Guys & Dogs

by Elaine Fox

  “Sutter,” she said, sending a desperate wish heavenward that whoever was in the damn bathroom would get the hell out so she could go splash some cold water on her face. “I’m not looking for an apology. At least not for that. I knew about Briana before the reporter called. And maybe I don’t need to apologize for the reporter, but there is one thing I would like to say. You and I—whatever you and I were—are finished. Clearly I do not fit into your world, nor did I enjoy ‘seeing my name in print in a celebrity magazine.’” Her tone as she quoted him was scathing. She took a deep breath and finished more gently. “It was truly nice while it lasted, Sutter, but it’s done now. Let’s just…forget we ever met each other.”

  His expression was immediately disconcerted and she congratulated herself for her performance.

  “Forget we ever met each other?” he repeated.

  “That’s right.” Her heart slammed in her chest and she could hardly believe her own words. But there was no way she could continue this…whatever this was between them, if he thought her capable of trying to manipulate him through the press. Her pride had been assaulted tonight, but that was small compared to being thought of as a celebrity hanger-on by the very celebrity she was sleeping with.

  “Forget we ever met each other,” she repeated, breathing as hard as if she’d just run a mile with the devil on her heels. But she was not far enough away from him yet. “Clearly we’ve caused nothing but trouble for each other.”

  At last the door to the bathroom opened, and a crooked old woman in a feathered hat emerged. Megan felt the impulse to head for the door, but something stopped her.

  The look in Sutter’s eyes, the high color in his cheeks, the obvious effort he was making to reconstruct what he thought had happened, all had her wanting to take him by the shoulders and shake him.

  What about that night at his house, when he had looked at her so tenderly? What about the laughter they’d shared? What about the incomparable thrill of being together, just the two of them, neither of them famous or poor? They were not part of this madness of fame and gossip and wealth, she thought, the madness that contained things like the National Tattler and Briana Ellis. Whatever it was between them was something different, something better…

  But no, she needed to shake herself. If nothing else he’d made it perfectly clear tonight that his main concern was keeping whatever was between them a secret. Like something shameful…something wrong.

  “I’ve got to go,” she said, forcing herself toward the door instead of pulling him into a dark corner like she wanted to. A dark corner where it was just the two of them and they could forget about all of this, forget “all the best people” upstairs, and most of all forget Briana Ellis. But there were some things—well, many things—sex couldn’t solve.

  “Megan, wait. You—” He stopped, dropping the hand he’d reached out toward her. “I have made so many mistakes.” He paused. “But I never thought of you as one. Not you,” he insisted—to himself?

  She forced a smile, maintaining a calm she did not remotely feel. “Until you saw the National Tattler.”

  He stiffened, then swore.

  She raised her brows, schooling her voice to sympathy. “Look, I know it must be tough, living in a fishbowl the way you do. I know I wouldn’t be able to stand it. That one encounter with the Tattler convinced me of that. But in the future, Sutter? Could you just maybe give me the benefit of the doubt?”

  He bowed his head once. “Absolutely. I should have been more sympathetic to the effect I had on your life, instead of thinking only about your effect on mine.”

  She smiled sadly. “I guess I’m glad I had some effect on yours. Even if I was a ‘wrong turn.’”

  He was quiet a moment, then he approached her and took her arms in his hands. Desire raced along her skin.

  “You’ve got it backwards,” he said, looking down at her with eyes so kind it hurt. “It is my road that you don’t wish to be on. Trust me.”

  For a moment she was caught, stuck in the look in his eyes and by an emotion—something even stronger than desire—that pulled at her chest. Before it swallowed her whole, she pulled back from his hands.

  She gave a light, thoroughly unconvincing laugh, and said, “Well, no need to get out the hair shirt.”

  He regarded her steadily, not fooled by her bravado. “I hope I see you again. Not the same way, I understand…but…well, you know what I mean.”

