by Radclyffe
On the short trip home, she said, “How would you like to go out to the diner with Mommy for breakfast, honey?”
Ronnie and the rabbit thought it was a great idea. Thirty minutes later, with Ronnie washed and dressed and carrying Mr. Bunny, Wynter buckled her into the child seat in the rear of her Volvo wagon and headed for the Melrose Diner in South Philly. Open twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, it was a perfect place for a fast meal and a chance to think. Unfortunately, by the time she returned home an hour and a half later, her stomach was full but her head was no clearer.
She took Ronnie inside and settled her on the bed with her favorite books and toys while she curled up next to her with a newspaper. It was all for show, because she couldn’t concentrate on anything. Fortunately, Ronnie required little in the way of focused conversation. When her cell phone rang Wynter snatched it up, trying not to be disappointed when she recognized the number.
“Hi, Mina,” she said.
“I take it that really was you who kidnapped our little darling before sunrise this morning.”
Wynter couldn’t help smiling. “Guilty. Are you interested in the ransom demands?”
“Of course. How much are you going to pay me to take her back?”
“I don’t think I’ve got enough saved.” At that moment, Ronnie crawled into her lap and closed her eyes. “However, right this minute, she does resemble an angel. Maybe we could negotiate price.”
“Must be nap time.”
“You’ve got it.” Wynter nuzzled the top of Ronnie’s head, soothed by the smell of Johnson’s Baby Shampoo and innocence.
“How come you didn’t stay for breakfast?”
“It was early. I knew we’d just wake up the whole house.”
“Did you eat?”
“We went to the Melrose.”
There was a moment of silence. “The Melrose. On a Saturday morning.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Something happen I should know about?”
“How do you do that?” Wynter closed her eyes and stroked her daughter’s soft hair.
“Doctors, especially surgeons and anesthesiologists, are creatures of habit. You have very few and very predictable responses to stress. Ken eats ice cream out of the carton by the gallon and forgets about sex. You go to the Melrose and brood.”
“Ken really forgets about sex?”
“Get Ronnie settled. I’m coming over.”
Wynter was in the kitchen making tea when Mina arrived. She looked over her shoulder and said, “Do you want some toast?”
“I’m fine. So tell me what happened, and don’t dance around.”
“We went to the concert,” Wynter said as she carried two mugs of tea to the table. “It was wild. I don’t know if it was that place or the music or the fact that I haven’t been out on a date in years, but I…” She stopped and stared at Mina. A date. “Well. I guess that answers your question from last night.”
Mina sipped her tea and said nothing.
“I felt so good. A little bit crazy. She put her arms around me and every nerve in my body fired at once.” She smiled, remembering how alive she’d felt. “I turned and kissed her. I couldn’t seem to get enough of her.” Her voice drifted off as she tried to recognize herself in that kiss and failed. Confused, she met Mina’s warm, kind gaze. “I think I scared her. She left in a hurry, and I haven’t talked to her since.”
“Were you scared?”
“Scared.” Wynter tried the word on for size, then shook her head. “No. No, I wasn’t. Or uneasy or embarrassed. I was just…nuts for her.”
Mina drummed her fingers lightly on the tabletop, a slight frown of concentration breaking the smooth contours of her forehead. “It’s funny, the things we don’t know about our friends. I’ve known you, what? Going on eight years, maybe?”
Wynter nodded and pushed her tea aside. Her stomach had tied itself into a knot.
“Have you ever been with a woman before?” Mina asked.
“No,” Wynter said softly.
“Ever wanted to?”
“If you’d asked me three months ago, I would have said no.” Wynter looked at Mina, but her gaze was unfocused as she searched the past. “I always had a lot of friends growing up. Our community was small and pretty tight. All the kids hung out together in one big social group all the way through high school, boys and girls both. We didn’t pair off the way a lot of kids seem to do. I thought of boys as friends first, I guess, and boyfriends second. Naturally, I was closer to my girl friends.”
“So you never had any indication that maybe you liked girls as more than friends?”
“No,” Wynter said, but she sounded uncertain.
“What?”
“I told you about Match Day. I bumped into Pearce,” Wynter smiled, “literally. She looked a little younger and tougher then. Still just as beautiful as she is now, though. I just kind of got lost in her.” She looked at Mina and shook her head, unable to find the words to describe what she felt. “I just wanted to be with her. When she started to kiss me that day, I wanted that more than I’d ever wanted anything in my life. It made no sense, and I never even questioned it.”
“What happened?”
Wynter snorted. “Dave called at the critical moment. And I suddenly realized that I was about to kiss a woman who happened to be a total stranger. I left her there, and I didn’t see her again until a couple of months ago.”
“But you thought about her.”
“Yes.”
“That way.”
“Yes. Sometimes. For just a second, and then I’d brush it away.” Wynter sighed. “I was pregnant when I met her, Dave and I were ready to move to Yale and start our residencies, and I thought it was just a fluke. Just a moment of perfect insanity.”
“Like last night.”
Wynter shook her head. “No. Last night was a thousand times better.”
Mina laughed. “Woo-ie, you are in a bad way.”
