The house was quiet. Cindy and Deanna were still away. He was glad because he wanted to be alone. Not that he didn’t appreciate Cindy, but enough time had passed for her to regain independence and establish a permanent home and future for herself and Deanna.
Between his busy schedule and Cindy’s schedule, oddly enough they barely bumped into each other. By the time he’d make it home, Cindy would be sound asleep and gone by the time he’d awaken the next morning. If he didn’t know any better, he would’ve thought she was intentionally trying to avoid him altogether. If that were the case, he couldn’t blame her, especially after what had happened the night of the banquet.
He wanted to be angry with Katharine about the article, but he knew he was partly to blame. If only he’d taken a different approach to solving his marital problems, the piece in the Ledger would never have been written.
Chapter 30
It had been a week since Carson’s inexcusable exhibition, and neither he nor Katharine chose to bring up the subject. Their conversations had been civil and focused mainly on the children and the household finances.
Katharine rang the doorbell of his condo and waited. She spotted CJ and Bethany playing with some children she didn’t know in the nearby playground.
She was dressed somewhat casually, a blue skirt and a sleeveless white shell. Her long legs were stockingless, and she was wearing four-inch heels, certain that Carson would approve.
Carson’s eyes widened when he saw her standing less than two feet away from him. “I never told you, but I like your new look,” he said immediately.
“I like your new house,” she returned, stepping inside. “But it’s quite a change from our style.”
“This unit belongs to some guy who’s out of the country on a four-year government assignment.”
“Sounds intriguing.” She didn’t bother asking how he’d found the place.
Katharine could hear music playing inside the condo: slow and sultry and funky, a love ballad. The music swirled around her head, its bluesy rhythm synchronizing with the beating of her heart.
She went into the high-ceilinged living room and looked around at the furniture and fireplace. From where she stood, she could see the dining room, with its heavy wooden chairs and table. A large painting of three Dalmatian puppies hung on one side of the wall. Two tall, side-by-side windows in the room, looking out on the rear bush garden, flooded the place with light.
Nothing in the house belonged to her. There were no framed pictures of her and Carson or CJ and Bethany on the walls, no posters of vacation destinations fondly remembered, no candid snapshots of grinning friends or posed family portraits that invited questions or memories. The room was impersonal and barren. Katharine suspected Cindy was responsible.
Carson flopped on the sofa and offered Katharine a seat close beside him.
“I saw the children outside playing,” she said, accepting the offer. “Looks like they’ve made some friends in the neighborhood.”
“Uh-huh,” he said turning to face her. With one finger, he traced the line of her jaw from her chin to her ear, setting her entire body atremble. “What did they have to say to you?”
She looked into his eyes, just inches from hers. “They didn’t notice me,” she whispered.
He touched her arm with a fingertip and ran it up to her shoulder. “I never was any good,” he said, raising his hand to her cheek, “at paying attention to what was in my best interest.”
She touched his face, but instead of smooth skin, her fingertips roamed along coarse razor stubble. “It seems I have to learn some things the hard way myself.” Her hands moved to his biceps.
Carson pulled Katharine close, his eyes taking in every inch of her face. “About the other day with you and Stephen, I—I—”
“If you kiss me, I won’t be able to concentrate on that,” she whispered. She didn’t dare spoil the mood with his apologies when she’d already forgiven him.
Carson’s hand tightened in Katharine’s hair. He kissed her cheek, her neck, his mouth disturbing the soft flesh of her throat.
She let out a whimper and then gasped as he nibbled behind her ear.
“Look at me,” he whispered.
The familiar way in which he’d touched her left her tingled and slow to process thought. Her mind raced to catch up with what he’d asked her. She opened her eyes and looked into his. Passion had turned them a sultry grayish brown.
“Hi, baby,” he said softly.
“Hi,” she echoed breathlessly.
“You’re so gorgeous.”
“So are you.” Her hands left his biceps, found his face, that magnificent face she’d never been able to get over.
He smelled her hair, inhaling its soft fragrance, and then sat back. She saw his eyes move to her chest, and she yearned for his touch, willing him to touch the implants to see what they felt like.
He drew his hand down her chest, exploring the hills and valleys that marked her new body. When she caught the hem of his shirt in her hands, she heard the sharp intake of his breath.
He drew her head down to his shoulder. With a sigh of contentment, she snuggled against him, allowing her mind to drift as his arm encircled her. The air-conditioned room had dried the sweat from her body, but she could feel the dampness of his T-shirt and guessed that his skin was sticky and sweaty.
“I think I need to go change my shirt,” he said as if reading her thoughts.
She lifted her head from his chest to view the spots that had seeped through the cotton fabric.
“Come with me,” he said. “I want to show you the upstairs.”
It was just an excuse and a lousy one at that, but she followed him.
When they reached the top step, Carson turned to face her, his eyes glistening. “I can’t stop thinking about you,” he confessed. “Why do you suppose that is?”
“I don’t know,” she said. Maybe it’s my new body. She wanted to say it, but she knew he’d secretly deny it. “I think—” She closed her mouth with a soft click of her teeth. She didn’t know what to think.
