A Splendid Obsession

by Cathleen Galitz

  “Where’s your friend?” Dave asked, feigning nonchalance.

  “That woman is not my friend,” Rose said, taking the chair Dave offered her. “She is the bossiest, most controlling person I’ve ever had the displeasure to be around. You have no idea what I had to go through just to steal some time alone with you today.”

  Dave couldn’t help but grin at the thought of Rose giving the indomitable Kayanne the slip. She didn’t strike him as the sort who would enjoy playing hide-and-seek on her shift. He couldn’t imagine why such a fascinating creature was hiding her beauty in, of all places, a retirement center, but he was determined to uncover the reason. As much as he wanted to believe that this budding obsession sprang only from a need to advance his own sluggish plot, he couldn’t help but be enthralled with her as a person. And he wasn’t fool enough to dismiss the physical attraction he felt for her as anything less than what it was.

  Unmitigated lust.

  He tried to look stern. “I hope this isn’t another unauthorized visit, Rose.”

  She gave him an audacious wink that took him aback. “What Kayanne doesn’t know won’t hurt her.”

  “But it could very well hurt me,” Dave replied, thinking about the many ways the redheaded drill sergeant could put him in his place. Some of which made his belly tighten.

  He was in the process of looking up the number for the Evening Star Retirement Manor when Rose’s keeper made a belated albeit not entirely unexpected appearance on his front porch.

  “Isn’t anyone going to invite me to the party?” she asked, sauntering up the walk and smiling at them both in a fashion reminiscent of the Cheshire cat from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

  The way Kayanne managed to make a simple work smock look chic was worthy of at least a full page of description, Dave decided. She wasn’t beautiful in the classical sense. More like Hilary Swank than the Grace Kelly type he was usually drawn to, Kayanne nevertheless had an aura about her that made a man take notice of the whole package. Tall, big boned and physically powerful, she wore sex like an exotic brand of perfume. Her hair had a windblown look that beckoned a man to run his fingers through it, looking for glints of gold among those fiery strands. There was nothing coy about the way she trained her piercing eyes on him either, tearing away his usual sense of ease and leaving him feeling exposed and guilty.

  It was almost as if she knew the lascivious thoughts he’d been entertaining about her over the past few days.

  Rose interrupted his runaway train of thought by snapping, “Everybody knows two’s company and three’s a crowd. Surely, Kayanne, you have more pressing issues back at the Manor than ruining my afternoon.”

  “I was just about to call,” Dave interjected holding out the phone as if tendering a peace offering. “Would you care for a gingersnap and a drink?”

  The flash of vulnerability he glimpsed in the depths of Kayanne’s eyes was gone before she could arch a fine eyebrow into a question mark.

  “Gingersnaps, huh?”

  The look she gave him made him feel like the kind of scoundrel who might deliberately lure an old lady over to his place with cookies for the sole intention of getting to know her young companion better. Dave was surprised when she took a conciliatory stance and her mouth relaxed into a smile.

  “I guess there’s no reason for me to be a party pooper,” she said, easing into the nearest chair.

  Rose harrumphed. “Lordy, girl, don’t you know how to take a hint?”

  “Better than you apparently,” Kayanne countered before turning her attention to Dave. “Houdini himself would have been easier to commandeer the last couple of days. I was afraid she was going to break a hip climbing out a window trying to sneak over here.”

  Dave did his best not to embarrass Rose by laughing. Here was the perfect opportunity to ask Kayanne for a date to see if he couldn’t get to know her better. Preferably without her elderly client in tow. Figuring his chances would be greatly enhanced if he came across as a nice guy, he tried enlisting Rose as an ally and working his way up incrementally.

  “I have an idea,” he said. “Why don’t you just set up a time every day when the two of you can come by to visit? That way Rose doesn’t put herself in danger, you don’t have to worry about her and everybody at the Manor can breathe a sigh of relief.”

  Kayanne studied him so intensely that Dave had to fight to keep from fidgeting.

  “That sounds like a great idea,” she said startling him by leaning in and deliberately invading his space. “There’s just one thing I need to know before I go to my supervisor with this proposal.”

  “What’s that?” Dave asked, doing his best neither to step back submissively nor to succumb to the desire to ravage her on the spot.

  Kayanne gave him the kind of hard, searching look he suspected she reserved for men who were clearly after one thing and one thing alone.

  “Just what’s your angle, buddy?”

  Three

  Kayanne had slapped men who looked less shocked than Dave Evans did at the moment. Taking his indignation as a positive sign that he wasn’t up to anything sneaky helped take the edge off any guilt she might feel for posing the question in the first place.

  “Are you always so paranoid, or do I just bring that trait out in you?” Dave asked, all former charm wiped from his countenance.

  Kayanne stopped overworking a piece of gum between her jaws to scowl at him.

  “It’s just you.”

  Rose harrumphed.

  A smile toyed with the edges of Kayanne’s lips. On some masochistic level she enjoyed matching wits with Rose. It beat trying to coax a simple greeting from some of her other clients who were, as far as Kayanne was concerned, overmedicated and under-stimulated. She just hoped she was as stubborn and passionate as Rose when she reached eighty.

