A Splendid Obsession

by Cathleen Galitz

  And had begged Forrester from a distance to make a change.

  He had, in record time, by promising to transform himself into a better man—all the while sneaking around behind her back with one of her “closest” friends. Given a history of such disastrous relationships, it was little wonder Kayanne had come to associate hitting rock bottom with men in general. She’d dated so many guys who lived on the edge that it was hard to separate healthy relationships from unhealthy ones.

  “Ouch!”

  Her mother bolted upright in the chair, knocking her head on the back of the sink in the process.

  “Pay attention to what you’re doing. While you were off daydreaming somewhere, I got soap in my eyes,” Suzanne complained.

  She would have none of her daughter’s profuse apologies. Grabbing the towel out of Kayanne’s hands, Suzanne dripped water on the floor while attempting to wipe the offending soap from her eye. After cleaning up the mess, Kayanne offered to set her mother’s hair for her even though she hated the thought of it—working with hair was absolutely repugnant. Especially her mother’s, which was thin and attached to what had to be the most sensitive scalp on the planet.

  She gathered up the same pink sponge curlers she remembered from high school and started rolling her mother’s hair into neat rows. Kayanne did her best to keep her mind on the task at hand but couldn’t help her thoughts wandering to Dave Evans. For some reason, she wondered what kind of a drunk Dave Evans was. Was he mean? Or the sloppy, sentimental sort who liked to toss obscure verse around in hopes of impressing the barflies with his academic credentials? It was hard to imagine him inebriated. Come to think of it, since the first time they’d met, she hadn’t seen any sign of the whiskey bottle she’d spotted on his porch.

  The ringing phone caused her mother to jump again and Kayanne to pull her hair.

  “Answer that, would you?” Suzanne said, rubbing her scalp.

  “I wish you’d let me buy you a caller identification box or answering machine so you could screen your calls,” Kayanne told her. “I hate being bothered by sales-people when I’m in the middle of something.”

  “Those contraptions are a waste of money,” Suzanne replied.

  Kayanne knew that bringing such “modern technology” into the house would only lead to an argument about how much money she’d sent home over the years and what had become of it. So she simply did as she was told and picked up the receiver. If there had been any way to know who the caller was in advance, she definitely would have let the phone ring off the hook rather than take a call destined to suck her even deeper into the mire of the past.

  Five

  Jasmine was dead. Someone dashed her brains out with a blunt object and left her bleeding all over page seventy-eight. The viciousness of the crime shocked Dave—and, on some visceral level, fascinated him as well. While he couldn’t prove anything, he secretly suspected Spice, who had never made any bones about her antipathy for cool, submissive blondes with nothing between their ears but outdated moral platitudes.

  Poor, beautiful Jasmine. Cut down in the prime of her youth before being given the opportunity to consummate her one great love. Dave wondered why anyone would want to kill someone so perfect. His grieving process was cut short by morbid curiosity however. He believed a certain fiery redhead had all the answers, but she wasn’t talking.

  Unusually tight-lipped and evasive, Spice had taken to parading a stream of incongruous lovers across the pages of a novel that suddenly seemed to be writing itself. Dave suspected her scandalous behavior was designed more as a shock tactic to throw him off the trail than from any sensual pleasure derived behind closed doors. Confused and a little jealous, Dave knew the place to dig for answers was in the real world outside his imagination.

  He looked forward to Rose’s and Kayanne’s visits insomuch as they provided the necessary creative fuel for him to keep writing at such an accelerated pace. They also were a pleasure in and of themselves. He wished there was some way to swing an actual date with Kayanne so he could delve the depths of her personality.

  While not as intimidating as the character she had spawned in his book, like Spice, there was an edge to Kayanne that cut through anything that smacked of pretense. Dave found that refreshing. He also admired her wry sense of humor and a quick wit that wouldn’t let him get away with a thing. Hence he made a point of shutting down his computer whenever she was around. He wasn’t nearly as worried about the threat of libel for “borrowing” from real life as he was afraid that Kayanne might feel personally betrayed if she were ever to identify herself in the thickening plot.

  The sound of the doorbell prompted him to close his laptop, leaving no telltale sign of the liberties he was taking with Kayanne’s life. Having never seen her in anything other than her work-issued uniform, Dave wondered what she would look like in the same thing Spice was wearing in the scene he was presently writing. That is, in nothing at all.

  Although he was expecting both Rose and her keeper, he didn’t think he ever could get used to the way Kayanne changed the molecular structure of the air itself whenever she entered a room. Opening the door of his home to her was like letting fresh air into a stuffy library.

  “Come on in, sunshine,” he said, taking Rose by the elbow and helping her to the chair from which she held forth like a queen surrounded by her loyal subjects.

  Kayanne seemed particularly fidgety today and couldn’t be coaxed into sitting down. While Dave and Rose discussed various issues of the day, Kayanne meandered around the room inspecting various mementos: photographs and paintings, an eclectic collection of antiques, a western bronze and a couple of framed awards for his writing. When she tested a glass paperweight in one hand, Dave couldn’t help but think about how it was heavy enough to crack a person’s skull if hurled with enough force….

