Love Me or Leave Me

by Gwynne Forster

  Drake chose a big wing chair, one that would complement rather than diminish his stature, for he realized that Phelps Langford did not welcome him and that the man would attempt to put him on the defensive. He hoped Pamela would hurry with the lemonade or that her mother would finish primping and come in, because the idea of a battle with Pamela’s father didn’t sit well with him, though he wouldn’t back away if Phelps initiated it.

  As if, by extrasensory perception, she knew his thoughts, Pamela returned quickly with a pitcher of lemonade, glasses, cookies and dessert plates that had a dancing reindeer painted on them. She poured three glasses of lemonade and sat on the end of the sofa that was closest to Drake.

  “Pretty hot out there today,” Phelps said, serving notice that he would guide the conversation to suit himself.

  Drake didn’t answer. He disdained banalities and didn’t engage in small talk if he could avoid it. At the moment, he simply didn’t care to oblige, so he let Pamela agree with her father about the weather and decided that if the man mentioned the recent dearth of local rainfall, he’d leave.

  However, he discovered that Phelps Langford was too sophisticated a man for that level of nonsense when he said to his daughter, “See what’s keeping your mother,” a ruse that guaranteed him at least a few minutes of privacy with his guest.

  Pamela got up with obvious reluctance. “Daddy, you know Mama won’t come in here till she looks perfect.” She threw Drake an apologetic glance and walked toward the foyer where he had observed a wide staircase leading upstairs.

  He could see that Phelps was not going to allow him and Pamela any privacy. Whether it was with malicious intent he wasn’t certain, but he was getting negative vibes, and he didn’t like them.

  “I take it you’ve been seeing a lot of Pamela,” Phelps began.

  “Less than I’d like.” He waited for the man’s reaction to that, leaning forward, his sensors whirling, focused like a hound before it snares its prey.

  “I see. And you think you deserve a woman like Pamela?”

  Hmm. So here comes the nasty. Drake sat back in the chair and draped his left knee over his right one, the epitome of suaveness—cool outside and seething within. He looked Phelps straight in the eye. “I deserve any woman I decide I want.” With both his words and his icy tone, he meant to force Phelps Langford to stop fencing and put his cards on the table.

  “Pamela’s used to comfort.” He waved his hand around to indicate the comfort of his home. “When this moon-eyed phase is over, what do you have left?”

  “I suppose you’d know the answer to that. I’ve never married,” he said, responding to the man’s attempted put-down.

  Phelps’s eyes narrowed to slits. “You’ve got a smooth, sharp tongue, but that won’t carry you far in this world.”

  Drake stared at the man, eyeball to eyeball, fighting back his rising anger. Like so many other people, Phelps Langford had looked at him and classed him as a shallow womanizer.

  “Today, the smart men are computer wizards,” Phelps said. “They’re the ones making the money. If you’re computer-savvy, I can get you a job tomorrow easy as that.” He snapped his fingers. “It’ll pay eighty to a hundred thousand dollars a year, and my word is all that’s needed.”

  “I didn’t know you owned a computer business,” Drake said, making sure of his ground before he aimed at the jugular.

  “I don’t, but I’m well-placed in one.”

  “I’m computer-savvy, as you put it,” Drake said. “I have to be, in my line of work.”

  Phelps waved a hand as if to suggest the insignificance of what he’d just heard. “And what kind of work would that be, I’d like to know?”

  Heated nearly to the point of boiling, Drake took a deep breath and told himself to calm down. “I’m the architectural engineer for Harrington, Inc., Builders, Architects and Engineers, a company that my two brothers and I own. We have designed and built houses, schools, malls, municipal buildings and hotels here and abroad. In fact, we’ve decided that we need a resident computer analyst. Would you be interested in the job?”

  “Daddy, how could you?” Pamela nearly shrieked, and his head snapped around toward the door, for he hadn’t been aware of her presence. “I’m surprised at you, Daddy, and I’m hurt. After what you’ve gone through with your parents, how could you… Oh, forget it.” She walked over to Drake and, in a gesture of support, leaned over and kissed his cheek. “If I had thought anything like this would happen, I wouldn’t have asked you to come in.”

