Chapter 5
Jeannetta looked around her comfortable stateroom, pleased with the soft, feminine decor and glad the decorator hadn’t liked wild colors. She had decided not to splurge on first class and was glad; her cabin-class quarters offered as much elegance as she needed. Light filtered through the windows, and she moved a chair in order to look out of one. Passengers strolled the deck, and large gray birds dived off the thick wooden planks at the edge of the water, caught unlucky fish and flew away. Was everything on earth a predator, including herself? She unpacked, found an iron and ironing board in a closet and pressed a few items of clothing. Restlessness hung on her like a heavy weight, and she knew its source. Pretending an airiness she didn’t feel, she donned a pair of white slacks, a yellow T-shirt, socks and white canvas shoes, but got only as far as the door before turning around. She had to do something about Mason, had to find a way to talk with him about herself. Four weeks, and she hadn’t found an appropriate occasion. Pricked by her conscience, she admitted that he’d given her a good chance on the bus, and that she’d used a handy excuse to forfeit the opportunity. Though she knew she was responsible for her predicament with Mason, anger seethed within her, and she couldn’t help feeling hostile toward him for withholding his precious skills from desperate people.
Determined to find a way, she left the room and strolled down the deck. The fresh, salty air enlivened her as she walked along, greeting tour members and other passengers. She stretched out in a deck chair and watched the Singapore skyline, waiting for the ship to pull anchor and head out to sea. A tall man of indeterminate age and race walked over to her.
“I’m Rolfe Merchinson.” He extended his hand and waited for an invitation to sit with her. “Would you join me for a drink?”
She shook hands; not to have done so would have been out of character for her, but she refused his offer.
“Thank you, but I rarely drink.”
“Why not make this one of your exceptions?” he asked with the practiced smoothness of a worldly sophisticate. She picked up the magazine that she’d brought along for the purpose of discouraging unwanted acquaintances, glanced at it and replied.
“I’m alone here, but I’m not by myself on this ship.”
“You’re with someone?”
She nodded.
Rolfe Merchinson straightened up, bowed briefly and told her, “That is a pity. The gentleman is a lucky man, indeed.”
She glanced up as Mason approached, slowed his steps, nodded and kept walking.
“Excuse me.”
She reached the bottom of the wide curving staircase just as Mason stopped and looked back as though to confirm what he’d seen. Not a smart move, she told herself. But she hadn’t wanted Mason to think that, forty minutes after boarding ship, she’d struck up an acquaintance with a strange man. Rolfe Whatever-His-Name might have been nice enough, but she didn’t play games with men and she didn’t want Mason to think her easy pickings. She slowed her steps in the hope that she wouldn’t catch him, but he waited.
“Settled in okay?”
She nodded. “My stateroom’s super. Couldn’t ask for better.”
A smile enveloped his whole face and the warmth in his eyes seemed to caress her. Even his stern top lip had relaxed. She detected a difference in him, a softness, a strange tenderness. Maybe now was a good time to lead him to thoughts of medicine.
“How’s your patient?”
“She’s...” His eyes widened, his lower lip dropped for a second and, as though he’d programmed himself to do it, he looked over his shoulder. Something akin to anger flashed in his eyes. She’d have to brazen it out.
“Is she alright? I wondered why you had to stay with her so long last night if she only had indigestion.”
“Jeannetta, Lydia isn’t my patient. I don’t have patients. She’s a senior citizen and I was concerned about her health. Still am, for that matter.” His gaze bore into her. Searching. Judging.
“What on earth did I say to bring on this furor?” she asked as she struggled to present him with a bland, innocent face.
“Nothing. But try to remember that travel managers don’t have patients, we have customers. I’ve got a few things to attend to. Please excuse me.”
She watched his long, broad back as he strode toward his stateroom.
That sure didn’t work, she told herself. You’re in trouble, kiddo. The longer you wait, the worse it’ll be. He stopped before turning the corner and looked back at her, and she remembered that late, sun-shrouded afternoon in Paris when he’d wanted to turn the corner and, by the sheer power of her mind, she hadn’t allowed it. His gaze sliced through her until she did the only thing that she could; she smiled and held out her hand to him. She half expected him to walk on, but he stood there. She took several steps toward him, his own pain searing her, for she at last knew that he lived with discomfort and unhappiness for having disclaimed his true self.
Just like I’m pretending to be an ordinary tourist. She moved another three or four steps in his direction. She wasn’t guiltless; who was she to judge him?
She took another step toward him, and his gaze didn’t waver. For the first time, she could see vulnerability in him. She walked closer, and he took a short step toward her. Encouraged, she took another. His smile was a brilliant lamp, a symbolic beacon in the darkness, and she opened her arms wide and sped to him. Mason met her three-quarters of the way, swept her into his strong arms and twirled around with her before setting her on her feet.
“It wasn’t my intention to be short with you. I don’t know what got into me,” he said.
