Cross My Heart

by Phyllis Halldorson

  She was disappointed he'd gotten out of bed before she was awake. She wondered what it would be like to wake up in the mornings with him in bed beside her.

  She rolled over, and he turned around. For just a moment there was a closed, strained look on his face, but then he smiled at her. "Good morning. Did I wake you? I didn't mean to."

  She smiled back and shook her head. "No, you didn't, but what are you doing up and about so early?"

  He walked over and bent down to kiss her. "I wake up at the same time every day. It's an automatic reflex from years of early rising. I rarely sleep past seven o'clock."

  He took off his robe and climbed into bed beside her. "Come here and give me a proper kiss," he said as he took her in his arms.

  She complied immediately, and he rolled her onto her back and lay partially across her as he ravaged her willing mouth. "Did I wear you out last night?" he murmured as he moved from her lips to her throat. "I couldn't seem to get enough of you. Every time I thought I was finally appeased you'd touch me, and I was ready to go again." He raised his head and grinned at her. "You're going to make an old man of me before I'm forty."

  She reached up and stroked her fingers through his tousled hair. "I might as well have been a virgin," she said, and there was a touch of wonder in her tone. "I've never experienced anything like last night. I didn't know that making love could be so beautiful, so…so soul searing."

  She ran one finger across his cheek and touched his lips. "Oh, Clint, I love you so."

  She'd hoped he'd be pleased, but the look that flashed in his eyes wasn't pleasure; it was almost certainly remorse.

  With a blink of his eyelids it was gone, replaced by a melting softness. "Since we seem to have such a great thing going for us, I guess we ought to get married."

  He kissed her again, but a chill replaced the warm glow that had been burning brightly inside her. Seem. Guess. Ought. Hardly the words of a man impatient to make her his bride!

  He must have felt her withdrawal, because he looked at her questioningly. "What's the matter? Don't you want to marry me?"

  "That depends," she said. "Are you saying that you guess we should get married because after last night you feel we ought to? You don't owe me anything, Clint."

  His frown deepened. "That's nonsense. It was just a poor choice of words." He rolled off her and sat up. "Proposing marriage isn't something I've had a lot of practice at. Besides, it's hard for me to think, let alone talk, when you're lying beneath me with no clothes on."

  Was she being overly sensitive? She hadn't expected him to ask her to marry him at all, so why was she quibbling over semantics? Words were easily garbled, but it was also possible he'd inadvertently said what he felt, instead of what she wanted to hear.

  She wanted to marry Clint more than she'd ever wanted anything, but not if he felt trapped into it. After all, she'd seduced him and then made the mistake of telling him she loved him. Did he feel guilty? Did he think he'd taken advantage of her because she was younger and relatively inexperienced?

  Was he still carrying a torch for Dinah?

  Elyse sat up, too, and pulled the sheet over her breasts. Clint was sitting beside her, with the same sheet covering his lap. He was so definitely male, and she wanted to throw herself into his arms and tell him yes, of course, she'd marry him, and to hell with the consequences.

  She could make him happy. She'd love him and cherish him and give him children of his own. But could she share him with the ghost of another woman? Would his first love always stand between them?

  She had to know, and there was only one way to find out.

  She turned her head to look at him. "Clint, I think you'd better tell me about Dinah Jefferson."

  Clint stared. "Who told you about Dinah?" His tone was grim.

  She opened her mouth to answer, but he didn't give her a chance. "Never mind. I know it wasn't Paul. That only leaves Reba Ogden."

  "It doesn't matter who told me, except for the fact that it wasn't you. Had you expected to keep her a secret?"

  She almost wished the knowledge had been kept from her. She'd have married Clint with no reservations, and maybe by the time she found out he'd have forgotten all about his other love.

  "No, I suppose not," he said, "but that's been over for a long time. I haven't seen or heard from Dinah in four years. She has nothing to do with you and me."

