by Elaine Fox
“I’m fine.” Megan waved the concern away like a fly. “It was tough to take at first, of course. Million to one shot, is what the doctor said, and of course it was a problem with me and not my ex-husband, who wouldn’t have given a damn one way or the other. But still, in a strange way it made me look at the world in a whole different light.”
“How so?” Georgia asked.
“Well, it was little things at first, or subtle things, I should say, because they grew to feel huge. I found that my sense of what was important was different. Like, I don’t save things the way I used to. For posterity, you know. Nobody’s going to care about my old love letters after I die, for example. My old yearbooks and photographs…I just started looking at things like that as a waste of time and space. I stopped looking back so much, I guess is what I’m saying. And I approach things more for the moment.”
“You didn’t throw any of that stuff away, did you?” Penelope asked, scandalized.
Megan smiled ruefully. “Some of it. Not all. I’m still getting used to the idea, I guess. I haven’t added to the collection, though.”
“That’s just sensible,” Georgia said. “Even if you had kids, who’d want to wade through all that mess when you die? It’s just plain arrogant to think you’re goin’ to be that fascinatin’ to your kids.”
“I’ve saved it all,” Penelope said archly. “My love letters, my old yearbooks, corsages from just about every dance I went to, old school papers, tests. It’s a record. It’s who I am.”
“It’s not who you are, Pen,” Georgia scoffed. “I know who you are and I’ve never seen any of that stuff.”
“Maybe I’m not who you think I am.” Penelope gazed enigmatically across the park.
Georgia shook her head, chuckling. “I know you’re full of horse manure, Porter. Have you ever looked through your mother’s old junk?”
“As a matter of fact, I have,” she said, not looking back. “Unfortunately a lot of it burned in a fire when she was in college.”
“Yeah, right.” Georgia laughed. “She threw it out in a fit of sanitation insanity. Penelope’s mother is about the cleanest person you’ll ever want to meet,” she added to Megan. “She dusts the pantry, for pity’s sake. Now who in the world does that?”
“I do,” Penelope said. “Don’t you?” She passed her gaze from Georgia to Megan.
“This is a discussion I’d better not participate in,” Megan said, holding up her hands. “You might never come to my house otherwise.”
“I’ll come,” Georgia said, “because I’ll know you’re a woman with better things to do than dust jars of applesauce.”
Drops of rain started to fall and Megan saw the men at the other end of the park get out their leashes and call their dogs.
“Darn,” Penelope said. “I bet this rains out my afternoon match.”
“Well, that’s that,” Georgia said, pulling a clear plastic rain bonnet out of her pocket, the kind that looked like they were made out of kitchen wrap. “Sage and I melt in the rain. Any minute now he’ll have his head in a bush like it’s gonna keep his whole body dry. Besides, Sage’s got his acupuncture appointment this afternoon up in Springfield.”
“What’s he getting acupuncture for?” Megan asked, sorry they were leaving so soon.
“Arthritis. I swear it’s helped him tremendously. He moves like a puppy again after a session.”
The drops got more frequent and Penelope made a hassled noise as she pulled Wimbledon’s leash from her pocket.
Disappointed, Megan watched the two women gear up for going home. She’d wanted to tell them about Sutter Foley, about how he’d come by the hospital and been so charming. She wanted to ask them about this woman he was supposedly dating. But she couldn’t bring it up now, the skies were clearly about to open up completely.
“Aren’t you coming?” Penelope asked, noting that Megan had not gotten out Peyton’s leash or called her.
“No, I’m going to let Peyton run a while longer. She’s been cooped up a lot lately,” she said. “And I don’t mind getting soaked every once in a while. It seems…healthy in some way.”
Georgia laughed. “Whatever.”
“Are you sure, Megan? I can give you a ride home if you walked.” Penelope was backing toward the gate, Wimbledon secured on his leash.
“I’m sure. You guys go on. I’ll see you next week.”