He buried his nose in her hair. “I screwed up royally,” he said. “I—I’m sorry.” He spoke urgently, directly into her ear. “I love you, Kat.”
Katharine’s words caught in her throat. She’d waited months to hear him say those words, but it felt as if years had passed. She wanted to say, I love you and I forgive you, my darling. Now come home and let’s forget all about this foolishness and start our lives over again. But she couldn’t say it.
She watched his face, waiting for him to speak, hoping he might at last air some of the things that were bothering him. If he did, maybe she could explain to him how she felt as if she were going dry inside, how she seemed daily less able to feel anything. If only she could open up and let her reactions pour out.
They shared a long look, which she was first to break. She breathed deeply. “I—I think we need to get downstairs and check on the children,” she said, knotting her fingers together.
“Right now? I mean, can we just—” He broke off, kissing her fingertips.
As much as her heart said yes, her conscience said no, not now. “It’s been an exhausting week. We really need to get downstairs,” she whispered.
He searched her eyes and nodded slowly, turning the conversation to her complaints of fatigue. “You do seem to be a little drained.”
“Between work, taking care of CJ and Bethany, and maintaining the house, it’s been a little strenuous, but I’ll be all right,” she said quietly. “Not perfect. Just all right.”
“Not perfect? What’s that supposed to mean?”
Katharine didn’t respond. She bowed her head.
Carson lifted her chin and their eyes connected. “I’m not interested in perfection,” he said softly. He lowered his forehead to hers, resting it there. “I mean it.”
Knowing where he wanted to go with the conversation, she forced herself to shift in another direction. She’d tried to give him a perfect bod
y like Cindy’s and those women in the magazines. Was he now trying to tell her it hadn’t been necessary?
She was now wondering how to voice her fears without revealing too much to him. She was almost convinced that Carson had just been overtaken by a moment of passion. Tomorrow he might feel completely different about wanting her again.
* * *
Carson wondered how he would include the Ledger and Freeman into the conversation without disrupting the passion. But the two didn’t go together. He decided to forgo the subject for now and bring it up later.
“Would you like a cup of coffee?” he asked, bending his head to her wavy hair.
She shook her head. Silky strands brushed his lips. Her hair was cool, haunted by perfume.
“Sure?” he whispered. “It’ll help you to relax.”
She made an odd, abrupt sound that could have been laughter. “I’m having enough trouble sorting out this moment,” she said in a tired voice. “Coffee won’t help.”
“Can you sleep at night?” he candidly probed.
She answered with a slight head sway.
Carson suppressed a shudder of self-condemnation. It didn’t take a therapist to tell him that his actions had contributed to her restlessness.
While Carson rummaged through his drawers for a polo shirt, Katharine wandered around the upstairs hallway. It was clean and tidy. The woodwork was a warm honey color, and the hardwood floors looked recently refinished. In the bay window overlooking the street, half a dozen African violets grew in clay pots.
She remained alone only for a short time. Carson appeared right behind her, his hand resting lightly just above her waist as he eased her down the hall past a pair of bedrooms, one door closed and the other opened. He didn’t want her to inquire about the other rooms.
* * *
Cindy pulled into the covered carport right next to a car that looked identical to Katharine’s. Peeping inside the car window, she saw a blue ceramic ornament on a chain hanging from the rearview mirror. Inscribed on the blue oval in white letters were the words “CJ and Beth.”
Anger swelled up in Cindy. She grabbed her purse and the two plastic bags of groceries that were in the backseat and hurried to the front of the condo. She’d dropped Deanna off at her mother’s before stopping at the market. Even though she’d told Carson that she and Deanna would spend the night with her mother, she wanted to surprise him with a savory dinner of garden salad, squash casserole, oven roasted new potatoes with a little olive oil, garlic, and rosemary, and filet mignon—by candlelight. Just the two of them.
When she opened the door, she shouted, “Carson, honey . . . I’m home.”
At that precise moment, Carson and Katharine came down the stairs. He was adjusting his shirt.
“Aha,” Cindy said, trying to sound unconcerned. “What’s going on here?”
Carson stood stunned for an instant. “Excuse me, ladies,” he said. “I’m going to get the children.” He hurried out the door, leaving them alone together.
Katharine blinked twice as Cindy swept into the room, her flowered purple sundress swirling around her. It didn’t come as a surprise to Katharine that Cindy had privileges of entering Carson’s place unannounced.
“I can’t believe you’re here!” Cindy said as if she were delighted to see Katharine. “I came to find out who this heifer was that he’d brought home to amuse himself with, under his own children’s noses, right in broad daylight. I had no idea it was you.” Cindy laid a hand on Katharine’s arm. Her fingernails were painted magenta, a perfect complement to her dyed auburn-colored hair. “Not that you’re a heifer, sweetheart. I had no idea that you and Carson were”—she paused delicately—“seeing each other again.”
“Carson was just showing me the condo,” Katharine said lamely, squirming under Cindy’s touch.
“It’s all right, darling. You can’t know how relieved I am. I’ve been so worried ever since Carson told me that he was thinking about getting serious with me. Thank God he’s come to his senses.”
