My Heart's Desire

by Jo Goodman

  Rennie's shoulders sagged a little. "Oh, God," she said, closing her eyes. She put her cup down on the narrow window ledge to keep from spilling it. Her hands trembled. She looked at him. "The blond's name is Richard Dunny. He's an old friend of Hollis's. I suppose Taddy and Warren Beecher were the others. Taddy saw me kissing you at the Jones Street Station. He was in the crowd that gathered. That's why I wanted to get away from you so quickly. Taddy must have run straight to Hollis with the story—that would be just like him—but no one ever breathed a word of it to me."

  "I didn't think they had." He paused, studying the drawn, colorless features of her face. "Do you think I blame you for what happened to me, Rennie?"

  "No, but it would be easier if you did." All the times she had seen him struggle with his arm, she had blamed Dee Kelly for the injury and Jarret himself for not taking care of it. It wasn't so simple. The real damage had been done by Hollis's friends and, in turn, Hollis. It was easy to feel some of the responsibility herself. If she hadn't kissed him in public, right there on Jones Street, with God and James Taddy and a dozen strangers looking on, Jarret Sullivan would still have the full use of his right hand and arm. "You know I thought what money you hadn't lost gambling was spent on liquor and—"

  "And women," he said, grinning. "Don't forget women."

  "It isn't funny," she snapped. "Damn you! You know it isn't funny."

  Jarret sobered. "It also isn't in any part your fault. If you want to know the truth, I did blame you for a time. There just wasn't any sense in it, and after a while I came to see it that way. I admit it wasn't to my liking when you showed up in Echo Falls, but there were a lot of other reasons for that. I didn't need you here to recall what Hollis had done. I only had to drop a glass of whiskey or miss the grip on my gun to bring Hollis Banks to mind. I had been trying to live with that since leaving New York. Seeing you again made me realize I hadn't been living at all, perhaps not for a long time, Rennie, longer than even I had suspected. Perhaps not since my parents were murdered."

  His chair scraped the floor. He went over to the window seat and sat beside her. "You touched me, Rennie. You threw yourself at everything with such tremendous spirit and will; you set a course for yourself and hung on. I admired that. There was a time I thought you might be turning it on me." His smile was tinged with self-mockery and regret. "Who's to say if I was leaving New York because my job there was finished or if I was running scared?"

  If only he had given her some hint. She had waited a long time to hear from him. "But you stayed away. There was never a word from you."

  "What was I supposed to offer you? I didn't have any money. I couldn't earn it the way I knew how. I didn't see any hope for the ranch I wanted, and I doubted you would ever leave New York." He leaned back against the windowsill and sighed. "And you were still set on marrying Hollis. You haven't forgotten that, have you?"

  "No," she said dully. Her eyes dropped away from his profile. "I haven't forgotten."

  Behind him, Jarret could feel the warmth of the sun pressing on the glass. He glanced over his shoulder and saw that daybreak was well upon them. "You're not going to make it back to the boardinghouse without being seen," he said. "You'd better go get dressed. I'll escort you back. There's a lot we need to talk to your father about."

  "Jarret, I—"

  "Go on." When she hesitated again, he said, "Are you worried what Jay Mac will say about you being with me?" He leaned over and kissed her lightly on the cheek. Her skin was cold. He drew back slowly, searching her face. Her emerald eyes were clearly pained, her lower lip swollen where she had been worrying it. "Rennie, you realize, don't you, that I plan to ask Jay Mac for your hand today?"

  Her eyes widened. The blanket around her shoulders dropped as she reached for him. "No, you can't do that!"

  "What do you mean? I thought it was understood."

  "No!" She stood up. "It's not understood at all."

  Jarret came to his feet as well. "I'm sorry," he said. "I've never done this before. I should have asked you first."

  Her heart was breaking. It was there in the eyes she turned on him. "No," she said softly. "Don't do it. Don't ask."

  Jarret was certain he hadn't moved. It was the earth that had shifted under him. He heard her words, but he couldn't make sense of their meaning. "You're not going to marry me?"

  "I can't."

