Honor

by Sherryl Woods

  “Exactly.”

  “Who’s going to make me?”

  “You’re a grown man. No one should have to make you listen to reason.”

  “Maybe I’ve forgotten what it’s like to rest. Maybe I need someone around to show me.” He met her gaze and held it. “I need you, Lacey.”

  Her lips parted, but before she could speak, Brandon slipped into the room. Kevin managed a rueful grin. “Your timing’s lousy, Dad.”

  Brandon looked from Kevin to Lacey and back again, then nodded in obvious satisfaction. “Interrupting your courting, am I? I’m sure you’ll remember right where you left off. Just wanted to say goodbye before I go get some sleep. These old bones of mine can’t take another night on that poor excuse of a sofa in the waiting room.” He glanced at Lacey. “Remind me to order up some new furniture for this place.”

  “I’m sure they’ll appreciate it,” Lacey said, already edging toward the door. “Why don’t I leave you two alone. I don’t think Linc wants two of us in here at a time.”

  “Lacey,” Kevin said, stopping her before she could flee, “I won’t forget.”

  “Forget what?”

  “I won’t forget what we were talking about,” he answered meaningfully.

  She scurried out the door, reminding him of the only other time he could recall seeing her flustered—the day he’d asked her to marry him. She had wanted so desperately to say yes. He’d been able to read that much in her eyes. She’d tried to weigh that desire against the implications, from Brandon’s wrath to the certain end of his future in the family business.

  “Yes,” she had said hesitantly, then before he could whoop for joy, “No. Oh, Kevin, I couldn’t bear it if our being together ruined your relationship with your father.”

  “Dad will survive this little setback to his plans. He always does.”

  “But there’s nothing more important than family.”

  “We’ll have our own family. You and I. Our children. It’ll be enough for me. Will it be enough for you?”

  “All I’ve ever wanted in my life was to love you.”

  “Then that’s our answer, isn’t it?” Kevin had said with the naive faith only a twenty-year-old can have. “All I’ve ever wanted is to make you happy.”

  For so many years love had been enough. Only lately had he realized that sometimes marriage took more than love. It took patience and understanding and a willingness to struggle through the bad times. It took listening and sharing and compromise.

  Kevin knew, then, what he had to do, what it would take to win Lacey back, to convince her that what they had now was just as strong as what they’d had back then.

  When Jason came in later, Kevin asked him to make arrangements to open their house on Cape Cod. “Call the caretaker and have him stock the refrigerator and put in a supply of firewood. I’m going there when I get out.”

  Jason’s expression was concerned. “Shouldn’t you stay in town, closer to your doctor?”

  “I need to get away. I can’t bear the thought of going back to that huge house again. Your mother hates it. Did you know that?”

  Jason looked startled. “She does?”

  “Always has. I insisted on buying it after I went to work with your grandfather. I thought we needed to make a statement, live up to the corporate image, some such nonsense. She put up with it when you were growing up, but once you’d moved out, she started talking again about moving, getting something smaller.”

  Kevin took a deep breath as he made another decision. “I want you to put it on the market. Maybe then she’ll see that I’m serious about wanting a reconciliation.”

  “Dad, are you sure? I thought you loved that house.”

  “I loved what I thought it represented. Turns out it’s just a house, and a lonely one at that.”

  “Are you planning to stay on the Cape?”

  “If I can convince your mother to stay there with me, I just may.”

  Jason grinned. “You always could twist her around your little finger.”

  Kevin shook his head ruefully. “No, son. You’ve got that backward. All it took was a smile and she could make me jump through hoops. Guess I’d forgotten that because in recent years I haven’t given her much to smile about.”

  “Want to tell me what that means?”

  He grinned at his son. “No.”

  Lacey would know and that was all that mattered.

  * * *

  The next morning Kevin waited impatiently for Lacey’s visit. She didn’t come. She wasn’t there when he moved into a private room. Nor had she arrived by the time he got his pitiful excuse for a dinner.

