Blair sat at his desk, reviewing some documents he had not finished at the office. A steel pen poised in his hand, he made sketchy, scrawled notes on a separate page with quick dips into the inkwell. Occasionally he stared at the page, noting the change in his script that adjusting for his lost finger caused.
He closed his eyes trying to squeeze from his brain a memory that simply was not there. Did he know how he had lost the finger? Was that part of the lost time? Who was the woman who haunted his dreams? What kind of life had he been living that had changed his body so drastically? He had nobody he called friend, but his acquaintances and business associates commented, often snidely, about his tanned face with the pale forehead scar, his callused hands and the laborer's muscles even the best tailoring could not disguise.
Shaking his head, he resumed his review, trying to force his concentration to focus. In the four months since his return from God knows where, he had been unable to focus on this work he had hated but had managed so skillfully for so many years. Too many people relied on him to be what he had mandated himself to be: the stern, hard-driven entrepreneur. To keep wishing to return to his foggy idyll, his dream world of dark angels and open spaces was foolishness.
Unexpectedly, a light knock at the door served as a vaguely welcome interruption. Blair looked up to see Adele leaning in from around the door.
"Good afternoon, Blair. I hope I'm not disturbing you."
Blair put down his pen. "Not really. The words are swimming around tonight anyway. Why don't you come all the way in, Adele? I don't bite--much."
Adele stepped inside the room. Blair noticed she was wearing her usual modest white cotton shirtwaist with the tiny tucks in the front and an unassuming ruffle trimming the high collar, above a plain navy blue skirt of lightweight wool. As plain as the garments were, they perfectly suited Adele's tall, slender form. Blair thought fleetingly that he could not imagine this woman in frills or frivolous laces or pastel colors. She was a practical woman who wore practical clothes. Her hair was drawn back into a braided chignon at the nape of her neck.
For a moment Blair found himself wondering how long her hair was and what it might look like unbound. He then put the thought forcefully out of his head. It would not do for his dream world to intrude on reality anymore than it did already. It was folly to mistake this flesh and blood woman for the dark angel of his dreams.
"Is there something I can do for you?" he asked.
"Have you made any dinner plans?"
"Actually, I hadn't thought about it. Why do you ask?"
"Well, the cook has the night out and Stephen is taking my sister out for dinner and the theater. I was going to make something light and I wondered if you might be interested in joining the children and me for dinner in the nursery."
"Why would I want to do that?"
"Joshua was telling me he hasn't seen you for the longest time. I realize for a six-year-old `the longest time' could be two or three days, but I think he would enjoy having dinner with his father. He tells me he hasn't done that in the three months he's been here. You really ought to get to know him better. He's a wonderful boy."
Blair stared through Adele. She could not tell what he thought of the idea.
Suddenly, he leaned forward as if better focused. "Are you a good cook?"
Adele looked down. Blair noticed how long and thick her lashes were. As he had the night Donelli fired her and she cried against his chest, he felt oddly drawn to her. If he did not know himself better, he would have sworn it was sexual attraction. But that was ridiculous. He did not even like women that much.
Adele's response brought him back into focus. "I guess the best compliment you could give me is to say that I'm a competent but indifferent cook. Susannah is the family cook. She loves cooking. I just make simple fare, filling but not too exciting. But you won't get sick from my cooking," she added hastily.
Blair chuckled. "Sounds just like you, Adele. Always practical."
"I make do; I always have. Being fancy doesn't get you too far on a farm. I suppose my only real talents are with a needle."
"Ah, but in that you're prime stock. I've never had clothes that fit so well as the ones you made for me. What's your secret?"
Adele blushed to her roots. How can I tell you it's because I've had intimate contact with every part of your body? I probably know your body better than you do yourself.
Instead she answered, "Just years of making everything my father, and then my husband, wore."
"Like that sacque suit you lent me until some of my order from Donelli was finished."