  "I hope you're right," Elyse said, "but surely you can understand why I'm skeptical. Just last night you told me you weren't looking for a wife and had no time for an affair. Now, after I've seduced you against your better judgment, you say it seems we ought to get married."

  Clint ran his hand through his hair. "You didn't seduce me, and I didn't mean what you're implying."

  He looked so upset and bewildered she couldn't resist the urge to reassure. She moved her legs and twisted around so that she was kneeling before him on the mattress, her hands on his bare shoulders. "Of course I seduced you, darling. That's exactly what I came here to do, but I wasn't trying to trap you into marriage." She leaned forward and touched his lips with hers. "I just wanted to apologize and convince you I wasn't teasing when I pulled away from you on Sunday."

  The strain disappeared from his face and was replaced by a much warmer expression. "Look at you," he said softly as he reached out and cupped her naked breasts. "How can you say you're not a tease when you set my blood to boiling every time I look at you?"

  Her glance flew downward, and for the first time she was aware that she'd totally dislodged the sheet when she changed position. Her eyes opened wide, but he smiled and pulled her into his arms and cuddled her against him. "You tease me and seduce me and keep me in such a state of arousal that I can't think of anything but how intensely I need you."

  He took one of her hands and moved it to his lap. "You see what you do to me." His words ended in a strangled moan of gratification as her fingers explored his pulsating hardness. "Even after a night like the one we just spent, you can make me stand up and beg for more without even touching me."

  His arms tightened around her, and he buried his face in her shoulder. "My God, Elyse, what man wouldn't want to marry such a woman and keep her with him always?"

  Elyse knew there was a flaw in his logic somewhere, but she was in no shape to analyze it as he readjusted their positions so she was lying on her back with his feverish body covering hers.

  This time there were no preliminaries. They didn't need them and couldn't slow down enough to enjoy them as they made love with a frenzied excitement that exploded in a molten convulsion of erotic fireworks.

  It was nearly noon when Elyse woke for the second time, and again Clint was gone from the bed. But a few minutes later the bathroom door opened and he stepped out wearing nothing but a navy towel wrapped around his hips.

  "Good, you're awake," he said as he walked across the room and sat down on the side of the bed.

  He leaned over and kissed her thoroughly, then sat up before she could get her arms around him to hold him. "Enough of that," he said with a grin. "Do you realize we could starve to death if we don't take strong disciplinary measures and get out of bed?"

  She grinned back. "Just like a man," she grumbled playfully. "Always thinking of your stomach."

  He reached under the sheet and caressed her intimately. "It's not my stomach that's been uppermost in my mind for the past fifteen hours," he said, and reluctantly withdrew his hand.

  He stood and went to the walk-in closet. "I'll fix breakfast while you shower and dress," he called to her, "and you'd better be out of that bed by the time I get my clothes gathered up, or I'll climb back in with you and you won't get another chance to eat until dinner."

  Elyse laughed and moved stiffly to comply. "Promises, promises," she shouted, darting into the still steamy bathroom.

  As she stood under the shower the warm, invigorating spray refreshed her mind as well as her body, and with the fog of passion cleared away she knew what had bothered her about Clint's argumen
t in favor of marriage. It was all based on lovemaking rather than love.

  She could almost hear his derisive snort if she dared say such a thing to him, but the truth was there even if the words sounded silly.

  Clint wanted her in his bed. She'd even agree that he probably needed her in the strictly physical sense. She needed him that way, too, and there was nothing wrong with that. It was good and beautiful and even necessary in a marriage, but it was only a part of the vital elements.

  Sex without love was always an emotional risk, Elyse knew, and it was no basis on which to build a life. Clint had never mentioned love. He liked her, he enjoyed being with her, he even felt protective of her, but was that enough?

  It might be. Possibly in time he'd grow to love her the way she wanted him to.

  But not if he still loved another woman.

  With a heavy heart she turned off the water and stepped out of the shower stall.

  Back in the bedroom she discovered that Clint had brought her overnight case and laid it on a luggage stand. She opened it and put on clean underwear, then dressed again in her cream slacks and lightweight sweater. She brushed her teeth, and applied a rosy shade of lipstick, the only makeup she usually wore in the daytime.

