My Heart's Desire

by Jo Goodman

  He saw the still caution in her face, knew that he had put it there with his unthinking, violent act. "Oh, God, Rennie," he said, stopping in his tracks. "I'm sorry. I just..." His hands fell helplessly to his sides. "I think I want to kill him." The admission caught him off guard. He had never once considered revenge on Hollis for the incident at the train station, but the thought that he had hurt Rennie made it difficult for him to breathe let alone think. "No," he said, shaking his head, "that's wrong. I know I want to kill him."

  Rennie came away from the wall. She raised one hand as if she could deflect his horrible anger and simultaneously prevent him from carrying out his threat. "Don't make me sorry I told you," she said quietly. "I healed. He never had the opportunity to do it again."

  Jarret thrust his hands into his back pockets. He let out a breath slowly, searching her face. "I don't know what to say, Rennie."

  "It's all right," she said, becoming the comforter. "You don't have to say or do anything. Just hear me out, Jarret. It's the hardest thing I've ever asked of you, and it's the only thing I want."

  He nodded. "Go on."

  "I didn't just let him beat me," she said. "I gave it back as well as I could. We were spending our first night together at one of the suites at the St. Mark, and I think he was afraid someone might hear me screaming. When he couldn't knock me unconscious he stormed out of the suite." Rennie's short laughter was rife with disbelief. "The most amazing thing was that he really expected me to allow him back in the suite the next morning. He stood on the other side of the door, begging, swearing that he would never touch me again, even promising to give up his mistress.

  "He had to leave eventually or risk bringing on the curious. I don't know where he stayed those weeks while we were supposed to be away. I stayed right where I was, letting the bruises heal. He came to me at least once every day, making the same promises, and every day I denied him entry. When the last bruise had faded I opened the door to him because I was ready to leave. I told him there would be no word of what had passed between us to my family, but that I would be seeking an annulment.

  "I went home to my family then, and they took me back without asking for a single explanation. I stopped going to work at the Worth Building, and messengers brought my assignments to the house. I have no idea what Hollis told anyone else, or even if anyone else had dared to ask him about me. I know that until word came to me about the accident at Juggler's Jump, it wasn't necessary for me to see him."

  Jarret recalled some things Rennie had said to him weeks ago. "Hollis took over the company then."

  She nodded. "Almost immediately there were problems—at least to my way of thinking—but Hollis had the confidence of the board just as he had had my father's confidence. Projects that had been on hold prior to the accident were suddenly approved. Hollis would not allow me access to certain information any longer, and he stopped allowing me to work out of my home. He wanted me back at the office, and he wanted me to stop pursuing the annulment." Rennie shook her head, still disbelieving that Hollis had thought she would comply.

  "I was inclined to do neither of these things," she said dryly. "Instead I told him I intended to find Jay Mac." She laughed, remembering Hollis's outrage. "I truly think Hollis would have had me committed if he could have avoided the scandal. That was at first. Later I believe he thought it was better to have me out of the way for a while, that if I kept myself busy on a wild goose chase I couldn't interfere in the running of Northeast."

  Jarret pulled out a chair and straddled it. "But you said Hollis had the confidence of the board. How were you able to interfere at all?"

  "In his will Jay Mac let it be known who he wanted to manage Northeast, but he divided his interests in the company among his heirs. His wife received fifty percent. Twenty-five percent went to my mother, and the remaining twenty-five was divided equally among me and my sisters."

  Jarret whistled softly as he realized the impact of Jay Mac's decision. "Then, the interests were split evenly."

  "That's right. Hollis knew my mother and sisters would follow my advice and that it would not always be the same as his. Nina Worth, like the board, was prepared to follow his lead. The potential existed to stop all the activities at Northeast. Hollis wanted my five percent interest to prevent that. As my husband he had the opportunity to get it."

  Jarret's brows came together. "Another reason for him to object to the annulment."