"Yes, only that suit was special. We couldn't afford new fabric very often, so before that suit I usually had to make over my father's things for him. He never criticized me for it, but it never stopped me from wanting to make him clothes that were just for him."
"How recently did your husband die?"
Adele started, a shudder running through her, "I never said he was dead."
Blair sat upright. "Is he still alive?"
"More or less," she said sadly. "He no longer recognizes me as his wife, nor is he aware of our marriage."
Blair had been under the impression that Adele was a recent widow. That she was still married was a shock to him. Even more shocking was his assumption now that her husband was insane to the point where he no longer recognized his wife.
If she were my wife, he found himself thinking, I would never forget her. Somehow, the idea of being married to this woman was not as repugnant as the thought of marriage had always been to him in the past. He frowned slightly. Since he had known Adele Strange, extraordinary thoughts of that sort had begun to bang around in his brain. "Is there no hope of his recovery?" he asked with mixed feelings of concern.
"While we're both alive, there is always hope, but I get discouraged," she answered. "He doesn't know I'm his wife, but he acknowledges my existence as a person. When I see him, he's generally nice to me, but not with any depth of feeling. Not like we had. I feel sorrier for my baby. She was truly Daddy's girl, but she's too young to explain to her where her father has gone. I'm so glad to have Joshua as well as my Beatrice to care for. It gives me something to keep from brooding about the past. I must get back to them now. Will you come tonight? Seven thirty?"
"Why not? It might be amusing."
Amusing was not what Adele had hoped for, but it was better than nothing. Adele turned and headed out the door.
"Adele--"
Adele poked her head around the door again. "Yes, Blair?"
"What are you making?"
"Oh, baked chicken, green salad, cooked carrots...."
"Do you like sweet wine or dry wine?"
Adele shrugged. "I don't know. I've never had wine before."
"Can you taste us?" he had asked that morning.
"Um-Hmm," she had responded. "We taste good together."
"Sweeter than wine."
"I wouldn't know. I've never had wine...."
With a smile, she added, "Surprise me."
For a minute, it seemed to Blair that the office lit up with her smile. Then she shut the door behind her as she left and the lightness faded.
A light knock bade him answer.
Adele pushed her head in again. "I forgot. Don't dress for dinner."
"Beg your pardon?"
"Shirt sleeves are okay. Dinner with a six-year-old and a baby is hardly the most formal dining. Until later," she finished and the door closed again.
SUSANNAH TWIRLED around in front of Adele in the bedroom just off the nursery. She was wearing a brand-new dress of lavender silk trimmed with silk violets and a ruffle-trimmed bustle. The gown was cut off the shoulder and lower in the décolletage than any gown she had ever owned, showing off her full bosom and pale skin. Her sable hair had been pulled up with sausage curls dripping down over one shoulder. The cut of the bodice combined with a tightly laced corset made her waist look small. Her face was rouged with excitement and her eyes shone. She looked a strange combinatio
n of sophisticated lady and wide-eyed country girl.
"You look like a princess tonight," Adele admired. "Like Cinderella going to the ball."
"You don't think this dress is too racy, do you? Do you think Stephen will like it?"
"I'm not expert on racy dresses, but I think it will drive him crazy. If you're not careful, you could wind up in bed with him. If it's not already too late."
Susannah blushed beet red. "Do you mind?"
Adele laughed, the first honest laugh she'd had in months. "Mind? Sweetheart, what kind of question is that from the girl who gave me a lover as a Christmas present?"
Soon both women were laughing uproariously at the joyful memory. They hardly heard the knock at the bedroom door.
Stephen strode into the room, looking like Prince Charming to Susannah's Cinderella. His long, lean frame was adorned in spotless white tie and perfectly cut evening clothes with a pearl gray waistcoat that turned his gray eyes silver. A rebellious curl of his raven hair fell over his brow despite the conservative cut of his hair. Although he was two inches shorter than Blair was, his slimness made him seem taller in these fine black clothes.
