When I Found You (A Box Set)

by Webb, Peggy

  “Eleanor’s planned a wedding reception for us. When my wife walks in, every head in that place will turn. And they’ll all know that Malone Corday is finally a winner.”

  Until that moment Ruth hadn’t realized how heavy rubies were. Almost as heavy as guilt.

  Chapter 43

  THE VIRUNGAS

  The minute Ruth entered the room, Brett knew why he had come, why he had finally rejected all the reasons he’d come up with for staying away from the wedding reception at Luke Fisher’s ranch. Reason had nothing to do with why he came. It was desire—desire so raw, it melted his insides and burned holes in his retina.

  If she looked, she’d be terrified of what she saw.

  “My God, she’s stunning. Don’t you think she’s stunning?” he heard someone say.

  He had forgotten Lorena was with him until she spoke.

  “You don’t need to answer that. Your face says it all.”

  He didn’t comment on that, either. The great thing about Lorena was that she dropped time bombs in the middle of silences and was content to let them sit there and tick.

  “Look at that necklace she’s wearing. Is it real?”

  He hadn’t even noticed the necklace. It was the face that held him spellbound.

  “It looks it,” he said. “Must be a family heirloom.”

  Malone could certainly not afford such jewelry.

  She was holding Malone’s arm, smiling up at him the way she had in the photograph, smiling in a way that looked like love.

  “Why don’t I get us something to eat and drink?” he said. “Then we can sneak out of here.”

  “If I thought you had something on your mind besides escape, I’d be only too happy to skip the whole party. I’m out of my league here. Heck, most of these people have more money than the whole state of Texas. There are enough private planes on Luke Fisher’s landing strip to outfit a small air force. And look at the jewels on that woman over there. I could live three years on what those diamond earrings cost. Besides, these shoes are making sausage out of my feet.” Lorena made a rueful face at her two-inch heels, modest by anybody’s standards.

  When he didn’t comment, Lorena prattled on. “That’s what I get for being vain. I don’t know what made me decide to try to be beautiful instead of comfortable. I couldn’t hold a candle to your sister-in-law if I had a figure to die for and solid-gold titties.”

  Even while he laughed, he was thinking what it would be like to press his lips against Ruth’s throat and feel her skin heat up the way it had when she’d left her scent on his bed.

  His hands curved into fists, and he rammed them into his pockets just in time to hide them from his brother.

  “My God, they’re coming this way, and I’m standing here beside the world’s most desirable man looking like a dish mop. I think I’ll head to the kitchen and blend in with the cleanup crew.”

  Feeling selfish at his blatant neglect of a woman as fine as Lorena, Brett took one hand out of his pocket and placed it on her upper arm.

  “You’ll stay right where you are. I’m proud to be seen in your company. Always have been and always will be.”

  “I think you really mean that, don’t you?”

  “Yes. I really do.”

  Suddenly they were standing in front of him, his brother and his brother’s wife.

  “Well, hell, stay gone nearly a month and my own brother can’t come across the room to say hello.” Malone clapped him on the shoulder.

  Brett returned the shoulder clasp, careful to keep his eyes off Ruth, who was standing so close, he could smell her perfume. He believed it might just be possible to die of too much yearning.

  “Hello, Malone.” He made introductions without looking at Ruth. “How was the trip?”

  “How was the trip, he says.” Malone didn’t have to answer the question. His full-bodied laughter and his good humor said it all. “My wife’s wearing a king’s ransom in jewels, and my brother asks how was the trip. How about something like, ‘Congratulations, Malone.’”

  Brett’s imagination ran wild. Malone had given his wife rubies. He’d gone to the bank and taken out a loan because of the best news a man could have. Ruth was pregnant.

  From a strictly scientific viewpoint Brett knew that it was possible for someone who had turned into a lump of salt to still have movement. His eyes swept over Ruth, noting her high color, her radiance. Was it true then? Was she carrying his brother’s child?

  And why not? She was his wife.

  “Congratulations,” he said, but he wasn’t looking at his brother when he said it.