  “There’s no need for you to apologize,” he told her. “I can hold my own.” He raised his voice to make certain that Phelps heard him. “Your father is protecting your interests, although as far as I’m concerned, he could have chosen a better way in which to do it.” He tasted a cookie. “Hmm, these are good. I wanted to meet your mother, but I’m leaving now. Please give her my good wishes.”

  “Sorry to be so long,” a soft voice purred, “but when you arrived, I wasn’t dressed.”

  Drake stood and walked to greet the tall, darker version of Pamela. A beautiful woman, whose smile seemed to warm the air-conditioned room.

  “Pamela told me about you, but she didn’t mention how tall you were, and she knows my taste in that respect.”

  “Welcome, Drake. I’m so happy to meet you.”

  He took her hand and held it. “You can’t know how pleased I am to meet you. It is stunning how much alike you and Pamela are.”

  Her smile radiated kindness and warmth. “Yes. Everyone says that. She’s truly a love child. Pamela said you’re leaving tomorrow, and that the two of you don’t have plans for this evening. I don’t want to seem to meddle, but—”

  He had to interrupt her before she asked him to have dinner with Phelps Langford. He’d had enough of that man for one day.

  “That’s because she wants to spend the evening visiting with you and her father. We can all get together the next time Pamela and I are here, and that may not be too far off.” He glanced toward Pamela to get a sense of her reaction to what he’d said, and let himself relax when she smiled.

  “I must be going now, Mrs. Langford. I have to get to San Antonio before the airline office closes. I’m glad to have met you. Goodbye.” He looked in the direction of Pamela’s father. “Goodbye, sir.”

  He didn’t offer to shake the man’s hand, not because Phelps Langford hadn’t extended a hand to him when he arrived, but because to do so would have branded him a hypocrite and a liar. As of that minute, he did not like Phelps Langford.

  “Will you call me this evening?” Pamela asked him as they walked to the door.

  “Of course I will.”

  “I’m sorry Daddy acted out. His behavior was unacceptable and not a bit like him. I’m going to have a good talk with him.”

  As far as he was concerned, “acting out” hardly described it, but he didn’t want to be an issue between Pamela and her father. “You’re his daughter and his only child, and I suspect he dotes on you. Fathers don’t believe any man is good enough for their daughters. Don’t be too hard on him.”

  Her failure to promise wasn’t lost on him. He urged her into the warmth of his embrace. When she lifted her lips to his, his blood raced to his loins and he braced himself against the force of his libido. Her kiss, warm and welcoming, set his heart to racing, and he hugged her to his body.

  “Lay off, sweetheart,” he said. “I have to face the public when I leave here.”

  Her laughter, low and sensuous, like the first bubble when a pot of water begins to boil, curled around him, and he wanted to hold her forever. “That’s nothing,” she said. “I have to deal with Daddy, and he can read me like a scanner.”

  Quickly, he brushed her lips with his own. “Call you tonight.”

  He strode down the steps and when he reached the car, he looked back and waved, for he knew she’d still be standing there. Phelps Langford may be important, but now he knows he isn’t the only man of stature and value. He’ll try
to keep his daughter away from me, but as long as she loves me, she’s mine.

  Pamela waved at Drake, went inside and stood before her father. She knew he anticipated her ire, and she didn’t plan to disappoint him. “You didn’t greet Drake, and you gave him the impression that you thought him worthless, that he didn’t have a decent enough job to support himself and a family. I was speechless. I couldn’t believe my ears. Why did you do that, Daddy? Anybody, including you, can look at that man and see that he stands for something worthwhile. If you hurt his feelings, you hurt me.”

  Phelps flexed both of his shoulders in a shrug. “You needn’t defend him—he’s got a mouth and he used it.”

