by Janet Dailey
“Are you okay?” Whit was beside her, a hand on her waist in a silent offer of support if she needed it.
“Yes,” she nodded affirmatively and breathed in deeply. Lifting her head, Shari studied his handsomely carved features and the compassion written in his amber-brown eyes. “I want to stay with her.” She expected him to argue, so she rushed to justify her request. “I know she’s receiving excellent care from the hospital staff, but they’re all strangers to her. It would be less of an ordeal if she could see a familiar face.”
“You don’t need to convince me, Shari,” Whit smiled faintly, the sun-creased lines deepening around his eyes. “I agree.”
“You do?” She was vaguely surprised, although she wasn’t sure why.
“A member of the family should sit with her. I know she’ll be very pleased if that person is you. She’s missed you a great deal since you’ve been away at college. We all have,” he added with an intently probing look.
There was a tightness in her throat. She made a little move toward him. A second later, he was taking her into his arms to hold her close and rest a hard cheek against her hair. Shari reveled in the strength and comfort she found in his undemanding embrace. His hand gently rubbed her shoulder blade, his touch familiar yet with a trace of intimacy.
“You belong at Gold Leaf,” Whit muttered near her ear, his warm breath stirring her hair. “It is your home, Shari. Someday I’ll prove it to you.”
Something unsettled her. She was too confused to decipher whether it was his subject matter or the hard flesh and bone of his male body pressed to her length. Whit seemed to sense the beginnings of resistance in her and loosened the circle of his arms to let her stand alone. There seemed to be a veil over his expression, yet there wasn’t anything different in the way he looked at her.
A nurse walked by them in the corridor, her white uniform rustling softly. Shari was reminded of where they were and why. Concern for her mother overrode the vague confusion of the moment.
“I’ll let Mother know I’ll be staying with her,” she said.
“Just during the day,” Whit qualified. “After visiting hours are over at night, you’ll be coming home to Gold Leaf.”
That day started a routine that was followed for an entire week. Shari spent the daylight hours at her mother’s side and drove back to Gold Leaf late in the evenings to sleep. In one short week, her mother had made a lot of progress.
From not being able to make any intelligible sound at all that first day, she could make understandable words. It was still difficult for her to speak in complete sentences, so their conversation usually included a sign language they had developed. She had recovered some use of her left side, and the doctors hoped she would regain more of it with physical therapy.
After witnessing some of the minor triumphs her mother had achieved, Shari was encouraged by her progress. Her mother would definitely get better.
She told Beth that when her friend phoned on a Friday morning before Shari had left for the hospital. “The doctors are talking about releasing her next week,” she added.
“Shari, I’m so glad to hear it,” her friend declared.
“We all are.” It was a tremendous relief.
“Doré and I are back at the sorority house. Will you be arriving Sunday?” Beth asked. “Don’t forget classes start again on Monday morning.”
“I wish I could,” Shari smiled ruefully. “I suppose I’ll come sometime late Sunday night.”
“We’ll be watching for you,” she promised. “Let us know if there is any change in your plans—and drive carefully.”
“I will.”
There was an exchange of good-byes before Shari hung up the telephone receiver. She glanced at her watch and saw she was running late. A cup of coffee and some toast were all she’d have time to have for breakfast this morning. She wasn’t worried about being hungry before lunch because she could always get some scrambled eggs and sausage at the hospital cafeteria.
When she entered the dining room, Rory and her grandfather were seated at the mahogany table. Whit had eaten breakfast hours ago and was already gone. She hadn’t seen much of her stepbrother this past week, except for a short time in the evenings or when he visited her mother at the hospital.
“Who were you talking to on the phone?” Frederick Lancaster questioned as he dabbed a spoonful of marmalade on his toast.
“Beth Daniels, one of my friends from Duke,” Shari answered and smothered the rise of irritation. Her step-grandfather considered anything that went on in this house his business. He didn’t regard such inquiries as an invasion of privacy.