“Look, Cindy,” Katharine said tightly. “Please don’t read more into this than there is.”
Cindy moved toward her. Raising an eyebrow, she said irritably, “I’m not reading into it. I know what Carson needs.”
Katharine shot her a hostile look and moved so close to Cindy’s face she could see the hair tracks mixed with new growth sprouting from her scalp. “The two of us were meant to be together,” she said in a clear, clipped voice. “Carson knows it, and so do you. So why don’t you just butt out and let Carson and me handle our own affairs?”
Cindy’s stomach plunged like a roller coaster.
Katharine turned to leave.
“That’s interesting,” Cindy said to Katharine’s back,” because Carson seemed to be under the impression that he and I had a future together.”
Katharine, who had reached the door, turned around and stared blankly at her. “Come again?”
“You heard me.”
“Yeah, I heard you, but I don’t believe it.”
“Believe it, honey.”
“Does the expression ‘not in this lifetime’ mean anything to you?” Katharine retorted.
“We’ll see,” Cindy said smugly.
“Not in your wildest dreams,” Katharine said.
Cindy knew how to be catty. For most of her teenage and young adult life, she’d had to defend herself and the spoken-for boyfriend or husband she was after. Most girls and women were intimidated by her beauty, style, charm, and intelligence. It was a miracle her complexion had remained free from scars from their fingernails.
“Honey, you wish you could work it like me,” Cindy said, her left hand hugging her hip in a supermodel pose. “And if my dream is so wild, then why is your husband here with me and not home with you?”
The sound Katharine made could have been an inarticulate protest or harshly suppressed laughter. “Let me tell you something you fake, conniving homewrecker,” she said savagely, her index finger pointed directly at Cindy’s face.
Carson entered the room right in the nick of time, his expression noncommittal. Bethany and CJ marched in behind him.
“Mommy!” CJ and Bethany sang together. They both hugged Katharine—CJ around her waist and Bethany around her hips, snapping the hard, silent stares of the two women.
Katharine scooted them out the door again. Looking at Carson, she said, “You can pack their overnight bags and bring them by later.” Her eyes slowly settled on Cindy. “Good-bye,” she said softly but sharply, her mouth a hard, straight line.
* * *
She stepped out onto the pathway and began pacing toward the car, CJ and Bethany racing ahead of her. Anger and vulnerability still battled within her, but she was no longer on the point of explosion.
Carson caught up to her in two steps, taking her hand in his. She shivered at his touch.
Directing the children into the car, she kissed Carson on the cheek, got in the car, and allowed him to close the door. He knocked on the rear window. CJ rolled it down. He spoke a few words of encouragement to them, kissed Bethany on the forehead, and ruffled CJ’s hair playfully.
“Your mother told me how the two of you are keeping your bedrooms cleaned,” he smiled. “Keep up the good work, always listen to your mom and behave yourselves.”
Unless he brought it up, which she suspected he wouldn’t, Katharine decided not to mention Cindy. She was feeling too good about what took place between them and she refused to allow Cindy to burst the bubble. She turned her head and gazed up at him with rapidly blinking eyes. Her cheeks felt warm, and her breathing was rapid and shallow. She wanted to open the door and was on the verge of getting out when she changed her mind. Remembering the failed seduction half an hour earlier, she gave a breathy little laugh.
“What’s so funny?”
“Oh, nothing. I’d better go. I need to fix dinner. “Forcing the words to come out, she said, “I love you, Carson.”
“Me too.” He kissed her cheek th
rough the lowered window then stood watching as she backed out of the parking space, leaving her with a glowing hope for the future.
* * *
Observing through a lifted window, Cindy squinted and cocked her head, unsure she’d heard him right. “Did he just tell her that he loved her?” she whispered to herself. “No. He said, ‘Me too.’ Look at him. He can’t even say the words to her. That means I’m still in the running.”
The candlelight dinner would have to be put on hold. She couldn’t take a chance of him having flashes of Katharine again like he did in Asheville and on the night of the banquet.
The time was ripe to show Carson the photos of Katharine and Freeman embracing. Between the photos and the news article, she couldn’t lose. As for Katharine, she was in for a surprise.
She’d make them both think that each was playing games with the other’s heart. And yet, after watching them together, Cindy almost regretted the pain she was about to cause the O’Connor family.
Can’t you see? her inner voice spoke. This has to be done. Don’t feel sorry for her. Feel sorry for yourself. Norman was taken away from you and Deanna was gone awhile, too, remember? Now it’s your turn to take what’s yours. Carson belongs to you now. He just doesn’t know it yet. It’s up to you to show him.
Cindy was doing what was necessary for her happiness, her future.
Chapter 31
“Are you familiar with Chee-Chee’s at Colony Square near the Fourteenth Street Playhouse?” the voice on the other end asked.
“Yes,” Cindy said, speaking into her cell phone. “That’s the open food court, right?” She was standing in the parking lot of the condo, about to get into her car.
“Check,” he said. “I’ve completed everything you need with the information you gave me, including signatures and official seals.”
“Thank you so much. How much do I owe you?”
“No charge.”
Sweetest Desires (A Sweetest Day Romance) Page 20
