“I—I’d l-like b-bed.”
Carly stood to push her mother’s wheelchair back to her room.
“Can I help you get her into bed?”
“I got this,” Carly assured him, waving off his help.
A few minutes later, she maneuvered her mother via the mechanical lift from the chair into her bed. Perhaps she should have let Stone help. Her mother was usually able to help support a little of her weight. But she didn’t usually get up out of bed in the evenings to eat dinner. Exhausted, Audrey was a limp ragdoll during the transfer, leaving Carly with extra work in transferring from the wheelchair.
Working as a nurse, she was used to transferring patients, but there was only so much one person could do.
She got her mother into her bed, got her situated, gave her night-time medications via her tube, then sat with her for the few minutes it took her to go to sleep.
Before leaving the room, she bent down and kissed her mother’s cheek. “I love you, Momma.”
Her mother’s lashes fluttered open and she mumbled, “I love you, too.”
Her words were so clear, so reminiscent of what Carly had often heard while growing up, what she had felt every moment of her life, her eyes watered.
She stood at her mother’s bedside, not surprised when a tear, then another, rolled down her cheek.
Such a good, good woman to be so incapacitated.
Maybe the neurologist would have some miracle cure at her mother’s upcoming follow-up appointment.
Which had her questioning how she was going to continue to transfer her mother in and out of the car.
She’d figure it out. Maybe her mother would be having a good day and it wouldn’t be a problem. Maybe.
She swiped at her cheeks, dried her eyes, then pasted on a smile as she went to find Stone.
She’d expected him to still be at the small table, but he wasn’t. He was in the kitchen, wiping down the countertop. The clean countertop.
He’d cleared the table and done the dishes.
“I won’t promise I got things put away in the correct places, but at least there’s nothing you have to clean up.”
“I…thank you.” Carly stared at him, a bit awestruck. None of the boys she’d dated, including Tony, had ever done anything so sweet and unexpected.
Boys. Maybe that was the difference. Stone was a man.
Not that they were dating. They were friends.
“You really didn’t have to do that,” she continued. “But I appreciate that you did.”
“I didn’t know how long you’d be. Cleaning up gave me something to do. Plus, I want to help you.”
“I could have gotten it after I got Mom to bed. It’s not fair for you to cook, plus wash everything.”
His smile said cleaning hadn’t bothered him in the slightest. “Like I said, I won’t promise things are put away correctly. If you can’t find something, just keep looking because I stuck it somewhere.”
She nodded.
“Speaking of cabinets, if you have a screwdriver, I’ll tighten the screws making that door hang down.” He gestured to one of the top cabinet doors that hung at a slight angle.
“I can do that,” she assured him. She’d been meaning to for weeks. Every time she was in the kitchen and would see the cabinet, she’d think about it. But there was always something more pressing to get done.
“There’s no time like the present. Get me a flathead screwdriver, Carly.”
She wanted to argue further, but decided it was easier to get a screwdriver. She dug through some odds and ends until she found the tool in her grandfather’s small, rusty toolbox that was stuck in the hallway closet.
Rather than hand it over, she scooted a chair to the cabinet, climbed up, and tightened the loose screws. Opening and closing the door, she made sure her repair had completely corrected the problem.
When she went to step down, Stone put his hands on her waist, steadying her.
Supposedly steadying her.
Because his hands on her waist had quite the opposite effect and she ended up losing her balance and grasping his shoulders as she stepped down from the chair.
“Sorry,” she apologized, looking up at him, clinging to his shoulders.
“You should have let me do that.” His voice was soft.
“I did just fine.”
“You did, but I wanted to help you, Carly. Let me do things for you.”
She wondered if his attraction had already waned into pity. She didn’t want his pity. She wanted his…oh, good grief! She wanted him.
Much more than the boys she’d dated in high school and college. Not that she’d slept with them. Just Tony and he’d been okay, a good enough guy, but nothing spectacular when it had come to the act of sex. Definitely nothing spectacular when it had come to sticking around when her circumstances had changed.