If You Loved Me

by Vanessa Grant

  "It was a long time ago. It doesn't matter." She clenched her hands together.

  "She lived across the hall, a waitress. I used to eat at the place where she worked."

  "I don't want to know—"

  " You called every night. I knew you'd call that night, too. I asked her to answer my phone."

  She clenched her fingers more tightly. Much more of this and she'd be seeing the internist about an ulcer. "You wanted to hurt me?"

  "No." He lifted his head and his eyes were hard blue, but not with anger.

  "When I asked you last month, you said you were lovers."

  "We weren't. From the night I drove you home when Paul's car broke down until I left Farley Bay, there was no one but you." His fingers curled around his cup and clenched hard as he enveloped the mug with his hands.

  Why would he lie about something so far back?

  To push her away, she realized. That could be the only reason. And if he needed to push her away, it meant he was afraid... vulnerable?

  "Gray, last month... you weren't the only one who said things you didn't mean." Her eyes caught the avid gaze of a student nurse at the next table. She wondered if her voice carried that far, realized she didn't really care. "We were so young when we... last month I felt as if it were happening all over again and for a while I forgot..."

  Had her heart stopped beating? He was silent, watching her, waiting for the words. "It was all or nothing when I was eighteen, Gray. I saw everything in black and white, no shades of gray. Either you loved me or you didn't. There was no in-between. I'm thirty-seven now, and I really—" She tried a laugh but it didn't work. "I think I'm grown up enough to handle an affair now. Could we try it all again? Please?"

  "What is it you want to try?" His voice sounded strained, unnatural.

  All the old fears swept up, threatening to swallow her. What if he pushed her away? What if he walked away and she never saw him again? "I could see you whenever you're in Seattle. We could..."

  "We could what?" His voice sounded harsh, but his eyes were different, cloudy with some emotion. She wished she could see into his heart, but knew there could be no guarantees.

  "I'd like us to be lovers. Friends. I know I said I wanted it all, but can we just start there and see where it goes?"

  "Emma, I don't think—"

  "I want whatever there is." She realized she'd stretched out a hand as if pleading, pulled it back and curled her fingers in on themselves. "Maybe I could come to your place for a holiday in the spring, and you could visit me when... times like this, when you're passing through Seattle."

  His hand gripped hers. "Emma, I want more."

  "More?" she breathed. She stared at their locked hands, thought of that dinner with Alex when he'd picked her up at SeaTac airport. He'd grasped her hand, and she'd felt his concern, the bond of their friendship. Gray touched her and she felt herself melt.

  "Marry me, Emma."

  Someone sent a chair crashing to the floor. Emma's body jerked with the sound but neither she nor Gray broke their locked gaze.

  "You said it couldn't work." Her voice sounded unreal. The trained part of her mind noted his face was unnaturally pale, like a patient in shock.

  "Marry me now. Right away."

  "—spilled coffee on me!" a student nurse yelped.

  "Right away?" Emma pulled her lip between her teeth and felt Gray's hand tight around hers. "Why, Gray? Is it because you'll change your mind if you don't do it fast, like jumping out of a plane in a parachute?"

  He looked down. In the instant when their gazes broke apart, she thought she saw everything in his eyes.

  "Gray, I'm frightened. Why do you want to get married quickly? Why tell me now you never had an affair with that girl?" She pressed her free hand to her face. Everything was trembling, hands, face—her legs, even though she wasn't standing. She wanted to be steady, cool, rational, as Alex had been when he listened to her say she didn't love him.

  "Is this a game?" she asked.

  "No, not a game. This is for real."

  She gripped the edge of the table until her fingers protested the pain and whispered, "Last month when you said you'd come to Seattle in September, I told you I'd send you away if you called, but I could never send you away. If you believed me when I said that—"

  "I want it all, Emma. Marriage. Babies." His face had never seemed so harsh, the lines so deep. "Whatever you want. You were right. Having a relationship terrifies me when I know you can tear me apart with a word, but I can't spend the rest of my life without you."