  When Jason arrived at seven-thirty, Kevin swallowed his pride and asked, “Have you seen your mother today?”

  “No. Why? Hasn’t she been here?”

  Kevin shook his head. “You don’t suppose she’s sick?”

  “I’ll check on her on my way home.”

  “Go now.”

  “But I just got here.”

  “I’ll feel better knowing that your mother is okay. Maybe the stress of the past few weeks caught up with her. That terrible flu is going around.”

  Jason threw up his hands. “Okay, I’ll go, but I think you’re worrying about nothing. Dana usually talks to her during the day. I’m sure if anything were wrong she would have let me know.”

  Kevin watched as Jason pulled his overcoat back on. “You’ll call me?”

  “I’ll call you. Now stop worrying and eat your dinner.”

  Kevin glanced at the bland scoop of mashed potatoes and the colorless chunk of chicken. “This is not dinner. It’s a form of torture dreamed up by Linc Westlake. I don’t suppose you could sneak me some of Mrs. Willis’s chicken and dumplings?” he inquired hopefully, thinking of Jason’s housekeeper’s delicious cooking.

  Jason grinned at him. “I’ll check with the doctor. If he says it’s okay, I’m sure Mrs. Willis will be thrilled to make it for you. Get some rest, Dad. Don’t tire yourself out with worrying. It won’t help.”

  Jason had been gone less than twenty minutes when the door opened and Lacey walked through, her expression harried.

  “Hi,” she said cheerfully. “You’re looking better.”

  “Where have you been?” Kevin asked, unable to control the edge in his voice.

  Lacey regarded him sharply. “You sound angry.”

  “Worried,” he corrected. “And if I sound worried, it’s because I was. I expected you hours ago.”

  “Expected?” she echoed softly.

  Kevin heard the warning note in her voice, but couldn’t keep himself from adding, “If you couldn’t get by, you should have let me know. I just sent Jason to check on you.”

  “Why on earth would you do that?”

  “I told you. I was worried.”

  Kevin could see that Lacey was fighting her temper. She’d always been independent. No doubt she’d grown more so during their separation, when she’d been accountable to no one for her actions. She drew in a deep breath and pulled a chair close to the bed. He noticed she didn’t take off her coat, as if to indicate to him that she wasn’t here to stay.

  “Kevin,” she began in that patient tone he’d heard her use on Jason when he was five and misbehaving, “I’m sure you are bored to tears in here,” she continued, “but I can’t be here every minute. I have other obligations.”

  “One of those committees, I’m sure.”

  The sarcastic barb brought sparks into her eyes. “May I remind you that I am on those committees because you thought it would be the thing for the wife of a Halloran to do.”

  He winced. “Sorry. You’re right. Is that where you were?”

  “No. As it happens, I’ve gotten involved with something else.”

  Something or someone, he couldn’t help wondering. Kevin felt an ache deep inside as he realized that this was probably just one of many things he didn’t know about how Lacey spent her time.

  “Tell me,” he said. He saw her slowly relax
at the genuine note of interest in his voice.

  “Another time,” she said. “For now, tell me how you’re feeling. You must have had a good day, since Linc moved you out of intensive care and into a private room so quickly.”

  “The day’s better now that you’re here.”

  Kevin reached for her hand. After a hesitation so light that only a man deeply in love with his wife would notice, she slipped her hand into his. Contentment swelled inside him and he realized with Lacey here he could sleep at last.

  Later he would never be sure if Lacey’s gentle kiss was real or something he had dreamed.

  Chapter Five

  Over the next several days Lacey realized her feelings about Kevin’s continued rapid recovery were oddly mixed. Day by day his strength returned. It was almost as if he applied the same obsessive attention to healing that he did to everything else. It was both astonishing and reassuring to see.

  Though Lacey hated herself for even thinking it, she couldn’t help wondering what would happen when he was well, when she no longer would have these hospital visits as an excuse for seeing him. The prospect of letting go for the second time daunted her. And yet there was no going back, not on the basis of a few quick promises, which were all too likely to be broken. She’d made up her mind about that.

