Love Me or Leave Me

by Gwynne Forster

  “I am serious. I gave him to a little boy who was sick and needed a pet. And, strangely, the cat didn’t come back to me, but stayed with that child.”

  “That’s way past me. How do you feel this morning?”

  “I don’t think I can describe it. I walked out on our back deck a few minutes ago, and everything looked new. I’ve never much liked the daisies that my mother loves so much, but in the reflection of this morning’s sunshine against the dew, I couldn’t help staring at their beauty. Everything, even the grass, looked different.” She glanced at him, warily, as if confused, and he could see that she wasn’t sure that she saw what she thought she saw.

  “Drake,” she said. “I’m different. Honest.”

  “So am I. It’s as if I’m a brand-new man.”

  Tess, the Cooper family cook, greeted them at the door. “Come in. You’re right on time. We’re just about ready to start. Bathroom’s over there if you need it. If you don’t, follow me.”

  They followed her to the breakfast room where Magnus sat with Selena. Sixteen-month-old Sutton Cooper bounced in his mother’s lap, trying to get his fingers into the bowl of raspberry jam. After greeting them, Magnus explained that the Coopers said grace at the table.

  “So do the Harringtons,” Drake said.

  Selena lifted her son from her lap and put him in his high chair. “We’ll begin as soon as Tess and Jackson sit down. Tess says grace.” Tess joined them, indicated that all should clasp hands, said a prayer and added, “Now, let’s get to it, before it gets cold.”

  The more Drake saw of Magnus and his wife, the more he liked them. He could see that Tess and Jackson had a place in the Cooper home similar to Henry’s status in his home, though perhaps less intimate.

  “The horses are ready for you,” Jackson said, “and this is the time of day that they most love to trot.”

  “I thought we’d ride along the Cayman Lake,” Drake said, helping himself to blueberry pancakes and bacon. “I saw a bit of it yesterday, and I’d like to explore it some more.”

  “Good choice,” Jackson assured them. “You can just head that way and leave it to Bingston. He loves cantering along there. But he’ll walk it if that’s what you want.”

  Drake glanced at Pamela. He wanted to know her preference as to where they should ride, but she seemed unaware of the conversation. Thinking that she might still be under the influence of their intimacy the previous night, he resumed talking about riding and its pleasures. Then he followed Pamela’s gaze and nearly gasped aloud. Selena leaned over her son, smiling adoringly as she fed him with a spoon, and the child beamed with happiness, his eyes sparkling and his face bright with smiles.

  His heart seemed to plummet to his belly when he identified the apparent sadness on Pamela’s face as raw envy. A feeling of helplessness pervaded him. He no longer cared about the food, although he forced himself to eat it with seeming relish. He wanted to be alone with her, to love her and comfort her. Yes, and to assure her that she would one day have her own child, hers and his.

  “Do you mind if I hold him?” Pamela asked Selena after the child finished eating.

  “I don’t mind if he doesn’t. Let’s see if he’s willing to cooperate.”

  She passed the boy to Pamela, who cradled him as if she’d always done it. The boy found that her nose and her cheeks made perfect toys, and laughed and played with her. So captivated was she by the child’s antics and his total acceptance of her that Drake hated to remind her of their plans to ride along the lake.

  “You’re a natural,” Tess said. “Sutton doesn’t take to people readily. Usually if a stranger picks him up, he yells at the top of his lungs. Yes, indeed, you have a way with little ones.”

  Pamela looked up then, and as her gaze caught Drake’s eye, he detected a flicker of embarrassment that he knew was meant for only him: he had seen her at her most vulnerable, and she knew it. He smiled to reassure her and hoped that it worked.

  Jackson rose from the table, leaned over and kissed his wife. “Up to your usual high standards.” Then he said to Drake, “I think we’d better get started.”

  With obvious reluctance, Pamela returned Sutton to his mother. “He’s so sweet,” she said in that low, sultry voice that made him imagine all kinds of intimate scenes with her. “Thanks for the breakfast…and for the baby,” she added, with a twinkle in her eyes.