  The world stopped. Gray's face blurred in front of her.

  "Don't cry," he growled. "For God's sake, Emma, don't cry."

  Her lips parted but no more words seemed to get out. She blinked and two tears escaped. He turned his hand and their fingers clasped, interlocking.

  "Emma, darling—damn! I never could handle it when you cried. The only way I know to stop you—"

  He muttered a curse and pushed his chair back. The whole cafeteria had fallen silent. Gray came around the table and pulled her to her feet, took her lips with his in a hard kiss before he closed his hands on her shoulders and held her away.

  "I warned you," he growled.

  "If we're talking about warnings, Gray MacKenzie, you've got a whole cafeteria full of witnesses. You'd better mean whatever you say."

  "Marry me, Emma."

  There would be wild gossip tonight, she thought. By morning there wouldn't be anyone in the hospital who didn't know a man had proposed to Dr. Garrett in the cafeteria.

  "Yes," Emma said clearly. "I will."

  "No conditions?"

  "One," she whispered.

  "Name it."

  "Love me. Even if you can't say the words, love me."

  His eyes shuttered and he said grimly, "We're getting out of here, right now."

  Her panic didn't last more than a heartbeat once she saw what was in his eyes. His gaze drove into hers with one sharp thrust as he pulled her toward the exit, and deep inside Emma, a smile began to grow.

  "I'll teach you to say the words," she promised softly.

  He marched her out of the hospital. She felt the silence as they passed people she knew, whispers and stares in their wake. When Gray got her to the visitors' parking lot, he stopped and turned her to face him. The wind whipped around them and Emma stood without shivering, staring up at him and seeing what she had always dreamed of in his eyes.

  Someone honked a horn.

  Gray took her face in his hands and brought her lips to his.

  "I love you," he said in a husky voice. "I've always loved you."

  She closed her eyes and felt his hands slip the pins out of her hair until it cascaded down over his hands and her shoulders.

  "Always?"

  "Always," he repeated soberly, cradling her head in his hands and staring deeply into her eyes. "And from the first moment, it scared hell out of me."

  A jet roared overhead. From somewhere in the distance an ambulance screamed and was silent.

  "I signed up for ground school," she said. "I take my written test next month."

  She saw his surprise. "You'll be a good pilot."

  "It made me feel closer to you." She smiled and saw his lips curve in response. "I liked the feeling of freedom, flying in your plane. I thought, even if we didn't... I wanted to share your world as much as I could."

  "Emma—"

  "Gray, tell me about Samantha. Really tell me."

  He twisted her hair around his hand. "She had hair like yours—eyes, too. She even sounded a bit like you." He drew her close and folded her hard against him with strong arms. "I'd just given up and gone looking for you, just learned Paul had eloped with you within weeks of my leaving, that you'd had his child. Then I met her, and I guess..."

  She tilted her head back and she could see all the love she could ever need in his eyes. He must have seen something similar in her eyes, because suddenly he took her mouth in a hard kiss that left her breathless.
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  "You were right, every word you screamed at me on the floats back in Prince Rupert. I've been listening to your words for three weeks, remembering things." His arms tightened. "I took Chico up the mountain and we spent a couple of weeks thinking."

  "I love you, Gray."

  "I know." He closed his eyes and she felt the shudder go through him. "If you didn't, I couldn't do this. It's always terrified me. I always knew that if I let myself I would need you too much." He took in a violent breath. "I don't mean sex. I mean not being able to breathe without feeling your breathing. Not being able to come into a room without looking for you. I didn't want to need anyone. I'd always managed on my own. I told myself it was better that way. No one to let me down. If I counted only on myself, I always knew where I was. But needing someone else... needing you..."

  She pressed her face against the soft leather of his jacket. "Was it your mother?"

  A muscle jerked in his jaw as he fought some inner battle. Then he said, "She left when I was thirteen. I never heard from her again."

  She slipped her arms around his neck and closed her eyes tightly. Somewhere close behind her a car engine roared. Gray smoothed Emma's hair down against the wind.