  “I looked for your novel at the local bookstore,” she mentioned in a tone best described as noncommittal. “There weren’t any copies available.”

  That came as no surprise. The typical shelf life of a book was slightly little longer than a carton of yogurt, and much of the space in typical stores was allocated to only the biggest names in the industry. Dave’s dream was to someday be among them.

  “If you’d like, I’ll sign one for you out of my personal stash,” he offered.

  The conflict that played upon Kayanne’s features left little doubt that she hated feeling indebted to anyone for anything. Even something as trifling as a book.

  “That won’t be necessary. I had them order one for me.”

  Dave was slightly relieved. How would he have signed such a gift anyway?

  With love?

  Hot for you?

  Thanks for contributing without consent to my next book….

  “It should be in sometime soon,” Kayanne said. “I told them they should buy at least a gross once school starts and all your soon-to-be adoring students meet you in person.”

  Dave gave her a funny look. Could it be possible that such a stunning woman was actually exhibiting signs of jealousy?

  Her usual presumptuous self, Rose didn’t hesitate inserting herself into the conversation. “Personally I’d love one of your books.”

  He smiled. “I like a woman who knows what she wants,” he said, leaving the room with the promise that he’d be right back. When he returned a moment later, he was carrying a book.

  “Hardback,” Kayanne observed. “Impressive.”

  Dave handed it to Rose who clutched it to her bosom as though it were the Holy Grail itself.

  “I’ll cherish it forever,” she gurgled, opening it to the inscription and reading it out loud. “To my dear friend, Rose. Fondly from your next-door neighbor and admirer, Dave Evans.”

  Rose dabbed at her eyes with a frilly handkerchief. “I hope you know how fond I am of you, too, dear.”

  Kayanne was impressed. It was the perfect dedication. Thoughtful and tender without being overtly sappy. While Dave and Rose carried on a friendly conversation ab
out literature, Kayanne sauntered over to the front window and considered the world outside this pleasant sanctuary. A harbinger of change in the air, a slight breeze rustled the tops of a stand of aspen trees. Lost in reflection about the phone call that had left her feeling so utterly vulnerable, Kayanne was startled when Dave came up behind her a little while later to share the view.

  He put a gentle hand on her shoulder. “I didn’t mean to scare you,” he said.

  Despite the intent, his touch was not in the least reassuring. It had been such a long time since she’d felt a man’s hands upon her that Kayanne longed to direct them over every inch of her body. Or at the very least to lean into his hard masculinity and turn that touch into something more substantial—such as a full-fledged embrace.

  Kayanne wondered what it would be like to let herself lean on someone strong. Someone who wasn’t out to use her. Someone around whom she could let down her guard and share the dream of a normal life. Images of creating a home of her own with someone special flashed through her mind and left her feeling conflicted.

  “Rose has nodded off,” Dave said.

  Turning to face him directly, Kayanne saw that the warmth of his touch matched the heat of his gaze. Seeing herself reflected in eyes the color of melted chocolate, she caught a glimpse of a woman without a past. And couldn’t help but fantasize for a fleeting instant about wrapping herself around this man and pretending to be exactly what he needed. Dave was so sweet that she hesitated inviting him into a world colored by cynicism and hard experience. Having worked so hard to overcome the shortcomings of her youth, Kayanne hated the thought of losing control of the image she’d fashioned for herself, whether as a top fashion model or as a woman doing her best to get her life back together.

  The words she’d practiced stuck sideways in her throat.

  “I have to ask you a favor.”

  Amusement toyed with the corners of his sensual, masculine mouth. “It must be something terrible to make you tremble so,” Dave pointed out.

  That he’d even noticed said a lot about his sensitivity. When he took her hands in his, it only intensified the tremors that had taken over Kayanne’s body. Once again, she was rendered helpless by the charge of pure sexual energy sizzling between them. Blood poured through her veins like hot brandy.

  Kayanne reminded herself that there were always repercussions in asking a favor from any man. Although Dave didn’t strike her as the sort who might expect something sexual in return, she still hated risking their tenuous friendship. However accidental in nature it might be, Dave was the only male in town she counted as a friend.

  “What kind of favor?” he asked.

  Her sponsor had insisted that it was time to stop dancing around the past and confront it once and for all. Bethany seemed convinced this opportunity was God Himself knocking on her front door.

  Kayanne wasn’t so sure.

  “I know it’s terribly late to ask,” she said in a rush. “But my class reunion is coming up this weekend, and I was wondering if you would mind going with me?”

  “That’s all?”

  Dave sounded incredulous. His smile alone lifted the heavy weight pressing on Kayanne’s chest.

  “I thought you were going to ask me for a kidney or something even more dear.”

  “I wouldn’t take bets on which would be more painful,” she told him in all honesty.

  He threw back his head and laughed at her candor. “I’d love to go. But before I commit myself to a night of such impending doom, I have to ask. Why go at all if you don’t want to?”

  It was a fair question. And the same one she had been asking herself ever since she’d received the call from a former classmate informing her that her old mentor Mrs. Rawlins was going to be honored with special recognition Saturday night and had specifically requested that Kayanne be present.