“Oh, don’t forget about the SPCA meeting on Monday!” Penelope called. “I’ll pick you up at the animal hospital. Six-thirty.”
“Okay!” Megan waved.
Peyton did a dog’s version of a canter toward the gate, tongue lolling, mouth grinning. She wasn’t intent on escaping, she was too much of a momma’s girl for that, it seemed more that she wanted to usher them out. She was probably eager to see them leave so she could re-pee on every urinary message the other dogs had left, Megan thought.
The rain started to come down harder and Megan turned her face to the sky. As people ran to their cars, ducking their heads as if able to dodge the drops, she let the rain pelt her from the air. The water was warm, the sensation soothing. There was something about resigning yourself to getting wet that made you let go of everything you were hanging on to, she thought. For the first time in weeks, she was completely in the moment.
While she stood, listening to the frying-pan sound of the downpour on the street and the gentle trickle of water from the leaves on the trees, she thought about where she was now. A new town. A new job. A new direction. As the rain dropped onto her head and sluiced through her hair like fingers, she realized that she was a new person. She was whoever she wanted to be, here in this town. She had a clean slate.
She raised her arms out beside her and felt the water on her skin, God tapping her on the shoulder.
She smiled. How Sutter Foley would laugh to hear that, she thought. And yet, there was something about him that made her want to say those things to him. It was as if he was so caught up in being him, that he forgot to see what else was around him.
She laughed at herself. What egotism to think she knew him at all after a couple of chance meetings. And yet there was something about him that cried out to her. Something that wanted to be set free.
She thought about that picture on the magazine cover. That stiff, stern visage that was so at odds with the charmer who had winked at her as he’d driven off last night. Or maybe he hadn’t winked. It had been pretty dark. And she was more than capable of seeing things in a man that weren’t there. Just look at what she’d done to Ray. She’d imagined him a dedicated husband, a man who’d be true to her forever. Instead he’d been true only to himself and cheated on her effortlessly, and repeatedly. No wonder he’d seemed so happy.
Well, that’s what one got for expecting monogamy, she told herself. It was an unnatural state, she knew that.
She wandered across the park toward the picnic table and noted another figure with a dog coming down the sidewalk toward the gate. She’d have thought he was another rain lover but he wore a hooded sweatshirt and hunched down into it against the weather, hands jammed into his jeans pockets. Someone who’d obviously started walking to the dog park and gotten caught in the downpour.
She sat on the picnic table and looked to make sure Peyton wouldn’t head for the gate as it opened. A moment later she leaned forward and studied the hooded figure more intently. He walked a small dog that strained at the leash. A dog that looked a lot like…
Megan’s breath stopped and she froze, watching man and dog enter through the gate.
Sutter Foley leaned down and let his dog run.
Six
The puppy immediately took off.
Sutter stood and gazed in the direction the dog ran, then froze.
He knew the figure on the picnic table instantly. What were the odds, he asked himself. He’d come to the park in the rain specifically to avoid people, but now that he was here, he realized she’d been the one person he wouldn’t have minded finding.
He started
across the field toward her, his eyes taking in the effortless yet affectionate way she deflected the spastic puppy. She looked incredible, her lithe body perfect in her drenched, form-fitting tee shirt and rain-darkened jeans.
Soaking wet, her hair curled to her shoulders and dripped down her cheeks, tendrils clinging to her neck. As he got close, he noted the long dampened eyelashes over her rich dark eyes. Her lips were parted, half smiling.
She said, “Fancy meeting you here,” in a voice that made desire crawl straight up his back.
He almost didn’t know what to say. Despite, or perhaps because of, having thought of her the entire way to the park, he was shocked to find her right here, right now, on the one day he’d thought to come. Of course, for all he knew she was here all the time. Or only came when it rained. But to him it was a kind of miracle.
If, that was, miracles were sent to plague a man.
