Dr. Dad

by Judith Arnold

  And then Lindsey saw Susannah’s arms moving. She couldn’t tell exactly what Susannah was doing at first…Oh, God. She was taking off his shirt. Opening it, shoving it back from his shoulders, kissing his naked chest.

  Lindsey felt queasy. She should have stopped watching before, but she hadn’t, and now it was too late. She wanted to scream, or throw up, or break the damned binoculars. She wanted to charge across the lawn to Susannah’s house, storm through the open window and yell at them to stop.

  But they weren’t going to stop. In the last instant, before she hurled the binoculars down onto the mattress, she glimpsed her father’s face. She could barely make out his features, but what she saw was scary. He looked changed. He looked sad and happy at once, angry and pleased, tired and full of energy. He looked like a man she hardly knew.

  Susannah was taking him away from Lindsey. She was transforming him, turning him into a strange creature, someone who couldn’t even stop and tell her she was a bad mother to abandon her child. Susannah had sucked the soul right out of Dr. Dad, and he was never going to be the same.

  Nothing was ever going to be the same.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  SHE TRIED NOT TO think about him, but that was like trying not to breathe. Knowing he was right next door, a ten-second sprint away, both soothed and unsettled her. She liked having him near, but she wanted him nearer. She wanted him with her.

  But that was not a simple matter, not when a ten-year-old girl was a part of the package.

  He telephoned her several hours after leaving her bed—undoubtedly waiting until Lindsey was asleep before he called. “I wish I hadn’t had to leave like that,” he murmured.

  Hearing his voice through a telephone receiver at 11:00 p.m. frustrated her—yet his concern for his daughter was one of the things she loved about him. He was a good father, a magnificent father. As much as she would have liked him to stay the night with her, she understood his need to leave.

  “It’s all right.”

  “I was thinking…maybe we could spend all day Saturday together. The three of us, I mean. I know Lindsey is crazy about you. I’m just not sure she’s going to be crazy about us. If we had a whole day together, maybe she’d grow accustomed to the idea.”

  “If you feel that would help, okay.”

  “Lindsey has a soccer game in the afternoon. Afterward, we could all go out someplace for dinner and a movie.”

  “Whatever you’d like.” The plan sounded great. It was what ordinary families did, families where parents and children loved one another. It was what Susannah had imagined a real family would be like that first night she’d had dinner with Toby and Lindsey and envied their lives.

  “I’ll be dreaming about you,” Toby whispered before hanging up.

  She didn’t dream at all that night. She was too restless to sleep, her body still tingling from him, her mind still reeling from how it had felt to make love with him. And her heart pounding the pulse of dread when she thought about how readily she’d agreed to do what she could to make the relationship palatable to Lindsey.

  Once again, she was doing what other people needed. She’d made love with Toby. She’d rushed when she should have gone slow. She’d fallen headlong, and now she was eager to do whatever she could to make the relationship work.

  It was what she’d done in California—tried to make things right for everyone else. It was what she’d promised herself she wouldn’t do again. But Toby…Lord help her, she didn’t want to go slow with him.

  He phoned her again from work the next day. He told her he’d like to have her over for dinner, but Lindsey was in a really bad mood. “I don’t know what’s bugging her,” he said. “I’ve never seen her this gloomy.”

  “I don’t think it’s PMS,” Susannah told him. Lindsey had only laughed when Susannah had asked her whether she needed tampons.

  “Well, whatever it is, it’s driving me crazy. I don’t want to subject you to her when she’s like this. I’ll call you later.”

  He did, late that evening, after Lindsey’s bedtime again. And Friday they talked again. But she didn’t see him until Saturday.

  When he opened his door to her that bright, sunny morning, she felt reborn. She hadn’t realized how much she’d missed him until she was gazing into his dark, expressive eyes, until she could slide her hand into his and accept a discreet kiss on the cheek. His touch reawakened sensations that had never really fallen dormant inside her. The brush of his lips against her cheek made her want to press herself to him, kiss him for real, open her body and her heart to him.