  "I'd always been prepared for you to leave me for a medical career, but I found it a hell of a lot easier to fantasize you soothing some kid's brow and straightening his bones than to think of you in bed with another man. I went insane when I found out you'd married Paul. When I came back to reality, I was married to a nice girl who had the misfortune to have hair like yours."

  He touched her hair softly, almost reverently. "Thank God she's now happily remarried and raising a herd of kids and horses in the interior. I've enough to regret without having Sam on my conscience for the rest of my life."

  He caught her chin and tilted her face up to his. "Emma, you told me two people who love each other can compromise, they can find a way."

  "I've dreamed of the chance to compromise with you." She freed one hand and touched his mouth. "We'll make it work."

  Heat and laughter flared in his eyes. "I'll compromise you," he growled softly.

  She laughed and felt her heart swell. "You already have. The whole hospital is gossiping about me."

  "A long time ago I tried to prove to myself you didn't love me by telling you it was a choice—me or the vocation you were meant for." He touched her face gently. "No sacrifices, darling. Just love. And that baby you wanted—I want that, too."

  "Gray, I can be a doctor anywhere."

  "Hmm. You can be a doctor right here in Seattle. I'm not going to ask you to move. Emma, I don't want you to have to give up anything for me."

  "But I—"

  "I have an apartment in Prince Rupert that I use during the winter. With jet airplanes, it could be Seattle just as easily. As for the rest of the year, I'll need to make some wilderness trips for my photographs, but in between I'll be here in Seattle, with you. If you've got room in that house of yours for a darkroom—"

  "Can I come sometime? On one of your photography trips?"

  His smile grew slowly. "I'm hoping you will."

  "I'll take more time off. I want to be with you on Stephens Island when I can, and when the baby comes..." She flushed at the tender heat that flashed into his eyes. "I wouldn't work full time when a baby comes anyway. Oh, Gray!"

  He brought her closer to touch her lips with his. She flowed into his arms and felt herself bathed in the love she'd ached for all these years. On his lips, she heard the words her heart had known were lying in wait for her.

  "I love you, Emma.... Darling, let me show you how much I love you."

  The End

  Page forward for an excerpt from Vanessa Grant's

  THE COLORS OF LOVE

  Alex Kent stumbles into a storm of love

  and learns that life has depths he never dreamed

  Excerpt from

  The Colors of Love

  by

  Vanessa Grant

  Chapter 1

  Jamie Ferguson grasped the glass in her hand more tightly. "Say that again. How many?"

  "We sold eight of your paintings tonight." Liz Havers adjusted the silk scarf that accessorized her gold suit so perfectly, "It's an incredible opening night for an unknown artist."

  Behind Liz, a big sign displayed the words:

  Introducing Jamila

  A Strong Young Northwestern Talent

  It was Liz who had suggested she sign her paintings with her exotic given name instead of the more common Jamie she normally used, and no surname. Mystery sells paintings, said Liz, and it would do no harm to surround Jamie's image with a tinge of mystery.

  The gallery was empty now, but an hour ago it had been swarming with people. One, an art critic for a national newspaper, had told Jamie he expected to see a lot more of her work in the years to come.

  "You're off duty now," said Liz gently, taking the glass from Jamie's hands. "Stop nursing this glass—you've been carrying this same glass of champagne around all evening. Go home and get some sleep. When you wake up, start painting. I need twenty-five canvases for your autumn showing."

  "My autumn—oh, Liz! I was so scared tonight, it took me three tries to get my lipstick on straight. You're really going to do an autumn showing of my work?"

  "At least twenty-five paintings, and I don't want them all at the last minute."

  "I'll start tonight," she promised, laughter bubbling. "I can't believe it's really true. When I was a child, I used to walk through your gallery staring at paintings by real artists, telling myself it must be the most wonderful thing in the world to have painted them."

  "And now you have."

  "It's you who encouraged me," Jamie said. "Thank you for telling me my paintings weren't ready the first time I brought them to the gallery, for making me work harder."