  "You can't?" he asked. The shield that came over his face hardened his features. His deep blue eyes cooled and his jaw tightened. "Or you won't?"

  "I can't," she said again. She wanted to look anywhere but at him. She didn't because she owed Jarret a straightforward response. "I'm already married. I married Hollis Banks a month before Jay Mac's accident."

  Chapter 13

  He looked as if he were going to be sick. His features were suddenly drawn and gray. In a heartbeat of time his sapphire eyes had become remote. Rennie reached out to him.

  Jarret flinched from her outstretched hand and took a step backward. "It's not a good idea to touch me right now, Rennie."

  Her arm dropped to her side. He was already turning away from her. "Please," she said, "please, listen to me."

  He picked up his mug and filled it at the stove. With the part of his mind that could think rationally he marveled at his ability to do so without spilling a drop. That he could place one foot in front of the other also impressed him. It only proved that the piece she had cut out of him wasn't necessary for the daily business of living. He sat at the table. His knuckles were white on the mug; the set of his shoulders was rigid. "I'm listening," he said with credible politeness. "Though I can't imagine what you have to say that's worth hearing."

  The chill between them had become a tangible thing. Rennie kept her distance and implored him with her eyes and her voice. "I know I should have told you," she said.

  "Then we agree on that."

  "I didn't think you'd take me to find my father if you knew," she said.

  His voice finally revealed the powerful edge of his anger. "I sure as hell wouldn't have touched you!"

  "Don't you think I knew that, too?" she asked quietly. "That's as honest as I can get, Jarret. When I first decided to come to Colorado I didn't know I was going to see you again."

  He snorted derisively.

  "It's true," she said. "I thought Ethan would be taking me to Juggler's Jump."

  "Your sister's not stupid enough to let you loose with her husband," Jarret said bitterly.

  Rennie rocked back on her feet as if pushed. At her sides, her hands clenched. She closed her eyes long enough to steady herself, and then she went on. "There's no need to say things like that. Do you think I'm not hurting already?"

  "You know, Rennie," he said evenly, "right now I don't give a good damn." He smiled without humor. "That's as honest as I can get."

  The words were hurled back at her. Rennie sat on the edge of the window seat, her hands folded on her lap. She pressed on. "I didn't come with Ethan because of his broken leg. He directed me to you. I wasn't certain Duffy Cedar and I would ever find you, and I wasn't certain I wanted to... until I saw you again. You made it very clear you didn't want to see me, though. When you finally introduced me to Jolene you made a snide remark, asking if I were Mrs. Banks now. I decided right then I wasn't going to tell you and have you respect me any less than you already did. I cared too much about finding Jay Mac to let that get in the way, and I had no desire to explain my reasons for marrying Hollis. I certainly didn't feel then that I owed you an explanation. I still don't."

  Jarret's brows raised a fraction, and he gave her a contemptuous look. "You'll understand if I disagree."

  "No," she said. "No, I won't. What I owe is an explanation for why I didn't tell you about the marriage, not why I married in the first place. You were no part of my life then, Jarret. You had been long gone from New York, and if you're being really honest, you know you had no intention of ever seeing me again. Are you suggesting I was supposed to wait for you? Wait for someone who was n
ever coming? We didn't part on those kinds of terms. You were so careful never to state anything of what you felt, so careful never to promise, and I admit I wasn't any more forthcoming than you."

  Rennie scooted back onto the seat and drew her knees up to her chest. Her bare feet were visible beneath the lace-edged hem of her shift. "Still," she said softly, "I found myself wishing things had been different. For a while I allowed myself to hope that you'd write or simply show up one day. When Michael and Ethan moved back to Denver I thought I'd learn something about you then." She stared straight ahead, shaking her head sadly. "It never happened. It was as if you had disappeared."

  Rennie smoothed her shift over her knees and hugged herself more tightly. "So no," she said, "I don't think I have to explain why I married Hollis Banks."

  Jarret set his mug on the table and pushed it aside. "I'm not trying to fool myself that it had something to do with me not being around," he said. "It wasn't any secret that you wanted Hollis so you could have more influence at Northeast. I don't know why you thought you had to marry him."

