For Now, for Always

by Lynn Turner

  The twins turned to each other, ear-to-ear smiles breaking out on their faces.

  “We were right!”

  “I knew it all the time.”

  And then Neil’s slightly wary look of expectancy changed to amazement as they simultaneously hurled themselves at him. They started out standing between his legs, but within seconds each had claimed a knee and they were fastened “around his neck like leeches.

  “They’re very affectionate,” Lacey said when Neil’s questioning eyes sought hers. She smiled and saw his instant relief. With a small shock she realized he’d been worried that she might resent his sons’ immediate and enthusiastic acceptance of him. Unaccountably, the knowledge brought sudden tears to her eyes, but before Neil could notice, the boys were bombarding him with questions.

  “Are you gonna live here with us now?”

  “No,” His gaze flicked briefly to Lacey. “I’ve just bought a farm out in the country.”

  “A farm! Neat-o! Has it got pigs and chickens?”

  “And cows? A farm’s supposed to have cows.”

  “And horses!”

  “Yeah, horses! Has it got horses, dad?”

  Lacey saw him gulp at that, but his voice was steady enough when he answered. “I’m afraid it doesn’t have any of those things. At least, not yet. See, it’s an old farm and nobody’s lived on it for quite a while. It needs a lot of fixing up.”

  “Can we help? We can hammer nails real good.”

  “Yeah, if we helped, you could get it fixed up quicker, and then you could get some horses.”

  Neil struggled to contain a grin as he looked from one of them to the other. “Can you really handle a hammer?” he asked somberly.

  They both nodded vigorously, and he pursed his lips in thought. “Okay, then. You can be my chief carpenters. We’ll work out with mom when you can come out and start fixing up the barn. It’ll need new stalls if we’re gonna have horses,”

  The promise earned him two ecstatic hugs from the boys and a not altogether approving look from Lacey. He lifted his brows as if to say. How can I resist them? And her expression answered clearly, You’d better learn.

  Neii stayed for dinner and on until the boys’ bedtime, at their insistence. When he bent over their bunks to kiss them good-night they locked their arms around his neck for a tight hug.

  “You’ll come back tomorrow, like you promised, won’t you?” Todd asked anxiously.

  Neil sat on the edge of his bed and gentiy gave the little boy the reassurance he needed, “I’ll be here,” he murmured, his voice unusually deep. “You just make sure you’re up bright and early, and wear some old clothes, so mom won’t get too mad at us if they get dirty. Okay?”

  Todd nodded with a grin. “Okay. Night, dad,” “Night, Todder. Goodnight, Scotty. Now you two get to sleep. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  When Lacey finished tucking them in she found him downstairs, gazing at their framed school pictures on a table in the living room. He looked up when she entered, then held out a hand.

  “Come here,” he said huskily, “I need to hold you.”

  Lacey walked into his arms without a second’s hesitation. He held her tightly, his cheek pressed against the top of her head. She knew he was struggling with emotions he had never before experienced and was trying to cope with. Her hands moved over his back in a gently soothing rhythm.

  “They’re so amazing!” He shook his head in wonder. “They just accepted me! No questions about where I’d been until now, no resentment about the way I just showed up. I don’t deserve two kids like that.”

  “I know the feeling,” she answered softly. “Sometimes I look at them and can’t believe they’re really mine. But you done good,” she murmured, knowing he needed some reassurance of his own, but wouldn’t ask for it.

  “You really think so?” he said as he held her away a little.

  “Mm-hmm. Except for the bit about the horses,” she added, “Horses, Neil?”

  His mouth slanted upward at one comer. “Well. how about a couple of ponies then, until they’re big enough for horses?”

  “I don’t want you spoiling them,” she warned sternly.

  “Who, me?” His air of innocence didn’t fool Lacey for a minute, and her expression showed it. Neil released a sigh. “Okay, I promise not to go overboard on the presents. Besides,’ he added in a sexy murmur as he bent to kiss her neck, “I’d just as soon spoil their mother.”

