Phil Harris was around sixty and a perfect stand-in for Colonel Sanders; Leigh wished she could weather his heavy-handed humor with a bourbon—or four—but because of her pregnancy, she could only sip her ginger ale and smile. His wife, Irene, dressed fussily in lavender, was a nonstop talker. The business manager of the group was Jackson Cunningham, a short man with small cat’s eyes that seemed to miss very little of what went on around him. He refused food or drink or any other kind of entertainment; he had his mind strictly on business until Leigh finally ferreted out an interest in fishing. She was able to raise no smiles, but still felt a modicum of success when she at least got him to sit down and stop his restless roving while waiting for the others to get down to brass tacks.
Phil’s son, Dan Harris, was as tall as Brian and as thin as a sapling, with light hair and colorless eyes. He had as much interest in business as a cat in swimming; he cared only for the profits in this deal, and was eager to talk money. Rita, Dan’s wife, was a dark-haired beauty in a red peasant-styled dress. Leigh felt an instant antipathy toward her when she positioned herself on the arm of Brian’s chair, leaning over, talking and laughing intimately with him. No one else seemed to notice, or perhaps they were used to her, or perhaps they just didn’t care. But Leigh cared: Rita’s behavior, and the way Brian seemed to lap it up, reminded her forcefully of how tenuous a hold she had on her husband.
After the better part of an hour, Phil finally brought up business and the glasses were set down. A few details were argued, and then Brian’s proposal was accepted. A basic contract was set before him, to be returned in the morning after he’d looked it over. Finally the Harrises and Jackson Cunningham rose as a group to leave. When the door was closed behind them, Leigh gave an audible sigh of relief. The next time Brian described people as being “difficult,” she would be more inclined to believe him. But it was all over now. He had his project, and Leigh felt a certain pride in having been part of that.
Brian, however, did not appear to be in a mood for rejoicing. With a fresh drink in his hand, he had opened the sliding doors to the balcony and was staring out over the ocean. Leigh started gathering the glasses and dishes to clean up, and as quietly as possible removed herself to the kitchen. It was obvious from the intent concentration on Brian’s face that he wanted no company. She had seen the beginnings of a brood coming on before. Without disturbing him, she snatched up a sweater and went out the back door for a few minutes of fresh air.
The sunset had just finished its color splash; the stars were barely visible and a faint hue of violet was still reflected on the horizon. Leigh reclined on a chaise longue on the small patio, feeling peace flood over her like a warm blanket.
Brian’s footsteps startled her some minutes later. She got up instantly with a smile of welcome, but the smile faded as she saw the tension in his face.
“You heard me tell the Harrises the project will take closer to four months than two,” he began abruptly.
“I heard you, Brian,” she answered quietly. “But so what? Not knowing how long we’d be away, I didn’t take on any new clients before we left. And you arranged things with your partners, so what’s the problem?”
“No problem at all,” he said tersely. “But surely you don’t think I’d let you stay here, away from your own doctor, and especially now that I know about the possibility of twins?”
“I don’t understand what all the fuss is about,” she told him. “Surely I can take a plane up once a month to see Dr. Franklin and—”
“My schedule will be crazy. I won’t have much time for you. You know how I am when I’m working on something big, Leigh.”
“Yes, I do know. And I understand. Brian, I love you—”
“You think you do,” he cut her off sharply. “Look, Leigh, I need some time to myself. I’m going for a walk.” And with that, he turned abruptly on his heel and left.
He was gone a long time. Leigh stayed outside until she was shivering in the damp cool air, shivering in apprehension as well. Why didn’t he want her to stay? Could it be that he was planning an affair with Rita Harris, and the presence of his wife—his pregnant wife—would cramp his style? Despair touched her heart.
An hour passed and then two, and finally she gave in to weariness, going inside to wash and undress for bed, listening intently for the sound of the door. The lights were off and she was under the covers when he finally came in.
“You’re going home, Leigh,” he told her flatly. It was a tone he had used before, one that brooked no discussion.