  Rennie shot to her feet. "Bastard!" She ran to the ladder and started to climb, intent on getting her clothes and leaving. Jarret caught her by the waist and stopped her. "Let me go!" she said through clenched teeth. She struggled, hanging on to the ladder while he tried to pull her away. "You don't know anything about it!"

  "Then tell me!"

  She kept her lips closed in a mutinous line and kicked back at him. "Go to hell!"

  Jarret got his left arm completely around her waist and yanked. She had to let go of the ladder or let it fall on top of her. She let it go. He turned her around, pressing her back against the slats and blocking her escape with his body. "Now tell me why you were so eager to marry Hollis Banks if it wasn't because of Northeast," he said, his words clipped.

  She pushed at his chest. He didn't move. "I wasn't eager."

  "Then why, dammit!"

  She shouted at him. "Because I was lonely!"

  Stunned, Jarret let himself be pushed aside as Rennie put some distance between them.

  Trembling with the strength of her pain, she escaped as far as the fireplace and picked up the poker.

  "Are you going to hit me with that?" he asked, turning toward her.

  Her eyes dropped to the poker. Its end was tapping against the floor, an extension of her shaking hand. "I want to," she said, looking back at him. She let it drop. Tears hovered on the rim of her eyes. "You don't know anything about my life in New York. I was never part of the social circles that gave fabulous balls and afternoon teas or drove carriages through Central Park for show. I didn't have friends who invited me to be part of their skating party in the winter or asked me to tour a museum with them in the spring. My sisters were my friends."

  Rennie swiped at a tear that dripped over her cheek. She took a shallow breath and let it out slowly, fighting for composure. "As for men... there were none. Did you think they lined up on Broadway and 50th to call on the bastard Dennehy sisters?" She laughed scornfully. "Jay Mac sent us all to boarding school so we could be insulated from the jibes of the outside world, though I can tell you that no one's crueler than a schoolgirl who thinks your place is beneath her dainty feet. Michael and I were fortunate. We had each other for friendship. When it was time to leave there was no coming out party for us. We weren't part of any debutante balls. We quietly slipped into college and fought every prejudice that was in place to defeat us.

  "Michael went to a woman's college, but I took a different course. To study engineering I needed to study with men. To learn the science I had to compete as an equal. My classes were filled with colleagues who resented me at every turn."

  Jarret made no attempt to approach her. Almost against his will he said her name softly, feeling her pain.

  "No," she said, swiping at her eyes again. "You wanted to hear this." She swallowed the pressure that was building at the back of her throat and gave Jarret her frankest stare. "Men who showed me any attention generally fell into very specific categories. There were those few who simply wanted to pick my brain and score their success on my hard work. There were those who came from families with good social connections, who didn't realize at first that I was one of Jay Mac's bastards. As soon as they found out, they either disappeared—which was much more honorable—or they stepped up the pursuit in order to get me into their bed. After all, what prospects did I really have? Their attitude was that I should have been grateful for their attention.

  "Other men, whose prospects were perhaps more than my own but with pockets to let, came courting my money. Jay Mac's wealth has always made the issue of my illegitimacy very complicated for New York's middle crust. They want entry into the exclusive homes but lack the finances, but getting the finances means taking me."

  She smiled now without rancor. "Do you see, Jarret? They can't decide if I'm a stepping stone to a finer life or a millstone around their neck."

  Jarret leaned one hip on the edge of the table, stretching out a leg in front of him. He returned her level stare, his eyes implacable.

  "Michael and I kept going our own way after college. She wouldn't allow Jay Mac to buy her a position at the Herald, and she took the job at the Chronicle. She had a hard time of it before she was finally accepted, and she was very fortunate to work for someone like Logan Marshall. I didn't have the same harassment at Northeast. No one would have dared. All the same, I was never taken very seriously by my colleagues, and mostly I was just plain ignored."

  "Except for Hollis," said Jarret.

