Hard to Handle

by Diana Palmer

  “I’ll miss you,” she said softly.

  He lifted an eyebrow and smiled mockingly. “Will you? Why?”

  She bit her lower lip without answering.

  He stuck his hands into his pockets and the smile left his face as he looked down at her. “Sex is a bad basis for a relationship,” he said bluntly. “I wanted you. Any man would. But common ground is something we never had, and never could. I don’t want a white lover, any more than I want a white wife. When I marry, if I marry, it will be to one of my own people. Is that clear enough?”

  Her face went very pale, so that her blue eyes were the only color in it. “Yes,” she said. “You told me that before.”

  “I want to make sure you get the message,” he replied, forcing the words out. “It was a game. I play it with white women all the time. A little flirting, a little lovemaking, no harm done. But you’re one of those throwbacks who equate sex with forever after. Sorry, honey, one night isn’t worth my freedom, no matter how fascinating it was to have a virgin.”

  She dropped her wounded eyes to his sports jacket. “I see,” she said, her voice haunted.

  His fists clenched inside his pockets. It was killing him to do this! But he had to. He was so damned vulnerable that he wouldn’t have the strength to resist her if she kept pursuing him. It had to end quickly. “Now go back to your office and stop trying to fan old flames. I’ve had all of you that I want….”

  She whirled and ran before he finished, tears staining her cheeks. Nothing had ever hurt so much. She went into her office and slammed the door, grateful that her coworkers were still at lunch. She dried her tears after a while and forced herself to work. But she knew she’d never forget the horrible things Hunter had said to her. So much for finding out how he really felt. He’d told her.

  Hunter was on his way to the airport, feeling like an animal. Tears on that sweet, loving face had hurt him. It had taken every ounce of willpower he had not to chase her into the office and dry them. But he’d accomplished what he set out to do, he’d driven her away. Now all he had to do was live with it, and he’d never have to worry about the threat of Jennifer again.

  Simple words. But as the weeks turned into months, he grew morose. Not seeing Jennifer was far worse than having her around. He missed her. His grandfather noticed his preoccupation and mentioned it to him one evening as they watched the horses prance in the corral.

  “It is the white woman, is it not?” Grandfather Sanchez Owl asked in Apache.

  “Yes,” Hunter replied, too sad to prevaricate.

  “Go to her,” he was advised.

  Hunter’s hands tightened on the corral. “I cannot. She could never live here.”

  “If she loved you, she could.” He touched the younger man’s shoulder. “Your mother never loved your father. She found him unique and she collected him, as a man collects fine horses. When his uniqueness began to pale, she left him. It is the way of things. There was no love to begin with.”

  “You never told me this.”

  Grandfather’s broad shoulders rose and fell. “It was not necessary. Now it is. This woman…she loves you?”

  Hunter stared out over the corral. “She did. But I have done my best to make her hate me.”

  “Love is a gift. One should not throw it away.”

  Hunter glanced at him. “I thought that I could not give up my freedom. I thought that she, like my mother, would betray me.”

  “A man should think with his heart, not his head, when he loves,” the old man said quietly. “You do love, do you not?”

  Hunter looked away, wounded inside, aching as he thought of Jennifer’s soft eyes promising heaven, remembered the feel of her chaste body in his arms, loving him. He closed his eyes. “Yes,” he said huskily, fiercely. “Yes, I love!”

  “Then go back before it is too late.”

  “She is white!” Hunter ground out.

  The old man smiled. “So are you, in your thinking. It is something you do not want to face, but you are as comfortable in the white man’s world as you are here. Probably more so, because your achievements are there and not here. A man can live with a foot in two worlds. You have proven it.”

  “It wouldn’t be fair to a child,” he said slowly.

  The old man chuckled. “A man should have a son,” he said. “Many sons. Many daughters. If they are loved, they will find a place in life. This white woman…is she handsome?”