“Why?” She switched on the light by the bed, making no pretense of being any nearer sleep than she was. “What are you talking about?” She didn’t dare mention Rita, show herself as a jealous, shrewish wife. He had married her precisely because he’d thought he could do so and still retain his freedom.
He stripped off his tie, shirt, and then the rest of his clothes. “Leigh, I’m going to be very busy for the next few months. I won’t be there for you if you need me. At home you’ve at least got Robert around during the day if you don’t feel well, and you’re only a phone call away from your doctor.”
“Brian, Robert could come down here and stay,” she said reasonably. “We have room. It would do him good.”
He didn’t bother to look at her as he switched out the light and climbed into the other side of the bed. “I’ll book you a flight at the end of the week.”
“You can book a dozen flights if you want,” Leigh snapped.
Brian was silent for a long time. And then suddenly he switched on the light and turned to her. Leigh had her arms folded rigidly under her breasts and her eyes were ablaze with fury and unshed tears.
“It won’t work, Red. Not for me,” he said coldly. “Do I have to come right out and say I don’t want you here?”
She lowered her eyes so that he wouldn’t see the pain in them, and immediately turned away, lying on her side. The hurt nearly choked her. “I’ll book my own flight in the morning,” she said hoarsely.
He turned out the light again, and as if in a bad dream she felt his palm on the back of her neck, pretending to soothe with incredible gentleness. She jabbed back with her elbow; hit out at his hand. “You have to be joking, Brian! Leave me alone!” It was hard enough being told he didn’t want her, without revealing to him just how vulnerable she was where he was concerned. There wasn’t a chance in hell she would ever stay where she wasn’t wanted.
He drew her protesting furiously to the cradle of his chest.
A trickle of wetness slid down her cheeks, and she lodged her hands helplessly between the two of them. “I hate you!” she hissed.
“That’s just the problem, Leigh, you don’t,” he said gently. “Do you think I don’t know what you’re feeling? You’re so sure you’re in love with me, Red.” He gave her a penny of distance, and she reached up hurriedly to wipe away the tears on her cheeks. “It’s not love, Leigh. It’s only the feeling a woman has for the first man who’s made love to her. You’ll be fine once you get away from me. There hasn’t been too much time together…like this. You’re just in a hurry to love, now that you know what it’s about, and it shows in your every action. You’re going to get hurt if you stay here. A breather will do us both some good, and then we’ll see.”
She didn’t argue. She knew from the tone in his voice that there wasn’t any point. The threat of tears passed. She had never realized how much pride she had—until now, when it seemed to be the only thing she had. She sat up stiffly on the edge of the bed. “What I felt for you, Brian,” she said quietly, “was alive a long time before you made love to me.”
“Leigh,” he said gently.
She stood up to avoid the touch of his arm. “No,” she said firmly.
“You fought hard to have that child in you conceived,” he said harshly. “One of us has to think of what’s best for—”
“Oh, shut up, Brian!” Leigh stormed. If nothing else, she hoped to part from him with honesty. It was for his sake and not he
rs that she was leaving. She thought the less of him for not admitting it, when all of the humiliation was on her side. “I’ll take care of myself from now on, and the baby, too. I don’t want any more help from you of any kind! What’s ‘best for me’ no longer has anything to do with you!”
***
Leigh left before sunrise, being careful not to awaken Brian. She took only her purse and a small tote bag of belongings she always carried with her. There were no frequently scheduled flights from the Keys, so she knew she couldn’t count on getting a seat, particularly at this time of year. She ended up renting a car to Miami, because she had no choice.
By dinnertime she was back home in Chicago exhausted, hollow-eyed and thoroughly miserable after having been sick throughout most of the flight. She could hear Monster barking and Robert scolding the pup even before the door was opened. Outside, snow was still lush on the ground, although a thaw was forecast for the following week.
As soon as the door opened, Leigh threw her arms around Robert and burst into tears. “What on earth? Oh, honey,” Robert said, his voice familiarly soothing. His shock at seeing her—and alone—was clear, but being Robert he didn’t express anything but the comfort she so obviously needed. She was fed soup and crackers, regaled with a list of achievements Monster had failed to master and assured that she had been sorely missed.