  "No, not really. He was just a little more careful about how he did it. He placated me on the one hand and then did as he damn well pleased on the other." Her angry emerald eyes narrowed. "Don't look at me that way. I didn't always know that about him. Certainly I realized that he was interested in my money and in furthering his connection with my father and his authority at Northeast. I had no illusions about being loved by him, but I thought he genuinely cared about me. In my mind at least, I believed we would work comfortably together."

  Rennie leaned against the warm, smooth stones of the hearth. She pushed back the dark red fall of hair that had spilled over one shoulder and crossed her arms under her breasts. "Still, I didn't know if I wanted to marry him. Then Michael returned to New York. She was pregnant. She was miserable. God knows, I wasn't sympathetic. I was horrible to her at first. I didn't understand how she could have allowed herself to become pregnant." Rennie blinked hard, reining in the tears. "Just what the world needed, I thought. Another Dennehy bastard."

  Looking not at Jarret now, but at a point beyond his shoulder, Rennie said, "I decided to marry Hollis for a lot of reasons, but the foremost among them that first time was my promise that I would never end up like my mother and my sister." Her smile rose faintly now, full of brittle self-mockery. She said, "The second time I planned a wedding with Hollis it was because I had given up hope that I would ever end up like my mother or my sister."

  When Jarret looked as if he might approach her, Rennie shrank against the stones and kept him back. "You see, I had finally realized what they had, and I was willing to settle for even a pale imitation of it. So I married Hollis. It was a small wedding this time. We did it in St. Gregory's in front of a few witnesses. Jay Mac wasn't there. Neither was Michael or Ethan. Mama cried through the whole service. Mary Francis fiddled with her rosary. Maggie and Skye were wretched. They all knew that what I was doing had much less to do with Northeast than it did with just not being alone anymore." Tears spilled over her cheeks, and now she made no attempt to wipe them away. She pressed her lips together, stuffing back a sob. "It wasn't that I married Hollis for all the wrong reasons, but that I married him for none of the right ones."

  She raised the hem of her shift to dry her eyes. When her vision cleared Jarret was standing in front of her with a handkerchief in his hand. "Here," he said. "You never seem to have one of these."

  She nodded, hiccupping. "I know. Hollis hates it."

  J
arret's mouth flattened. "What else does Hollis hate?"

  Startled, Rennie raised her tear-stained face. "What do you mean?"

  "I mean what happened between you and Hollis after the wedding? You were a virgin, Rennie, when you came to me. Does Hollis hate all women, or is it you in particular?"

  "Oh, I see," she said after a moment. She took a shaky breath, composing herself. "You think he's one of those men who likes other men."

  "Well?"

  She shook her head. "No, it's nothing like that. Hollis has someone. A woman. He's had her for a long time, long before the first time I planned to marry. He told me about her on our wedding night, as he was getting ready to join me in bed. He said he wanted me to know that I shouldn't expect him to be faithful, not when I had already..."

  "What? What did he say?"

  Rennie sighed, looking away. "Not when I had already whored for you."

  Jarret swore softly.

  "It's no good being outraged," she said, her eyes accusing. "It's less than what you've said to me yourself."

  It was Jarret who had the grace to look away now. "You're right." He crossed to the window and stood staring. The vision that filled his mind wasn't the one in front of him. He didn't see the eddies of powdered snow swirling on top of the crust. He didn't see the pine boughs trembling in the wake of some playful squirrels. What he saw was Hollis Banks standing over his bride and informing her he had a mistress... and demanding his own rights in the next breath. He was so certain that Hollis had acted in just that way that his words came out as a statement, not a question. "He tried to press you for his marital rights then."

  "Yes."

  Jarret turned back to Rennie. She was holding the handkerchief balled in one hand. Her arms were still crossed protectively in front of her. "You refused him. What happened?"

  "He beat me."

  She said it so matter-of-factly that it took a moment for the words to register. When they did Jarret recoiled as if struck himself. He picked up the mug Rennie had left on the windowsill and pitched it at the fireplace. The pottery shattered, flames hissed as coffee splashed over them, and Rennie flinched, then froze against the stones, afraid of the searing, angry heat in Jarret's eyes. When he took a step toward her she couldn't move.