  She’d spent more time than usual choosing an outfit, as if she were extra eager to impress him. Maybe she was. She wanted him to see her and remember the night they’d spent together. She wanted him to take one look at her and realize that Lindsey’s moods shouldn’t determine what he and Susannah did.

  Lindsey was in the kitchen, dressed in a soccer uniform of burgundy and black. She glanced up when Susannah entered, then muttered, “Hello,” and busied herself strapping on her shin guards.

  “There’s time for a quick cup of coffee, if you’d like one,” Toby offered.

  “No, thanks.” Susannah was disturbed by Lindsey’s chilliness toward her. The last time she’d seen Lindsey—just hours before making love with Toby—they’d talked so easily together. They’d posed for photos and baked cookies. Now Lindsey wouldn’t even glance at her.

  “I’m looking forward to seeing you play,” she said.

  Lindsey grunted.

  “It’s a perfect day for a game. Sunny but not too hot.”

  Lindsey pulled dark-red knee socks up over her shin guards.

  Susannah turned to Toby, who was standing behind Lindsey’s chair. He shrugged and shook his head, as if to say, Don’t bother. Nothing you do will make a difference in her mood.

  They headed for the park where the game was to be played. Lindsey immediately abandoned Susannah and Toby for her teammates. Susannah felt a knot of pain in her chest, a sense of failure. She and Lindsey had gotten along so well until now. What had Susannah done wrong?

  Toby touched the small of her back—a subtle, almost unnoticeable gesture that meant far too much to her. “Don’t worry about it,” he murmured. “It’s not your fault.”

  “Whose fault is it?” She watched Lindsey line up with her teammates for warm-up drills. Lindsey dribbled the ball up toward the goal, then gave it a hard kick, trying to send it past the goalie and into the net. Her face was set in a frown of concentration. The mild breeze tugged at her dark hair, which was held back from her face in a ponytail.

  “I don’t know. I thought she’d be glad we were getting close,” he said. Although Lindsey obviously took after his wife, Susannah saw a similarity between their frowns. The tight focus of his eyes, the angle of his chin, the taut line of his mouth mirrored her expression.

  “Do you think it’s because of her mother?” Susannah asked, remembering the photo she’d seen in Toby’s office. They’d been an ideal family once and that ideal had been destroyed, and now Susannah was trespassing in the wreckage.

  “No. I honestly don’t.” He strummed his fingers against her waist, but he kept his eyes on Lindsey.

  “I’ve dated women before. It never threw her into a tailspin. I’m really stumped. I thought she was crazy about you.”

  “I think she idolizes me,” Susannah pointed out.

  “That’s not the same as liking me.”

  “I want her to be happy,” he said. Such a simple wish, yet so enormous. His hand lingered on her for a moment longer, then fell. “The Daddy School teacher says I should worry less about making Lindsey happy and more about making myself happy. Do you think she’s right?”

  “Yes,” Susannah said firmly. She might have answered that way because making himself happy would mean making her happy, too. But she also felt he, like her, needed to stop letting the demands of others determine his fate. He needed to figure out what he wanted and to go after it.

&nb
sp; Of course, Lindsey was just a child—one who’d suffered a terrible loss. Yet why should Toby and Susannah’s pursuing a relationship make her unhappy?

  “If you’re happy, she’ll ultimately be happy,” Susannah predicted. “And anyway, you’re not going to change. You’re always going to worry about her.”

  He chuckled. “That’s true.” Lindsey’s team and the opposing team were arranging themselves in formation on the field. “Come on—the game’s about to start.” He took her hand and pulled her toward the field. A few people stared at her in recognition, but she didn’t care. She was with Toby, and they were there to cheer their hearts out for Lindsey, whether or not she wanted them to. They were there for each other, but also for her.

  LINDSEY’S MOOD didn’t change throughout the rest of the day. Even though her team won their game, she seemed apathetic about the victory. After showering and donning regular shorts and a T-shirt, she insisted she didn’t want to see any movies, or even go to the mall. She remained indoors while Toby and Susannah surveyed Susannah’s backyard and debated whether she should resuscitate the bedraggled flower garden the Robinsons had planted in the southwest corner of the lot, or seed it for grass and let it go.

