by Webb, Peggy
"Don't mention it."
o0o
It was Ann's first show since she'd come back to New York and she was nervous.
"What do you think about this dress?" It was an elegant blue linen column, slit on the left side. "Is it too sexy? Too plain? Maybe I should have worn chiffon."
Erica put her hands on Ann's shoulders and gently pushed her toward the door.
"You're perfect. Now get out there and work your charm on my patrons so they'll spend obscene amounts of money and make us both fabulously wealthy."
Erica had been the first person to handle Ann's work, and she'd lost count of the number of times she'd seen Ann through opening-night jitters. Once Ann stepped into the gallery, though, she was transformed. Moving among the pieces she'd created, she was alight with a true passion for her art, and her enthusiasm was contagious. Erica watched as the patrons flocked to her, eager to hear about the creative process, to ask questions, or merely to bask in Ann's glow.
Erica caught Ann's eye and gave her the thumbs-up sign.
"Bravo," she mouthed. Ann smiled at her, then leaned down to answer the question of Mrs. Gordon Palk, who had been to every one of Ann's gallery showings since her first.
"My dear, these pieces are some of the best you've ever done."
"Thank you, Mrs. Palk."
Ann welcomed the affirmation. Alone in her studio with the wet clay she had nothing except her own instincts to rely on. It pleased her to hear Mrs. Palk confirm what she'd thought.
"They're different." Mrs. Palk pointed to a freeform piece entitled The Sea. "Such power, such passion. My dear, what was the influence?"
"Nature," she said, and it was partially true. "I experienced Hurricane Bethany at close range, and my art will never be the same."
Nor my life, she thought, but that was not the kind of thing she would tell a patron, nor anyone else for that matter. Ann laid her heart bare in her work, but in public she kept her private life closely guarded.
Mrs. Palk took her hand. "I am in awe, my dear."
"So am I."
Electrified, Ann turned slowly to face Colt Butler. He was as tall as she remembered, as fit, as deeply tanned. His hair was the same, wild and untamable, his smile still magical. Unbidden passion stole her breath.
Colt bent over her hand. "Hello, Annie." The kiss he planted in her palm sent shivers through her.
Ann knew she had an audience. Big and brash and handsome, Colt was enough to draw a crowd, but her own reaction to him didn't go unnoticed. Mrs. Palk was looking on with avid interest, as were several other longtime fans.
Ann finally found her voice. "What brings you to New York, Colt?"
"You. I want to buy the piece you call The Sea." He took her arm and led her away from the crowd. "Now, tell me again about the influence."
"You heard?"
"I did. You mentioned the hurricane, but I see something more in that piece, Annie."
Displayed in the center of the gallery, The Sea sucked her in once more, and Ann felt the power, the passion, felt the water lapping against her skin, wet and cold, felt strong arms around her, felt stars exploding in her soul as they merged.
"What do you see?" she whispered.
"You and me, Annie."
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Had love of art brought Colt to New York, or love of her?
It was a question Ann didn't dare ask. She didn't want to know the answer, not yet. Her feelings were too new, her experiences too raw.
He was the last patron to leave the gallery.
"Will you two excuse me a moment?" Erica said. "I have to go to my office and tally up all the nice fat checks I received." She kissed Ann's cheek. "Thank you, thank you, darling."
Then turning to Colt, she shook his hand. "And thank you."
She left in a swirl of black taffeta and a trail of expensive perfume.
"I'm staying at the Algonquin, Annie. Will you join me?"
"Join you?"
Her face must have given away her thoughts.
“For drinks."
o0o
He couldn't have chosen a more perfect place. Seated in a plush velvet chair in a room with the original paneling rubbed to a soft patina, Ann felt the spirit of the artists who used to gather there. But as she looked across the small table at Colt, her mind wasn't on art. Far from it. Everything she'd experienced in that attic room on the bay came back to her.
She sipped her drink. "How did you know about the show?"
