grip.
“Thanks,” she whispered, startled by the powerful sensation of such a brief contact. She wished she could see his eyes behind his glasses, the distinctive copper-brown she remembered so clearly. Unfathomable eyes that gave away nothing. “I was sorry to hear about your accident.”
He paused in the middle of twisting the top off his beer. “A temporary problem. No big deal.”
Assuming, according to Chief Gray, that Jay didn’t manage to kill himself before he got his eyesight back. “I’m sure that’s true.”
He finished twisting the top off and took a swig. “I guess the explosion at the plastics company made the news, huh?”
“I wouldn’t know. I haven’t been watching TV much lately.”
“Then how did you—”
“Your boss dropped by to see me. Chief Gray thought—”
“The chief? Geez, what is this? A sympathy visit?” He whirled, his demeanor angry, and he marched across the room to the counter. “I don’t need your pity, Kim.”
She could understand that. The thing Kim dreaded most was seeing pity and revulsion in someone’s eyes when they saw her scars. “I dropped by to see if I could help you in some way, not to pity you.” He was too virile, too much of a man, to be the object of anyone’s pity, certainly not Kim’s.
“I don’t need your help, either. I’m getting along fine on my own, so you can finish your beer and be on your way.”
“I see.” She twisted off the bottle cap and took a sip. The cool liquid slid down her throat; his rejection left a bitter aftertaste.
In the silent kitchen, the cat nudged his empty dish with his nose, then padded across the room to wind his way between Jay’s legs. Ignoring the cat, Jay stared at a spot a little to Kim’s right, as if he didn’t quite know where she was standing but didn’t want to let on.
“I think your cat’s hungry. His dish is empty.”
“Right. I’ll take care of it.” Setting his beer on the counter, he opened a cupboard, and grabbed a box of Cheerios from a high shelf right next to a similar box of Friskies. Feeling his way with the toe of his tennis shoe, he found the cat’s dish, bent over and filled it to overflowing.
Kim pulled her lip between her teeth. “Does your cat always eat breakfast food?”
“What?”
Sniffing disdainfully, Cat didn’t appear impressed with the menu selection.
“You just filled his dish with Cheerios.”
“I didn’t—” He picked up one of the circles, smelled it and nibbled half. “He likes variety, okay?”
“The Friskies are in the box next to—”
“I know that. I got confused. It happens when you can’t see anything.”
Her heart ached for Jay, for his enormous pride that wouldn’t allow him to bend, to accept anyone’s help. “I did a story once at the Braille Institute in town. There are ways to organize your shelves and mark boxes and cans so you’ll be able to tell which is which.”
“That seems like a helluva lot of trouble when I’m going to get these damn patches off in three or four weeks.”
“Patches?”
“Two of them.” He lifted the reflective dark glasses, propping them on his forehead. “Great, aren’t they? A real attractive addition to a man’s wardrobe.”
In spite of the pain she knew he was in emotionally and the fear of permanent blindness he must be experiencing, Kim smiled. “You look like some totally radical pirate. Very dashing.”
She wasn’t lying. With his burnished complexion, strong jaw and straight nose, he could easily be cast as a pirate hero in any Hollywood movie and scripted to steal a sweet damsel’s heart. Not that she thought of herself as a damsel, of course, but the storyline had considerable appeal.
His full lips twitched with the hint of a smile, his mood switching back to the cheerful, determined man who’d been mowing his own yard—and making a hash of it. “You think so?”
“Absolutely. Very dangerous and very attractive.”
“Maybe I ought to lose the glasses. I could start a new fad with the guys at the fire station. Everybody on the job could wear eye patches.”
“That might be stretching it a little. Hard to drive those big fire trucks when you can’t see where you’re going.”
“The more I think about it, the more I like it.” Finding the cat’s dish again, he carried it to the counter, dumped most of the contents in the sink—the rest spilled onto the counter—and refilled it with Friskies, returning the dish to its place on the floor. “How ’bout you give me a chance to change my shirt and pants, and I’ll take you down to the station. We’ll lay the idea on the—”
“No!” Panic shot through her. She didn’t go out in public, not since the earthquake. Not unless she absolutely had to.
His eyebrows shot up. “What? You’re not going to let me prove to you how well I’m getting along on my own? That doesn’t seem very fair.”
“It’s not that.” She couldn’t bear the thought of the pitying looks strangers sent in her direction and their shock when they got a good look at her scars.
“Don’t worry about a thing. I’ll drive.”
“You’ll what?” she gasped. “You can’t do that.”
“Why not?”
“Jay, you’re blind.” And possibly a lunatic.
“So? Don’t you remember that TV commercial where the blind guy was driving a classic convertible? If he can do it, so can I.” He eased past her.
“He wasn’t driving, Jay. He was being towed!”
“Come to think of it,” he said as he sauntered down the hallway to what she took to be his bedroom, “I still could use some exercise. How ’bout we walk instead? It’s only a couple of blocks.”
She was so stunned by his offer to drive, Kim forgot she didn’t want to go at all. Before she knew what was happening, he had changed into jeans and a clean shirt. He took her arm, giving her only an instant to wrap her scarf around her head and pick up the purse she’d dropped on the couch, and they were out the door walking toward the main thoroughfare running through Paseo del Real. His strides were long and confident, his attitude filled with bravado. Not unlike the way he’d been as an adolescent, she recalled.
When they were growing up, Paseo del Real had been a quiet college town with a permanent population of about thirty thousand. That number had doubled in the intervening years. Malls had replaced strip shopping centers; a second high school had been built at the north end of town.