  Staring out the window, she nodded. "That five percent interest in Northeast was the reason he wanted to marry me in the first place," she said. "It gave him control. Jay Mac's accident gave him opportunity, but our marriage put control in his hands. He had been planning it for a long time."

  "The marriage or the accident?"

  Rennie turned to Jarret. Her eyes were unwavering, her expression frank. "Both," she said. "Hollis planned both."

  Jarret was silent for a moment. He could see that she believed what she was saying. "That's a powerful accusation, Rennie."

  "You were thinking it yourself."

  "I told you already, that was before Jay Mac said he hadn't informed Hollis about inspecting the work at Queen's Point."

  "You're missing the point," she said, puzzled that he did not understand. "Jay Mac did tell someone, and she told Hollis."

  "Why would—"

  "Didn't I say?" asked Rennie. "No, I suppose I didn't. It's what I've been trying to say all along, though. Nina is Hollis's mistress. Nina Worth... my father's wife."

  Jarret's eyes flickered with surprise. For the space of a minute it was his only reaction. "My God," he said finally. "Hollis told you that?"

  "He relished telling me that." She did not have to close her eyes to recall how Hollis had gloated, how he had derived so much pleasure from her own stunned reaction. She remembered it more vividly than the beating that followed.

  "Does Jay Mac know?"

  She shook her head. "I've never said a word to him. If he knows Nina has a lover, then I'm certain he doesn't realize it's Hollis." Rennie scooped up a blanket and returned to the window seat. "It's Nina's ultimate revenge on Jay Mac and the Dennehys. I can't even find it in myself to blame her. She's been married more than twenty-five years to a man who doesn't love her, who has never made any secret of his devotion to his bastard family. I've never even formally met Nina, and I've only seen her a few times; but she's always been a presence in my life. She's quite beautiful, very delicate and reserved. Some might say cold. Jay Mac would.

  "Perhaps she and Hollis are merely using each other, or perhaps they're really in love. I don't know the truth, and I don't know if motive matters. What I do know is that the accident at Juggler's Jump wasn't an accident. It was a deliberate attempt on Jay Mac's life and an opportunity for Hollis to seize complete control of Northeast. My husband is responsible for the deaths of more than sixty people, and it was done to cover the fraud of the Queen's Point project."

  Jarret said nothing as he took it all in. He felt Rennie's eyes on him, waiting for him to challenge her assertions. He didn't. More to the point, he couldn't. He believed her. "When I showed you Queen's Point it all came together, didn't it?"

  She nodded. "At the moment Jay Mac said he'd spoken to Nina, I knew what happened."

  "There's no proof."

  "I know that, too."

  "What are you going to do?"

  Rennie stared at the far wall, her shoulders hunched. "I haven't thought that far," she said quietly. "I've only been able to think about the consequences of telling you."

  Jarret's fingers pressed against the top rail of the chair. He managed to keep his voice even, his frustration in check. "You married him, Rennie, and you lied to me about it. What is it you want from me? Absolution? Forgiveness?"

  She couldn't speak. She stared at him helplessly.

  He slammed the heel of his hand against the top rail. "Dammit, Rennie! You didn't give me a choice! Do you expect me to thank you for that?"

  Her voice was choked, barely audible. "No. I
was wrong. I told you that." She stood, drawing the blanket more tightly about her shoulders. "I was wrong about a lot of things. I don't want anything from you, Jarret. It was a mistake... all of it."

  Rennie crossed the floor to the ladder, and this time Jarret let her go.

  * * *

  Jay Mac was eating breakfast in Mrs. Shepard's dining room when Rennie entered the boardinghouse. He caught her attention as she paused in the hallway, removing her coat.

  Rennie accepted the chair her father held out for her and unfolded the napkin on her lap. "I was with Jarret," she said without inflection.

  Jay Mac's green eyes searched his daughter's pale and stoic features. "When you weren't in your room this morning I suspected as much." He poured her a cup of tea and pushed the saucer toward her. "You told him."