“This is serious, Mina. Pearce was really upset. She walked out of the concert in the middle of the night, left her car, and went to the hospital.”
“She’s probably scared right down to the tips of those big black sexy boots of hers.”
Wynter frowned. “Why?”
“Oh come on, sweetie. You’re a divorced mother, straight as far as everyone including you can tell. She probably thinks you’re just…playing—you know, experimenting.”
Wynter rose quickly and strode to the sink, dashing the now-tepid tea into the drain so forcefully it splashed out. “That’s ridiculous. I would never do that.”
“Well, she probably doesn’t know that.”
“Well, she should.”
“Honey,” Mina said, rising slowly, “you might have to do some explaining. Because I’ll tell you one thing. She’s got a serious case for you.”
Her heart racing, Wynter asked softly, “You think?”
“I know. It’s written all over that beautiful face of hers.”
*
As soon as Mina left, Wynter retrieved her phone from the bedroom, called the page operator, and asked for Pearce.
“I’m sorry, Dr. Rifkin has signed out for the day.”
“Sorry, didn’t I say Pearce Rifkin? She’s on call for the chief’s service,” Wynter said, knowing Pearce’s schedule as intimately as she knew her own.
“Just a moment.”
Wynter tuned out the background chatter of the page operators, four women who occupied a glassed-in booth on the first floor opposite the admissions office. Most of them looked like they’d been with the hospital since the first brick was laid, and they knew every person on staff by name. She was certain they could tell stories that would top the New York Times Bestseller List for years.
“Dr. Rifkin is not on call today. Dr. Dzubrow is covering for Rifkin’s service.”
Wynter frowned. She was certain Pearce was scheduled to be in-house today. “Can you page her to—”
“She left word that she would be off b
eeper for the entire day. Do you want to leave a message in case she calls in?”
“No,” Wynter said slowly. “Thanks.”
She closed her phone and stared at nothing, wondering what to do. One thing was certain, she’d go crazy if she had to sit around all day wondering where Pearce was and what she was doing, and with whom. She glanced at the leather coat she’d dropped over the rocker next to her bed, then idly scanned the dresser where her wallet and keys and…Pearce’s keys…lay jumbled together. She opened her phone again.
“Mina? I’m sorry. Do you think I can bring Ronnie over for an hour after she wakes up?”
“Chloe is coming by with her kids, so we might as well make it a party. Bring her by whenever.”
Just after noon, Wynter walked down the narrow driveway toward the garage where Pearce kept her vehicles. Both doors were open, and somewhere in the cavernous space, Patti Smith wailed about the night.
Wynter unzipped her parka and removed it when she stepped inside. The CD was so loud that Pearce couldn’t have heard her coming even if she hadn’t been almost entirely underneath the body of the Corvair. All that was visible were the bottoms of her blue jeans and the soles of her scuffed workboots. Wynter knelt down, contemplating how to announce herself without startling Pearce. As if sensing her presence, Pearce shifted one booted foot to the concrete floor and propelled the dolly on which she’d been lying out from underneath the car. Wordlessly, Pearce turned down the portable CD player by feel, then lay on her back on the wooden slab looking up at Wynter, who leaned over her from two feet away. A smudge of grease streaked Pearce’s cheek just below her left eye, and there was a small scrape on her chin. She wore no jacket, only a stained gray T-shirt that had pulled free from her jeans.
They stared at one another until Wynter reached down and wiped the grease away with her thumb. Then she brushed Pearce’s chin adjacent to the scrape. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you that you shouldn’t lead with your chin?”
“You should see the other guy.”
“I parked your car across from your house.”
“Thanks.”
“I can’t stay very long. Mina’s got Ronnie, and I need to spend time with her on my day off.”
Pearce sat up and straddled the dolly, her legs kicked out in front of her, her hands resting between her parted thighs. “Good. I understand.”
Wynter knelt on the cold hard floor and framed Pearce’s face with both hands. “I don’t think you do. I don’t know that I do. But we need to talk about last night.”
“Wynter,” Pearce said quietly, remaining still although her every instinct screamed to get up and back away. Or finish what they’d started the night before. “You’re a great person. Terrific. But we can’t…get involved.”
“Why is that?”
The muscles in Pearce’s belly quivered, a rush of heat raced along her spine, and everything she had figured out in the last six hours as she’d welded and winched and created order out of disorder began to slip away. Every reason why that kiss had been a mistake seemed negotiable now that Wynter was here and she could see her eyes and hear her voice and feel the warmth of her hands. “Too complicated,” she finally managed to rasp.
“I agree with you there,” Wynter said gently. She leaned forward and lightly kissed Pearce on the mouth, then drew back. “Just checking.”
“Checking what?” Pearce’s chest rose and fell as if she had been running for miles.
“To see if kissing you still made me want to climb inside your skin.” Wynter drew her fingers over Pearce’s mouth. “It does.”
“Jesus, Wynter.” Pearce closed her eyes. “You’re straight. You’ve got a kid. We’re both residents, and it would take about three days before everyone knew we were fucking. I don’t have time for a relationship. I don’t even want a relationship.” She opened her eyes. “And I’m done sleeping with women who are sleeping with men.”