  “You’re welcome. I’ll expect you both for lunch at twelve-thirty, and if you want to swim, you’ll find bathing suits, swim caps and towels in the cabana by the pool.”

  They thanked her and, along with Jackson, headed for the stables. Drake watched somewhat anxiously as Jackson led Lady Love out to Pamela. She greeted the horse with a smile, patted her nose and hugged her neck. Then, assured of the horse’s cooperation, she put her left foot in the stirrup and swung herself into the saddle with the grace and expertise of a seasoned cowboy.

  Not bad. He mounted Bingston, rode up beside her and said, “That was as graceful a mount as I’ve ever witnessed. Let’s go.” He patted the stallion on his rump and, as Jackson predicted, the big bay headed toward the lake. He ran his hands over the saddlebag to feel what it might contain. Jackson or Tess had provided them with something to drink, and he was sure that by the time the sun was high, drinks would be a blessed relief.

  Branches of the cypress trees and lost maples bent low over the bridal path beside the lake, creating a lovers’ tunnel that obscured from their eyes all but what was beautiful. Occasionally, a fish jumped from the water, and the symphonic voices of birds greeting the morning was as pleasant a sound as he’d ever heard. He pulled the reins slightly, and Bingston stopped and looked back at him as if to ask, “What’s the matter? Aren’t you satisfied with me?”

  He patted the horse’s rump and dismounted. “Let’s walk,” he said to Pamela, and they walked along leading the horses and holding hands. Seeing a wrought-iron bench beside the lake, he tethered their horses and sat on the bench.

  “If city folk had this quiet, this peace, if they could hear birds sing and water lap, maybe they wouldn’t be so stressed,” he said. “I’ve been thinking that when I build my own house, I’m going to have a stable near enough that I can ride frequently.”

  “I love riding,” she said, “but I don’t do it unless I’m down here. Selena and I ride together. Where will you build your house?”

  “On the Harrington estate. It’s much bigger than you imagine. But I want to be near the family. Russ is building up the hill from Harrington House. I want to build closer to the Monocacy River, which would put me a fair distance back of Henry’s house. Of course, I’ll have to have my brothers’ agreement. Russ and I want Telford to keep the family home, and Alexis is happy there. We’re building Russ’s house the way he wants it, and when I’m ready, we’ll build mine.”

  He threw a small stone into the lake and watched the water ripple outward. “Pamela, I want to impress upon you how much I love my family and what it means to me to be around them. I’m not a child—I could handle separation, but I wouldn’t be happy doing it.”

  “I understand that, Drake. I’ve seen the love among all of you, and I think it was expressed best in the way a little five-year-old girl related to all of you. She belonged to all of you, and all of you belonged to her. The love in that house was so strong that it was palpable. I wouldn’t want to leave it, either. Will all of you accept Russ’s wife? I like Velma a lot, and I thought she suited him. But when I saw her Christmas morning, she said she didn’t think she’d made any headway with Russ.”

  “Doesn’t surprise me. Russ is a closed book. He shows what he wants you to see, and nothing else. I hope for Velma’s sake that she’s penetrated that wall.” His laughter seemed to crash the peaceful environment. “But he’s marrying her, and he’s very happy about it, so I guess she can handle him.”

  She seemed pensive and then, in a complete change of demeanor, smiled and asked him, “Why do women have to handle men? Why can’t we just be ourselves
?”

  Laughter poured out of him until he shook. “Sweetheart, you’re not serious. Velma can thank Alexis for partially taming Russ. Al least, by the time she met him, he’d stopped leaving his boots under a chair in the living room, walking around the house in his birthday suit, leaving his socks wherever he pulled them off and dragging himself to dinner anytime it suited him. Russ is like a puppy—he’ll do tricks for you, but you have to reward him. He stopped resisting Alexis’s orderliness when he learned that she’s a great cook, and Russ loves fine, gourmet food. Fortunately for him, Velma is just as good a cook.”

  By the time he finished that explanation, she had turned fully to face him. “Please tell me that you’re not sloppy.”