  A lump grew in her throat and she felt that dangerous emotion welling to the surface, ready to spill over. She had to stop this. After everything they’d said, she didn’t need him thinking she was suffering a broken heart on top of everything else.

  “I’m sure we’ll see each other around. It’s a small town, right?” she offered, glad that in the dim light her expressions might not be visible.

  His voice was gentle. “I’m sorry if I’ve hurt you.”

  Oh God, this was the worst. It was torture. She didn’t want him to be sorry. She wanted him to want her, and if he didn’t…

  “I’m not hurt!” she protested. “You have nothing to be sorry for. I told you, I understood how things were from the beginning. And hey, we all know monogamy is not a natural state.”

  He stopped, regarding her with puzzlement. “You don’t really believe that.”

  “Of course I do.” She threw a hand out with, she hoped, insouciance. “Men and women are sexual beings, and tying ourselves to one person sets up the unreasonable expectation that we can overcome our own biological imperatives. It’s simple science.”

  “Megan—” he started, but she couldn’t stop.

  “No really.” Her voice was rising but she didn’t seem to have any control over it. “All you have to do is look around. The proof is everywhere. Fidelity is a fiction. I believe that, I really do.”

  Why, then, did she feel tears—actual inconvenient, weak, stupid tears—pricking her eyelids? She blinked them away and turned toward the stairway.

  But Sutter was next to her in a heartbeat. “Megan, you don’t have to do this,” he said in a low voice.

  The same low voice he’d used weeks ago, when they’d been alone in another dark room. Don’t you look delicious, here on my kitchen table…

  A breath caught in her throat. “Do what?” she squeaked.

  He took her upper arms in his hands and turned her toward him, looking intently into her face, trying too hard to see the truth in the dim light from the hall.

  The truth that even Megan was shocked by.

  She had fallen for him, head over heels. For all her bold words and bolder actions, for all her determination that she didn’t want a relationship, that he was just somebody she desired, she felt emotion as big as a tidal wave threatening to sweep her away.

  “Megan,” he said gently, and pulled her toward him.

  Then a flash blinded them both.

  Megan heard Sutter’s voice. “What the—?”

  A flash went off again. “Gotcha!” a male voice laughed. “What do you suppose Miss Ellis will think of this, Sutter Foley?”

  “Bloody hell—”

  Belatedly, Megan realized it was a camera. Someone was taking pictures of them. Here, alone, in an empty Sunday school room, with Sutter’s hands on her.

  She stepped quickly away, squinting toward the door.

  Through the retinal echoes of the flash, Megan saw a man in a short-sleeved shirt and jeans, with a camera around his neck and another in his hands, laughing at them.

  “One more for the Tattler!” the man said.

  And she was blinded again.

  Megan fled. She pushed past the man with the cameras, the smell of his sweat brushing her nose as his laughter rang in her ears, and she charged up the steps.

  The commotion had caused people to gather near the top of the staircase and Megan pushed through them too, oblivious to their questions about what was going on, was everything all right, and was that Sutter Foley?

  Megan headed for the door like a horse fleeing a b
urning stable, only stopping when a hand grabbed her forearm and wouldn’t let go.

  She whirled to see Penelope’s distressed face. “Megan, what is it? Oh my God, you’re crying!”

  Megan pushed the dampness off her cheeks with her fingers. “No, I’m not.”

  Penelope followed her out the front doors, glancing anxiously behind as if someone might be after them. “What is it? What’s wrong? Megan, you’re scaring me.”

  Megan reached the sidewalk and stopped. “I’m sorry. It’s nothing. Really, I’m fine.” She glanced past Penelope and saw people emerging onto the steps. “I just—got upset so I think I’d better go home. You go on back in and enjoy the rest of the concert.”

  She started to pull away but Penelope protested. “Megan! I’m not going to just go back inside and enjoy the concert, for pity’s sake.”

  Megan stopped, took a deep breath and wondered why on earth she felt so out of control. “I’m sorry,” she said again and forced a smile, “but I really have to get out of here.”