  “I won’t be bought with expensive trinkets,” she quipped to cover her reaction to his caressing lips and tongue,

  “Actually, what I had in mind wouldn’t cost a cent.” His deep voice was muffled against her skin, and Lacey couldn’t suppress the shiver that ran down her back. “You might say it’s the gift that goes on giving. Am i stimulating your curiosity at all?”

  He was stimulating a lot more than her curiosity, but she forced herself to push him away with a bland little smile.

  “Sorry, not interested,” she said lightly. “Hadn’t you better be getting home? You’ve got quite a day ahead of you tomorrow.”

  Neil frowned, then observed her heightened color. The warmth returned to his eyes as he said, “Okay, I’ll go.. .for now,” He added softly, “Sure you don’t want to come with us in the morning?”

  Lacey shook her head. “I think you should have some time alone with them. It’ll give you a chance to get to know one another.”

  “You trust me with them but not with you.” There was more than a trace of bitterness in his voice.

  Lacey dropped her head to conceal the conflicting emotions it roused in her. “Please, Neil,” she murmured wearily. “Don’t—”

  He reached out suddenly, taking her in his arms. “1 love you, Lacey!” he said fiercely. “If it takes the rest of my life, I’ll make you believe that!”

  As he crushed her lips in a kiss so violent it took her breath away, Lacey found to her surprise that she wanted to return it with an equal intensity. Maybe it was the fact that he had taken her by surprise, but whatever the reason, when she realized how shamelessly she was kissing him back, she wrenched her mouth away in horror. This time it was her own response that had frightened her, but Neil couldn’t know that. He held her against him for a moment more, and then his arms dropped to his sides.

  “I didn’t intend to do that,” he said heavily. “Are you all right?”

  Lacey nodded, avoiding his eyes. “Yes. But I wish you’d leave now.”

  “All right.” His shoulders seemed to slump as he turned for the door. He looked back with his hand on the knob. “I’ll be here around eight, if that’s okay.”

  “Fine,” Lacey agreed. “I’ll have the boys ready.”

  Neil nodded once, and then he was gone, closing the door silently behind him. As soon as she heard his truck start, Lacey sank into a chair She was trembling, weak and shaky, and the worst thing was she knew that the reason for her delayed reaction wasn’t fear. It was something much more threatening to her peace of mind.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Neil brought the same single-minded determination to parenting that had made him such a success in business. Within a week he started arriving at Lacey’s house during the day, relieving Mrs. Moore to take charge of the boys himself. Lacey wondered how he managed to get anything done at the farm with them underfoot all the time, but then she supposed he wasn’t actually doing any of the physical labor himself, anyway. So far as she knew, Neil didn’t know the first thing about carpentry or plumbing, and he could well afford to hire the best people around to do whatever needed doing. He must be spending a lot of time outdoors, though. At the end of the week he was almost as brown as the twins, and while she couldn’t tell that he’d gained any weight, he looked somehow harder, fitter in the jeans and work shirt she’d grown used to by now.

  The boys adored him. Every night she was subjected to a litany of, “Dad said this,” and “Dad said that,” during dinner and during bedtime preparations. It occurred to her that she might be
forgiven a twinge of jealousy now and then, but strangely there was none. She could only feel happiness and gratitude that they finally had their father around; and as for Neil, he obviously took such joy in them that she was happy for him, too.

  Lacey’s work kept her so busy that she seldom saw him except in passing. If he had the boys in the afternoon, he always called to see when she planned to leave the office and was waiting when she got home. He refused when she invited him to stay and eat with them, and Lacey didn’t insist. She suspected he was giving her some space, some time to decide about their own relationship while he concentrated on the developing one with his sons. For the time being at least, he seemed content with getting to know them and making up for all the time he’d missed with them. He even took them to a soccer practice, a fact Lacey didn’t know about until later, when Paui stopped by the office to invite her to lunch.

  “We missed you at practice yesterday,” he remarked as they faced each other across a booth in a downtown restaurant.

