Finding You

by Maureen Child

  She was changing.

  And it terrified him to think that he might lose her.

  The front door opened as he watched the silent house and a spear of lamplight sliced through the encroaching fog. His breath caught in his chest. Beth stepped out of the house, wearing that floor-length white cotton nightgown and robe set that she liked so much. Her auburn hair hung loose down past her shoulders, ending with a soft curl just above her breasts. He swallowed hard but couldn’t tear his gaze from the woman who was his wife. His everything. With the lamplight glowing golden in the fog, she looked like an angel stepping out of the mists.

  And just as unreachable.

  He climbed out of the car, walked across the grass that needed mowing, and climbed the set of five steps to the wide front porch that ran halfway around the house.

  “You’re back,” she said.

  “You sound surprised.” God, he wanted to touch her. To pull her close as he’d always been able to. But there was a distance between them now, brought on by too many harsh words and cold silences.

  She swung her hair back over her shoulders and Tony’s gaze dropped to the tiny ring of embroidered pink rosebuds lining the scoop-necked collar of her nightgown. How many times, he wondered, had he run his fingertips across those roses before sliding his hand beneath the fabric to cup her breasts? An ache he recognized and yearned to satisfy clawed at him, but there were things that had to be said. Things that had to be settled, first.

  “Every time you leave I’m not sure if you’re coming back. At least, not lately,” she said, and the words cost her.

  He heard the tremor in her voice and her pain jabbed at him. “How can you even think that?” he asked, honestly bewildered. Surely she knew that she was as much a part of him as his own heart. Did years together, years of loving, trusting, laughing, and loving, mean nothing? Did you suddenly wake up one morning and say, Okay, that’s it; I want something new? Could you really turn love on and off like a faucet?

  “How can I not, Tony?” Her bottom lip trembled and she made a Herculean effort to steady it. It almost worked. She shook her head and her mouth worked a time or two as she tried to regain control, but finally she gave it up and spoke anyway, letting the sound of tears color her voice. “I don’t even know you anymore.”

  “I’m still me,” he said, stepping closer and reaching for her. When she stepped back, out of reach, it almost killed him. “Beth, you know me better than anyone else on earth. You always have. Even when we were kids.”

  “But we’re not kids anymore, Tony.” She reached up and rubbed her hands across her face, wiping the glistening tracks of tears from her cheeks. “I’m not stupid. I know men get … bored. When wives become mothers, they’re just not sexy anymore.”

  “Bullshit.”

  Her gaze snapped to his.

  For the first time in his life, he wanted to grab his wife and shake her. “I haven’t changed, you have,” he countered, and kept his teeth gritted to avoid shouting as loud as he really wanted to. Amazing how quickly a man could move from sadness to fury.

  “How have I changed?” she demanded, moving farther away from him and the lamplight, walking down the porch toward the swing that drifted lazily in the soft wind. Pale tendrils of fog reached for her, snaking around her legs. “I’m still here. Night after night. I’m not the one running around God knows where doing God knows what.”

  “You’re not happy anymore. Don’t you think I noticed?”

  “It’s not that I’m unhappy. I’m just…”

  “What?”

  “Tony, I tried to tell you this before and you didn’t want to hear it.”

  “Try again.”

  “I just … need more.”

  “And that’s what I’m trying to give you.”

  She laughed shortly, a hollow sound that rippled around him. “You’re trying to give me more by never being around?”

  He followed her, moving into the shadows until he was standing right beside her. Staring down into her face, he said, “You think I like being away from you and Tina? You think I’m enjoying myself here? I’m only doing this for you!”

  Beth jerked her head back and stared at him in stunned surprise. Her sake? “What the hell are you talking about?” Her voice went up a notch.

  Across the street, a light flashed on in an upper window.

  He saw it, muttered a curse, then lowered his voice to a furious whisper. “Keep it down. You want to do this in front of Abigail, for God’s sake?” The old woman had ears like a bat and there was nothing she’d like better than to have a fresh piece of gossip to report the following morning.