  Ruth touched the rubies at her throat.

  “These were a gift.” Her voice was low, throaty, like music sung on a winter’s night when two people cuddled together in a warm bed. Like a lullaby. It made Brett’s heart ache. “From a supporter.”

  “A supporter?” It was odd, the little things that gave relief to a man whose reason had been stolen.

  “Yeah, bro. Wait till you get a gander at the check he gave the foundation. You and Joseph are going to be kissing my feet.”

  “How about kissing mine first, Brett?” Lorena said. “They hurt like hell.”

  Ruth wondered at her ability to laugh when she was trembling inside like an orphan who had been told somebody finally wanted her. It had been one thing to be on the other side of the world and tell herself she could make her marriage work, but back in Africa, face-to-face with Brett, Ruth knew better. She knew that no matter what she did, no matter where she went, she could never make her marriage anything except a sham. Her spirit would never lift with wings at the sound of Malone’s voice. Her heart would never race at his glance. She would never wear sunshine on cloudy days simply because he was a part of her life.

  “Why don’t I get you a chair instead, Lorena?” Brett said.

  Ruth wanted to walk away with him, never mind that he was going only a few feet. Wither thou goest, I will go.

  But she had not pledged those vows to Brett; she’d pledged them to his brother.

  What if she divorced Malone? Would two wrongs make a right?

  Brett scooped up the chair without even bending over. Strange how the back of a man’s head could mesmerize. She couldn’t take her eyes off the dark hair that followed the curve of his neck and brushed the top of his collar.

  He turned around suddenly, his black eye catching hers, holding, probing, piercing. Desire as fierce as a tiger in the night climbed through her. Riveted, she stared at him.

  He knows.

  Wrapping her arms around herself, she held back her shiver. It was all there in his black eye—desire, despair, determination. And she knew that no matter what she did, Brett Corday would always be forbidden to her. Because he loved his brother. As she should love his brother.

  Unaware, Malone smiled at her. “The day you became my wife was the proudest day of my life. I love you, Ruth.”

  She had tried so hard to love him. Now she understood that she never would, not in the way a woman should love the man she’d married. Brett was wedged in her mind, and she knew she wasn’t going to stop thinking about him or stop wanting him, no matter where she went and no matter how hard she tried.

  Like swimmers coming up for air, she and Brett broke eye contact, and he returned with a chair for Lorena.

  “Is that better?” he asked.

  “You treat me like a princess.”

  “You are a princess, Lorena.”

  “Speaking of princesses, who in the world is that?”

  They all turned in the direction Lorena was looking. The woman standing in the doorway on the arms of Joseph and Eleanor Corday wore a lavender voile dress, a Panama hat with a lavender scarf hanging down her back, and three-inch heels with closed toes and ankle straps.

  Ruth reached blindly, and a large hand closed over hers.

  “That’s my mother.” She was surprised that her voice worked. “How in the world ...”

  “I knew she was coming, but I wanted to surpris
e you. Are you surprised, sweetheart?”

  She squeezed the hand she was holding so hard, she felt as if the skin on her knuckles would break. The reassuring warmth pressed her palm.

  “I’m stunned,” she said.

  Margaret Anne saw her and swept toward them like a ship under full steam.

  “God, she’s a looker,” Malone said. “Like mother, like daughter. Right, sweetheart?”

  No! Not as long as she had breath in her body.

  Malone forged toward Margaret Anne with his arms wide-open.

  That’s when Ruth discovered whose hand she was clutching. Brett gently rubbed her hand between his.

  “Are you all right, Ruth?”

  “Yes.”

  “You look pale. Let me get you a glass of water.”

  “I’ll get it.” Lorena hurried toward the kitchen.

  “Ruth! Darling!” Her mother was bearing down on her.

  “Water won’t help,” she whispered.

  “I’m right here beside you, Ruth. I won’t leave you.”

  Although Brett released her hand, she could still feel his solid presence, his warmth, his reassurance. Somehow he gave her courage to endure the Judas kiss Margaret Anne place on her cheek.