She looked even better than she had in his memory, but that was not going to matter to him. She was simply not the kind of woman with whom he should get involved. All of the warning signs were there. He needed to stick to his own kind. Or rather, the kind he had become.
Fame was a tricky thing, he’d discovered. Some people could take it and some couldn’t. The ones who couldn’t, it seemed to him, tended to be the most candid and open-hearted. The type who said what they meant and did what they wanted, only to have it all wind up in a tabloid, twisted beyond recognition.
His ex-wife Bitsy had been that way. “Flaky,” they’d called her, though he’d always considered her free-spirited. Happy, disingenuous, a little offbeat.
Like Megan Rose, with her talking universe and orbiting dogs.
“As you can see,” he said as mildly as possible, “I have not killed your dog yet.”
She smiled and he felt as if the sun had come out. “Oh, Baywatch isn’t mine. Besides, I didn’t really believe you had petricide in you.”
“Petricide? That’s not a word.”
“I know.” She grinned. “I have to admit I had my doubts about you a time or two.”
“Did you?” He tilted his head and wondered if she really was the type who never told a lie or if she just seemed like the type. He’d been fooled before.
He turned to watch the pup chase after a large black dog—the one he’d seen with Megan before, obviously hers—who appeared more irritated than excited to have such a companion. He understood.
“My cook’s been calling the dog Twister,” he said, “as she seems to have the same effect as a tornado whenever I let her out of the box.”
“Twister,” she said, trying it out. “I love it. It suits her.”
He glanced back over at Megan to see her eyeing him appreciatively. “Glad you approve,” he said, and he was, though there was irony in his smile.
He turned away again and though he felt her eyes linger on him he did not look back. It was strange, even though the rain streamed down around them they stood there talking as if they were chatting on a sunny street corner. Or rather, he stood, she sat on the picnic table, leaning back on her hands, openly contemplating him.
“Do you want to sit down?” she asked.
He looked at her and she patted the picnic table next to her.
“Thank you,” he said and stepped onto the bench seat, turned and sat a respectable distance away. When she didn’t say anything else, he looked over at her.
She blinked against the rain, but looked at him steadily.
“What?” he asked, a bit nettled. “Have I done something else wrong? Is the dog not happy enough? Too skinny? Too fat? Should I have kept it in away from the rain?”
She started to laugh. “No, I was just thinking you look pretty good wet.”
God help him, so did she. “Thank you. I think.”
“And I was wondering how often you do this, walk in the rain. It shows an unexpected side to you.”
He couldn’t look at her, her shirt was too revealing all wet. And he was having a hard time remembering why he shouldn’t reach out and trace the path of the rain down her neck to the curve of her perfectly outlined breast.
Briana, he thought, Briana Briana Briana. Who once he could have sworn had actual tears in her eyes when a frilly pair of her shoes got wet in a puddle. He could not even picture her sitting serenely on a picnic table in a downpour, ignoring streams of rain dragging her hair down her back and making her clothes cling to her skin. But she loved the limelight, and she was excellent at keeping her mouth shut about anything important. She manipulated the media on both her own and his behalf with consummate skill—something he admired more than he could say.
Briana belonged in this crazy world into which he had climbed. Not Megan Rose.
“Never,” he said. “I only came out in this weather so that I wouldn’t run into anyone.”
He didn’t even have to look at her to know her brows rose at that. “Why? Are you avoiding people?”
He narrowed his eyes as he looked across the field and didn’t answer.
“Is that what your success has gotten you?” she asked. “The feeling of having to hide from people? What, are you afraid we’re all going to ask you for money or something?”
He brought his gaze around to her sharply. “Do I insult you every time we meet?”
She paused. “Not every time.” Her dark eyes met his.
He’d never insulted her, he was sure of it. He wanted to challenge her to tell him when he had, but he couldn’t take his eyes from her wet lips, naturally pink and plump and parted just enough…
Without another thought, except maybe the ridiculous one of having to do this to shut her up, he leaned forward and captured her lips with his. The sensation was immediately overwhelming. Her softness yielded instantly, her body arched toward his—he could feel it though it did not touch him.