"Erica. I bought my first piece of Ann Debeau pottery in her gallery." He leaned back in his chair. "You look good, Annie."
"So do you."
"I saw the crew you'd sent to Windchime House."
"How does it look?"
"The outside looks great."
"I'm glad."
Like opponents in a high-stakes game of poker, they danced around, waiting to see who would stand and who would fold. Colt set his glass down, then reached across the table and traced the top of her left hand.
"No ring."
"I returned it."
"I take that as a good sign."
She smiled. "You would."
Matilda, the Algonquin cat, padded up to Colt, arched her back, and rubbed against his leg.
"You've charmed her."
His eyes darkened, and he folded her hand into his. "What about you, Annie? Have I charmed you?"
Ann didn't play games and had no patience with people who did.
"Yes," she said. "And confused me."
"As long as you think of me, that's a start."
"I think of little else, Colt. Not just you but everything that happened in Fairhope." She leaned an elbow on the table and cupped her chin. "Was it all a dream, Colt?"
"It was no dream, Annie. It was real."
"Sometimes I feel split in two," she confided. "Don't you?"
"On the contrary. I feel whole. Knowing about Anthony Chance has made me understand myself more fully."
"In the daytime when I'm working, I see flashes of my grandmother and Anthony, and at night my dreams are so vivid, I almost feel as if I've gone back again."
"I dream too."
Everything he felt shone in his eyes, and Ann was almost blinded by the force of his passion. Desire swamped her, and if she hadn't been sitting down, her knees would have buckled.
"I dream of making love with you again, Annie."
Again. Souls merged, bodies intertwined, and the sea beating against the shore.
Fools rush in, caution whispered, and she was determined not to go to Colt on the rebound, regardless of what had happened in Fairhope. To get herself under control she thought of the tranquility of the flower garden at Windchime House. But just when her libido slowed to a trot, she thought of the roses, and she was off and running once more, her imagination taking her to places she'd never been with another man, sensual, erotic places, pleasure palaces among the stars.
"I wonder if I'm seeing those images because of what I read in Anthony's letters to my grandmother or what I experienced ... or what I wanted to be true?"
Mesmerized, they studied each other, then he pulled back her chair.
"Come," he said.
She took his hand without hesitation. "Where are we going?"
"There's something I have to show you."
They were alone on the elevator. The air was so thick with desire that Ann felt as if she were in a sauna. His chest rose and fell as if he were running, and Ann matched her breathing to the hard rhythm of his. He laced their fingers, and made erotic circles in her palm. The pad of his thumb was slightly roughened, hot and insistent.
Waves of desire and pleasure built in her, and she bit the underside of her lip to keep from crying out.
The elevator doors hissed open, their sound as loud as a thousand snakes to her heightened senses.
"This is it."
He led her into a suite on the ninth floor, and pulled out a chair in the sitting area, but all she could see was the bed, an old-fashioned ch
erry four-poster, visible through the open door.
"Wait right here."
He disappeared into the bedroom while she stayed on the sofa, more conscious of her body and its raging needs than she'd ever been before.
o0o
Colt had to collect himself before he could return to the sitting room. His hunger for Annie was all-consuming, but his need for her was far more than sexual. He wanted total commitment and undying love. Nothing less would do. Nor could it be forced. Annie had to come to him of her own free will.
And so he stood in the bedroom viewing her through the door and imagining what it would be like to wake up with her beside him every morning, not sleeping across a dusty space on a chaise longue while he tossed and turned on a quilt nearby, but curled up against him in his big bed on the ranch, her hip pressed intimately against his, her hand curled in the hair on his chest, her cheek resting on his shoulder. He wanted to turn her face to the light first thing every morning and see the pink patch his shoulder would make on her skin. He wanted to rub his fingers over the spot, then kiss it softly as he watched her come awake.
He wanted to see her pad barefoot to the bathroom, her shiny hair mussed from a night of lovemaking. He wanted to watch her brush her teeth. He wanted to watch her emerge from the shower, skin glistening. He wanted to watch her dream.