  She didn’t want to plead with her father, because the more she begged, the more stubborn he became. “He’s a man, Daddy, and a strong one. Would you expect him to hang his head like a whipped puppy when you insulted him? And another thing—your marriage to a black woman isn’t proof that you aren’t prejudiced against black men. I’m reminded of your advice that I should marry a white one.”

  He jerked forward. “What you’re suggesting is ridiculous.”

  She’d known since childhood that a wise person didn’t put Phelps Langford on the defensive, that he fought hardest and most ruthlessly when he was down. An inner voice told her to let it be, that she may one day want her father and the man she loved to join hands. But she also knew that she was enough like him to ignore her own warning.

  “You may know it’s ridiculous,” she said, “but does Drake? He came to your home with your daughter, the first man who’s walked into this house with me since I was eighteen years old, and you didn’t shake his hand or welcome him in any way.”

  He pulled air through his front teeth, a gesture that was rare for him. “If he can’t decide whether to ask you to marry him, why should I genuflect when he shows up here?” The comment didn’t surprise her. Her father wasn’t given to wasting time fencing, but went straight for the jugular.

  She told herself to be calm and to use more tact. “Daddy, yesterday for the first time, Drake Harrington told me that he loves me. I understand him well enough to know that he didn’t say it until he was sure he meant it and was willing to back it up. For a while now, he has behaved as if he cares deeply for me. He’s not a frivolous man.” She could see that she was getting to him. “I love him. I tried to forget him, but it was like trying to store water in a sieve. Useless.”

  He held his hands up, palms out. “If he loves you, you don’t have a problem. I tell you, a man who looks like that one invites mistrust. He’s an awfully good-looking man.”

  “Yes,” Delta Langford said, having avoided entering into a conflict between her husband and her daughter as she usually did when they disagreed. “He is definitely that, charming, good manners, and he’s got success written all over him.” She walked over to where her husband sat and soothed his hair. “Why didn’t you see that, honey?”

  “Oh, I saw it. I wanted to test his mettle, but he tested mine.”

  Pamela blew out a deep breath and went upstairs to her room. Phelps Langford didn’t know it, but he would discover that making peace with Drake might not be as simple as saying, “I’m sorry.”

  By the time Drake left the airline ticket office in San Antonio, where he exchanged Pamela’s ticket for a firstclass one and got them seats together, his temper had begun to cool. Controlling it while in the Langford home cost him a great deal emotionally, and it didn’t satisfy him merely to return Phelps Langford’s insult. But he had to call Pamela, and he needed a change of mood before he did it.

  After a pleasant dinner of roast lamb with Magnus, Selena, Jackson and Tess, he sat with them and watched The Maltese Falcon, an old Humphrey Bogart movie, on a wide flat-screen television. The experience was similar to seeing a movie in a movie theater. Thinking how much Tara would enjoy watching Sesame Street on such a screen, he decided to buy one for the den in Harrington House. Around eight-thirty, he excused himself, went to his room and telephoned Pamela on his cell phone.

  “Hi. Did your father ever cool off?” he asked her.

  “I have no idea. He’s in the doghouse. Mama and I really stuck it to him. He said he just wanted to test your mettle.”

  Drake sucked in his breath, his furor rising anew. “He could have found a more gracious way to do it.” For the time being, that was his last word on the subject. He would take up the matter with Phelps again when he next saw him, and he would see him again.

  “I changed your ticket. We’re leaving San Antonio on American Airlines Flight 1776 tomorrow afternoon at two, so I’ll be by for you at eleven. I hope that suits you.”

  “It does, and thanks. It’s a pity we didn’t plan to be together this evening. I fulfilled my filial obligations this afternoon. Besides, I got used to being with you.”

  He definitely liked the sound of that. “You miss me, huh? Keep it up, and I’ll be putty in your hands. Does that mean I’ll have things going my way the next time we’re together?” He meant it as a tease and a test of her sense of humor.

  “You serious? On a plane? What can you do on a plane?”

  Thank goodness she couldn’t see him, for he was sure he gasped and that his face mirrored his incredulity. “I’m not going to comment on that. You’ve had a long, emotionally draining day, and you’re tired.”

