14 Valentine Place by Pamela Bauer Page B

doubted his brother would ever give up his bachelor lifestyle. If Dylan didn’t believe in marriage, why would he want his mother helping others find the road to happily ever after?
    “Tell me, Dylan. What bothers you more? That she might not be the authority you think she should be or that she deals in a subject you haven’t much interest in?” She challenged him with a direct stare.

    “I’m not against romance,” he responded with a dangerous glint in his eye. “Just the opposite. I like women, Maddie.” The look he gave her left her in no doubt that he liked them very much.
    “But you don’t need to ask anyone’s advice on romance, do you?”
    “Most men I know don’t.”
    “Oh—so you think it’s only women who need help in that department?”
    “Uh-uh.” He leaned back and held up his left hand palm outward. “You’re not going to trap me in that corner. I’m not going to make some sexist observation that you can jump all over.”
    “Your mother has both men and women clients,” she informed him.
    “Maybe she does, but most men I know wouldn’t be caught dead hiring a romance coach and I can imagine what kind of questions Rob Lerner’s going to ask Mom on the subject.”
    Maddie could see his concern was real and felt a bit guilty that she herself hadn’t thought about such a possibility. Probably because she hadn’t wanted to think that Leonie had been invited to be on the show for any reason other than to be her charming self.
    “I hope he doesn’t ask difficult questions or make her uncomfortable, but if he does, I think your mom will know how to handle it,” she stated evenly.
    “I hope you’re right.”
    He didn’t look convinced and Maddie wasn’t sure there was anything she could say to change his mind, so she didn’t try.
    Having finished her lunch, there was no reason forher not to return to her room. As she cleared away her dishes, she said, “I’m going to leave for work shortly. Is there anything else you need?”
    He shook his head. “I’m fine.” As he flexed his fingers on his left hand, she remembered Leonie had said he was supposed to exercise his arm at regular intervals.
    “What about the exercises? Do you want me to help you with them?”
    “No, it’s all right. I can do them myself,” he stated stoically.
    Maddie knew that wasn’t true. If there was one thing Leonie had stressed before she left it was that Dylan needed an assistant when it came to his passive motion exercises. Still, if he wanted to do them alone, what was it to Maddie?
    Glancing over her shoulder, she saw that he’d eaten everything she’d made for him. He pushed back his chair and carried first the salad plate over to the sink, then the soup bowl.
    “I’ll take care of the cleanup,” she offered.
    To her surprise, he didn’t protest. “Thanks for lunch.”
    “You’re welcome.”
    She watched him leave, then finished with the dishes. She was about to go back upstairs when Dylan returned.
    “I guess I need your help after all,” he said as he entered the kitchen.
    Maddie could see by the look on his face that he wasn’t happy he had to ask her for anything.

    “I tried doing the exercises by myself and it didn’t work,” he confessed.
    And now she was going to have to help him. Trying to sound as detached as possible, she asked, “What do you need me to do?”
    He slipped his hand out of the sling and let it drop to his side. “You have to lift my arm forward until it’s at a ninety-degree angle to my side.” Just before she was about to touch him, he added, “Gently.”
    She wasn’t sure where to put her hands and ended up slipping one beneath his elbow and the other on his wrist. Carefully she lifted the arm forward. She was close enough to smell a hint of his aftershave. It lent an intimacy to an act that should have been strictly therapeutic.
    “Hold it there for a few seconds, then let it down again,” he told her.
    She did as he instructed, repeating the