  Beth cringed and lowered her voice. Fine. She’d be quiet, but she was going to have her say. Right here. Right now. Ever since Carla had offered to spy on Tony for her, Beth had been ashamed of herself. She should have confronted Tony the minute he’d started acting so weird. Waiting for a situation to get better only made for ulcers and profits for the Mylanta people.

  “That’s really good, Tony,” she said, and punched his upper arm with a balled-up fist.

  “Ow.”

  “You’re doing this for me. Right. Gee, thanks so much.” She hit him again. “Hey, it isn’t every cheating husband who tells his wife that he closed his eyes and did it for her!”

  “I’m not cheating!” he yelled, and instantly regretted it.

  Down the street a dog barked, a window sash was thrown open, and someone yelled, “Keep it down!”

  “Perfect,” Beth muttered. “Think Abigail heard that all right or would you like to repeat it for those in the back of the audience?”

  Dropping into the swing, Beth gave it a push with her foot, and the chains creaked as it slid into motion. Usually she loved sitting out here in this swing. She could watch her neighbors, play with Tina, wait for Tony to come home from the station. It was a place built with love. But tonight she only wanted to rock it hard enough to shake the misery out of her bones.

  Tony, though, had other plans.

  He snatched her up out of that swing, dragged her up close and tight to his chest, and wrapped his arms around her in an iron-hard grip. She shoved at his chest, hating that her body responded to his physical nearness even as her heart was aching. She shoved again but didn’t move him an inch. He was the proverbial unmovable object.

  “I have never cheated on you,” he said, his voice a low rumble of sincerity.

  Beth looked up at him, and even in the strangely distorted light, she saw his gaze, clear, straightforward, steady. He stared right into her eyes, and if he was lying, then he was a better actor than she’d ever given him credit for being. The ice around her heart thawed just a bit, weeping into her soul with a profound sense of relief.

  But he wasn’t finished.

  Tightening his grip on her even further, he held her pressed close, her body aligned with his. She felt every solid, strong inch of him, and just as it had the first time he’d kissed her, when she was fourteen, her blood did a slow, thick dance through her veins.

  “How could you even consider that?” he asked, his breath dusting across her cheeks, his voice scraping along her spine. “Damn it, Beth, you know me better. You know that I’ve never loved anyone the way I love you.”

  She dipped her head and stared at the vee of flesh exposed by the open collar of his shirt. “I didn’t say you loved the bimbo, I said you were having sex with her.”

  He squeezed her tighter and the air left her lungs in a rush. “There is no bimbo.” Lifting her clean off the porch, he drew her up until they were eye to eye. “And why in the hell would I want to go have sex when I could be here making love?”

  Her stomach did a quick pitch and roll and her throat closed up. Love shone in his eyes. She felt it in his touch, heard it in his voice, and basked in it briefly. But there were still unanswered questions hanging in the air between them.

  “If all of that’s true—”

  “If?”

  “Then where are you going three nig
hts a week? Why won’t you tell me?”

  Fog swirled in deeper, thicker, cloaking them in a misty blanket of gray, binding them together with filmy, damp fingers.

  Sighing, Tony knew the only real way back to the closeness they’d always shared was the truth. Maybe he should have been honest from the get-go, but it wasn’t easy for a man to admit to letting his wife down. Swinging her up into his arms, he sat down on the swing, held her close, and let the chains creak in accompaniment.

  “I’ve been working,” he said finally, and even then had to squeeze the words out like choking up something bitter.

  “No, you haven’t,” she said, and tried to push off his lap. “I’ve called the station to talk to you and you’re not there.”

  “I took a second job,” he said, and watched her eyes widen, then narrow again in suspicion.

  “Where?”

  “At the community college.”

  “Doing what?”

  “Teaching a course on criminal justice.”

  For several long seconds the creak of the swing was the only sound as Beth just stared at him.

  “You’re teaching.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Why?” she demanded, then took his face between her palms and forced him to meet her gaze. “And why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I should have.” A rush of air left his lungs in a heavy sigh. “But it’s not easy to admit that you’re doing such a crappy job of supporting your wife that she wants to go out and get a job herself to take up your slack.”