  “Come on then,” Penelope said in the most no-nonsense voice Megan had ever heard out of her. “Let’s get the car. I’ll drive you home and you can tell me what happened.”

  “Oh my God,” Megan moaned once they were in the car. Her head was in her hands and she rocked back and forth. “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.”

  “What happened? Did Sutter do something to you?” Penelope started the car and peeled away from the curb as if the cops were hot on their trail. In seconds flat they were pulling up in front of Megan’s house, headlights flashing across the darkened animal hospital next door as Penelope turned into the driveway.

  Megan recounted the conversation with Sutter for her, every word seeming to have been burned into her memory. She had to stop once or twice to regain control over her voice, or to stem the tide of tears that, having once broken free, now refused to stop for any length of time.

  Penelope made soothing sounds and asked soft, encouraging questions, making no judgements, offering no platitudes. She simply rubbed Megan’s back whenever she leaned forward to cover her face with her hands and let a few more self-pitying sobs escape her.

  Finally, she was talked out.

  “You really fell for him, didn’t you?” Penelope said softly.

  Megan’s throat threatened to close up on her again, but she shook her head angrily as if she could will the emotion away. “Oh Pen, I’m such an idiot. How could I have fallen for him? That’s like falling for Luke Perry when you’re fifteen.”

  “Honey, no,” Penelope said. “You’re not an idiot. For goodness sake, who wouldn’t fall for a man like that? He’s got everything. Charm, good looks, wealth…”

  “None of that is what I fell for, though.” She looked at Penelope and nearly wilted under her pitying eyes. “I swear, Penelope. There was something else between us and I truly believe he felt it too. We were good together. I felt like…like we knew each other somehow.”

  Penelope nodded.

  “Oh I know you don’t believe me,” Megan said, grabbing another Starbuck’s napkin from the glove compartment and drying a fresh round of tears. They were just falling out of her eyes now, like water from a leaky faucet. “But it’s true.

  I will believe it ’til the day I die. There was something between Sutter Foley and me. He just didn’t want it.”

  “I believe you,” Penelope said. “Though I’m not sure I agree that he doesn’t want it.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Megan said, blowing her nose.

  “No, I mean it.”

  Megan looked at her askance.

  “When Sutter came through the crowd tonight,” Penelope continued, “heading for you, there was a look on his face. Something…I’d never seen before. I looked at him, then I looked at you practically running into the church, and I thought…”

  Megan straightened. “You thought what?”

  “I thought, ‘He loves her,’” she said simply. “It was all over his face.”

  Megan’s breath caught. “Really?”

  Penelope shrugged, looking miserable on her behalf. “That’s what I thought.”

  Megan leaned back in the seat. She was exhausted. She felt like closing her eyes and going to sleep for a week.

  “I don’t know. He’s so hard to read. At first I thought he was livid. Then he was so kind…Oh, it’s just so confusing.” She took a deep breath and sat in silence a moment. “I cut it off, Pen. I told him we should pretend we’d never met. I told him we only caused each other trouble. Do you think that was stupid?”

  “Not if that’s how you felt,” Penelope said.

  “But I didn’t really. I mean, I know I caused him trouble but he…he was no trouble to me.”

  “Are you sure? That reporter never would have accosted you if not for him.”

  Megan waved a hand dismissively. “I don’t care about that. Who believes those rags, anyway?”

  Penelope shrugged.

  “In any case, he said he was the wrong road for me to be on anyway. If that’s not a kind way of blowing somebody off I don’t know what is.”

  Penelope glanced over at her, opened her mouth, then closed it again without speaking.

  They sat in silence for several minutes. Finally Megan sighed, reaching for the door handle. “Thank you so much, Pen. I don’t know what I would have done without you tonight.”

  “You wouldn’t have been there at all,” she said ruefully.