It was a toss up who gasped louder, Susannah at seeing Stephen or vice versa. Stephen took Susannah's hand and pressed the back of it to his lips. Susannah glanced downward, suddenly shy. The intensity of Stephen's gaze melted through her and turned her knees to jelly. She started to lose her balance, but Stephen caught her in his arms and pulled her towards him. Their arms slid around each other as Stephen pressed his lips to Susannah's.
"Excuse me," Adele interrupted, "but if you keep that up you're never going to get to the theater."
Stephen colored slightly, pulling away from Susannah and meeting Adele's steady gaze with a questioning one of his own.
"If you're concerned about my reaction, don't be. I'm all in favor. Just please be careful here in the house, for my sake. Blair knows you're going out tonight, but I'm afraid it wouldn't do yet to let him find out it's gone that far."
Stephen smiled at Adele, then turned to Susannah. "My brother is still cloistered in his office. Maybe you should get downstairs now and get your cloak and gloves. I need to have a few words with Adele in private before we leave."
"I go, I go! Look how I go! Swifter than an arrow from the Tartar's bow." Susannah quoted. "See, I even read the play in advance. Meet you out front." She stepped out of the room, shut the door behind her and headed down the hall.
After Susannah left, Adele said to Stephen, "I casually let Blair know you're taking Susannah out tonight. But I didn't make it sound like anything particularly important except that you would both be out of the house. So I guess you two can stop acting like you don't know each other."
Stephen sat down in a chair next to Adele's.
"I know I don't need your permission, but I'm asking anyway. I'm in love with Susannah."
"I know."
"I think it was love at first sight."
"I know how that is."
"I want to marry her. I'm going to ask her tonight."
"You don't need my permission, but you certainly have my blessing. Do you enjoy each other?"
Stephen blushed. "You mean--um--you know, it all sort of just happened. But God, yes, we do have fun." His occasional fluster at the discussion of intimate subjects was endearing to Adele.
"Stephen, you're the only one I can tell," began Adele, tears blocking her throat. "This all is getting beyond my bearing it. To see Blair day after day and not be able to touch him or tell him. Stephen, we were always touching each other, teasing each other. It was like making love twenty-four hours a day. Just watching his muscles move when he worked could arouse me. This Blair Carroll is so stern and stiff and unhappy. Sometimes I see more of Brian Strange in you than in him."
Stephen was silent a moment. "I don't think Blair has been truly happy since he was sixteen. Before that he was a hell-raiser--well, maybe not a hell-raiser, but carefree and friendly and always finding things to laugh about. In those days, Blair was my best friend and protector. Our mother was not a very strong woman but she listened to us. It was Blair who wanted to be a lawyer, but when Mother died, Dad, in his grief, pushed Blair behind a desk at the company and didn't let him go to college like he wanted. Then, after Blair worked and waited two years for our father to get over Mother dying, he showed up back in town with a mistress barely older than we were and dumped the business on Blair to run for good. Alabama Dodge is pretty and I'm sure Father loves her to distraction, but she's silly and gushing and stupid and all the characteristics Blair has no patience for. I think Blair saw for the first time an example of a frivolous woman stealing his life from him. Then I went away to college. I can only assume he found more examples during those years. By the time I got back from college myself, Blair had built a shell around him. He'd had some quick affairs, including with Joshua's mother, but he expressed the opinion that all women were as useless and ornamental as Alabama and as much a waste of time. He was willing to marry Julia Longridge because she would look good on his arm and not intrude on his business nor his thoughts any more than necessary.
"By the time we went to Milwaukee two and a half years ago to get custody of Joshua, I think he'd developed such contempt for women that he'd virtually stopped having sex altogether. The funny, friendly big brother I grew up with made himself into a dour, hard-driving, misogynistic cynic. I think that blow to the head those bushwhackers gave him wiped the slate clean. The cynic was driven out of his brain and what was left for you to find was what was there before disappointment changed him."