He drew back a fraction, looked into her dark unreadable eyes with his own startled glance. His breath came heavily, as if he’d just been punched, and yet he could tell that hers did too.
One long second, their look held, before she pushed up off of her hands and put her lips back on his. Her hands grabbed hold of his sweatshirt and pulled, and before he knew it his mouth was opening under hers. His hands, of their own accord, rose to either side of the long slick column of her neck, the skin there so soft and warm and wet. Their tongues found each other and danced as if they’d been waiting all their lives to meet.
Sutter lowered one hand to her back, felt the supple strength of her muscles, her hot skin through the thin wet cotton of her shirt. She curved into him, her damp hair playing against his fingers, her tongue playing mind-blowing games with his. Electricity shot along his nerves, making him wonder if they’d been struck by lightning.
And the rain poured down from the heavens. Soaking them. Dousing them. Surely sizzling against their heated bodies.
She pushed back first, breathless and flushed. Her eyes were nearly black, the pupils huge, her lips puffy and pink. He wanted to draw that lower one into his mouth once more, but he drew back.
She swallowed, but didn’t say anything, just looked at him with that heat emanating from her. It was a wonder they weren’t surrounded by their own steam.
Slowly, sanity returned and he turned his head away, gazing sightlessly across the field.
“I must go,” he said abruptly, pushing off the picnic table to stand awkwardly next to it. “I do apologize.”
He had no idea what the hell he was doing.
“Really?” she said, but her tone held no clue as to what she was thinking.
“I…I didn’t mean to…” He stopped, took a deep breath and commanded himself to return to his senses. “I didn’t expect to see anyone here. In the rain. I’m sorry.”
Jesus, he was a moron. But what in God’s name did one say when one had just accidentally kissed someone? He shouldn’t be kissing her at all. He did not want her, not Megan Rose. And she didn’t want him, she just didn’t know it yet. She had no idea how being with him could ruin her life.
No, he was with Briana and that was for the best. For everyone. And besides, Briana was moving to Fredericksburg. And he was losing his mind.
“I must go.” He turned back to her, looking at her but not seeing her. His eyes would not clearly focus on her, as if he had to look at her obliquely to let him gaze in her direction at all. “Again, I apologize. That was…uncalled for.”
He turned and whistled sharply for the dog. Miraculously, she came tearing over. As did the other one, which gave him enough time to capture Twister and snap the leash on.
He headed for the gate, amazed and perhaps disappointed that the normally audacious Dr. Rose had nothing to say as he did.
His only mistake was looking back, to see Megan Rose still sitting on the picnic table, looking more beautiful than she ought to, with one hand touching her lips.
From: “Elizabeth Powell” Bitsy@ worldnet.net
To:
Date: Mon, 25 Jun 19:09:30-0800
Subject: Re: Sleeping
Sutter, darling, I’m astonished that you who’ve always prided yourself on self-reliance have turned to sleeping pills. What paltry aides to your own immaculate self-control! I don’t understand your resistance to seeing my hypnotherapist. Yes, yes, the bloody tabloids, but, Sutter, they’re as likely to say things about you if you don’t do them as if you do. And a hypnotist’s methods only enhance your own abilities to control your life. Darling, if you look beyond your preconceptions it is right up your alley.
Don’t misunderstand, my dear, I’m glad to see you have lost none of your stubborn streak, it only confirms how right I have always been about you. But you must do something or you will go as mad as your Aunt Edna. And the elegant Miss Briana Ellis wouldn’t like that at all. Yes, I heard about her. But lord, Sutter, isn’t she a little high maintenance for you? And is it true she’s moving to tiny Fredericksburg for you?
Got to run. Have a massage at 2 followed by a seaweed wrap and pedicure. Love to Berkley.