  That Dave was serving the old lady’s favorite cookie thawed something that had been frozen hard inside Kayanne for a long time. Recalling the wild escapades of her past, she wondered when she, of all people, had become the world’s official rule enforcer instead of its number-one breaker. God surely had a wicked sense of humor.

  Her mouth watered at the thought of washing away her troubles with a shot of something other than reality for a change.

  “I’ll take that glass of iced tea now,” she said. “That is, if you’re still offering.”

  There. Kayanne felt proud of herself for remaining on the wagon without anyone being the wiser about how incredibly difficult it had been not to ask for the “something stronger” Dave had offered the last time she’d been here. Her crusade was strictly personal in nature. She didn’t feel the need to push her newfound sobriety on anyone else. Or expect the rest of the world to stop drinking just because she’d chosen sobriety over a lifestyle that had left her empty and used.

  Of course, that didn’t mean that she’d forgotten all about the old gang. She often found herself wondering what they were up to. And who her hard-drinking ex was spending his time with now that she was out of the picture. Forrester would get quite a laugh out of seeing her in a shapeless smock working with a bunch of tired, old farts—a name he bestowed on anyone over the age of forty.

  Forcibly pulling herself out of the past and into the present, Kayanne dialed the number for the retirement center.

  “I’ve located Mrs. Johansson,” she said. “There’s no need to worry. She’s safe and sound at a neighbor’s less than a block away. As soon as she finishes up visiting here, we’ll both be back.”

  With that, she disconnected and studied Dave at length while he fixed her drink. His dusty-blond hair was cut short in a tousled, no-nonsense style favored by athletes, and there was an outdoorsy air about him that belied the sedentary nature of his writing career. If he were to offer her a tour of the house, Kayanne bet she’d find one room devoted solely to weights and exercise equipment. She found it hard to believe he maintained that physique by lifting books alone.

  It was difficult aligning his nice-guy image wi
th the latent virility he emoted. Kayanne took a moment to examine her manicured nails. If she scratched beneath his courteous veneer, would she find a hot-blooded lover? Or just another loser out to get what he could from her?

  “Are you from around here originally?” Dave asked, handing her a tall glass.

  The slice of lemon decorating the rim was a nice touch, she thought.

  “Born and raised right here in Sheridan County.”

  “You’ve lived here all your life then?”

  While not inclined to go into details about her past, Kayanne saw no reason to avoid answering questions simply designed to facilitate polite conversation.

  “I didn’t say that. The truth is I couldn’t get out of this provincial hellhole fast enough when I was younger.”

  “Feeling like that, what could have possibly brought you back here?”

  “My mother had a heart attack, and she needs somebody to stay with her while she recuperates.”

  She felt no obligation to explain that the real reason she’d taken a break from modeling was to pull herself together. Or that her mother’s illness had merely been the impetus to bring Kayanne back home rather than signing herself into a private rehab center that she could scarcely afford considering some of the terrible financial decisions she’d made at the height of her drinking.

  “That’s commendable,” Dave said. “I understand about the need to get away from, and yet still stay connected to, family.”

  Kayanne caught the subtle lilt of a Southern drawl in his words. She wondered if it had been deliberately schooled out of him for the same reason her agent had encouraged her to lose her own Midwestern accent. He’d found it as hokey as the apple-pie name that her parents had given her.

  Dave chatted on amiably unaware of the road her thoughts had taken. Charming, gracious and funny, he was attentive to Rose without being patronizing.

  Shaking her head at his lame jokes, Kayanne found herself truly relaxing for the first time in a long time that she could remember.

  Without alcohol or drugs.

  If she wasn’t careful, she realized that she just might let her guard down. She forced herself to remember just how dangerous that could be to her sobriety. Holding Dave’s gaze, she wondered how she might feel if it ever came down to breaking his heart. Undoubtedly a whole lot worse than in previous relationships with men like Forrester who didn’t have hearts to break.

  She glanced curiously at the laptop sitting open on the coffee table next to her.

  “What are you writing, by the way?”

  Dave feigned nonchalance as he reached across her to activate the screen saver. When his hand accidentally brushed across her arm, a frisson of awareness caused her to draw back as if she’d been scalded. Kayanne wondered if the unexpected tingles affecting her nerves were wreaking havoc with his as well.

  “I already told you,” Dave replied glibly, “the great American novel.”

  Having been around artistic types a good deal, Kayanne understood that novelists were territorial, but she couldn’t imagine what—or who—this man thought he was protecting. Finding his response cliché and evasive, she didn’t bother hiding her irritation.

  “Surely you don’t think either Rose or I are out to steal your ideas?”

  Dave’s smile wobbled at the corners. “Of course not. It’s just considered bad luck for a writer to show his work to anyone before he’s had a chance to polish it.”

  Past experience led Kayanne to believe men would just as soon lie to your face as trust you with the truth on even the most inconsequential of matters. Not that she cared one way or the other. As long as it didn’t involve her, she didn’t give a damn what he wrote about. She suspected that, like so many of the artistes who’d frequented the same parties that she’d attended in New York, Dave hadn’t produced much of anything other than empty bottles of booze. He was probably just embarrassed to be put on the spot.