"Stephen, I was his lover, then his wife. I'm still his wife. Our marriage was legal because he was using Brian Strange as his legal name when we got married. It was the only name he had. I love him with all my heart and I think that my heart will break if I can't get him back. I'm going to do something I never thought I would ever do. I'm going to attempt to seduce a married man--who happens to be my own husband. It may not work. He thought I was a widow. Now he knows I'm not. But I can't bear this much longer. If I can't help him fit the puzzle pieces together again by the time you and Susannah get married--and I know you will--I will take Bea and go back to Wyoming where I belong and file for divorce from `Brian Strange' for desertion."
Stephen kissed his sister-in-law's cheek and rose to leave. "I love you, Adele. I don't want Susannah or myself to lose you. I'll help you in any way you want."
As Stephen reached for the door, Adele called, "When you come home tonight, do you think you can manage to convince Susannah not to visit my room as camouflage to conceal her going to yours? I may need this room to myself tonight."
Stephen's silver eyes sparkled. "Well--I can give it a try. But you know, the bed in Blair's room is larger."
"That may be, but I don't want this to seem too planned."
"Understood. Good night, big sister."
AS THE LAST half hour ticked down on the little mantel clock atop the nursery fireplace, Adele hurried to complete the finishing touches on the most important evening of her life.
Joshua sensed the importance to himself as well, as he insisted on wearing the new blue suit Adele had made for him, the small sacque coat and ankle length pants, with a light-blue dutchboy shirt. Fully dressed, he was helping out by arranging the silverware on the table that doubled for meals and lessons. His face was serious, concentrating on the task as if it were the most challenging campaign a general ever mounted.
Adele glanced over at the serious-faced little boy and her heart caught. His curly black hair and dark gray eyes were the image of the Carroll brothers. Blair must have looked so at this age. Joshua's uncanny ability to focus on a new task and learn it the first time was every bit like the father he, as yet, barely knew. He may have inherited his mother's gentle nature, but in that he was his father's son.
She then looked down at Beatrice, who was fussing tiredly in her arms. It was apparent she would sleep through the dinner and, with luck, the whole night. Like Joshua,
Bea had the Carroll looks, baby soft black hair and eyes like silver velvet. Despite having different mothers, these children were as plainly sister and brother as the Carroll brothers themselves were. If Blair saw her, would he see it? Beatrice had none of Adele in her features, but everything of Blair.
"Is Bea coming to dinner?" asked Joshua.
"No, sweetheart. It looks like she's going to sleep now."
"That's too bad."
"Why so?"
"She's so funny when she bangs with the spoon and tries to talk." Joshua ran over to Adele. "Miss Adele, can I kiss Bea good night?"
"May I...."
"May I kiss Bea good night?"
Adele stooped down to Joshua's height. The little boy threw his arms around the baby and kissed her on the cheek.
"Good night, Bea. Sleep well," he said, then added in a whisper in the baby's ear he didn't know Adele could hear, "I wish you were my sister."
Adele's eyes filled with unshed tears. God, how I wish I could tell you that she really is your sister. There's so much love in this little boy. He needs so much in return. I only hope his father can see it. She stood up and put Beatrice in the white painted crib in her bedroom. She brushed her hand up the baby's cheek and smoothed her fine curls. Bea made contented gibberish noises, which became less frequent until replaced with the even breathing of slumber.
Returning to the nursery, she said, "Joshua, how are you doing with the table?"
He took her hand and led her to the table. "See, all done."
"Indeed it is, and it's all correct." She drew her arm around the boy's shoulders and gave him a quick hug. "Can you sit over there and look at your picture book for a few minutes while I go downstairs and get our dinner?"
Joshua nodded his accord and went over to the rocker near the fireplace. Adele quickly ran down the back stairs and loaded the freshly cooked food on a silver serving tray Bertha had set up for her before leaving for her night out. She grabbed the tray by its handles and carried it upstairs to the nursery, the smell of freshly baked chicken drifting along behind her.
Remember My Love Page 19