  Nodding, she raised her cup. She could feel the scalding heat of the tea before it touched her lips. She drank anyway. Out of the corner of her eye she saw her father wince at her self-inflicted pain. "He was angry."

  "You didn't expect otherwise, did you?"

  Rennie shrugged. "It doesn't matter what I expected," she said. "It's over now. It was a mistake. I told him that."

  "I see."

  "Do you?" Her laughter was brief and humorless. "I'm not certain I do. I thought he loved me."

  "Did he say he didn't?"

  "He didn't have to. It was there in his face, in the way he looked at me."

  Jay Mac's voice was gentle. "You haven't given him any time."

  Rennie returned her father's gaze unflinchingly. "I committed adultery, Papa. I made him an accomplice. He never said it in so many words, but it was what he was thinking." Rennie set her cup down. "He asked me to marry him. He was going to come here with me today and ask you for my hand." A faint smile crossed her face as she thought about Jarret's desire to honor convention. Only her eyes were regretful. "I had to tell him then. It was painful."

  "For both of you."

  Rennie's eyes glistened. Her mouth pressed in a flat line. She waited until she gathered her composure. "I don't think I care for any breakfast," she said carefully. "If you don't mind, I'd like to go to my room."

  "Of course." He stood and kissed Rennie's pale cheek. He watched her go, a heavy ache in his own heart.

  * * *

  Jarret opened the door to his cabin at the second thunderous knock. He stared at his visitor for several long moments before stepping aside. "I thought you might come. I didn't know if you'd find me or not."

  Jay Mac removed his hat and coat and hung them up. He stomped snow off his shoes while his eyes darted around the cabin. Leaning on his cane, he took a seat at the table. "I asked around. A Miss Jolene Cartwright was happy to give me directions."

  One side of Jarret's mouth lifted in disgust. "She would." He leaned against the door, his arms folded in front of him. "You've spoken to Rennie?"

  "Yes."

  "Then, you know everything."

  "I know enough."

  "What are you going to do?"

  Jay Mac carefully balanced his cane against one of the table legs. His chipped and twisted spectacles rested far down the bridge of his nose. At his temples and at his side-whiskers the threads of gray were more pronounced. The lines at the corners of his green eyes were deeply engraved. "Odd," he said, studying Jarret carefully. "I came here to ask that of you."

  "I'm not sure what you mean," said Jarret. "You're leaving soon, aren't you?"

  "I am, yes. I don't know what Rennie will do. I'm going to offer her the opportunity to take over the Queen's Point project. I'd like you to be her foreman. She'll need someone to help her handle the men, at least until she wins them over."

  "Under the circumstances I don't think she'll jump at the chance."

  "Because you'll be there?"

  Jarret shook his head. "Because you'll be there. In New York. She's not going to let you go back alone. She's probably not going to let you out of her sight once you're there. She didn't come all this way to find you only to let you risk your life a second time."

  Jay Mac pushed his spectacles up his nose. His sandy brows came together, deepening the vertical crease in his forehead. "What the hell are you talking about?"

  Jarret pushed away from the door. "The train wreck," he said. "Your wife and Hollis. What the hell are you talking about?"

  "You and my daughter coming to your senses."

  Both men were quiet. They stared at one another recounting the conversation in their minds. Jarret said, "I thought you talked to Rennie."

  "I did."

  "Not about the accident at Juggler's Jump."

  "No," Jay Mac said. "Was I supposed to?"

  Jarret ran his fingers through his hair, sighing. "I thought she would bring it up. Have you sent a telegram east?"

  "Not yet. What's this about Hollis and Nina?"

  Jarret didn't answer directly. He went to the pantry and found a quarter-full bottle of whiskey. He set out two glasses and poured the drinks.

  "It's not even noon," Jay Mac said.

  Jarret's smile was grim. "It's that kind of news."

  * * *

  Hollis's smile was grim. "It's that kind of news," he said, pushing a tumbler of Scotch toward Nina. He added another splash to his own glass before replacing the decanter on the sideboard. He raised his glass to Nina in a mocking toast.

