Moonlight Man

by Judy Griffith Gill

  Sharon was still shaking her head and trying to sort out all those pronouns, when Roxy handed the phone over to Zinnie.

  “You don’t mind, do you?” asked the older woman.

  “No. No, Zinnie, I think it’s wonderful the way you and Harry have adopted my kids. And me,” she said with a lump in her throat.

  “We’ve come to love you all,” Zinnie said, sounding a bit throaty herself. “To get two daughters and two grandchildren through the marriage of one son has been the highlight of our lives. But we were wondering if you’d like to come up and join us New Year’s Eve. If you left right after work, you could be here by early evening, and with the next day being a holiday, and the day after that a Sunday, you could get in a couple more days of skiing. You could also,” she added slyly, “ask Marc to come along.”

  Sharon sighed and glanced over at Marc, who was lying with his hands behind his head, gazing at her. “Zinnie … I’d love to, but I can’t. I have a date for New Year’s Eve.” She watched Marc’s gaze narrow and looked quickly away from him. “I’d break it if I could,” she said to Zinnie, but mostly for Marc’s benefit, “but it’s one of those long-standing agreements, and I really can’t get out of it.”

  “Oh, well. Never mind,” Zinnie said brightly. “Maybe next year. Wouldn’t that be fun? Jeanie and Max, Rolph and somebody, you and … somebody, and us and, of course, the kids.”

  “Yes,” said Sharon sadly, watching Marc stand up and gather his clothes before going into the bathroom. “Maybe next year.” They talked for a few minutes longer, while the sound of the shower pounded in her ears, then Sharon hung up. Marc came out of the bathroom, looked at her blankly, as if he’d never seen her before, and went downstairs.

  She showered, changed into a comfortable caftan, and shoved her icy feet into fleece slippers. In the kitchen, Marc was carefully slicing the roast.

  They said little, and ate even less, then left the table. She thought he might go home, but he followed her into the living room, sitting down well apart from her, looking into the flames of the fire.

  Finally, he glanced over at her, his golden brown eyes expressionless. “I’d have thought things had changed,” he said in a flat tone. “That you’d cancel a date with another man, no matter how long ago you’d made it, under the circumstances.”

  “Marc …” She swallowed, moistened her lips. She felt sick. “I wish it could be different. But I already told Lorne that it would be our last date.” She remembered suddenly that she was also supposed to tell Lorne her answer to his important question. Of course she knew what it was going to be; no amount of “thinking it over” would ever change her mind, not even if Marc Duval hadn’t become her lover. “I tried to get out of it. But he reminded me that he had spent a lot of money for tickets, and …”

  “I’ll buy the damn tickets from him,” Marc growled.

  “I also said I wouldn’t let him down.” She bit her lip. “Lorne feels he has a … a position to uphold in the community. He considers himself one of the town’s leading citizens. He makes business contacts on social occasions and, well, he’d feel that I was insulting him publicly if I appeared at that dinner-dance with another man while he stayed home. Everyone who knows him knows we’re supposed to be there. Together.”

  “I find I don’t really give a damn about Lorne Cantrell’s feelings at this moment, Sharon. It’s my feelings that are uppermost in my mind. And I hate the idea of my woman going out with another man, dining and dancing and kissing! I hate it!” he added vehemently, slamming his fist onto the arm of his chair, and she winced, staring at him, her eyes wide and dark.

  Suddenly, his anger subsided. “Oh, hell, I’m sorry, petite.” He came and knelt before her, taking her hands in his. “I didn’t mean to yell at you. Please, don’t look at me like that. Don’t be afraid of me.”

  “I’m not afraid of you. I just—”

  It was as if he didn’t hear her, or maybe he didn’t believe her. He went on, still holding her hands, running his thumbs soothingly over their backs. “I’ll never hurt you, Sharon. I promise that solemnly. I am not a violent man. I’m just a man experiencing jealousy for the first time in his life.”

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I don’t want to make you feel that way. I don’t like hurting you, but this is something I have to do. I hate to break promises, Marc, and I did promise him, just last night, that I wouldn’t let him down. Don’t you think I’d rather be with you?”