Wynter leaned back on her heels and rested her hands on her thighs. She held Pearce’s gaze and said very clearly, “The last one is easy. I’m not sleeping with anyone at all.” She took a deep breath. “The other ones are a little more problematic, except for Ronnie. She’s a given. I don’t know if I want a relationship either. I don’t know if I’m straight. I don’t know if I’m not. As to who knows what about anything we’re doing, I don’t care.” She pressed her hands harder against her thighs to hide their trembling. “Your turn.”
“No strings. No promises. We see what happens.” Pearce reached behind her, found the body of the car, and used it to push herself up. She rested her backside against it, because her legs were shaking. “That’s all I’ve got to offer.”
Wynter stood, took a step forward, and pressed full length against Pearce. She put her arms around her neck as she had the night before and kissed her. Unlike the night before, she took her time, starting with a light play of the tip of her tongue over the surface of Pearce’s lower lip. When she felt Pearce’s arms come around her, she slicked her tongue inside just a fraction—in and out again—forcing Pearce to chase the kiss, to follow with her tongue. They teased and tangoed, back and forth, deepening the kiss until they were both moaning. Finally, Wynter braced her hands against Pearce’s shoulders and pushed away, panting.
“No strings. No promises. We see what happens.” She turned and retrieved her jacket from the floor. “Come to dinner tonight. Seven o’clock.”
Then she walked away.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Pearce waited until Wynter reached the end of the driveway and disappeared from sight before slumping to the floor, her back against the side panel of her Corvair. She sat with her legs straight in front of her, her hands in her lap, her head back, eyes closed. Her lips tingled. Her face was hot, the thermal imprints of Wynter’s hands branded in her skin. One breath. Two. She still couldn’t get enough air. Her stomach was tense, her chest constricted.
Wynter had taken her by surprise the night before. Pearce knew that she’d invited the kiss with her unconscious embrace, but she hadn’t been prepared for the intensity of Wynter’s reaction, or her own response. Wynter’s mouth, her hands, had been insistent, taunting and sweet and unapologetic. Pearce was used to women who made their needs clear, and usually she had no problem giving them what they wanted, taking her own pleasure in the process. Last night, her instantaneous and uncontrollable arousal had disassembled her. She’d craved Wynter’s touch with the desperation of a drowning woman clawing her way toward the ocean’s surface. She felt the same way now, and it scared her in more ways than she could count.
All her life she’d had one goal—to fulfill her father’s expectations. His requisites had never been spelled out for her, because they’d never needed to be. From the time she was aware of herself in the world, she’d understood her heritage and her destiny. Nowhere in the design had there been room for anything other than ambition and accomplishment. No blueprint for love, no roadmap for a relationship, no outline for life other than a professional one. She did have the model of her parents’ marriage, which appeared to be have been one of mutual convenience and polite propriety, absent of passion or real companionship. She’d learned her lessons well.
The superficial liaisons she’d allowed herself satisfied her needs and never interfered with her aspirations. In less than five months, she’d be the chief surgical resident at one of the premier institutions in the country and on her way to achieving everything she’d set out to accomplish. Everything that was expected of her. Everything that she wanted. Success was within sight.
She opened her eyes to the empty garage, seeking the familiar to remind her of who she was. But she could still see Wynter’s face. Still hear her voice. Still feel her. And that was not part of the plan.
No strings. No promises.
Whatever it took, that’s the way it had to be, because there was no room in her life for complications or diversions. And if she doubted that, she had only to remind herself that Wynter was very likely to wake up some morni
ng and realize that she’d let her body overrule her senses. And then she’d be gone.
“Just let it play out and don’t take it too seriously,” she muttered as she pushed herself to her feet. Satisfied that she had things under control, she ignored the thrum of excitement that lingered in the pit of her stomach. Dinner was just dinner. Everyone had to eat.
*
The phone rang just as Wynter was sliding a roast into the oven. She caught it on the fourth ring. “Hello?”
“Hey, whatcha doing?”
She smiled at the sound of her sister’s voice. “Cooking dinner.”
“What’s the Little Princess doing?”
“You’re the only one who calls her that, which just proves you haven’t been doing enough babysitting.”
Rosie laughed. “I hear you.”
“At the moment, she’s trying to push SpaghettiOs onto her fingers. She thinks they’re rings.”
“Oh, that sounds so cute.”
Wynter glanced over at Ronnie, who had spaghetti sauce in her hair, on her face, and all over the kitchen table as far as her arms could reach. She smiled. “Pretty much. Oh, wait—you should say hi.” She held the phone for Ronnie. “It’s Aunt Rosie, honey.” Ronnie made excited conversation for sixty seconds and then lapsed into silence. Wynter took over again. “So, what’s up?”
“That’s what I was calling to ask you. What’s happening with Pearce?”
“We talked.”
“And?”
“She’s coming to dinner tonight.”
“Your idea?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Do you have ulterior motives?”
Wynter ran water in the sink to wash potatoes and carrots. “Such as what?”