  In the kitchen Clint prepared the coffee maker and plugged it in. He knew the discussion about Dinah hadn't been ended, only postponed. Not that he'd deliberately initiated that last interlude in bed with Elyse in order to distract her. He just plain lost his ability to reason every time he touched her.

  He hadn't expected the subject of Dinah Jefferson to come up. He never talked about her or discussed his feelings, and he'd just assumed that everyone had forgotten about their relationship. It was nobody's business but his.

  He got the bacon out of the refrigerator. No, that wasn't quite true, he thought. If other people were still gossiping about the breakup of his engagement to Dinah, then he owed it to Elyse to tell her the truth before she heard garbled versions of it from others.

  What had she been told? Reba loved to gossip, but she usually got her facts straight, and she never knowingly distorted them. If Reba were Elyse's only source, then she had only the bare facts.

  Clint grimaced. He tried never to think about that painful occasion, and he'd refused to discuss it. It was going to be difficult to try to explain it to Elyse, but maybe it was for the best. Possibly bringing it out and examining it, reliving it in the telling, would help to defuse it and lay it to rest once and for all.

  He put the rack with the bacon in the microwave, then leaned against the wall and closed his eyes. It might, but he doubted it. Did he really want Elyse badly enough to put himself through the emotional carnage of a replay of that year with Dinah?

  Elyse found her way to the great room, then followed the mouth-watering aroma of bacon and toast to the kitchen in the other wing. Clint, wearing jeans and a tan open-necked polo shirt, was busy at the stove.

  He looked up and smiled. "You're just in time," he said. "How do you like your eggs?"

  "Scrambled," she answered promptly, heading for the coffee maker on the tile counter.

  "Good. I never quite mastered the art of turning fried eggs over. They always break and wind up scrambled, anyway." He cracked several eggs in a bowl and began to whip them.

  Elyse poured coffee into the two bright mugs that had been set out and carried them to the heavy round oak kitchen table. She put one on each of the quilted turquoise-and-brown place mats and sat down. Clint appeared immediately with a warm ironstone plate piled high with bacon, eggs and toast and set it in front of her.

  Elyse eyed it with dismay. "Clint, I can't eat all that."

  "Of course you can," he replied. "You can wash it down with orange juice." He left and returned with a full pitcher and two juice glasses. "We've got to keep your energy level high." He grinned suggestively as he brought his own plate and sat down beside her.

  He seemed in good spirits. Was he happy she'd hadn't said yes to his proposal, or did he think she had said yes by sleeping with him again?

  She didn't press the point while they were eating, and afterward he was the one who brought it up.

  They took their mugs of fresh coffee into the great room and sat down together on the king-size leather sofa. Clint put his mug on the highly polished free-form redwood burl coffee table and turned to look at her. "I've had time to think, Elyse, and I've decided that you're right. You are entitled to know about my relationship with Dinah Jefferson."

  Elyse caught her breath, and the liquid swayed in her cup as her hand jerked. She hadn't expected him to agree so readily, and now that he had she wasn't at all sure she wanted to know, after all. There were times when ignorance really was bliss.

  She sighed and put her mug down, too. Unfortunately this wasn't one of those times.

  She tried to relax, but even her jaw was tense as she spoke. "Please understand, Clint. You don't have to tell me anything. I'm not prying into your private life. It's only if you want me to share that life that I have to know, and then only because I feel strongly that it has a bearing on the present. On my well-being as well as yours."

  He leaned over and kissed her gently. "It's a painful subject and I won't deny that I prefer not to discuss it, but I don't want you listening to a lot of garbage from people who don't know what they're talking about."

  He settled himself rather stiffly on the couch. "I met Dinah Jefferson almost six years ago when she came to work at the Capitol. She was a widow. Her husband, a congressman in Maryland, had been assassinated three years before. She was with him at the time, and he died in her arms."