  He pulled her off the sofa and onto his lap, leaning back against the cushions, rocking her as if she were a hurt child, which in so many ways she was. Of course she hated to break promises; too many that had been made to her had been broken. She knew firsthand how it felt. “Yes,” he said, “I think you’d rather be with me. It’s okay, ma petite, I understand. I don’t like it, and won’t be happy to see you go out with him, but I won’t try to stop you. You are a grown woman, and you can make your own decisions. I know this is the right one for you, or you wouldn’t have made it.”

  She drew in a tremulous breath and let it out slowly. I love you, she thought, and wished she could make herself say it. He had, but she couldn’t. The words were locked up inside her. And she didn’t know if he’d said it because he thought he should, when he was about to make love to her for the first, time, or because he really felt that way. He’d only said it once.

  He had also said he might move on again come spring, so that nebulous “future” he’d mentioned might be very short. Maybe he still loved his wife. Maybe he always would. And there was still so much she didn’t know about him. Why, for instance, if he had enjoyed his law practice, was he establishing himself as a cookie-maker?

  She longed to ask those questions and more, but years of experience had taught her that it was best never to push a man to do anything he didn’t want to do. And Marc, by his continued silence, had made it clear that he didn’t want to talk about his past. She shivered, even in the warmth of his embrace, remembering the look in his eyes when he pounded his fist on the chair, the fury with which he had said those words: I hate it! He said he wasn’t a violent man, but she knew every man had his breaking point, every man could become violent, if pushed hard enough.

  She would never, never push.

  Marc stood just at the door of the huge, crowded room. His eyes sought and found Sharon, a golden flame in her bridesmaid’s gown, shortened now to just above her knees, where the white fur trim swirled as she danced. His throat tightened as he saw Lorne Cantrell’s hand planted square in the middle of her back, against her skin bared by the vee of her dress, his other holding hers intimately close to his chest.

  Drawing a deep breath, he forced himself to relax and searched the tables for his friends Candice and Norm, owners of one of the local stores that carried his line of cookies. When they’d learned he was to be alone tonight, they’d willingly offered him a seat at their table. Of course, he’d already overheard Norm telling someone else that his brother and sister-in-law, who had intended to join them, were not going to make it. It hadn’t taken much expertise to swing his subsequent conversation with Norm to the fact that he was dateless this New Year’s Eve, and regretting it, wondering what might be on in town that a lonely bachelor could attend.

  Candice had been delighted to welcome him too. “A stag is always great to have around,” she said. “He can spell tired old husbands when they don’t want to dance anymore.”

  He’d willingly promised to do just that, and now he saw his friends on the dance floor. He waited until they went back to their table, then casually made his way through the crowd, wondering what Sharon’s face would reveal when she finally realized he was there.

  Sharon froze in mid-step as she walked back to their table with Lorne. Was she seeing things? Or was it just her imagination? But no, it was not her imagination. That was Marc, all right, dressed in the same dark gray suit he’d worn to the wedding and again on Christmas Day. As before, she couldn’t help but think how marvelous he looked, how
smooth, how suave, how … sophisticated. Like the well-off member of a prestigious law firm …

  Lorne took her arm, glancing at her as her steps faltered. “Are you all right?”

  “Uh, yes. Fine. I … almost lost my shoe.” She forced herself to walk on, and then experienced an indescribable stab of agony when she saw Marc take a tall, willowy blonde into his arms and dance her across the floor as the band began a slow, sensuous tune. She sat, staring straight ahead, struggling with the unfamiliar emotion eating at her. Who was that woman? Where had Marc found her at the last minute? And how had he got tickets, also at the last minute? To her knowledge, this New Year’s Eve dance had been fully booked months ago!

  “… don’t you agree, Sharon? Sharon?” She blinked and focused her attention on Lorne. They were alone at the table, the other two couples were on the dance floor.

  “I’m sorry. I was off in a dream. What did you say, Lorne?”