Their truce was still in effect. That it had lasted so long was due to the prolonged time Shari spent at the hospital. She was certain of that.
“What did she want?” he demanded as Shari poured a cup of coffee from the silver pot on the table.
“To see how Mom was getting along,” she replied.
“And to find out when I would be coming back. Classes start on Monday.” “You aren’t going.”
The piece of toast in her hand was halted midway to her mouth as her startled gaze swung to the elderly man seated at the head of the table. She played the words back in her mind to see if there had been any element of a question in the way he said them. There wasn’t. And there was nothing in his expression to indicate he expected a reply from her. Frederick Lancaster had handed down another one of his edicts and expected her to accept it.
“I’m not going where?” Shari set the toast on her plate and stubbornly dug in her heels, too independent to be dictated to by him.
“You’re not going back to college.” He repeated his statement with determination. “You’re here and you are staying here until your mother has fully recovered.”
“I am leaving Sunday for college,” she stated firmly. “There is absolutely no reason to stay longer. Mom isn’t in any danger. She’ll be released from the hospital next week. With you, Whit, Rory, and Mrs. Youngblood all here, she’ll have plenty of company. I don’t have to be here, too.”
“You are actually considering going back,” her step-grandfather challenged as if she had taken leave of her senses. “Have you any idea how much your mother worries about you? She’s doing fine now, but what if she has a relapse because of you? Do you want that on your conscience?”
“That’s blackmail,” Shari accused.
“Call it what you like,” Frederick Lancaster declared. “After all your mother has done for you, this is one thing you can do for her. You can be here when she needs you.”
“I have been here when she needed me,” Shari insisted.
“One week out of how many?” he taunted. “Is that an even trade? If your education means so much to you—more than your mother—then transfer to a college closer where you can commute daily from Gold Leaf.”
“That’s what you really want, isn’t it?” she challenged bitterly. “You want me back under your thumb.”
“I want you here with your mother where you belong!” he retorted. “Postpone returning to the university until the fall semester. Or is that too much to ask, too?”
“You don’t ask!” Shari stormed, rising from the table without touching her toast or coffee. “You order! But you aren’t ordering me.”
Her long-legged strides carried her out of the room in high temper. “Come back here!” Frederick Lancaster ordered. But Shari ignored the command.
She didn’t stop until she was outside and behind the wheel of her small sports car. Leaning one arm on the steering wheel, she raked a hand through the thick mass of her raven hair in frustration. She should have known the truce wouldn’t last, but she had wanted it to so badly.
The front door opened and Shari immediately started the car’s engine, thinking it was Granddad Lancaster. But it was Rory who ran down the steps to the car.
“Sis, where are you going?” Anxiety was written in his young face as he bent down to look in the car window.
“To the hospital.”
Furrows of inner impatience and anger continued to crease her forehead.
“Don’t go back to college,” he pleaded.
She stared at him in silent shock. “You surely don’t expect me to give in to his blackmail!”
“I don’t know.” There was a quiet desperation in the way he moved his head to the side, a helpless gesture of someone at his wit’s end. “If you aren’t here, I don’t know whether I can take it. How can I stay if you go?”
“Don’t put all this on me,” Shari protested. It wasn’t fair to make her responsible for his actions but that was precisely what Rory was doing. The emotional blackmail was coming at her from another member of the family.
“You’re the only one who understands,” Rory persisted. “Please, don’t go back.”
There was too much pressure. She lowered her head for an instant. “I don’t know what I’m going to do.” Shari sighed heavily and looked out the car’s windshield with troubled green eyes. “I’ve got to go, or Mom will be wondering where I am.” She shifted the car out of neutral gear into drive, and Rory stepped back.
Shari had a lot of time to think during the drive to the hospital, but her thoughts were no clearer when she arrived. Her mother seemed to be in exceptionally good spirits, which gave Shari a little boost.