  “Then it would have happened somewhere else, somewhere along the line. I did enjoy the concert, though.” Megan smiled. “What I saw of it.”

  “Well, that’s something. Call me tomor…” The word dwindled off her lips as they both watched a Lincoln Navigator pull into the parking lot of the animal hospital next door. It turned off its headlights and continued around the building to the back side, the one they couldn’t see from where they were parked.

  “That’s Georgia’s car,” Penelope said.

  “What in the world is she doing here?” Megan said, watching the next-door building as if she could see the car through it. “Surely she’s not…” She looked at Penelope, and a giggle escaped her. “You don’t think she and the mayor…?”

  Penelope gasped and a hand flew to her mouth. Then she, too, giggled. “Oh my God—they’re probably necking!”

  “Necking! Pen, you crack me up. Who says ‘necking’ anymore?” Megan said, laughter making her feel whole again the way nothing else could have. “We should go sneak up on them.”

  “Oh we should. We could scare them to death!” Penelope launched into a whole new round of laughter.

  Then a light came on in the animal hospital.

  “Wait a minute.” Megan leaned forward in the car seat.

  Penelope quieted and leaned forward too.

  “What’s she doing in there?” Megan murmured, then glanced at Penelope. “I wonder if this has anything to do with Danny and those puppies…”

  Penelope opened the car door. “Come on. Let’s find out.”

  Megan stuffed the tear-damp napkins in her purse and got out, and the two of them slipped noiselessly across the grass in the warm summer air.

  Fourteen

  Penelope and Megan rounded the corner of the animal hospital to see Georgia’s huge Lincoln Navigator parked by the back door. The engine ticked as it cooled.

  Megan pushed open the back door and stepped in. Voices carried from the middle exam area, so she and Penelope crept past the bags of food, the cat litter, the extra crates and supplies, to look into the brightly lit area.

  Georgia, her dog Sage, and Megan’s father clustered around the examination table.

  Megan and Penelope exchanged knowing looks.

  With a fortifying breath, Megan straightened her shoulders and strode into the room. “What’s going on?”

  Everyone jumped and Sage barked, then saw her and began wagging his tail. Her father turned around, a puppy cradled in his arms.

  “Oh thank God,” Georgia breathed. “I
thought you were Clifford.”

  “It’s not nice to sneak up on people,” her father said, trying on a parental frown.

  Megan stopped next to them and stroked Sage on the head. He sat slowly and leaned his entire body weight against her. She braced herself with a foot and crossed her arms over her chest.

  Penelope stopped just behind her. “Oh my God, is that one of Clifford’s puppies?”

  “Looks like I’m not the only one who’s been sneaking around tonight,” Megan said. “This is disgraceful. Hasn’t anybody ever explained the idea of ethics to you?” She nailed her father with a stern look.

  “Don’t be mad at him.” Georgia came around the table to stand next to Megan’s father. “I asked Doc to help me—”

  “You don’t need to explain anything, doll,” Megan’s father said. “I got a right to break the law, same as anyone else. Megan, honey, I’m just trying to right a terrible wrong. If that’s not proper ethics, then I don’t want anything to do with them.”

  “I think we can chalk that up as a given,” Megan said. “But stealing seems pretty clearly beyond the bounds.”

  “We didn’t steal this puppy,” her father protested. “We’re just borrowing it.”

  “Does anyone know you’re borrowing it?” Megan asked. “Call me picky, but that seems to be what makes ‘borrowing’ different from ‘stealing’.”

  “You know,” he offered weakly, then looked at Penelope. “And her. Now.”

  “I cannot believe you stole a dog,” Penelope said, her gaze censuring the two of them.

  “Really, y’all, it wasn’t stealin’,” Georgia said, flipping her hair back with one hand. “These dogs will belong to me, you’ll see.”

  “Besides, we got in through the laundry room window,” her father explained, “which was wide open. Puppies were right there. And don’t fret, we’re going to take it right back after I get enough blood for a DNA test.”