  He took her hand and put it on his lap under the table, leaning close to her. “What were you dreaming about? Do I dare think it was the future?”

  “Lorne…” She could feel her color ebbing, and knew the time had come to make things clear to him.

  “No, no,” he said, patting her parted lips with two hushing fingers. “Don’t worry. I won’t embarrass you by demanding your answer now.” He smiled with confidence that sent her heart plunging. “I can wait until I take you home after the dance.” His smile faded, replaced by a look she had never seen in his eyes and feared now that she saw it. “On the other hand, I have to say I can scarcely wait to take you home after the dance. Your children are away … mine are at home with their mother where they belong, and it will be just the two of us. A wonderful way to start the New Year.” Lifting her hand from his lap, he kissed her knuckles while she stared at him in total disgust. The touch of his lips made her skin crawl. What had she ever seen in this man, anyhow? Snatching her hand back, she half turned from him and saw Marc dancing by with that blonde in the flaring red dress.

  Suddenly, she didn’t want to be there. She wanted to go home and hide. She wanted to go home and cry. She wanted to pretend she had never met Marc Duval and wasn’t sitting in an agony of pure jealousy knowing he was holding another woman in his arms. This was worse, far, far worse than the first time she had found out for sure that Ellis was cheating on her, and she had no right to feel the way she did. Marc had made no more commitment to her than she had made to him. And she was the one who had insisted on accompanying Lorne to the dance, insisted on honoring what she saw as a firm obligation. But now, she wanted it to be over.

  She looked up again, and Marc was dancing by. He caught her eye, met her glance, gave her a grin that set her insides on fire, then he was gone again, turning the blonde expertly into an opening in the crowd, swinging her around so Sharon could look at her very beautiful face laughing up into his.

  Chapter Eight

  “LORNE, I’D LIKE TO GO HOME NOW,” she said when the pain in her throat permitted her to speak. She met her date’s eyes squarely, partly so she wouldn’t keep following Marc’s progress through the room, partly in an attempt to convey her apology, her sincere regret that she was forced to refuse him and ruin an evening he’d been looking forward to. If only he had listened to her earlier in the week and not insisted on her keeping this date. “You already know what my answer is going to be, Lorne. I can’t tell you how sorry I am, but—”

  “Stop.” His hand rose to silence her. His jaw jutted stubbornly. “I will not take you home now. Do you want everyone to think we’ve had a fight? We haven’t even had dinner yet, and I paid good money for the tickets, remember!”

  She sighed. She did know. That had been his original argument for getting her there, after all. Did he think her memory so poor? “I don’t see why I should miss a meal I’ve already paid for just because you’re playing hard to get,” he added, his face sulky, his eyes glittering with self-righteous indignation.

  “I’m not playing hard to get,” she said. “I’m trying to make you see the truth. I’m not the right person for you.” And you’re not the right one for me, she added silently, catching a glimpse of two laughing faces, two people having a wonderful time. Quickly, she looked away.

  “How can you know that?” Lorne asked with deadly quiet, his hand imprisoning hers tightly as she tried to pull it free. “As you pointed out yourself the other night, we haven’t even been to bed together. Listen to me, Sharon. I know I can make you happy. You just have to give me a chance.”

  “No, Lorne.” Did he really believe she was simply playing hard to get? And if he did, did that mean that he believed forcing the issue would make a difference?

  His pale blue eyes were angry, his mouth twisted in an ugly grimace. She knew then that he would not be taking her home. There was no way she would get into a car with a man in his mood. What she should do was get up and walk out, but the thought of the scene he might create held her pinned to her chair, and then the music ended and the others seated with them were heading back to the table.

  “I’ll call a taxi,” she said quietly, trying to rise, but he pulled her back down. “You can explain that I have a migraine, or something. If you don’t make a fuss, no one will think anything of my absences. There are plenty of other people here to keep you entertained.” They were with a party of six.

  “You owe me the full evening,” he said. “I’ve spent a lot of money on you over the past six months, and I mean to collect.”