  Nina was hesitant. Her slender fingers curved around the tumbler, and the weight of it looked too heavy for her delicate wrists. The crown of her pale yellow hair barely reached Hollis's shoulder. She raised her face to him, her milky skin seamless across the fine-boned features of her face. Her eyes were widely spaced with enormous pupils that crowded out most of the cinnamon color ringing them. She was nearing fifty but even under the most unforgiving light looked a dozen years less.

  Hollis loved the daintiness of her, the exquisite fragility of her lines, the grace of her movements. He loved lifting her against him, raising her silk skirts and plunging into her. She let him do whatever he wanted, never denied him any privilege with her body, but she never initiated their lovemaking, rarely spoke during it, and never commented afterward. Her cool reserve was never breached. It maddened him, intrigued him. He felt protective when he was near her, powerful when he was in her.

  It was hard for him to remember who had first approached whom. He had thought for a long time that the overture was his. Now he wasn't so certain. It seemed to him that she was capable of letting him believe he had come to her because it suited her purpose. There were times he felt in complete control of their association and times when he knew without question that he was being manipulated. There were also times when the lines between the two were blurred, when she gained control by letting him think it was his.

  If Nina Worth had been a cat, she could only have been Siamese.

  Hollis's broad shoulders lifted as he touched the rim of his glass to Nina's. Gaslight was reflected in the highly polished wainscoting of the study and refracted in the cut glass facets of the tumblers. He sipped his drink, then offered his arm to Nina and escorted her to the loveseat. They sat in unison, turned slightly toward one another. Her nearly black eyes never left his face. Her small bow mouth was damp with Scotch.

  "He's alive, isn't he?" she asked. Her voice was coldly elegant, like chilled crystal. There was no resonance to her speech, little nuance of passion or conviction. "That's what you want to tell me."

  That she had guessed astonished him. He nodded. "How did you know?"

  She shrugged. The narrow black and fitted lines of her mourning gown further emphasized the sleek, graceful line of Nina's figure. "How long have you known?"

  "Less than an hour. I came as soon as I heard. He's returning to New York." Hollis examined his pocket watch. "In fact, he will be here in just under thirty-six hours. No. 448 is scheduled to arrive in the middle of the night."

  Nina gave no evidence of surprise. "So soon," she said calmly.

  He nodded. "I believe it was meant to be a secret. He's
been traveling for days it seems. He was recognized by a dispatcher in Pittsburgh who sent the information on to me. I imagine he thought I would want to make a celebration of it."

  "Your wife's with him?"

  "Yes."

  "You should have killed her." She offered the rebuke with the same tone one would offer a practical suggestion. There was no hint of malice. "Her shares would have been yours then, and she wouldn't have gone looking for John."

  It amused Hollis that Nina never called her husband Jay Mac. She was of the opinion that it was a vulgar name. Hollis finished his drink. His dark brown eyes studied the cool, poised features of his lover's face. "I don't think it could have been done without bringing suspicion to me. Anyway, we both thought her trip to Juggler's Jump would be fruitless. He should have died in the wreckage. Others did."

  "Perhaps there is a mistake."

  "There's no mistake."

  "Do you think he saw Queen's Point?"

  "I don't know. Even if he did there are ways to explain it. It would have been better if he had died, but I'm not completely vulnerable there."

  "Do you think he knows about us?"

  "Rennie wouldn't tell him. She didn't before he left. I doubt she would later."

  "She's very protective of him, isn't she?" asked Nina.

  "Very protective."

  "It will be difficult to kill him."

  "Nina. I told you before. It isn't absolutely necessary." She did something she had never done before. She picked up his large hand and laid it over her breast. "I think it is." She let him take her on the floor of the study.

  * * *

  Thirty minutes later she was saying goodbye to him. He's so easy, she thought, watching him walk through the gate. He glanced once over his shoulder, grinned. She didn't miss a beat, raising her hand as she raised a perfect smile. She waved. Nina didn't step back from the threshold until he was out of sight.