  “Just look at you. Marriage agrees with my beautiful daughter. I was just telling your lovely in-laws how different Africa is from the genteel South, but this party is sure to prove me wrong. My, my, I haven’t seen such splendor since the Annual Charity Ball I put together last spring in Oxford.”

  In a cloud of lilac chiffon and gardenia perfume, Margaret Anne turned her attention to Brett.

  “And you must be the Gorilla Man. My, my, I’ve heard so much about you. Even in the short little distance across this room, my sweet little son-in-law simply raved about you.”

  “I’m pleased to meet you, Mrs. Bellafontaine,” Brett said.

  “Margaret Anne, please! ‘Mrs. Bellafontaine’ makes me sound so old. I was just telling Malone not to dare call me that. Margaret Anne or even Mom, but never Mrs.”

  Everybody laughed, but it was the strained kind of laughter frequently heard at social occasions that brought together people who didn’t much like each other.

  Eleanor decided that was the main problem with her family now. They didn’t like each other. She was merely tolerating Joseph these days, Brett tolerated her, Ruth probably hated her, and the Lord only knew what Malone thought.

  When you expected miracles, you were bound to be disappointed. That’s what she’d expected when she’d brought Ruth’s mother to Africa. And what did she get? A woman who was as phony as her eyelashes. If she emphasized one more word in that exaggerated molasses-and-magnolias accent, Eleanor thought she would scream.

  Not that any of that mattered. What mattered was the way Ruth was looking at her mother—like an escaped prisoner who had suddenly been cornered and expected at any minute to be sent to the electric chair—and the way Brett was looking at Ruth—like a man who had discovered the Promised Land, only to be banished forever.

  Now that the greetings were over, nobody knew what to say.

  “Why don’t I get us all some drinks?” Malone said.

  As if drinks would save any of them. But at least alcohol would soften the sharp edges of truth for a while and make it bearable. Eleanor guessed that was all she could ask. In the long silence that gripped them, she sought Luke Fisher’s eyes. Across the room he solemnly lifted his glass to her.

  She wished Malone would hurry with her drink.

  Suddenly Margaret Anne Bellafontaine flung her arms wide, and the long chiffon scarf on her hat flew outward, then wrapped twice around her neck.

  “I’m so happy,” she said. “I’m happy for all of us.”

  Chapter 44

  Malone slipped out of her bed in the wee hours of the morning. She heard him put on his clothes, then the sound of the front door closing.

  Ruth rolled over and looked at the clock. Three A.M. Where in the world was he going?

  Suddenly she remembered the way her mother had been with the Corday men at the party—vivacious, simpering, predatory. Rage filled her, rage and a terrible dread.

  She left the bed and pulled on jeans and a T-shirt. Surely Margaret Anne hadn’t lured Malone out at this time of night on some pretext. Even she wouldn’t stoop that low. Or would she? Malone was so kindhearted, he’d believe any old story Margaret Anne told.

  Ruth had to save her husband.

  “Malone!” she called, racing to the window. But she was too late. The taillights of the Jeep disappeared around the bend.

  What was she going to do? She could telephone the main compound where her mother was staying, see if Malone had gone there. She was smart. She could think of some pretext for sounding an alarm at three o’clock in the morning.

  But suppose Malone hadn’t gone there? Suppose he found she’d checked on him. He’d think she didn’t have enough faith in him to trust him out of her sight.

  Miranda left her basket by the window and rubbed herself against Ruth’s legs.

  “Sometimes I envy you, Miranda. Feed you and give you a warm, dry place to sleep, and you’re happy.”

  Ruth scooped her up, carried her into the study, and turned on the light. She might as well work. There would be no sleep for her until Malone was safely home.

  As she took her dissertation out of the desk, she remembered the way she’d felt when Margaret Anne had kissed her cheek. Cheap. Soiled. She’d wanted to scrub herself with soap. Even then her skin would still burn from the kiss of betrayal.