  “What do you like to read?” he asked, abruptly changing the subject.

  Kayanne took a moment to respond. It wasn’t the type of question often posed to her, she supposed because most people assumed she didn’t read much. Actually, her tastes were quite eclectic. As a girl, she’d devoured just about anything she could get her hands on, and in high school, she’d discovered a fondness for the classics that her English teachers had forced upon their captive audiences. When her modeling career had been in full swing, she’d barely had time to skim the current fashion magazines. And since returning home, she hadn’t picked up much because her mother’s preference tended toward overtly religious themes that Kayanne found heavy-handed and oppressive.

  “It depends,” she answered. “If you’ve got anything on the shelf, I’d like to give you a read. What exactly is it you write?”

  “It’s been categorized as a combination between literary and dark fiction.”

  Once again she was irritated by the vagueness of his response. Dave Evans sounded very much like a professor. She imagined him wowing a classroom full of women with fabulous reviews of his work.

  Feeling suddenly stupid, she ventured a question. “Just what kind of book isn’t considered literary?”

  Apparently one needed a college education to make such distinctions. Kayanne assumed that Dave would look down his nose at the popular fiction she enjoyed reading. She didn’t have a lot of patience with snobs, having encountered her fair share of them who had associated her looks with a lack of intelligence. Especially when she’d been starting out as a green kid from the sticks.

  “Kay Anne!” scoffed the first agent she’d approached. “If you’re lucky, a sweet, little old name like that will get you about as far as the back door in this business. Sorry, kid, but I don’t have the time to invest in trying to turn a desperate hick into a silk purse.”

  Even now the memory stung. Less than two years later she’d sent a copy of her first major magazine cover to the same fellow signed with her real name. After a painful trial-and-error period, Kayanne had discovered she could trick people into thinking she was chic by eliminating the space between her first and middle names, and adding a little spice to her country packaging.

  “By literary,” Dave explained, “I mean the kind of books that usually generate great reviews but lousy royalties.”

  Kayanne smiled at his unexpected candor. That could explain why he needed to supplement his writing income by teaching.

  Ever the capitalist, she ventured to ask, “Wouldn’t it make sense to combine the two?”

  “Good sense and inspiration don’t always go together,” Dave explained.

  Belatedly remembering to include Rose in the conversation, Kayanne glanced over at the comfortable recliner the older woman had claimed as her throne. She was sound asleep. Dave and Kayanne shared a look akin to that of doting parents studying a sleeping infant. Granted, Rose didn’t have the same cherubic face as a baby, but in repose she managed to pull off a look of innocence.

  When a deep snore erupted from her lips, they laughed out loud.

  Never had Kayanne felt so comfortable in the presence of such a drool-worthy man. Studying her surroundings, she decided his home reflected equal parts of industry and gentility. Books clearly held a place of importance in this house. They were neatly stacked from floor to ceiling in built-in bookcases, arranged artfully on the living room coffee table and littered in no apparent order about the recliner. A photograph of a handsome couple that Kayanne assumed were his parents rested on the mantel next to several of him in a variety of outdoor activities such as white-water rafting and skiing. It appeared that the American dream that had always been just out of reach for her when she’d been growing up poor and scared was this man’s birthright.

  She couldn’t imagine him writing anything particularly dark. Maybe he was afraid of exploring the sinister aspects of his own personality and was thus drawn to such things in his imagination.

  Or maybe, as in the fashion industry, dark themes were simply in vogue. More photographers than she
cared to remember had tried making her into an angry, cruel beauty. Kayanne’s athletic body and country-fresh face were contrary to the heroin addict’s look so popular on Fifth Avenue. Even with a hangover, she’d had trouble pulling off Gothic. Her meteoric rise to the top of the industry had surprised almost everyone.

  Her career was the last thing, however, she wanted to discuss with Dave. One of the nicest things about him was that he knew nothing about her past—neither the glamour that had set her apart nor the despair that had brought her back home.

  “So how did you end up living at the brink of civilization as we know it?” she wanted to know.

  “Unlike you, I deliberately picked it. I prefer Sheridan’s sleepy streets and rugged mountains to Birmingham’s botanical gardens and congestion.”

  “Does your family still live in Alabama?”

  Dave’s brow furrowed in consternation. “They’re so entrenched in that generational soil that just getting them to visit is a terrible imposition. Like you, they don’t understand what it is about the area that’s such a magnet for me. They’re hoping your bitter Wyoming winters will bring me to my senses.”

  He sounded suddenly sad, and Kayanne noticed how quickly he tried to change the subject away from himself.

  “How long have you been working with the elderly?”

  “About a week,” she said with a trace of chagrin. “And if Rose doesn’t start being a little more cooperative about staying put, I may not make it till my first payday.”

  Dave gave her a funny look. “Would that be so bad?”

  He wasn’t the only one who wondered if she was wasting her talents working at the Manor. Nevertheless, Kayanne was under no obligation to explain her reasons to anyone.