  Behind Liz, Jamie could see the painted outline of a young woman standing on a wooden float, waving to a departing fishing boat. Leavetaking was only one of the canvases that now sported a small red tag in one corner. She felt a sharp pain at the knowledge that she might never see the painting again.

  "I'll get a check ready for you," said Liz. "Come in Monday and pick it up."

  "I'm working Monday."

  Liz shook her head sharply. "Not here, you're not. You'll need all your time to get ready for the autumn showing. You're a professional painter now, Jamie. You won't need to work in the gallery to make ends meet."

  * * *

  Jamie welcomed the rain on her face and the smell of wet pavement in her nostrils as she stepped onto the sidewalk outside Northern Images. Faintly, she could hear music from a nearby nightclub. Across the street, a man hurried past a darkened bookstore, hat pulled down, shoulders hunched protectively while Second Avenue threw back broken reflections from the streetlamp.

  Rainy Night, she thought. She'd wash the canvas with pale gray, then build up the dark pavement, shades of gray sidewalk and buildings, tones of rain picked up in the creases of the man's trench coat. No face, only a gray shape moving through the wet night. She'd prep the canvas tonight and do a preliminary sketch, something for her muse to work on while she slept.

  Rain sparkled on her face as she stepped onto the pavement. The man in the painting would wear a hat, rain beading on its surface.

  She rummaged for keys, grasped them in one hand. If she wanted, she could buy a new car.

  No, she would not waste all that money on a new car when her eleven-year-old green hatchback was still reliable. She'd splurge on a tune-up and new tires. Then she'd be able to buy the new easel she wanted and pay off her student loans. She'd stash the rest of the money in term deposits to tide her through until the autumn showing, in case Liz couldn't sell another Jamila painting until then.

  Her car started on the second try, its engine sputtering before it settled into a quiet purr. Perhaps she should paint the man without his hat, rain beading on his hair and—No, she wanted the rain to blanket him with anonymity, a mythical figure in rainco
at and hat, an impression of a warm fire somewhere, his woman waiting to greet him at home with a smile.

  Jamie pushed the car into gear and made a U-turn on the empty street. Eight paintings sold for outrageous prices, her own successful first showing. Difficult to believe she'd stood in Liz's gallery for three hours tonight, a glass in her hand, lean green slacks on her legs under the colorful four-hundred-dollar shirt Liz had insisted she buy. The shirt wasn't a smock, and it wasn't a jacket, but it wasn't a blouse either. Jamie hadn't argued about buying it because she'd seen Liz groom other artists; she knew her mentor's skill in creating an artist's public image. And the colors were marvelous, shades of green and red swirled together so cleverly that when Jamie saw herself in the mirror, she actually looked like a successful artist.

  She'd never sleep tonight.

  God, she loved these crazy Seattle streets that ran along the hillside, the frequent intersections with steep cross-streets. Tonight, every time she looked down one of those streets, she found herself searching for men in raincoats, wanting to glimpse another hunched-over shape.

  Once she had the wash on the canvas, perhaps she'd go outside and walk, although it was already past midnight.

  Impulsively, she turned off toward Magnolia Bluff.

  She drove deeper into the peaceful, hilly residential area of Magnolia, enjoying the rain-swept emptiness of the streets. In daylight she would see a beautiful ocean view, but it was after midnight now and she saw only parked cars and lights streaming from house and apartment windows, diffusing the feeling of isolation.

  As Jamie braked for a stop sign, something seemed to move on the street ahead. She started out slowly, eyes narrowed, searching for a rain-drenched pedestrian, or an animal.

  Nothing, just the rain pounding as the heavens opened wider. The sidewalk ahead was empty, none of the cars showing taillights. Perhaps she'd seen a leaf, wind driven, tumbling across the road. The night was turning nasty, rain driven now by a twisting wind. A gust buffeted the side of her car as big wet spots splattered on her windshield. She switched the wipers to high speed and leaned forward to peer through the pounding rain.