A couple of her mother’s friends stopped by to visit her. Shari waited until they had left before attempting to bring the conversation around to her imminent departure for college. If her mother took the news well, then the pressure from her grandfather would be negated. At least, that’s what Shari hoped.
“Did I tell you Beth Daniels called this morning to see how you were?” she asked brightly and saw the vagueness in her mother’s eyes that indicated the name wasn’t familiar to her. “You’ve heard me talk about Beth,” Shari reminded her mother. “She and I are in the same sorority at college. Beth, myself, and Doré Evans were spending our vacation together when you had your stroke.”
There was a movement of the woman’s head on the pillow as she recalled the name. Shari reached out to link her fingers with her mother’s right hand in a kind of reassurance.
“Anyway, I told Beth how much better you are, improving by leaps and bounds every day,” Shari smiled in silent encouragement.
“I’m … try … ing.” Her mother had to speak slowly, and carefully form the words to make them come out right.
“You are succeeding,” Shari insisted and paused before breaking the news to her mother. “Beth was concerned that I wouldn’t be able to make it back for the start of classes Monday morning, but I explained you would be released next week so there wasn’t any reason for me to delay coming back.”
“N … no.” Her mother frantically tried to get her message across, tightening her hold on Shari’s hand as if to keep Shari at her side.
Shari felt the wrenching of her heartstrings and tried to conceal how her mother’s distress was affecting her. “You’ll be all right,” she assured her, more confidently than she felt. “You’ll be home soon with Granddad, Whit, and Rory. Mrs. Youngblood will spoil you terribly.”
Her mother became very agitated which only hampered her ability to talk. “M … m … miss … you.”
“I’ll miss you, too,” Shari insisted. “But I’m only a phone call away. I can come home on the weekends to see you. That really isn’t so bad, is it?” she reasoned, but her mother wasn’t convinced.
Granddad Lancaster’s warning kept ringing in her ears—what if she has a relapse? Shari tried desperately to calm her mother down and make sense of the mumbled words she was saying without much success. There were tears in her mother’s eyes and a mist was forming in Shari’s emerald pair.
She was about to ring for a nurse when she heard a set of footsteps approach the private room. She recognized that easy striding walk immediately. Relief trembled through her when Whit appeared in the doorway. His sweeping glance quickly assessed the situation.
“What’s going on here?” Although his voice was light, his gaze was sharp as he walked to the hospital bed. There was a gentleness about his expression that enhanced his innate strength.
“Mom became upset when I mentioned I was due back at college Monday for classes,” Shari explained, because her mother was too agitated to make herself understood. “I’ve told her she’ll be all right.”
Whit rested a hand on Shari’s shoulder, but kept his attention centered on her mother. A smile of understanding curved his mouth.
“You don’t want Shari to go back, is that it?” he asked. Her mother relaxed a little and nodded with slight relief. “I’ll have a talk with her,” he promised and her mother cast an anxious glance at Shari. “Will you trust me to handle this, Elizabeth?” Whit asked.
There was a hesitation before her mother agreed with a small nod of her head. “Yes,” she said clearly and appeared considerably reassured.
Shari marveled at how quickly Whit had brought the situation under control. He had only promised to talk to her, not guaranteeing the results, yet her mother was satisfied. Shari conceded that he definitely had a way about him that inspired confidence.
His hand tightened on her shoulder, but when he spoke, it was addressed to her mother. “I’m going to buy Shari a cup of coffee. I’ll be back later to see you.”
The pressure of his hand prompted Shari to stand. “We won’t be gone long,” she promised her mother and allowed Whit to escort her from the room.
As they walked down the corridor, Shari slanted a look at his chiseled profile. She liked its strength and the straight bridge of his nose, the intelligent slant of his forehead and the slight thrust of his chin. His hair was the color of burley tobacco, vitally thick and styled with masculine carelessness.
When his downward glance intercepted her study of him, Shari tried to hide the interest that had been strictly feminine. “I don’t know how you did it,” she declared with a disbelieving shake of her head.