For now, though, it was enough to touch her, to sit beside her and listen to the musical cadences of her voice.
"Here it is, Annie."
He set the bag on the floor, and watched her reaction. Her eyes widened, and her face turned pink.
"Anthony's bag."
"Yes. How did you know?"
"I recognized it. . . . Maybe I saw it in one of the photographs in the trunk."
"Maybe you saw it the day he left for the Pacific."
"Colt, please."
"All right. No more."
She opened the antique bag, and there on the top was a stack of yellowing letters, all addressed to Anthony Chance.
"My grandmother's letters . . . Where did you find the bag?"
"Remember those stories Pete told you about his friendship with Richard Debeau?" Spellbound, Ann nodded. "A few days ago he came into the kitchen carrying this bag. Anthony's bag. You should have seen Uncle Pete's face. He told me to tell you he's sorry he forgot to give it to you when you were there."
"But how did Anthony's bag end up with your uncle Pete?"
"The way he tells it, your grandfather brought it to him about three months after he'd married your grandmother. He said he had to get the bag out of Charlotte Ann's sight, that she cried every time she looked at it."
"Did he know whose bag it was and what was in it?"
"If he did, he never mentioned it. And of course, Pete never looked inside. He threw it into the back of his closet and forgot about it all these years, until he met you."
Knowing that Anthony's bag had been in the house where Colt Butler lived gave Ann chills. She believed that everything happened by design, not coincidence.
And yet, she still stubbornly refused to follow her heart.
She put her grandmother's letters back into Anthony's bag. It was time to go.
"How long will you be in New York, Colt?"
"Long enough."
"To conduct business? To see the shows?"
The look he gave her was eloquent, full of pent-up desire and unspoken promises.
"Long enough to convince you to go back with me.”
o0o
Ann sat on her bed, one of her grandmother's letters open in her hand, the others spread around her.
Though she'd told Colt she was perfectly capable of taking a cab home, he'd insisted on coming with her. Then he'd escorted her to the door to make sure she arrived there safely. He wanted to come in and check out her apartment to be sure no muggers were lurking behind the door, but she'd pushed him back toward the cab.
He looked so forlorn as he gave her a small salute from inside the cab that she'd almost relented. Now she was glad she hadn't.
The letter she'd picked at random spoke directly to her heart, as if Charlotte Ann Harris Debeau were standing over her granddaughter's shoulder offering advice. As Ann began to read, her grandmother's voice echoed to her down through the years . . .
"My darling Anthony, Even though I can never mail this letter, I write to you still, knowing that somewhere, somehow you'll see, and you'll understand."
The date on the letter was October 1944, two years after Anthony's death. Chill bumps raised on her arms, Ann continued to read.
"Yesterday I married Richard Debeau. He's a kind man, and he'll be good to me. We will live in the house you and I built, my darling, but the rosewood bed remains sacred, covered by a sheet. I've converted what was meant to be our bedroom into my private office. Sometimes when I'm alone I remove the sheet, lie on our rosewood bed, and imagine you're there beside me as I gaze out at the magnolia tree.
"The roses we planted thrive. I gather them by the armload and bring them into the house. The blue rose is my favorite. Remember how we celebrated after we planted it? I'll never forget, my love, just as I'll never forget you."
Ann dashed the tears out of her eyes so she could see the words.
"Richard takes me in his arms at night and makes love to me, but my heart is not in it. My heart is with you, my darling. It will be with you always and forever.
"Memories sustain me. I'm deeply grateful to you for showing me what true love is. And I'm grateful to myself, as well. If I had played by the rules, if I had sat back and analyzed instead of spurning convention and following my heart, I would never have known what real love felt like."
A knife twisted in Ann's heart. Would she ever know? Could she get past her doubts in order to find out?