  Hunter saw her face as clearly as if she were standing beside him. “She is sunset on the desert,” he said quietly. “The first bloom on the cactus. She is the silence of night and the beauty of dawn.”

  The old man’s eyes grew misty with memory. “If she is all those things,” he replied, “then you are a fool.”

  Hunter looked over at him. “Yes, I am.” He moved away from the fence. “I am, indeed!”

  He caught a plane that very afternoon. All the way to Tulsa, he prayed silently that he wasn’t going to be too late. There was every chance that Jennifer had taken him seriously and found someone else. If she had, he didn’t know how he was going to cope. He should have listened to his heart in the first place. If he’d lost her, he’d never forgive himself.

  To say that Eugene was shocked to see him was an understatement. The old man sat at his desk and gaped when Hunter came into the office.

  “I sent you to Phoenix,” he said.

  “I came back,” Hunter returned curtly. “Jennifer isn’t here. Where is she?”

  Eugene’s eyebrows arched. “Don’t tell me you care, one way or the other?”

  The dark face hardened visibly. “Where is she?”

  “At her apartment, taking a well-earned vacation.”

  “I see.”

  Eugene narrowed one eye. “Before you get any ideas, she’s been seeing one of the other geologists.”

  Hunter felt his breath stop in his throat. His dark eyes cut into Eugene’s. “Has she?”

  “Don’t hurt her any more than you already have,” the old man said, suddenly stern and as icy as his security chief had ever been. “She’s just beginning to get over you. Leave her alone. Let her heal.”

  Something in Hunter wavered. He stared down at the carpeted floor, feeling uncertain for the first time in memory. “This geologist…is it serious?”

  “I don’t know. They’ve been dating for a couple of weeks. She’s a little brighter than she has been, a little less brittle.”

  Hunter’s hands clenched in his pockets. He looked up. “Is she well?” he asked huskily.

  “She’s better than she was just after you left,” Eugene said noncommittally. He eyed the younger man quietly. “You’ve said often enough that you hated white woman. You finally convinced her. What do you want now—to torment her some more?”

  Hunter averted his face and stared out the window. “My mother was white,” he said after a minute, and felt rather than saw Eugene’s surprise. “She walked out on my father when I was five. I thought she didn’t love him enough to stay, but my grandfather said that she never loved him at all. It…made a difference in the way I looked at things. To ask a woman to marry a different culture, to accept a foreign way of life, is no small thing. But where love exists, perhaps hope does, too.”

  Eugene softened. “You love her.”

  Hunter turned back to him. “Yes,” he said simply. “Life without her is no life at all. Whatever the risk, it can’t be as bad as the past few months have been.”

  The older man smiled. He picked up a sheaf of papers and tossed them across the desk. “There’s your excuse. Tell her I sent those for her to look over.”

  Hunter took them, staring at the old man. “Have I killed what she felt?” he asked quietly. “Does she speak of me at all?”

  Eugene sighed. “To be honest, no, she doesn’t. Whatever her feelings, she keeps them to herself. I’m afraid I can’t tell you anything. You’ll have to go and find out for yourself.”

  He nodded. After a minute, he went out and closed the doo
r quietly behind him. He wondered if Jennifer would even speak to him. Whether she’d be furiously angry or cold and unapproachable, remembering the brutal things he’d said to her when they parted.

  All the way to her apartment, he refused to allow himself to think about it. But when he pressed the doorbell, he found that he was holding his breath.

  11

  Jennifer left her dishes in the sink and went to answer the doorbell, a little irritated at the interruption. She’d spent the past few months in such misery that she was only beginning to get her head above water again. Missing Hunter had become a way of life, despite the fact that she’d started dating a very nice divorced geologist in her group. And if he did spend the whole of their evenings together talking about his ex-wife, what did that matter? Didn’t she spend them talking about Hunter and things they’d done together?

  She opened the door, and froze. So many lonely nights, dreaming of that hard, dark face, and here he stood. She felt her insides melting at just the sight of him, feeding on it like a starving woman.