  “Oh, Tony,” she said, leaning forward until her forehead rested on his. “You really are an idiot.”

  “Thanks. Just what I needed to hear to make the night perfect.”

  Shaking her head, she pulled back, stared him directly in the eye, and said, “Me wanting to go back to work isn’t about money. It’s not about there being something wrong with us. It’s about me.” Her hands skimmed across his face, her fingers tracing the familiar pattern of his features, and when he turned his head to kiss her palm, goose bumps skittered along her spine. “Don’t you get it? It’s not that I don’t love Tina. And you. I do. But I need to talk to grown-ups during the day. I need to use my brain for more than playing sing-along with Elmo and Big Bird.”

  He gave her a wry smile and she hoped she was getting through. Staring into his eyes, Beth felt love pool inside her and overflow for this man. He’d tried to fix what was wrong—bungled it, sure, but he’d tried. And for that, she loved him. For that and so many other things.

  “Tony, I love you. I just need to—”

  He stopped her, placing his fingertips across her lips and smoothing them gently over her skin. “It’s okay, baby. I think I get it.” His gaze moving over her face, his hands followed, smoothing back her hair, skimming the line of her jaw, and tracing the length of her throat. When she shivered and moved closer, he whispered, “I love you so damn much that it scares me sometimes.”

  “I know; me, too.” Her words were hushed, slipping into the surrounding mist and disappearing.

  “I want you to be happy, Beth.” He leaned in and kissed her neck, running the tip of his tongue across the pulse point at the base of her throat.

  “Mmmmm.…” She tipped her head to one side and closed her eyes as his touch lit up the darkness inside. “Keep doing that,” she told him quietly, “it’s a good start.”

  “I’ve missed you, baby.”

  “Oh, God, Tony, me, too.” She shifted on his lap, sliding around until she was straddling him, knees on either side of him. Hooking her arms around his neck, she kissed him, then ground her hips against him, loving the feel of his erection pressed tightly to her.

  The fog swirled deeper, thicker, wrapping them in a soft, quiet world where only they, and the creak of the chains, existed.

  He slipped his hands up, beneath the hem of that nightgown, and up and up until he could cup her breasts and finger her taut nipples. She moaned in a deep-throated sigh that rippled through him and ignited the fire he carried only for her. Watching her expression shift, tighten, he whispered, “Just how strong do you think this swing is?”

  She looked him in the eye as her hands dropped to his belt buckle. In an instant, she had it open and was busily working the button and zipper on his khaki trousers. When her fingers curled around him and squeezed, she said softly, “I think we’re about to find out.”

  * * *

  “Noisiest night I’ve ever lived through,” Abigail complained over a cup of herbal tea the next morning.

  “Whatever was it?” Rachel asked, leaning across the table for a packet of artificial sweetener. She tore the pink paper open, dumped the contents into her tea, and stirred with one hand as she picked up her hot cinnamon roll with the other.

  “Probably gangs,” Virginia muttered, throwing cautious glances over her shoulders.

  “Don’t know what it was,” Abigail said, “but the screeching and moaning damn near kept me up all night. And that blasted fog. Couldn’t see a thing.”

  Stevie came out from behind the counter of Leaf and Bean, her coffee/tea shop, carrying a carafe of steaming coffee in one hand and a pot of hot water in the other. Offering refills to her customers, she listened in on the conversations as she passed.

  “… high school football team really needs help if we don’t want to get laughed outta the league.”

  “… there’s a sale down at Hastings.”

  “… Mike lost his paycheck at the Indian casino.”

  Smiling to herself, she threaded her way through the tables, topping off coffee cups and refilling tiny silver teapots. This was what she loved. Being here. In her own place, keeping up with the news in Chandler. Oh, she enjoyed traveling—seeing the world—but she loved coming back here. Home. Because this was the world that held her heart. Sooner or later, everyone in town came through her shop. A pastry and a cup of coffee—or tea, for the wimps—could solve most of life’s problems.