  And the lies Margaret Anne had told—of Ruth’s genteel upbringing, of old-family money, of familial love so thick and sweet, it made molasses look like vinegar water.

  Ruth forced herself to pick up pen and paper. Work would be her salvation for the next few days, and then Margaret Anne would be gone, taking her lilac-scented dresses and her rose-colored lies with her.

  o0o

  “You don’t have to come in tonight.”

  Brett stood on her front porch the way he had many nights, beautiful in the glow of the naked bulb that made a nimbus around his head. Had it been years? To Lorena it felt like only yesterday.

  “Fact is, I don’t want you to come in.”

  Why didn’t he argue with her? Foolish question. She’d seen the reason he didn’t argue with her.

  “I wasn’t very attentive at the party tonight, Lorena. I’m sorry.”

  “That has nothing to do with my not wanting you to come in.”

  He didn’t have to ask why. She wished he had to ask.

  She clutched her purse and felt her heart actually shriveling up, just like the rest of her. The best thing she could do for both of them was tell the truth. She could cry when she got into her bed in the dark where nobody could see. The funny thing was, she never thought she’d cry over a man.

  “She’s more than a beautiful woman, Brett. She has spirit, and that’s what counts.”

  “She’s my brother’s wife.”

  “Hearts don’t ask who someone belongs to. They have a way of attaching themselves anyway.”

  “Mine is not attached, and it’s not going to be.”

  “It’s attached tighter than a tick on a hound dog.”

  When he made a sound of protest, Lorena put her hand over his lips. Perfect lips that had kissed her in ways that made her feel like a pretty woman. Maybe she was wrong to be so noble. Maybe she’d change her mind and let him come in anyway. Forget pride. No wonder folks said it was foolish. Lorena was living, breathing testimony.

  “You don’t have to explain anything to me, Brett Corday. I know you better than anybody in the world. I, of all people, understand that you’d never do anything to hurt your brother. But the plain fact is, even if you came in, you wouldn’t be here. And I can’t stand the idea of three in a bed.”

  “You’re a good woman.”

  “Sometimes I wish somebody would tell me I’m a gorgeous, sexy, irresistible woman.”

  Brett cu
pped her face, and she had to swallow a lump the size of Texas to keep from bawling like a newborn calf and embarrassing both of them.

  “Lorena, you’ve been all those things to me—gorgeous, sexy, irresistible—all those things and more. You’ve been a very good friend.”

  “Don’t say ‘have been’ like I’m fixing to cut friendship off like a water tap.”

  “You’ll call me if you need me?”

  “Yep, but it’s liable to be a mighty long haul for you to get to Georgia.”

  “You’re going home?”

  “Well, I’ve been thinking about it lately. It’s not a settled fact. But I might head that way come Thanksgiving or Christmas. Holidays are always good times to make folks forget they’ve been mad because I’ve neglected them for years.”

  “You could really leave Africa?”

  “I know that’s hard for you to understand, but yes, I think I might.”

  “We’ll miss you, Lorena. Terribly.”

  She wished he’d said, “I’ll miss you,” but he hadn’t. And he never would. Even though she was older than he and much uglier, she realized she’d harbored the hope that Brett would actually fall in love with her.

  “I’ll miss you, too, but not so terribly that I’ll be sitting at home moping.”

  Lord, Lord, she loved his laugh. She loved the way he smelled, the way he looked, the way he talked. When he held her close, she shut her eyes and tried to memorize everything at once, how his shirt felt against her cheek, how the top of her head barely grazed his chin, how she could feel his thighs flat against hers if she bent her knees slightly and leaned in.

  “Don’t tell me good-bye,” she said.

  “I won’t.”

  He didn’t hold her long enough. Or maybe he held her too long. She barely made it through the door before the tears started. Blindly she went into the kitchen and reached for the tea kettle. She knew where it was, even in the dark. Without turning on the light she filled the kettle with water and put it on the stove to boil. Then she sat in a straight-backed chair, wrapped her arms around herself, and rocked back and forth, keening the way she’d heard African women do when they mourned the dead.