“Got eighteen inches of snow one day.” The blizzard had shut down the city, and as Robert told Leigh the details he studied her every feature.
As she did his. Robert was so dear to her, and he didn’t look well. She had been gone less than two weeks; how could he have aged so rapidly? “Have you been feeling all right?” she asked sharply.
“God, you’re starting in already,” he groaned.
The kitchen table had never looked so good, with Robert’s wrinkled face on the other side of it. The silky black pup was nestled on the tips of Leigh’s shoes, fast asleep. The kitchen was and always had been her favorite room in the house, and even the memories of Brian here were pleasant ones. But Brian didn’t want her—she mustn’t think of him.
“So,” Robert said carefully, “I gather we’re not to mention his name, or talk about it?”
At times, Leigh thought sadly, Robert could be heart-breakingly sensitive. “I love you, Robert,” she said. “If I haven’t told you before—”
“You’ll give me indigestion,” he interrupted gruffly.
She smiled, or tried to. “I want to move, and sell this house. Do you think you’re up for it?”
“Why?” he demanded.
“Because…” Because she’d just had twelve hours in which to think of something else besides Brian. “I don’t know. There’s to be a new baby, and I don’t like the idea of crowding it with old memories. I’ve been happy enough here, for most of the time, but…my mother wasn’t. And David—certainly wasn’t a happy man.”
“A fresh start for the baby, is that it?”
She nodded, and poured herself a second cup of tea.
“You have a place in mind?”
“In a way.”
“Someplace that’s for sale?”
“I haven’t the least idea,” Leigh said frankly. “For a long time, there’s been a certain house I liked, Robert. I just thought I’d knock on the door tomorrow and ask—”
“You’re not serious, honey. You can’t do that.”
“Of course I can, Robert. I can do whatever I have to do to survive.”
***
Survival was the issue, for more than four months. Long ago, Leigh had determined what made a life worth waking up to: someone to care for, someone to love. She had Robert already, and soon she would have the baby, and never mind that the bleakness in her heart seemed to overshadow everything.
She survived the move and sale of the old place during her sixth month of pregnancy. By some miracle, the woman who lived in the new house had been debating moving closer to her relatives in the South and Leigh’s offer settled the issue. The house was Brian’s design, and Leigh had sought it out deliberately—not to continually torture herself with reminders of the past, but as a legacy for her child. The house was as perfect as she knew it would be, all space and serenity, and the use of glass and wood and earth textures seemed to bring the outside in. Her face grew gaunt as she worked feverishly with endless piles of boxes to pack and unpack, yards and yards of curtains to put up, and the baby’s room to decorate.
She survived Robert’s increasing frailty. He liked the house well enough because it was all on one floor, but each day it seemed harder for him to get around despite all of Leigh’s efforts to protect him. He’d taken the move in his stride, but the doctor’s confirmation that Leigh indeed was carrying twins had upset him greatly. “Leigh, you can’t handle it,” he cautioned her. “One will like nights and the other days—one will sleep while the other’s up…” She tried to console him by joking that at least it was not triplets, but his feeble smile didn’t hide the increasing lines of fatigue and worry on his face.
And she survived the phone calls and the mail. She had answered the phone that first time, the night of her homecoming, to hear Brian demanding to know why she had stolen from his side in the middle of the night.
“I would have driven you to the airport,” he said angrily. “For heaven’s sake, Leigh, what’s the matter with you?”
“Nothing,” she said frostily. “I’m perfectly fine, Brian. It’s just, well, I’ve had time to think. I’ve decided you’re right, we need a breather from each other. I see that I was mistaken after all. It was sex, not love, and I…well, I just can’t deal with it all right now. I have a million things to do in the next few months to prepare for the baby. I have to get a nursery ready—buy the crib, the layette, a playpen. Robert isn’t too well, either. He needs me. And you’re busy, too. When you come back to Chicago, we’ll talk.”