“Did what?” Whit asked.
“Pacified Mother,” she replied. “You are more effective than a sedative.”
A throaty chuckle came from him, its rich, deep sound warm with humor. “I don’t know if I like being told I put people to sleep.”
“Ah, but only if that’s what you want them to do,” Shari qualified the statement, a dark brow arching with amusement.
“Do you have any suggestions how I might go about persuading you to wait until the fall term to go back to college?” Whit inquired with seeming humor, but, underneath, he was quite serious.
Shari lowered her gaze to the tiled floor of the hospital corridor, all her defenses leaping into place. “Don’t you start in on me, too, Whit,” she asked grimly. “I’m not sure I can take it. First, it was Granddad, then Rory, then Mom, and now you. Why do you have to gang up on me like this?”
“Haven’t you got the message yet?” he asked quietly. “We are all lost without you, Shari. Gold Leaf doesn’t seem alive if you aren’t there.”
Whit sounded so serious, as if he truly meant every word he was saying. Shari was forced to meet the dark intensity of his gaze. She couldn’t believe she was that important to all of them, yet the insistence was there in his eyes.
Stopping, Whit drew her to the side of the corridor out of the traffic area. She faced him, uncertain about his reason for halting. One hand continued to rest on the curve of her waist while his other hand smoothed the hair away from her cheek and stayed to hold her face.
The action was so close to a caress there was a little race of her pulse. If any other man than Whit had done it, Shari would have regarded it as such.
“Have I ever asked you to do anything for me?” Whit murmured the husky challenge.
The way he was looking at her made everything else seem unimportant. “No,” she admitted, disturbed by the softness of her answer.
“Then, I’m asking you now—for me. Stay with us at Gold Leaf until the fall term begins?” His steady gaze continued to weave its spell over her.
She breath
ed in, trying to find the willful stubbornness that had seen her through the confrontations with the other members of her family but it wasn’t there. She was powerless to refuse him.
“I’ll stay.” Shari released the indrawn breath in a sigh of surrender to a force she couldn’t identify or combat. Her troubled green eyes searched the rugged, male contours of Whit’s face, trying to discover why he had succeeded when the others had failed.
“Thank you.” He bent his head toward her.
For a split second, Shari was startled by the warmth of his male lips against hers. Something was wrong with her reaction to the innocent kiss. Little quivers of delight were running through her.
In a completely involuntary action, her lips softened and moved against his to invite a more complete demonstration of his affection. Just for an instant, Shari felt his mouth harden in response, then Whit was pulling away.
“I promised you a cup of coffee, didn’t I?” There was a certain briskness in his reminder while a degree of aloofness had entered his expression.
Shari desperately tried to match it. “Yes, you did.” She didn’t want him to guess that his brotherly kiss of gratitude had been misinterpreted.
They resumed their course to the cafeteria. Over a cup of coffee, they discussed only general topics. No reference was made to her decision to stay at Gold Leaf for the rest of the summer—or to the brief kiss that she had nearly made into something more.
When they returned to her mother’s room, Whit informed Elizabeth that Shari had agreed to stay at Gold Leaf and return to college for the fall semester, but he didn’t make a momentous occasion out of it. He treated it as a simple thing and, thus, prevented her mother from making a big fuss over it. After chatting with her for twenty minutes, Whit excused himself, explaining he was needed at Gold Leaf.
After he’d gone, Shari read to her mother for a while. Nothing was said about her decision to stay. It was as if she had never mentioned leaving. Shari let the pretense stand. She didn’t want to think about how easily she had given in to Whit’s subtle persuasion.
That evening, she arrived at Gold Leaf just as the family was sitting down to dinner. Whit stood to pull out the chair next to his, inviting her to join them. Shari hesitated, then sat down. When she caught the relieved look in Rory’s eyes, she knew Whit had informed them that she was staying for the summer.