  “What did I say to draw that comment?”

  Laughter rolled out of him. “It isn’t what you said. It’s what your words implied. If you think I’d let an airplane cramp my style, think again.”

  “If you think… Oh, for goodness’ sake. You’re making something out of nothing.”

  “Whatever you say! Do you have plans for tomorrow night?”

  “I had plans to do my laundry, if you can call that plans, but that was before I ran into you down here and got my life turned around. A real twister couldn’t have shaken me up more thoroughly.”

  He hoped she proved to be as honest about everything else. “And you didn’t do anything. Right? You didn’t help stir up that storm, did you? Kiss me.” She made the sound of a kiss. “I was going to send one back to you, but hell, I don’t feel like pretending. ’Night, love.”

  He listened for her reply, wondering if one of her parents had entered the room and she no longer had privacy. Finally, her voice came to him clear and sweet. “Good night, darling.” She hung up.

  “We’re making progress,” he said to himself. “If we ever open up to each other fully and completely, what a time we’ll have!”

  “You got me a first-class seat?” she asked as they took their places on the flight to Baltimore.

  He put her carry-on bag in the overhead bin and sat down beside her. “You don’t think I’d fly first class while you sat in an economy seat on the same plane, did you?”

  “You could have changed yours to economy.”

  He extended his left leg and eased the pant leg up. “Not my style, sweetheart. I work hard in order to enjoy creature comforts, and I wouldn’t have less for you than for myself. I always fly the best class the plane offers.”

  The flight attendant arrived and took orders for juice or champagne along with hors d’oeuvres, and asked about their comfort. Would they like a blanket or a pillow and would they please fasten their seat belts.

  “I could get used to this kind of attention,” Pamela told him. “Uh, I need to ask you something.”

  A frown flashed briefly across his brow. Then, he grasped her left hand, and in a gentle, encouraging and almost seductive tone, he said, “Tell me. I’m open to anything you want to discuss.”

  Thinking that if she wasn’t careful, he would lull her into just about anything, she said, “I’m invited to an old-fashioned garden party, and the invitation says I should bring my S.O.”

  “What’s that?”

  She couldn’t believe he didn’t know, but she told him anyway. “It means significant other, and I don’t have one. Would you go with me?” Suddenly he was holding her hand so tight that she a
ttempted to jerk it away. “Ouch!”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to… Are you all right?”

  She nodded. “What got into you, Drake?”

  “Me? What got into you? What do you mean you don’t have a significant other? You’re telling me I’m not important in your life?”

  “I don’t believe in being presumptuous, and you have not asked me not to see other men.”

  He turned to face her as much as his fastened seat belt would allow. “A little oversight on my part. After what’s gone on between the two of us this past weekend, I didn’t think you needed that assurance, but I’m too happy to give it. I don’t want another man to touch you. Not a strand of your hair or the tips of your fingers. If you need an escort, and I’m out of the country, call Russ or Telford and they’ll substitute for me. Do you want it any clearer than that?”

  She nearly laughed at the vehemence in his voice. “Suppose Alexis or Velma objects?”

  “Neither Telford nor Russ is hooked up to a stupid woman. When will this garden party take place and where? I sure hope men aren’t wearing morning coats, because I don’t have one.”

  “She said women should wear wide hats, gloves and long, wide-skirted dresses.”

  “Did she tell you what kind of shoes to wear? It would serve her right if you wore that slinky dress you had on at Cooper’s ball.”

  Pamela hadn’t thought too much about that. She made up her mind to wear whatever dress she chose, wide skirt or not. “You’re putting wicked thoughts into my head,” she said. “I’ll ask her what the men are wearing.”

  The captain’s voice came over the loudspeaker. “You are now free to walk around the cabin, but when seated, keep your seat belts fastened.”

  He leaned over and kissed her cheek. “I didn’t even know when the plane took off. Did you?” His dark eyes seemed to grow darker, and his face revealed a vulnerability she hadn’t seen in him.

  She shook her head. “Until the captain spoke, I thought we were still on the ground.”