“I see,” he said curtly. “The old self-sufficient Leigh, eh? But don’t forget, it’s my baby, too. And I’m concerned about Robert. I… Oh, hell, I’m late for a dinner with the Harrises, but I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?”
So, he wanted to keep up a connection—for the baby’s sake—and he cared about Robert, too. Good, let him talk to Robert then, between his dinners with Rita Harris. From that moment on, Leigh made herself unavailable to Brian. She didn’t read his emails. She told Robert to take his calls and say that she wasn’t in. “Don’t question me, Robert,” she pleaded. “It’s all over between Brian and me. I don’t want to discuss it.”
Even with the move and her deliberately unlisted phone number, Brian tracked her down somehow and called Robert regularly, at specific times that she guessed were prearranged. “I told you she had help for the moving… Why don’t you two settle this thing, anyway… If you care so damned much… The doctor isn’t sure…” Although Leigh couldn’t help overhearing snippets of conversation, she and Robert pretended the phone calls didn’t happen, and he never asked about Brian’s emails.
She survived spring in the new house, knowing Brian had directed the landscaping for it. She could not doubt it. The dogwood, crab apple and two plum trees blossomed, their heady scents permeating the grounds. The maples, careless about adding their leaves in the spring, finally succumbed to a steady stream of warm days, and whispering breezes shivered through the fresh green leaves. There was the scent of jonquils and hyacinths and of freshly mowed grass, and violets carpeted the floor of the woods to the back of the house. The landscape was designed for spring and for lovers, for memories not yet made and those that never would be.
The nights were the hardest to survive. She dreamed of Brian, over and over again. She dreamed of that Christmas in Minnesota, when Monster was a pup and Brian was so solicitous. She threw her arms around her dream lover, and he held her, just held her, for an eternity. Time swirled and they were on the museum steps, the waves of Lake Michigan catching the late afternoon sun. He kissed her and kept on kissing her, and she felt herself slowly descending into the cool silk waters of a
pool on a day so hot…so hot. And making love the first time: the power, the velvet power of his hands! She would have staked her life that there was no such response in her, that her fear was unbridgeable, that she could never again bear being helpless at the hands of any man. But she had been helpless, and there had been no fear, no degradation. She had felt revered, loved, cherished when he made love to her. Yet it hadn’t meant a thing to him.
She always woke from the dreams with tears in her eyes. For those moments in the darkness, she hated the burden she carried. If she hadn’t been like this—big and burdensome and clumsily unattractive—she might possibly, just possibly, have risked all her pride and sanity on one last try to be with him. “I don’t want you,” he had said, and the endless refrain echoed over and over as she feverishly tried to keep busy. So how could he possibly want her as she was? Especially when he could have Rita, and any other woman he desired. Night after night, she told herself that this had to pass; she had to start living again.
Chapter 16
Leigh was so accustomed to waking at the first light of dawn that the morning of June 7 seemed no different. Perhaps a little different, she thought wearily, as she stretched and snuggled tiredly against the pillow.
She’d seen Dr. Franklin the day before. In her usual no-nonsense manner, the obstetrician had told Leigh that she wanted to induce labor on the fifteenth—two weeks early. She didn’t want to let the twins take on too much weight in their crowded space. Reassuringly, Dr. Franklin had told Leigh that both babies had strong heartbeats…and then delivered the lecture Leigh had heard before: the one about the shadows under her eyes, about her being the only patient the doctor had to encourage to eat more.
Drowsily, Leigh noted now that it was raining outside, a gentle patter against the French doors that led to the patio outside her bedroom. The sound was lulling, hypnotic, and she found herself falling asleep again. At nine she startled awake, feeling more refreshed than she had in weeks. As quickly as she could, she washed and dressed, then ambled into the kitchen. “Robert?” She was almost smiling, anticipating his reaction to her oversleeping. He had been scolding her for weeks about her early risings, but she knew he would now have a comment like, “I see you finally got around to getting up?” or “It’s so late it’s nearly time to go back to bed!”
A Daring Proposition Page 17