She had to steady herself when his eyes, a black sea of adoration, caressed her, and his gentle fingers grasped hers in a wordless entreaty that she follow him. He led them to his stateroom nearby, entered and, before his portfolio hit the floor, he had her in his arms. She raised her lips but, even in her frantic eagerness to drown in him, she had the sense that he deliberately prolonged the tension, as though starving himself before a feast. His voice, strangely dark, dusty and littered with the cobwebs of his unhappiness, penetrated her understanding, and tendrils of fear shot through her as she realized the responsibility of sharing his vulnerability. Open honesty had replaced his poker face.
“Look at me, Jeannetta. We’re alone now. We’re not in a public place, a bus. Put your arms around me and kiss me.”
Her wide-eyed gaze searched his face for an answer to the change in him.
He stroked her cheek. “Kiss me. I...I need you.”
A bolt of heady sensation shot through her, and she curled into him, wanting, needing to heal him. Desperate to belong to him. Her right hand grasped the back of his head, and she raised parted lips to his. It seemed light-years before his mouth sent flames of passion roaring through her body. She felt the tremors that shook his big frame when she pulled his tongue into her mouth and sucked it. Emboldened, she slid her leg between his, and shuddered at the force of his arousal against her thigh. His hoarse groan stripped her of what reticence she had left, and her hand went to his buttocks and pulled his arousal tighter against her thigh. Frustrated with longing to hold him inside of her, she tugged at his belt buckle, but he pulled his mouth from hers and whispered, his voice harsh.
“Honey, do you know what you’re doing?”
She couldn’t hear his words for the thundering desire that roared in her head, numbing her to everything but her ravenous craving for him. Her hips rolled wildly, out of control, and his fingers grasped them and held her still.
“I need you worse than I need to breathe, but I have to know where this is go—”
The sharp buzz of his beeper brought them both to the reality of what they were about to do. He released her body and answered, though he continued to possess her with his fiery gaze.
* * *
“Fenwick speakin
g.” He listened for a second and flipped off the beeper. “That was the first mate,” he explained. “The ship’s about to leave harbor, and cocktails will be served immediately.”
The ship’s bellow confirmed their departure. Mason moved back a step, though he held her hand firmly in his own. He hadn’t known himself capable of such burning passion, such a powerful, humbling need. He had to go somewhere and deal with his feelings. Was this the woman with whom he’d share his life? How could he know? She hadn’t levelled with him. Nor you with her, his conscience needled.
“I guess we can be glad you’re wearing that beeper.”
“Speak for yourself, honey. As far as I’m concerned, that was the same as being awakened from a deep sleep and routed out of your house in the dead of winter because the place is on fire.” She leaned her head against his chest, and he locked her in his arms.
“I want you to sit quietly and decide what you want from me. Whatever it is, be honest with yourself. I’ve had my last take-care-of-your-needs kind of relationship. I deserve more, and I’m prepared to wait until I find it. I don’t doubt that if we hadn’t been interrupted we’d be lovers right now, and I’m also sure that both of us would have had second thoughts afterward.” He glanced at his watch. “I have to check on Lydia. I didn’t like the look of her when she boarded. When we get to Bangkok, I may send her home. It would be a pity, though, because she wanted so badly to make this trip.”
“Has she told you the truth about her health?”
He looked closely at her, certain that her voice had wavered.
“I doubt it. Truth isn’t too popular these days.” The tightening of her fingers in his hand told him more than she knew. “But we’ll settle it in Bangkok, if not before.” His words held an ominous ring for him, a dark prophesy reverberating in his head. He gazed down at her in wonder that she could induce such a mood in him.
“I hope you don’t have to send her home.”
He shook his head. He’d told her to face what was happening between them, and she’d managed to skirt the issue. Did she think he didn’t know that? She had discouraged him, but she’d also set him on fire and, on at least two occasions, she’d been deliberate about it. He grinned down at her, though he took pains to shut off his emotions.
“When we were on the plane to Singapore, you asked me if I planned to kiss you anymore. You may or may not have been serious, but, I assure you, if you get your ducks in a straight row, I’ll kiss you every time I get the chance.”
Her eyelids fluttered downward, and he tipped up her chin with his left index finger.
“What’s the matter, you don’t like the idea?”
She gave him a quick peck on the cheek and started for the door. “Don’t we have to dress for dinner?”
He nodded, and she blew him a kiss and walked out. He smiled, a satisfied male reflex at the shakiness of her steps after their passionate exchange, until the doctor in him doubted kisses could make a person stagger.
He showered quickly, and changed into a white shirt, white linen jacket and navy slacks. Black shoes, a red tie and a handkerchief completed his outfit. He left his room thinking how much simpler a surgeon’s green cotton garb was than the stylish clothes he had to wear as a travel manager. He strolled along the deck, letting the fresh salty wind invigorate him, but an unsettled feeling stirred in him. He paused and propped his foot against the rail, stared out at the dark sky above him and the South China Sea all around him, black but for the whitecaps of the rough water. So much like his life. He’d opened his soul to her, shamelessly let her see into him, into his heart. She had responded with a passion that he hadn’t previously known, but she hadn’t offered her trust, her truth, the person inside of her. Could he turn back? He didn’t think so, but she didn’t have to know that.