  She stared up at him with a helpless rapture in her eyes, the old warm vulnerability in her face. It had been so long since she’d seen him. The anguish of the time between lay helplessly in her face as she looked at him. He watched her with equal intensity. His dark eyes held hers for an endless, shattering moment before they slid down her thin body and back up again. She looked as if she was shattered to find him on her doorstep, but at least she wasn’t actively hostile. He measured her against his memories for one long moment.

  “You can’t afford to lose this kind of weight,” he said softly. “Are you all right?”

  His concern was almost her undoing. She had to fight tears at the tenderness in his voice. She forced a smile. Act, girl, she told herself. You can do it. You did it before, when it was even harder. He’s surely here on business, so don’t throw yourself at his feet.

  “I’ve been on a diet,” she lied. “Come in and I’ll brew some coffee. How are you?”

  He stepped into the apartment, looking and feeling alien in it. His eyes were restless, wandering around. Her apartment reflected her personality and her life-style. There were souvenirs from her travels everywhere, along with the sunny colors that echoed her own personality, and the numerous whimsical objects she delighted in. Potted plants covered every inch of available space, and ferns and green plants trailed down from high shelves. There were Indian accents, too, including a war shield and some basketry. His eyes lingered on those. Apache. He smiled gently.

  She saw where his gaze had fallen and tried to divert him. “My dad says it looks like a jungle in here, but I like green things,” she said, leading him into the kitchen. She tugged nervously at her yellow tank top. “How have you been? Is this a business call? Did Eugene want me for something? I’m just off for this week, but I guess…!”

  “Eugene wanted me to drop some papers off for you,” he said, drawing them out of his inside jacket pocket. He dropped them onto the kitchen table. “Something about a new rock formation one of your colleagues wants to check out.” He pulled out a chair and straddled it, his eyes narrowing as he watched her make coffee. “I thought you might go back into the field after I left. What happened?”

  “I’ve decided I like desk work,” she said. It was a bald-faced lie, but he couldn’t be told that. “I’m getting too old for fieldwork. Twenty-eight next birthday,” she added with a smile.

  “I know.” He leaned his chin on his dark hands, clasped on the high back of the chair. “Still alone?” he pursued.

  “There’s a nice man in my office. Divorced, two kids. We…go out together.” She glanced at him. “You?”

  The geologist made him angry. Jealous. His dark eyes glittered and he found a weapon of his own. “There’s a widow who lives next door to my grandfather, on the reservation. No kids. She’s a great cook. No alarming habits.”

  “And she’s Apache,” she said for him on a bitter, painful laugh.

  “Yes,” he bit off. “She’s Apache. No complications. No social barriers. No adjustments.”

  “Good for you. Going to marry her?”

  He pulled out a cigarette and lit it without answering. The snub made her nervous.

  She got down coffee cups and filled them. “Are you going to take off your coat, or is it glued on?”

  He chuckled in spite of himself, shedding the expensive raincoat. She took it from him and carried it into the bedroom, to drape it carefully over the foot of her bed. A few minutes, that was all she had to get through. Then he’d go away, and she could again begin to try to get over him.

  She went back into the kitchen, all smiles and courtesy and they talked about everything in the world except themselves. No matter what tactics he used to draw her out about her feelings, she parried them neatly. He was beginning to believe Eugene, that she had no feelings left for him. And he had only himself to blame, he knew. He’d deliberately tried to hurt her, to chase her away. The fact that his motives had been good ones at the time counted for nothing. He felt empty and alone. He knew he was going to feel that way for the rest of his life. He’d almost certainly lost her. She talked about the fellow geologist as though he’d become her world.

  He put out his second cigarette and glanced at his watch. “I’ve got to go,” he said in a voice without expression.

  “Another overseas assignment, no doubt,” she tried to sound cheery.

  “Internal,” he replied. He glanced at her. “I’ve given up fieldwork, too. I lost the taste for it.”