  “Oh, nol I completely forgot!” Lacey exclaimed in dismay, “I’ve just been so busy lately. But I’m surprised one of the boys didn’t remind me. They never forget a practice.”

  “They didn’t forget this one,” Paul said dryly. “Their father brought them.”

  “What?” She was astonished. “Neil took them to practice?”

  “And stayed until it was over. I got the feeling he was checking me out—sizing up the competition, you might say.”

  “Oh, Paul, I’m sorry,” Lacey apologized in embarrassment. “He once referred to you as ‘the competition’ but I guess I didn’t really take him seriously.”

  “Don’t apologize,” Paul said with a laugh. “If our positions were reversed, I’d have done the same thing. But you know something? If he wasn’t your husband, I think I could easily get to like him.”

  Lacey gaped at him in surprise. “You’re not serious, are you?”

  “Absolutely. He is what is known as a man’s man. I think you would always know exactly where you stood with him. He isn’t the type to play games or say things he does not mean.” Paul leaned forward, frowning slightly. “He is also a man who does not possess an unlimited amount of patience, Lacey. From what you’ve told me, I gather he wants to resume your marriage, and I also gather that you are reluctant to commit yourself. Tell me to shut up and mind my own business, if you want.”

  She shook her head, her eyes on her fingers as they played with the table setting in front of her. “No, I gave you the right to comment when I confided in you, and if you have something to say, I’d like to hear it.”

  “All right, then, here it is,” Paul said quietly. “I think you are being unfair to him, Lacey.”

  Her head shot up incredulously. “Unfair to himl” she echoed in disbelief.

  “Yes. I don’t know what happened to drive you apart, and I don’t want to know. It’s none of my business,” he said when she started to speak. “I do know that he hurt you very badly, and that you’ve carried around a lot of bitterness and pain because of it for eight long years. But, Lacey, you cannot carry a grudge for the rest of your life. Anyone who watches him with his sons can see how much he cares for them, how important it is to him to be a good father to them—”

  “I don’t deny that,” Lacey interrupted. “I know he’s good with them, and they love him, Paid.” She shook her head wonderingly. “I didn’t think it could be possible for them to accept him so totally and so quickly, but they have. And I’m glad, truly I am. But his relationship with them has nothing to do with how / feei about him. They only know the Neil Hartmann they met a week ago, but I remember the other one, the one who could be hard and brutal and totally unscrupulous in his dealings with other people.”

  “And you find it impossible to believe that he has changed, that he is no longer that man?” Paul suggested with a trace of impatience. “Stranger things have happened, Lacey. Years have passed since you knew that Neil Hartmann. Who can say what might have happened to change him in that time. You are letting bad memories cloud your judgment. The man I saw yesterday might occasionally be hard, but I cannot imagine him being brutal or unscrupulous.”

  He sat back with a sigh, as if he had said more than he intended and was slightly irritated with himself for becoming so involved in someone else’s problems.

  “I am only giving you my opinion as a man, and nothing more. It appears to me that he has been honest in telling you what he wants, what he expects, and I think you owe him the courtesy of being equally honest with him. If you have no intention of becoming involved with him again, tell him so and be done with it,”

  Lacey looked at him curiously, her eyes narrowed. “All right, since you’re pushing honesty, let me ask you something, Paul,” she said slowly. “If I sent Neil packing, so to speak, exactly where would that leave you and me?”

  His shrug was eloquent as a charming smile curved his well-shaped mouth. “I have never deceived you about what / want, either, Lacey. I would like to have an affair with you, but I’m not ready for marriage or the kind of commitment it requires. Perhaps someday, when I have done all I want to do, seen all I want to see, but not for the present. Does that answer your question?”

  Lacey’s lips pursed as she contained a smile. “Perfectly,” she said in a dry tone.

  “And now you are disappointed in me?”

