“Um…are you ready to go?” she asked after a few seconds of his glowering silence.
He was acting like a bad-tempered SOB. It was not her fault he wanted her. For crying out loud, it wasn’t even her fault he couldn’t have her. From the way she had responded to his kiss, he knew it wouldn’t take much to get her into his bed. It was his own blighted sense of honor that kept him from acting on his impulses.
She was his friend and he wasn’t decimating that friendship with a long, slow ride on the back of a hay wagon.
He forced his features into a more affable countenance. “Sure. I’m ready.” He grabbed the small bag he’d used to store her dinner and gestured for her to take it. “Eat this in the car.”
“What is that?”
“Your dinner. A sandwich, some carrots, nothing fancy,” he added when she looked confused.
“You made it? For me?”
“I may not be Wolf, but even I can throw together a sandwich.”
She shook her head as if to clear it and then took the bag from his hand. “Thank you. I…that was really thoughtful of you.”
He shrugged off her appreciation.
She didn’t say anything else, but grabbed her backpack on the way out the door.
They were driving and she’d eaten half of the sandwich when she spoke again. “You didn’t put any meat on it.”
“The point was to get you to eat.”
“Well, yes, but I didn’t realize you’d remember I was a vegetarian.”
“I’m not exactly a doddering old man. I’m only thirty-four, Claire. My memory works just fine.”
“Well, of course, but…” Her voice just trailed off.
“Why don’t you eat meat?” He’d wondered about it ever since he realized she was a vegetarian. “Is it part of your whole pacifist belief system?” Gandhi was a vegetarian, he remembered.
“I’m not a pacifist.”
“Yes, you are.”
“Excuse me, but I’m not, and I ought to know, don’t you think?”
“Well, you said you were.”
“When?”
“You refuse to handle a gun and I’ve seen how you react to talk about killing.”
“I don’t handle weapons because I know nothing about them. That makes a gun in my hand a dangerous thing…both to myself and the people around me.”
He agreed, but he’d never heard a civilian talk that way. Well…okay, there was published rhetoric on gun control, but most people thought they were smart enough not to hurt themselves with a weapon, no matter how deadly. “That’s commendable.”
“No, it’s logical. As for me being uncomfortable talking about killing people, that makes most nonmilitary types nervous, or hadn’t you noticed?”
He laughed at her acerbic tone. “I’ve noticed, but you’ve made it clear you have a problem with violence.” Did she think he would be offended by her beliefs?
He wasn’t. He just didn’t understand them.
“Most people have a problem with violence.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Believing nonviolent conflict resolution should be one’s primary reaction in a disagreement does not make me a pacifist.”
“I hate to tell you this, but yes, it does.”
“No, it does not. A pacifist is someone who believes that nonviolence is the only acceptable response to conflict. I don’t agree with that…I merely believe it should come first.”
“Sometimes there is no choice.”
“I’m sure that’s true, in theory.”
“Screw theory. That’s an observation made on sixteen years spent as a soldier.”
“I didn’t mean to offend you.”
“Who said I was offended?”
“Um…no one. Maybe I’d just better eat my dinner.”
“I still want to know why you don’t eat meat.”
“You’ll laugh at me.”
“No. I won’t.”
Her look said she didn’t believe him.
“I won’t.”
She sighed, giving in with bad grace. “Fine, but if you do…you just may find out how far from a true pacifist I really am. I have too vivid an imagination. When I eat a hamburger, I see some poor cow with tragic brown eyes facing the slaughterhouse.”
“That would put pretty much anyone off meat. So, why not think about something else?”
“I can’t. Did you ever watch the movie Chicken Run?”
“Yes. I’ve got a couple of nephews who think it’s their job in life to keep me educated on the animated movie industry.”
“Well, even chicken nuggets make me think of Ginger. She was such a gutsy little thing.”
“And you can’t stand the thought of eating her.”
“No.”
“The movie is fantasy. Ginger isn’t real.”
She laughed. “I know that, but I can’t help what my mind conjures up when I’m eating.”
In a way, he understood. He couldn’t help the images that his mind conjured up of her lying naked in his bed, either.
Chapter 3
Claire flipped off the call light for Lester’s room before making her way down the silent hallway to see what he needed. It was late, almost three in the morning, and few Belmont Manor residents were awake. Perhaps Lester was even the only one.
She found him clad in a robe and pajamas, sitting up in a chair and thumbing through a composition book like the ones she used to take notes in her classes.
“Did you need something, Lester?”
He looked up, his dark eyes intimidating even in a weathered face attached to a body stooped by age. “Just a little company. You didn’t work yesterday.”
According to the nurses and other aides, he never called for late-night company on the nights she had off. Maybe they didn’t listen with the same amount of tolerance to his sometimes confused ramblings. She’d had a lot of practice with her mom; Lester’s dementia was less taxing to her patience than her mom’s drunken discourse had been.
She smothered a yawn. “My best friend got married today…or yesterday, rather.” She smiled at the memory. Josette and Nitro were the perfect couple, and her friend deserved to be supremely happy; she was such a sweetheart. And Claire thought Nitro might actually turn out to be a man who could be counted on in the long run. “I took the night off to help her with last-minute preparations.”
Lester frowned. “I never got married.”
“I know.”
“A hired killer doesn’t make a good husband.”
“I’m sure you’re right,” she said, humoring him.
He looked down at the book in his lap and then shut it. “I killed too many people. Couldn’t