  Coming up on the Terrible Three, she heard Abigail again.

  “It’s a terrible thing when a person can’t sleep at night.”

  Rachel piped up, talking around a mouthful of cinnamon roll. “The sheriff lives right across the street. Why didn’t you call him?”

  Abigail leaned in close and used her best theatrical whisper. “He was gone most of the night again. Looked out my window before I went to bed at eleven and he still wasn’t there.”

  “A shame.” Rachel clucked her tongue. “Such a nice couple.”

  “He’s probably working for the Mob,” Virginia said.

  Irritation swept through her as Stevie stopped alongside their table and tried to remember that the old biddies spent nearly every morning in her shop. Steady customers. Everyone knew they were gossips. No one really paid attention. But hearing them go after her friends was just—Oh, what the hell.

  Giving them a wide smile, she refilled teapots and said, “Abigail, you must be so proud. I hear your great-grandson checked into rehab on his own, this time.”

  The old woman sniffed and her rouge-filled cheeks looked even redder than usual.

  “And, Rachel,” Stevie continued, starting to enjoy herself, “you know, I wouldn’t pay attention to what anyone else says. I think the face-lift turned out great.”

  Rachel sucked in air like a vacuum and huffed it out again with a muttered, “I never!”

  “Gossips can be so cruel, don’t you think? ’Morning, Virginia!” Then Stevie moved on, duty to friends done. As she crossed to the counter again, the bell over the front door sounded out and she turned to see Carla walking into the shop. Abbey, her faithful shadow, was just a step or two behind her, prancing, while Carla looked to be dragging.

  “Coffee. Quick.” Carla leaned on the polished wood counter and moaned helplessly. “My coffeemaker died this morning.”

  “God, it’s an emergency.” Grinning, Stevie hurriedly poured fresh coffee into a thick white ceramic mug.

  Carla cupped it between her palms, inhaled the fragranc
e slowly, deeply, then sighed as she took her first sip. “You saved my life.”

  “My pleasure.” Setting the coffeepot down on the hot plate, Stevie gave her full attention to Carla. “You look like shit.”

  “Gee, thanks.” Though she didn’t want to hear it, Carla knew it was the truth. Just taking a brief glimpse into her mirror this morning had damn near turned her into a pillar of salt. She didn’t have bags under her eyes. She had luggage.

  But then, what can you expect when you’re up all night watching old reruns on Nickelodeon? Still, staying awake on purpose was better than being chased out of sleep by dreams.

  And such dreams, she thought, taking another deep gulp of coffee. This time, it hadn’t been nightmares of past failures that had tortured her. This time, it had been Jackson. His image. His kiss. Although she was forced to admit that waking up horny was better than waking up crying.

  But torture was torture, right?

  “Do you have any Oreos around here?”

  “Good God!” Stevie looked at her, appalled. “I don’t do Oreos, remember?”

  “And you call yourself a friend.”

  “Biscotti?”

  Grumbling, Carla said, “I guess that counts as a cookie.”

  “Peasant.”

  “Snob.”

  Stevie sighed, slid a chocolate-dipped biscotti under her friend’s nose, wiped an imaginary spill from the counter, and asked, “What’s up, Carla?”

  “Nothing.” She didn’t want to talk about it. Didn’t want to think about it, either, but she didn’t seem to have a choice about that. That one stinking kiss had messed up her mind and set off a buzz in her body that was still humming twelve hours later.

  She really needed a life. Someone else’s, preferably. Because lately, her own really sucked.

  The everyday chatter surrounding her was comforting somehow. She’d really missed dropping in here during the two weeks Stevie had closed up shop for a vacation. Shifting her gaze to take in the room, Carla looked quickly past the Threesome up front and instead enjoyed the look and feel of the Leaf and Bean.

  Cream-colored walls, studded with the occasional dark wood beam, were hung with ferns and baskets of petunias that seemed to flower for Stevie no matter the time of year. Small tables and ladder-back chairs crowded the shining wood floor, and along one wall stood glass cases proudly displaying the baked goods that drew customers from as far away as Monterey.