Free Only By Your Touch by Catherine Anderson Page A

Heat crawled up his neck. She might as well show off his soiled underwear. “What are you doing?”
    Nan smiled up at him. “I’m walking Chloe through, dear. You run along and see to your business. I’ll get her all lined out.”
    Chloe arched her russet brows. “There seems to be a bit of confusion.”
    “Mom, Mrs. Evans isn’t a cleaning lady.”
    Nan kept talking. “It won’t be necessary to clean drawers weekly. Just vacuum them out with the crevice attachment a couple of times a month.”
    “Mom?”
    Nan waved him away and opened the silverware drawer. “He keeps this one wiped out, thank goodness.” She dampened her finger and chased a lone raccoon hair. “Mostly, anyway.” A speck of something on the front of a cupboard caught her attention, and just that quickly, her voice trailed away. The next instant, she was humming a lullaby.
    Ben stared at the back of his mother’s head. In thebeginning, it had broken his heart to see her like this, but now he just bled a little each time.
    “I’m sorry about this,” he told Chloe. “A few weeks ago, I said something about needing a housekeeper.” He shrugged. “She has Alzheimer’s.”
    Ben half expected Nan’s dementia to send Chloe Evans running, but instead she turned a compassionate gaze on Nan. “It’s fine. I understand.”
    If Ben lived to be a hundred, he would never get women. She was looking at him now as though he were almost human.
    Touching a hand to Nan’s shoulder, she leaned around to say, “Nan, I’m leaving now. It was lovely talking with you.”
    Nan turned, her expression vacuous. Still humming, she wandered from the kitchen, took up her usual station in the family room, and set her chair to rocking as she began to crochet. Chloe gazed after her, her bottom lip captured between her teeth.
    “I really am sorry,” Ben said again. “She drifts in and out. She probably felt embarrassed. Stress of any kind seems to trigger it.”
    Chloe nodded. “I realized something was—well, not wrong, exactly, but not exactly right.” Her gaze clung to his. “Mr. Longtree, I want to apologize. My behavior has been deplorable, and I—”
    Ben cut her off with a lift of his hand. “It’s not necessary. I’ve heard the stories in town, too. Why don’t we leave it at that?”
    Her face flushed crimson, whether with anger or embarrassment he couldn’t say. In that moment, he didn’t really care. He just wanted her gone. His mother’s illness was something private and painful that he shared with no one.

Chapter Five
    C hloe’s feet were dragging when she got to work. The security system chimed as she pushed open the front door. Sue Baxter, her coworker—a chubby brunette with laughing green eyes, a warm smile, a wonderful husband, and five little Baxters to keep her busy—waved as she ended a conversation on the phone.
    Waving back, Chloe circled her desk to stuff her purse into its cubbyhole. “Oh, Sue, you’re a saint!” she cried when she saw the take-out latte on her blotter. “I can’t wait to lock my lips on that. I’m so exhausted, I can barely see.”
    Sue rocked back on her chair, keyed the mike, and said, “Dispatch, calling all deputies.” She flashed Chloe an impish grin. “Old Sylvia Patterson is doing a striptease in front of her window again. Joe doesn’t want her arrested, but he would like her to get a boob lift before she strips for him again. Over.”
    Chloe burst out laughing. “For a second, I thought you were serious.”
    “You looked a little down.”
    “ Down isn’t the word.” Chloe uncapped the cup, breathed in, and sighed. Every evening, Sue went to the espresso stand and bought them each a latte.Today she’d evidently stopped by on her way to work. “What do I owe you?”
    “The next round is on you.”
    “You’ve saved my life. I didn’t get a wink of sleep last night, and I’ve been on a dead run all day. Maybe this will perk me up.”
    “What on earth kept you up all