  Toby invited Lindsey to choose a restaurant for dinner, but she shrugged and said she didn’t care. They went to an eclectic family place where the menu included pasta dishes, stir-fry dishes and quesadillas, along with burgers and steaks. At least a dozen patrons recognized Susannah and asked for her autograph. It wasn’t a good time to be pestered, but she didn’t want to raise a protest. Not when Toby was trying so hard to make this outing pleasant and Lindsey was trying so hard to make it unpleasant.

  She watched Susannah each time a stranger approached with a pen and a napkin. Susannah was courteous to them all, asking their names, assuring them she didn’t mind their intrusion on her meal. She used her acting skills to conceal her annoyance. But maybe, she thought, Lindsey might understand why Susannah was less than enthusiastic about her celebrity past, a life that made it difficult to enjoy a quiet dinner out with a special man and his daughter.

  “This must seem so boring to you,” Lindsey observed after the tenth or eleventh person interrupted their meal to request her signature.

  She shrugged. “They mean well. They think they’re flattering me by asking for my autograph.”

  “No, I meant eating dinner at this place.” Lindsey gestured vaguely at Susannah’s Caesar salad and then at her own plate of spaghetti. “It’s so, like, ordinary.”

  “I like ordinary things,” Susannah told her. “And the company I’m in is anything but ordinary.”

  Toby sent her a brief smile. Lindsey only rolled her eyes and sniffed. “Everything in Arlington is ordinary,” she argued. “Ordinary and boring. Soccer. Work. School. Spaghetti and tomato sauce.” She gestured at her plate again. “Anyone with half a brain would get pretty bored with it, pretty fast.”

  “I’m not bored with it,” said Toby. “Does that mean I’ve only got half a brain?”

  Lindsey shot him a look. “What do you think?”

  “I think you’re on a cynical streak.”

  “And I think you’ve gotta be really out of it if you think this isn’t boring. At least, it’s boring for anyone who has the chance be somewhere else.”

  “I could be somewhere else, but I’m happy here,” Susannah interjected.

  “You haven’t been around long enough to realize how boring it is.” Lindsey nudged her plate away, slouched low in her seat and folded her hands across her chest.

  They left soon after. Lindsey didn’t want any dessert, nor did she want to stop at Paganini’s for ice cream on their way home. When they got to Toby’s house, Lindsey helped herself to the last few homemade cookies, lying in plastic wrap on a plate on the counter, and vanished upstairs into her bedroom. The faint sound of music, a thin-voiced female singing a bland pop melody, filtered out under her closed door.

  “My world and welcome to it,” Toby muttered, gazing up the stairway.

  Susannah wished she could come up with a clever quip, something to reassure him. But the fact was, she didn’t even want to think about Lindsey right now. For the first time since they’d made love, they were alone together, Lindsey a flight of stairs away from them, Toby’s hand resting on the newel. Susannah covered it with her own, savoring the feel of his thick, strong fingers beneath hers.

  She wished it had been a perfect day. But perfection existed only in fiction. If this were Mercy Hospital, someone could have written the script so that in the end Lindsey would emerge from her bedroom, prance down the stairs and spring into her father’s arms, saying, “I’m sorry I was so cranky today. I love you, Daddy. If you want to be with Susannah, that’s fine with me.”

  But it wasn’t Mercy Hospital.

  He rotated his hand so he could twine his fingers through hers. “After a day like today, you probably miss the glamour of Hollywood.”

  She grinned. “I think that was what Lindsey was trying to tell me over dinner—that I should have stuck with Hollywood.”

  “Is she right?”

  “Let me put it this way. She thought today was boring. I wasn’t bored for an instant.”

  He turned to face her, then released her hand and brought his arms around her. He planted a light kiss on her brow. “I’ve been wanting to hold you all day. Ever since Wednesday night, actually.” He kissed her again. “When I asked you to spend the day with us, I had in mind that you’d spend the night, too.”