  Unfortunately, there was a troubling and unmistakable glint of determination in Kevin’s eyes every time he looked at her. She’d often seen that expression right before he or Brandon scored some business coup. Kevin was scheming and it made her very nervous. Worse, she had the sense that Jason was conspiring with him. Together, the two men she loved most in the world were formidable opponents.

  “Okay, enough is enough. What are the two of you up to?” she demanded when she found them with their heads together at the end of Kevin’s first week in the hospital.

  Jason looked from her to his father and back again. Guilt was written all over his face. “I’m out of here,” he said hurriedly, backing toward the door.

  Hands on hips, Lacey stepped into his path. “Not so fast.”

  He gave her a quick peck on the cheek. “Gotta go, Mom. Dana’s waiting for me in the car.”

  “She can wait another ten seconds.”

  “Couldn’t you just ask Dad, if you want to know something?” he suggested hopefully. “He’s the one with all the answers.”

  She glanced at Kevin and saw the old familiar twinkle in his eyes. It made her heart tumble, just as it always had. That twinkle was downright dangerous.

  Lacey recalled the first time she’d seen that glint of mischief in his eyes. He’d used some super glue to seal their fifth-grade teacher’s desk drawer shut. That drawer had held their report cards. Kevin hadn’t been anxious to take his home.

  Now he was scowling with mock ferocity at Jason. “Traitor,” he murmured, but there was a note of laughter in his voice.

  “Bye, Mom. See you, Dad. Good luck.”

  Lacey approached the bed cautiously. “Now just why would you be in need of luck?”

  “I’m a sick man,” he said in a pathetically weak tone that was so obviously feigned, Lacey almost burst out laughing.

  “I need luck, prayers, whatever it takes,” he added for good measure.

  “Nice try,” she said.

  Kevin managed to look genuinely dismayed. “You don’t believe me?”

  “I don’t believe you,” she concurred. “Try again.”

  “Have you seen Linc today?”

  Her gaze narrowed as the first faint suspicion flickered in her mind. “What does Linc have to do with this?”

  “He’s agreed to let me out of here on Sunday.”

  “Kevin, that’s wonderful!” she blurted out instinctively before she caught the glimmer of satisfaction in his eyes.

  “What’s the rest?” she asked slowly.

  He folded his hands across his chest and inquired complacently, “What makes you think there’s anything more?”

  “Oh, please. I know you. If it were a simple matter of getting out of here on Sunday, you wouldn’t look so smug.”

  “Smug? I was aiming for helpless.”

  “You couldn’t look helpless if you tried. Come on, spill it. What’s the rest?”

  “There’s a condition to my release.”

  Lacey got an uneasy feeling in the pit of her stomach, as suspicion replaced amusement. “What condition?”

  “That I have someone around to look after me.”

  She ignored the return of the obvious gleam in his eyes and asked briskly, “Isn’t our housekeeper there?”

  At the quick shake of his head, she very nearly moaned. He’d never liked the stiff, unyielding woman, but he’d never been willing to fire her, either. “Kevin, you haven’t fought with her, have you?”

  “Actually, I had Jason send her off to visit her sister in Florida.”

  “Tell her to come back. I’m sure she’d cooperate under the circumstances.”

  “Afraid not.”

  “Why?”

  “Well, the truth of the matter is that I fired her.”

  “You what?”

  “I was never there, anyway,” he said defensively. “So you see, I can’t go home.”

  “Then you’ll go to your father’s. Mrs. Farnsworth would love the chance to fuss over you.”

  “I suppose that would work,” he said. “But you know Dad. It wouldn’t be long before he’d want to have business discussions over breakfast, lunch and dinner.”

  There was more than a little truth in that, Lacey conceded reluctantly. She knew now exactly where Kevin was headed, had known all along that some version of this game would come up sooner or later. Even so, she didn’t have a ready, convincing alternative.

  “Jason has room,” she said desperately.