  “Not at all,” she denied. “You are what you are, and you’ve never deceived me. I just wanted to get it out in the open so there wouldn’t be any mistake or misunderstanding. You see, Paul, I need the kind of commitment you talk about. I know myself well enough to know a casual affair isn’t for me—not with you or anyone else. If I can’t have it all, I’d rather do without.”

  Paul spread his hands, palms up. “It appears we must agree to disagree,” he said with another smile. “A pity, because we go well together, you and I. I suspect I will end up envying that husband of yours when he succeeds in winning you back.”

  “If, not when,” Lacey corrected. But she had the distinct feeling that for him the fact that she and Neil would eventually get back together was a forgone conclusion.

  She wasn’t sure whether she was more annoyed or stung by Paul’s assumptions when she returned to the office. She’d known he was biding his time, waiting for her to clarify exactly what her relationship with Neil would be from now on. But apparently in the meantime he’d come to see the whole situation from Neil’s point of view. And what’s more, he seemed to be siding with Neil against herf

  The very idea left her feeling confused and unsettled. Paul was a very perceptive man, usually right on target in his assessments of other people’s characters and motivations. Normally she wouldn’t have doubted his insight, but in this case her own feelings were too ambivalent to allow her to be objective.

  She had a full work load that day: she’d shown three houses, settled two insurance claims and sold a new homeowner’s policy. There were also the usual number of telephone inquiries, mail to read and answer and a meeting with two attorneys concerning possible litigation against a teenager who’d bought auto insurance from her and then proceeded to drive his VW Rabbit across a neighbor’s lawn and into the side of his house. Busy as she was, however, she kept coming back to that disturbing conversation at lunch.

  She was still thinking about the things Paul had said when she arrived home that evening. The boys were there, along with Mrs. Moore, who had dinner started. Lacey thanked her sincerely. She had a Business and Professional Women’s Club meeting that night, and she was already running late.

  “Yes, and I’m so sorry I won’t be able to sit, but everything’s worked out all right, after all,” Mrs. Moore commented as she collected her purse from the coat closet.

  Lacey looked up from the sofa, where she was removing her shoes. “You can’t sit tonight?”

  “No, I’m afraid not. Remember, I told you last week that my niece and her husband were going to be in town, and I’d asked them to dinner.”

&n
bsp; “Oh, no, I forgot,” Lacey sighed. Then, in resignation, “Well, I guess I’ll just stay home.”

  “Oh, but that’s not necessary,” Mrs. Moore said in surprise. “Didn’t the boys tell you when you came in? They called their father, and he’s coming to stay with them. Now I really do have to run, or my own dinner won’t get cooked, I’ll see you Monday morning.”

  After she left, Lacey tracked the boys down in the back yard, where they were kicking a soccer ball around.

  “Did you guys call your dad and ask him to take care of you tonight?” she accused with a frown.

  Todd picked up the ball and they both came to where she was standing on the patio. “Sure, Mom. We knew he wouldn’t care. Are you mad cause we didn’t ask you first?”

  “Mad? No, I’m not mad,” she denied. “It’s just that I don’t think we should impose on him. He’s had you out at the farm every day this week, and he might want a little time to himself. For all we know, he might have already had plans for tonight.”

  “He didn’t,” Scott refuted. “He said he was just sitting around reading a boring book about spies and shady ladies.”

  “What’s a shady lady, anyway?” Todd asked curiously.

  “Never mind! How did you know where to call him in the first place7 Did he tell you what motei he was staying in? Maybe I can catch him there and tell him he doesn’t have to come.”

  They both gave her exasperated looks.

  “Dad’s not staying at any motel,” Scott said patiently.

  “Why would he do that, when he’s got such a neat house7” Todd pointed out.

  “You mean he’s been staying out at the farm all this time!” Lacey exclaimed in amazement. “Good grief, the place is a wreck! There isn’t even any furniture— not even a bed, for Pete’s sake!”

  “He doesn’t need one.”

  “He’s got a sleeping bag.”

  She tried to summon up a picture of Neil stretched out on a bare wood floor in the big old farmhouse, rolled up in a sleeping bag, but it was impossible.