  What, exactly, did he mean to “collect”? She shuddered, but stayed where she was, trying to pay attention to Evelyn, the accountant at Lorne’s bank, as she talked animatedly about her active two-year-old twins.

  Coward, coward, coward … . The words repeated hollowly in Sharon’s mind, but she knew she couldn’t deal with Lorne if he got really angry. She’d simply fold. It was easier to sit still and endure the rest of the evening. Was this a case of old patterns dying hard? Was she destined for a life of simply enduring?

  Dinner was sumptuous, but Sharon hardly tasted it. The wine was dry and crisp and plentiful, but she only sipped and set her glass down. Around her, laughter, talk, jokes, and happy people swirled, while inside her, fear coiled each time she glanced at Lorne’s set face, at the determined way he chewed his food, gulped his drinks. He had paid for them. He was getting his money’s worth.

  And he thought she owed him something he was planning to collect!

  Lord, why had she come? Why had she felt it necessary to try to appease him this way, to make her refusal as pleasant as possible? That was her biggest failing, she knew, always trying to avoid hurting people, steering a course away from unpleasantness. Not that she had expected conservative, quiet Lorne to start pouring the drinks back this way, nor had she expected that he’d take her refusal in anything but a gentlemanly manner. How little she knew him, even after all the times they’d dated. He had never given the impression of being a belligerent man, which had been one reason she’d continued to see him. He was supposed to be calm, quiet, safe. Of course, no issue had ever come up between them on which she’d had to cross him.

  She had to escape. Somehow, she had to get out of there. If she called a cab, it could take ages to arrive. The taxi companies were always snowed under with business on New Year’s Eve. She supposed she could hide out in the women’s rest room after she’d made the call, but again, she was faced with the thought of an ugly scene; the possibility of a drunken Lorne pounding on the door made her feel ill.

  No. There was only one thing to do. Sit through this interminable dinner, and then dance a few more times. Midnight wasn’t that far off. Maybe by then Lorne’s mood would have improved, though with the amount he was drinking, she doubted it. Maybe she’d get really lucky, and he’d pass out.

  Dinner was cleared and the band started up again. Suddenly, before Lorne could ask her to dance, Marc was there, his hand on her shoulder. “May I?” he asked, and she nodded, relief flooding her.

  “Yes,” she said,
and stood, moving into his arms. He pulled her close, and she knew that she never wanted to be close to anyone else, ever again.

  “Velvet angel,” he said, his mouth brushing the shell of her ear, his hand sliding slowly down her back. “Were you surprised to see me?”

  She flicked a deep, dark glance up at his laughing eyes. “‘Surprised’ isn’t quite the word I’d have chosen.”

  He bent and brushed a kiss lightly over her lips. Suddenly, a hand descended on his shoulder. “Excuse me, but that happens to be my date you’re trying to kiss, mister. I’m cutting in.”

  Marc saw the flare of fear in Sharon’s eyes, saw the color fade from her face. “Sharon?” he asked. She glanced from one man to the other. If she refused to return to Lorne, he was just stupid enough, drunk enough, pugnacious enough to fight. And Marc’s golden eyes had a hard, brassy cast to them. He was willing to take anybody on if she asked it of him.

  She stepped back from him. “It’s all right. I did come with him. I’ll dance with him.”

  Marc, with a hard look at Lorne, shrugged and walked off the floor.

  “Who is that guy?”

  “My next-door neighbor.”

  “Why was he kissing you?”

  “You really have no right to interrogate me,” she reminded him quietly.

  His hand tightened on hers. “Why was he kissing you?”

  “It’s New Year’s Eve,” she said more sharply than she’d ever spoken to Lorne. “People do that at this time of year.”

  “After midnight,” he said sullenly. “Not before.”

  She was dancing with Lorne again when the countdown began, and they stopped along with everyone else. He counted loudly, waving his tall, silver hat in time to the chant. Holding a roll of serpentine streamer aloft ready to fling them at the stroke of midnight, he didn’t seem to mind that he was one of the town’s “leading citizens” making a complete ass of himself; but then, Sharon reflected, a good many others who saw themselves in that light were doing the same.