  She nodded, her head rubbing against his chin.

  “But with Lindsey acting the way she is—”

  A dark ache twisted inside her. She loved that he was such a dedicated father, but…She wanted to spend the night with him. She wanted to make love with him again. Just because Lindsey was throwing a prolonged hissy fit didn’t mean Toby and Susannah had to ignore their own desires, did it?

  “I don’t know what she’ll do if she finds you here in the morning,” he said.

  Susannah recalled the first time she’d been in this house, when Lindsey had invited her to have dinner with the Coles. She’d been so taken by Toby’s attentiveness to his daughter then, the tight, solid warmth of their tiny family. She’d envied them their coziness, wishing she’d had such a close relationship with her parents.

  Now that closeness stood between her and Toby. “I’ll leave,” she said.

  “Not yet,” he whispered, sliding his hands to her head and tilting her face up so he could kiss her again.

  His kiss was deep, sending heat down her throat and through her body. She took his tongue, took his passion and let the sensations wash over her, warming her blood, melting her flesh. Life would have been simpler if she’d fallen in love with a man who wasn’t a father, but before she’d met Toby she hadn’t known that, and now that she’d met him it was too late.

  To kill time before going up to bed, they sat in the den, watching a bad movie on TV, holding hands and snickering over the inane plot. But both of them knew what they were waiting for. They knew what would happen once the movie was over and Lindsey was safely asleep.

  At ten they tiptoed up the stairs. Music was no longer seeping from her room, and there was no strip of light under the door. Toby signaled Susannah to wait for him in the hall while he eased Lindsey’s door open, moved silently across the room and smoothed the blanket over her. Susannah peeked through the door into the darkened bedroom. She could see only Lindsey’s silhouette in the dark, peaceful and still.

  Toby moved silently back to the doorway. He gave Susannah a shy smile, as if almost abashed that she’d seen his paternal doting. She smiled back, a proud smile, one she hoped would convince him she thought his tenderness was lovely.

  He closed the door, then ushered her down the hall to his bedroom. Once they were inside, she let Lindsey slide from her thoughts. In this comfortable room, with its sturdy oak furniture, its king-size bed and leather easy chair and Persian rugs, he was no longer a devoted father. He was
a man. Her lover.

  In the privacy of his room, they wouldn’t worry about a temperamental little girl. Only Toby and Susannah existed, two adults who yearned for each other. As Toby removed her clothing and his own, as he led her to his bed, as he kissed and caressed and aroused her, awakening her body to its own secret pleasures, awakening her mind to its capacity for love, nothing else mattered.

  He took his time. In fact, he took more time than Susannah would have liked. He seemed to think it was necessary to trace the creases and curves of her earlobe, to kiss a path from her shoulder to her palm, to roll her onto her stomach and nibble the length of her spine. Finally she turned around, her body hurting from wanting him so much. But he wouldn’t rush, wouldn’t give her what she ached for. First he would massage her insteps and tease her toes. He would kiss the skin behind her knees. He would urge her legs apart and press his mouth to her there, making her dizzy with longing, making her fear she’d come too soon the way she had the last time.

  Her desperate moans must have gotten through to him, because he raised his head and gazed at her, his breath ragged, his eyes burning with passion. “Susannah,” he whispered, rising onto her. She took him in her hands and he was already so hard. When she stroked him he shuddered, and she smiled inwardly. She wanted him to be as desperate as she was. She wanted him to feel for her what she felt for him. She wanted him to love her as much as she loved him.

  When at last their bodies joined, she could almost believe it. She could almost believe that even though she was nowhere near as deserving as he was—she’d never raised a daughter, healed a sick child, contributed to the world in the important ways Toby had—he could still love her. She could almost believe, as his body claimed hers, as her name tumbled from his lips again and again, as his fierce thrusts pushed her over the edge of sensation—she could believe she belonged in his world.

  “Stay,” he murmured as their bodies slowly cooled. He lay beside her, his arm slung around her so she could rest her head on his shoulder. “Don’t go.”