"I will try and be a good wife to Richard. We will have children, God willing. Perhaps we will grow old together. But I will never cease loving you, my darling Anthony, not in this lifetime, nor beyond. And if there is a way, I know that somehow, someday you will return for me. My deepest love, forever and always, Annie”.
Ann folded the letter and set it on her bedside table. She would read it again before the night was over. But first she wanted to read the rest of her grandmother's letters. They were filled with details of her days waiting in Windchime House while Anthony Chance fought in the Pacific. They described the sea and the rose garden and the changing of the seasons. They mentioned her engagement ring and her daily treks to the post office and the books she read.
And always, they spoke of her undying love.
After Ann had finished the letters, she took out the contents of the bag, item by item—Anthony's uniform, his dog tags, his medals, drawings of his Annie, a diary he'd kept. And in the bottom, the antique engagement ring described in the letters, a single diamond surrounded by emeralds and rubies. Charlotte Ann Harris had placed it back in its velvet box and tucked it underneath Anthony's belongings.
Ann put the ring on a slender gold chain and fastened it around her neck. And when the morning sun began to pink the windowsill, she knew what she had to do.
o0o
Colt was at the window when the phone rang, watching the city of New York wake up. He raced to his bedside table and picked up the receiver.
"Colt?" It was Annie, her voice soft but quietly elated.
"I'm here."
"I was hoping you would be . . ." He waited, his knuckles white as he gripped the receiver. "I'm coming home next week."
"Home?"
"To Windchime House.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
He was at her door within an hour.
"Does this mean what I think it does, Annie?"
"For now, all it means is that I'm going back South, to my roots, and I'm going to live and work in Windchime House. Have you had breakfast?"
"No."
"Neither have I."
She led him into the kitchen, which confirmed all his good opinions about Annie. Fine antiques vied for space with whimsical painted
furniture; windows were ceiling to floor with lots of sun pouring through; and she wasn't shy about setting her favorite things on the countertops—a cut crystal dish filled with Christmas ornaments and underneath, a scarf embroidered with bold pinks and reds and purples, edged with purple lace; a Mickey Mouse cookie jar; a silver bud vase with a single pink rose, a pewter baby's cup engraved DEBEAU.
“All this place needs is a good dog and my boots under the table," he said, promptly fulfilling one of its needs.
Balancing two coffee cups and a tray of assorted pastries, she joined him.
"I'm so glad you came, Colt."
"Are you, Annie?" He kissed her hand, which smelled like sugar sprinkles and roses. "That's good enough to eat."
He nibbled her fingertips, watching while the smile that started with her lips ended up lighting her whole face. And it was a grand morning if nothing more was accomplished except being the cause of that smile.
"Can you stay awhile?" she said.
"As long as you need me."
"I need you, Colt." Her smile turned mischievous. "There are some things a woman can't do by herself."
"Such as?"
"Lifting heavy boxes."
If it was less than he'd expected, nothing could dampen his good humor. "So that's your ploy? You're going to use me for a packhorse."
"Among other things."
"Promises, promises."
"More coffee?"
"Yes, please. It's delicious."
"Hazelnut. There's a great little gourmet coffee shop around the corner."
She leaned over to pour the coffee, and the slender chain around her neck swung forward. On the end, dangling in the sunlight, was the antique ring.
Mesmerized, Colt caught it in the palm of his hand, turning it this way and that, watching the play of sunlight on the precious stones.
"Where did you find it?" he said.
"Don't you know?"
"No."
The air was suddenly charged with energy, and the ring, suspended between them, sent sparklers that formed a small rainbow on the white tablecloth.
"The last time I saw that ring, it was another time, another place . . . You were wearing it, Annie."
Ann sat down abruptly in her chair, as if her thoughts were too heavy to carry. A whirlwind of images flashed before her—Christmas lights blinking along Royal Street, a crowded room, the auctioneer holding a board covered with black velvet, the ring from the DeMoville estate shooting fire, Anthony bidding.