  That statement pleased him as much as anything she’d said to him that day. “I definitely am not. I like the finer things in life gracefully laid out, and I was Alexis’s ally when she began changing Harrington House from a mausoleum for men to a home.” He put his right arm around her shoulder, wanting her to be at ease with him while he asked her some important questions.

  “You like horseback riding, and you’re good at it. What do you do in Baltimore that lifts you out of your daily grind? Tell me.”

  “I don’t do anything glamorous. You already know I love to sing. I sing even when I’m alone and, of course, in the choir of my church.”

  “Which is?”

  “Presbyterian. I love music and I go to concerts regularly.” She rested her head on his shoulder and began toying with the buttons on his shirt. “You probably won’t believe this, but my favorite thing to do is fish. I love that more than I love horseback riding or tennis. But there’s nowhere in Baltimore to fish, so I drive over to the Chesapeake Bay some Saturday mornings early and go crabbing. But that’s not nearly as satisfying as fishing with a fishing pole and going to sleep till you feel a tug at the line.”

  “You fish in order to get a nap?” He hugged her. “Next time you’re at Eagle Park, we’ll fish.”

  She snuggled closer. “The other things I love doing, though not alone, are walking in the woods and, especially, watching the sunset. I’d love to be in a place where I could see the sunset every day.”

  We’d get on well together, he thought, recalling his passion for walking in the woods and the serenity he felt watching a sunset.

  “I’d better warn you, though,” she said. “Dark clouds spook me.”

  “I’m not crazy about them, but they don’t spook me.”

  Bingston neighed, the horse’s way of telling Drake that he wanted exercise. He stood, but with reluctance, feeling closer to Pamela and wanting the feeling to last. She reached for his hand, but instead, he opened his arms, brought her to his body and pressed his lips quickly to hers.

  “That’ll have to do for now. It wouldn’t be wise to start a fire out here. When are you returning to Baltimore?” She told him that she had planned to leave later that day, but was considering postponing the trip until Sunday.

  “I have a ten-o’clock flight tomorrow morning, and I’d like us to travel together, unless that would inconvenience you.”

  “It won’t inconvenience me. I’d like it.”

  “If you’ll give me your ticket, I’ll change it.” She hesitated as if to refuse, appeared to change her mind and told him she’d give him the ticket when he took her home after lunch. “I have to spend a little time with my folks, so I hope you won’t mind if we don’t see each other tonight.”

  He did mind, but he understood that she should spend some time with her parents. They mounted their horses and continued the trek around the lake in the idyllic setting of wild blooming dandelions, bluebonnets, black-eyed Susans, flowering grasses and other vegetation native to the region.

  “I’m never going to forget this,” Pamela said.

  “I hope you don’t, but I’ve learned never to say never.”

  She patted his knee, a familiarity that, only two days earlier, she would not have assumed. “Don’t you think your allure has power?” she asked him, thinking he would take it as the joke she intended.

  Drake looked straight ahead. Did she assume, as other people often did, that his face guaranteed him anything he wanted? He fought back a sinking feeling. Lord, he hoped not.

  “I’m flesh and blood, Pamela, and I ache and sweat exactly like any other man. Don’t get it into your head that I don’t. I work like hell for everything I get, and it doesn’t come any easier to me than it does to Joe Blow. You didn’t fall over when you knew I wanted you, did you?”

  “Naah,” she said, her voice colored with amusement, “but have you ever braced yourself against a hurricane-force wind? I can tell you exactly what it’s like.”

  In spite of his effort to be serious with her, he had to laugh. “You’re a nut. I was serious.”

  “I was, too, but I know why that topic rings your bell. You don’t want to be seen as shallow. Have no fear—if I thought that, we might be on speaking terms, but that’s all.”

  “Glad to hear it. When we get off these horses, you’ll owe me a kiss, a solid one then and there.”

  “Be glad to oblige,” she said. He liked her comfortable manner with him, the ease with which she bantered and the fact that she didn’t try to impress him.

  “May it always be this way,” he added, and he meant it.