He shook off the mood, walked into the cocktail lounge, ordered a vodka and tonic and leaned against the grand piano, his gaze glued to the door. She stopped in the doorway of the lounge and looked around, a vision in a red sleeveless sheath that defined a perfect feminine silhouette. Breath hissed out of his lungs when she saw him and a smile claimed her face. His passion steamed as though hot coals simmered in his blood, and the innocent undulations of her rhythmic movements triggered his desire as she glided to him. Damn. He tossed his drink to the back of his throat, and his fingers squeezed his parents’ door keys that were always in his pants pocket. He didn’t go to meet her. He waited.
“Hi. I hope you haven’t waited long.”
He shrugged. “Hi. I’ve accepted that you have a problem with time.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
He couldn’t help smiling. She didn’t ask to be forgiven, because she knew she’d do it again. He let his gaze roam over her lovely form.
“My pleasure. You were well worth the wait. What would you like?” He touched her elbow and headed them toward the bar.
“Some of those stone-crab claws,” she said, pointing to one of the many small tables laden with finger food.
“I meant, to drink.”
* * *
“Mason, I don’t drink anymore.” Immediately she wished she hadn’t said those telltale words, for both of his eyebrows shot upward.
“Anymore? Why did you stop?” Here was her chance, the perfect opportunity, and she couldn’t summon the courage to tell him.
“Prudence.”
He lifted another glass of vodka and tonic from the tray of a passing waiter and raised it to her in a salute.
“Prudence, eh?” A cynical smile flashed over his handsome face. “Well, here’s to Prudence, whoever the hell she is.”
Stunned, she gaped when he tossed the drink to the back of his throat. He grasped her hand, and her heart thudded beneath her breast as he stared down at her with mocking eyes.
“Beautiful. Innocent. Vulnerable. When such a woman lies, it’s as though she’s smeared grease paint on pristine snow. My table is number twenty. Care to join me?”
She wanted to be with him, but his mood gave her a sense of imminent trouble. She tried unsuccessfully to push back the dark feeling, to banish the intuitive notion that the piper wanted his due. She walked beside him to his table.
“I don’t think I like you when you’re drinking,” she told him.
“Oh, you probably like me as much then as I like you when you lie.” She stopped walking, laid back her shoulders and glared at him.
“If you’d rather have someone else’s company...”
He guided her along, an enigmatic smile playing around his lips.
“On the contrary, my darling, you’ve pinpointed my problem. I’ve discovered that I don’t want anyone’s company but yours, and that’s bad news.”
“For whom?”
She couldn’t say he’d been rude, but he’d certainly set aside his usual politeness. He looked deeply into her eyes until she shifted her gaze.
“Since you won’t level with me, it’s bad news for me, wouldn’t you say?’
* * *
Mason stared, horrified, as she took a glass of tonic from a waiter’s tray, only to have it slip through her fingers, as though she lacked the ability to grasp it. After the waiter cleaned the liquid from her shoes and off the floor, Mason led her to his table, held her chair and seated himself beside her. He’d lost his taste for food, but he knew that if he didn’t eat she’d know that her accident worried him. He smiled at their dinner companions, reached in her lap and gathered her right hand in his left one, but he couldn’t banish the ache in the pit of his stomach. Gloom hovered around him when he let himself think of the horror that her syndrome of ailments suggested. It couldn’t be true.
“How’s your stateroom?” he asked Lucy Abernathy. Geoffrey had had it changed from tourist class to first class. She smiled up at him and told Mason it was the most beautiful room she’d ever seen.
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br /> “You come have breakfast with me tomorrow morning, you hear?”
At Mason’s raised eyebrow, she informed her companions that her suite had a dinette as well as a living room.
“She’s scared of the water,” Geoffrey explained, “and I wanted her to enjoy this trip.”
“I’m afraid of the water, too,” Maybeth chimed in, “and I’m sure I saw a shark swim past my porthole.” She and Lucy were the two tour members who had paid tourist-class rates for the sea portion of the tour.
“Keep the window closed,” Leonard Deek advised her, to everyone’s amazement.
Maybeth gave him a withering look. “Do you think the people who made this ship were crazy? There’s no window down there. I’d have to break open that porthole, and this ship might sink. Tourist class is below water level.”
The laugher that followed lightened Mason’s mood a little, and he glanced at Jeannetta.
“What about you? You scared of water, too?”
Several in the group twittered softly. He leaned over and whispered in Jeannetta’s ear.
“What?” she asked.
“I said Leonard Deek must sit on his brains. Of course, he isn’t the first bottom-heavy professor I’ve met. My freshman English prof fit that description, but her ancestors were probably Hottentots.” Her hearty giggle was what he’d hoped his exaggeration would accomplish, and he managed to eat the remainder of what would ordinarily have been a wonderful meal, though his anxiety about Jeannetta had ruined any chance of his enjoying it. He looked around the table.
“I apologize for whispering, but I couldn’t resist needling Jeannetta.”
Geoffrey eyed him carefully, and he’d have given a few Thailand bahts to read the man’s mind. For an uneducated person, he possessed a store of knowledge and wisdom. He hoped they would remain friends. He leaned toward Jeannetta.
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