  “What about Sammy?” he countered neatly.

  Obviously he’d planned this as skillfully as a master chess player, Lacey thought, trying to muster up her fading resolve as he went on.

  “I’ll need peace and quiet,” Kevin added for good measure. “You can’t expect a kid that age to be on good behavior for days on end. Besides, Dana shouldn’t have to take care of a sick father-in-law when she’s trying to prepare for a baby.”

  “I think she’ll have plenty of time to prepare after you’re fully recuperated,” Lacey retorted dryly.

  She didn’t have a strong argument where Sammy was concerned, however. Kevin was right to be worried about Dana’s younger brother. He would probably try to engage Kevin in heated video games. With her husband’s spirit of competitiveness, he’d land right back in the hospital.

  “You could be right about Sammy, though,” she admitted reluctantly. “Maybe Jason could loan you Mrs. Willis and you could just stay at home.”

  “I have a better idea,” Kevin said cheerfully.

  “Why doesn’t that surprise me,” she muttered darkly, envisioning the two of them in her cramped little apartment or, worse yet, back in their own home.

  “I thought you and I could go to the Cape. It would be peaceful there this time of year.”

  Peaceful? she thought, stunned by the suggestion. The two of them alone on Cape Cod? No, that wouldn’t be peaceful. It would be lunacy.

  Cape Cod was where they’d made love for the very first time. Cape Cod was where he’d proposed to her. Cape Cod was where Jason had been conceived. Cape Cod was chock-full of memories. She had no intention of subjecting herself to that kind of torture.

  “No,” she said adamantly, “absolutely not.”

  “It would be good for us, Lacey. You have to admit that.”

  Lacey felt as if the walls of the room were closing in on her. It wasn’t just the early memories. Later, nostalgic for all they had shared on Cape Cod, they had bought a house there. It was the one outrageously expensive indulgence that she had approved of totally.

  They had made a pact that no business problems could ever follow them there. That house had become their refuge, a place for quiet talks, long walks and s
low, sensuous sex. Kevin had kept his part of the bargain—until the day he’d stopped going because he no longer had time for the simple pleasure of a relaxing, intimate vacation.

  Of all the suggestions he might have made, this was the most wickedly clever. The memories they shared there were among their most powerfully seductive.

  She met his gaze and saw that he knew exactly what he was asking of her.

  “Please, Lacey,” he coaxed. “You did promise we would talk.”

  She was shaking her head before the words were out of his mouth. “I didn’t promise to move back in with you. It won’t work, Kevin.”

  “It will if we want it to. I’m ready to try. What about you?” He studied her closely, then added, “Or have you given up on our marriage?”

  There was no mistaking the dare. Lacey cursed the tidy way Kevin had backed her into a corner. He knew how desperately she wanted to salvage what they’d once had. If she turned him down, she was as much as admitting that she’d given up hope.

  Or that she was afraid.

  She couldn’t deny the fear that curled within her at the thought of what might happen if she gave in to his plan. If she accepted, if she went to the Cape and nothing had changed, she wasn’t sure she could bear the pain of another separation and inevitably a divorce.

  Now at least the worst days were behind her. She’d begun picking up the pieces of her life, creating a world in which Kevin was no longer the center. She liked the strength she’d discovered within herself.

  But if that strength were real, if she’d truly gained her independence, wouldn’t she be able to cope no matter what happened? She could practically hear him taunting her with that, though in reality he said nothing. Maybe it was simply her brain arguing with her heart.

  All of the questions and none of the answers flashed through her mind in no more than an instant. Lacey studied Kevin’s face and saw the uncertainty, the wistfulness in his eyes. It mirrored what she felt in her heart, the hope that had never died.

  “I’ll go,” she said finally. She’d thought the risk of leaving Kevin had been dangerous enough. The risk of going back was a thousand times greater. She had to try, though. She would never forgive herself if she didn’t.

  “Thank you,” he said simply. And she knew from the way time seemed to stand still as she met his gaze that her decision had been the right one, the only one.