  Chapter 7

  After lunch with the Cooper family, Drake and Pamela began the drive back to her parents’ home with Drake at the wheel of Magnus Cooper’s town car. A few miles before reaching their destination, he stopped the car at a deer crossing in order to get a better look at the flowering crepe myrtle that was bunched in a grove beyond the little brook that flowed beside the road.

  “I don’t know what it is about settings like this one,” he said, “but they make me want to slow down and take stock of my life.”

  They had so much in common. She understood what it meant to be close to nature. “I can appreciate that. When I lived at home, my mother and I would walk along that path on the other side of the brook on summer evenings when the air had cooled. I loved it, and I would daydream of someday walking along there in the moonlight with a man I loved and who loved me.”

  Her eyes widened when he said, “It’s too early for moonlight—I’ll take a rain check on that one.” Was he telling her that he intended to nurture their love?

  As if he knew what was going through her mind, he explained, “You and I have a long way to go, Pamela. A very long way. Last night, I slept as peacefully as a man can sleep and woke up this morning anxious to get on with the day. What do you think explains the fact that after years of light sleeping and of wrestling with the sheets, I woke up this morning in a bed that looks as if no one slept in it?”

  She wanted to hear it in plain English, not in allegories. “I’d rather you told me. I don’t want to jump to false conclusions.”

  He continued as if he hadn’t heard her. “You know what impressed me most about this weekend? The biggest and most pleasant surprise, besides the unlikelihood of finding you here, is finally knowing that it’s you that I treasure. It’s realizing that you and I are soul mates, and that has really rocked me.”

  “I know. When we were sitting on that bench by the lake, I had that same feeling, a sense that we were knit of the same fabric. Still, I’m almost ashamed to say that, in spite of that feeling, I kept thinking of that old adage, ‘There’s many a slip between the cup and the lip.’ I’m not a pessimist, but we moved so far so fast yesterday and today that…well, we need to be careful.”

  “Some guy made you wary of men, and I definitely do not want to meet him.”

  “Not of men, but of exceptionally handsome men.”

  He switched from Park to Drive, started to move and slammed his foot on the brake when a fawn jumped out of the bushes. For as long as it cared to, the animal stood in the middle of the road observing the car and then continued its journey.

  “See that?” Drake said. “That fawn trusted me not to harm him. Since you
know me, you should be able to do the same.”

  “I do trust you.”

  “Time will tell.”

  They rode in silence until they reached her parents’ home. “Are they expecting you to bring me with you?”

  “I told them you would bring me home, and that I would ask you to come in and meet them, but I didn’t say what time we’d get here, because I didn’t know.”

  She inserted the key into the front-door lock, and as if by the power of an inanimate sensor, simultaneously the doorknob turned. As the door opened, he prepared himself to smile, but the face that met his eyes bore what he could only describe as a frown of displeasure. Pamela gave the door a little push, and the man stepped back to let them enter.

  “Daddy, this is Drake Harrington, of whom you’ve heard me speak,” she said, and he didn’t miss the note of determination—or was it defiance?—in her voice. “Drake, this is Phelps Langford, my father.”

  “I’m glad to meet you, sir.”

  “Likewise.”

  “How about some lemonade?” she asked, looking at Drake, and he thought her fingers tightened around his in a plea for understanding. He came prepared to like Pamela’s parents and to extend himself so they would be comfortable with the knowledge that their daughter was in his company. But the man didn’t receive him with anything approximating hospitality, so he’d let the chips fall where they may.

  “I’d love some lemonade,” he said, for she and not her father was his focus. Moreover, if the situation was less than comfortable, she would hurt for his sake, and he did not intend to cause her any distress, not even if he had to deal with her father another time. “Where’s your mother? I’d like to meet her.”

  “She’s in there primping for your benefit,” Phelps said. “She thinks she has to make a good impression on you.” He might as well have added, “For what purpose, I don’t know,” because his tone suggested as much.

  Pamela led the way to the living room, holding his hand, and he wondered at the display of possessiveness and whether it was only for her father’s benefit. “I’ll be back in a few minutes. Have a seat.”