  That was surprising. He didn’t seem the type to thrive on a desk job. But then, she’d thought she wasn’t the type, either. She managed. Probably the widow didn’t want him in a dangerous job anymore, and he’d given it up for her sake. The thought made her sick.

  “I’ll get your coat,” she said, smiling. Her face would be frozen in its assumed position by the time he left, she thought ruefully.

  She picked up his coat from the bed. This would be the last time. He’d marry the widow and she’d never see him again. She’d lost him for good now. She drew his coat slowly to her breasts and cradled it against her, tears clogging her eyes, her throat. She brought it to her lips and kissed it with breathless tenderness, bending her head over it with a kind of pain she’d never felt before in her life. It held the faint scent of the cologne he wore, of the tobacco he smoked. It smelled of him, and the touch of it was precious. She was losing him forever. She didn’t know how she was going to live.

  She straightened, feeling old and alone, wondering how she was going to go back in there and pretend that it didn’t matter about his widow. That the past few months had been happy and full. That her life was fine without him in it.

  In the other room, the man who’d happened to glance toward her bedroom had seen something reflected in the mirror facing the door that froze him where he stood. Her lighthearted act had convinced him that she didn’t care, that she never had. But that woman holding his coat loved him. The emotion he saw in her face would haunt him forever, humble him every time he remembered the anguish in those soft blue eyes. She wasn’t happy without him. He knew now that she’d been pretending ever since he’d walked into the apartment. She’d only been putting on an act about not caring, to hide her real feelings. He grimaced, thinking how close a call it had been. If he’d taken her act for granted and left, his life would never have been the same.

  He caught his breath and turned away. All his former arguments about the reasons they were better apart vanished in an agony of need. If he walked out that door, she was going to die. If not physically, surely emotionally. She loved him that much. He loved her that much, too. It was vaguely frightening, to love to that degree. But even with the obstacles, they were going to make it. He’d never been more certain of anything in his life.

  He took the coat from her when she rejoined him, her mask firmly in place again. She couldn’t know that he’d seen her through the mirror, so he didn’t let on. He wanted to see how far she was w
illing to go with the charade, if she could keep it up until he walked out. Now that he knew how she felt, it was like anticipating a Christmas present that was desperately wanted.

  “It was nice to see you again,” she said as she went with him to the door.

  “Same here.” He opened the door and stood silhouetted in it, with his long back to her, looking alien and somehow unapproachable. “You haven’t said whether you were glad to see me, Jennifer,” he said quietly, without turning.

  She lowered her eyes to the floor. “It’s always good to see old…friends, Phillip.”

  He drew in his breath sharply. The sound of his name in her soft voice brought back unbearable memories. “Were we ever friends?”

  “No. Not really. I’m…I’m glad…about your widow, I mean,” she said, unable to conceal a faint note of bitter anguish in her tone.

  He sighed, still with his back to her. “The widow just turned eighty-two. She’s my godmother.”

  Her heart jumped. She took a steadying breath. “The divorced man only takes me out so he can talk about his ex-wife. He still loves her.”

  He turned. He shook his head, the light in his eyes disturbing, humbling. “Oh, God, what a close call we had! You little idiot, do you really think I came here on business?” He held out his arms and she went into them. And just that quickly, that easily, the obstacles were pushed aside, the loneliness of the past gone forever.

  He bent to her mouth and hers answered it. She moaned, shuddering, her control gone forever.

  He lifted his head, and had to fight her clinging arms. “I’m going to close and lock the door, that’s all,” he whispered shakily, reaching out to do it. “I don’t want the neighbors to watch us make love.”

  “Are we going to?” she asked helplessly.

  He nodded. “Oh, yes,” he said fervently. He bent, lifting her in his arms. “I love you,” he whispered at her lips, watching the soft, incredulous wonder grow in her face as he said it. “And now I’m going to prove it physically, in the intimacy of lovemaking. At least I won’t have to hurt you, will I, little one?” he asked, smiling gently at the memory of that night in his house.