  Elyse gasped. "Oh, how awful."

  Clint nodded. "Yes. They'd been married only four years and were very much in love. Dinah suffered a breakdown and spent almost a year in a hospital, but by the time I met her she seemed to have adjusted to the grief and shock. She enjoyed her position as an administrative assistant to one of the other senators and was very good at it."

  He paused, and Elyse murmured, "Reba said she was beautiful."

  Clint's gaze seemed to drift without focusing. "Yes, she was. Tall and slender as a model, with thick golden hair and wide blue eyes."

  Elyse glanced down at her own generous curves and wished she was ten pounds lighter, although she knew her weight was normal for her height. With her unruly auburn hair and ordinary brown eyes, she was surprised Clint had even looked twice at her. She wished she'd never brought the subject of Dinah up.

  "I was attracted to her," Clint continued, "and so were all the other unattached men who worked in the Capitol, but, although we all tried to date her, she refused to go out with any of the public officials. I persisted, and finally she told me she'd never again get involved with a man who was in a dangerous occupation, that she couldn't survive losing another loved one in such a shocking manner. I tried to reason with her, but she was adamant, so I retreated and vowed to forget about her."

  He shrugged. "It was easy to say, but impossible to do. That fail one of the senators' wives talked me into buying two tickets for a charity fashion show and dinner dance. I decided I had nothing to lose by asking Dinah to go with me, and to my surprise she agreed."

  He shifted restlessly. "After that we saw a lot of each other, and by Christmas we were in love. I was sure she'd finally come to terms with her husband's tragic death and realized that a politician is no more likely to be killed than a man in any other profession."

  Clint got to his feet and stood in front of the fireplace. "I asked her to marry me, but she refused. She said it was too soon, she was too recently widowed, we didn't know each other well enough. This was all non-sense, but I could see the idea of marriage to me still upset her, so I didn't push it."

  "For months we were almost inseparable, but still she refused to talk about a final commitment. At last I lost patience and we quarreled." He ran his fingers through his hair and turned away. "It was a very…difficult… time. I was stubborn and she was unyielding."

  His tone had beco
me harsh with emotion. "After two weeks I realized that… I… I…"

  Clint turned suddenly, and his face was white and twisted with anguish. "Dammit, Elyse, there's no way I can put this delicately," he grated. "I found out I couldn't live without her and was getting ready to go to her and tell her so, when she came to me."

  He jammed his hands into his pockets and began to pace. Elyse was numb with misery. She wanted to stop him, but she didn't seem to be able to move or utter a sound.

  When he spoke again it was as if he'd forgotten she was there. "Dinah told me she loved me, that she couldn't lose me, and she'd agree to announcing our engagement if I'd give her a little more time before setting a wedding date. I'd have done anything, anything at all, just to have her back."

  Elyse had an almost uncontrollable urge to put her hands over her ears. She didn't want to hear anymore. "Clint, don't, please—"

  He continued as if he hadn't heard her, and she was sure he hadn't. "We made the announcement, attended the prenuptial parties and started planning the wedding. Everything, that is, but the date. Dinah still refused to set one."

  "For several more months she kept me in a purgatory of uncertainty. I wanted her, needed her for my wife, but she was content to go on as we were, seeing each other when we could, grabbing a couple of hours here, a day there, sometimes a whole weekend. I felt I'd been put on hold, and I resented it more and more as time passed."

  The more he talked the more impassioned his voice became, and Elyse realized he was actually feeling the frustration all over again. Once more she tried to stop him, but he'd retreated into the past where she couldn't reach him.

  "I tried to understand and be patient, but eventually I reached the end of my endurance and blew up. I said things I didn't mean, made accusations that weren't true. I yelled… she cried—"

  His voice broke and he turned away again, but Elyse was on her feet and stumbling toward him. She wrapped her arms around his waist and pressed herself against his back, her cheek against his shoulder. "Oh, Clint, don't do this to yourself," she wailed. "It's not necessary. You've told me more than enough already."