  “It has to do with being there for a lady who was there for me when I was young and confused,” she said, chewing her lower lip in consternation. “And with making amends.”

  To an entire town…

  Watching Dave’s reaction closely to see what effect that admission would have upon him, she wondered if his writer’s training helped him remain so stoic. Or if he simply had no idea that her reference came straight out of AA’s big book.

  “I’m hoping to save time and money hunting down everybody I’ve offended,” she explained, donning a cavalier attitude. “This way I should be able to catch most of them in one place and get it over with all at once.”

  Her fellow alcoholics reassured Kayanne that this business of making amends was key to a successful recovery. It was hard arguing with their collective victories. Having failed miserably at white-knuckled sobriety before, she couldn’t allow pride and tricky step number nine to be all that came between her and serenity.

  “In that case, I’d be honored.”

  Kayanne let out the lungful of air that she’d been holding on to. Pertinent information regarding the date and time came out in a whoosh of exhalation. Feeling suddenly light-headed, she swayed on boneless legs.

  Dave reached out to steady her. His efforts had completely the opposite effect. Falling against him, she felt the length of his hard body as he enveloped her in his arms. Like a desert nomad finding respite in the shade of an oasis, she took safe haven in the protection of a pair of strong and gentle arms.

  Minute details leaped out at her. Gold flecks in his kind, dark eyes. Laugh lines around his sexy mouth. The closeness of his shave. A subtle hint of cologne almost masked by the clean scent of soap. Kayanne wondered vaguely how Dave always managed to look as if he’d just stepped out of the shower. In spite of her determination to keep their relationship on a platonic level, she found herself willing him to kiss her!

  Kayanne wondered how some women could live without sex and feel blessed when others like herself considered celibacy a curse. In her own case, she saw it a necessary measure for maintaining sobriety. Passionate by nature, she didn’t know which was worse: going without alcohol or going without sex for the rest of her life.

  Testing the powers of her own resistance, she told herself that one little kiss was far different than one little drink.

  She closed her eyes and leaned into the kiss they’d both been wanting since first laying eyes on one another. Threading her fingers into the short hair at the nape of his neck, she pulled Dave’s mouth down to hers. His lips were firm, his response as hungry as her own. There was nothing tentative in his reaction as he took control, demanding everything she had to give.

  Writhing with the intensity of the pleasure that rolled through her, Kayanne melted against him and marveled at the wonder of tasting a man without alcohol on his breath. It was far more intoxicating than she could have ever imagined.

  Never had she experienced such a powerful reaction to a simple kiss. A simple tongue-tangling, high-voltage, soul-merging kiss that made her want to rip off his shirt and drag him to the nearest bedroom. The air around them crackled with enough sexual current to light up the entire state during a full-scale blackout.

  Behind them someone cleared her throat.

  They separated as quickly as a pair of teenagers caught necking in the back seat of a car by the local police.

  “I’m having some palpitations. Would you mind taking me home right away?” Rose asked in a weak voice.

  Her hand fluttered delicately toward her heart as she glared a hole straight through Kayanne, who was clearly the sole object of her fury. A typical clueless male, Dave seemed unaware that Rose felt anything other than the actual fondness she professed for him. As understandable as that was given the difference in their ages, Kayanne couldn’t help but feel sorry for Rose.

  And a tiny bit frightened for herself.

  She acquiesced to “Her Majesty’s” command with all the expediency demanded of an impending heart attack. Even though technically she’d done nothing wrong, Kayanne hadn’t meant to hurt the old lady’s feelings. Nor did she want to be responsible for causin
g her cardiac arrest either.

  “Do you want me to call an ambulance?” she asked.

  “I’ll be just fine,” Rose said icily.

  All her life it seemed Kayanne had been destined to hurt those she cared for the most. Some people actually claimed that her love was as deadly as poison, a charge that she knew could very well be repeated at the reunion by some of her old classmates. In the past, Kayanne supposed she’d been subconsciously drawn to men whose appeal didn’t go beyond the physical for fear of endangering anyone she really loved.

  A shrink would have a heyday with her neuroses.

  Rose suffered no such psychological preconceptions. She knew exactly who she was mad at. And why. Kayanne supposed it was a tribute to her upbringing as a lady that the octogenarian waited until they safely cleared the front gate before turning on her.

  “Why, you backstabbing little bitch!”

  Six

  A few short weeks ago, all Kayanne would have been worried about was how to get Rose safely back to the retirement home without compromising her job in the process. Today, her heart was on the line. Decidedly uncomfortable with being the object of the old lady’s ire, she tried teasing her way back into Rose’s good graces.

  “For someone with heart palpitations you sure are setting quite a pace today.”

  Anger took all the shuffle out of Rose’s feet as she made a beeline to the pedestrian crossing. Kayanne had to double her stride just to keep up.

  “I pity the poor Boy Scout who tries to take your arm to help you across this street,” she joked.

  “And I pity the Girl Scout who puts her trust in you!” Rose spat without bothering to slow down.