Handful of Dreams

by Heather Graham

  She stiffened, totally unprepared for the unwanted probing.

  “He died.”

  “You were close?”

  “Very.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  She smiled and said softly, “So was I.” She quickly turned her attention to her drink.

  “So you’re all alone in the world now?”

  The question was somehow intense, not at all casual. But there was nothing to discover from his penetrating crystal stare, and Susan smiled again, shaking her head. “Actually I’m not. I’ve a cousin with whom I’m quite close.”

  “Near here?”

  “No. She and her husband live in Windsor, Canada.”

  “Well, at least there’s someone,” he murmured.

  Susan sipped her wine, then raised it to him slightly. “And what about you, David? You’re actually quite alone, aren’t you?”

  He chuckled. “I suppose, if I went back to Ireland, I could find a number of relatives. Dad was one of eleven children. The name used to be McLane, as you must know. But when he first came over here, he wound up in Boston, and Boston was teeming with Irish. The thing to do in those days was to become Americanized as soon as possible. Dad was never big on beating his head against stone walls—he became a Lane and prospered.”

  Susan grinned. “Not completely. He never lost his brogue.”

  David grinned in return, then mimicked his father’s accent so perfectly that it was chilling as he told her, “Ah, no, and he wouldn’t be doin’ that, now, would he? Appearances be one thing, and truth another.”

  Appearances and truth. David had just spoken the words without a thought, without a qualm….

  “That must have been very hard,” he persisted, smoothly changing the subject back to her, “losing your brother after having been orphaned so young.”

  “I told you, I don’t remember my parents. I was raised by my grandparents.”

  “I see,” he murmured, as if she had just uncovered the final piece to some great puzzle.

  “You see what?”

  “Pardon?”

  “You said, ‘I see.’ What did you just see, Mr. Lane?” Susan insisted, feeling her temper rise.

  “Nothing,” he began, but he saw the glittering persistence in her eyes and sighed. “All right, Susan. I think I understand a little better your … aptitude for dealing with an aging man.”

  “Aptitude?”

  “Miss Anderson, everyone in the restaurant is looking at us. If we’re going to have a knock-down drag-out fight, maybe we should step outside.”

  She lowered her voice instantly but stripped none of her intensity from it. “Is that it, Mr. Lane? Aptitude? Well, then, hell yes, I’ve got it! I despise that attitude! My grandmother was sixty-eight when I was ten, but she was in there battling away at the PTA far more often than younger, busier working parents! My grandfather brought both Carl and I through too many seasons of Little League! And do you know what else, Mr. Lane? They were bright people. They helped us with our homework, and Carl and I both graduated at the top of our classes! They were just tops, too, when it came to American history—they’d lived a lot of it, you see. They were wonderful, wise, gentle, and kind, and I valued them—both of them—until the very end. And how you could ever consider your father less than a wonderful, wise, bright, gentle, noble man—no matter what his age—is beyond me.”

  He had gone white, very white beneath the bronzed tan of his features. And as Susan stared at him her eyes locked with his crystal-blue ones, the wineglass in his hand suddenly shattered. Susan gasped, and the horrible moment was at an end.

  “Your hand!” she exclaimed, watching blood seep from his finger to ooze onto the tablecloth.

  He snatched up his napkin and quickly wrapped his hand. “It’s nothing,” he muttered quickly, offering the waiter a pleasant smile and an apology as he came to clean up the mess. And when it was gone and a new glass of wine was set down to replace the old one, he was still staring at Susan with a cobalt gaze.

  He started to say something, but then stopped, because their lobster was being served. Susan, very tense and nervous, picked up her cracker and started into a claw.

  David leaned close to her. “Susan, I never thought of my father as anything other than a great man. A very great man. I just want to say that…”

  He paused. Tension seemed to mount in her ridiculously. What? she wondered. What? She gripped down on the cracker with all her might against the obstinate claw.

  “That I’m sorry, really very sorry—”

  “Oh!” The claw gave, shattering just as the glass had done. Pieces of shell went flying across the table and onto David’s plate and his lap.

  “Oh, Lord!” She moaned, ready to sink under the table as the anxious waiter came running back over to retrieve the bits and pieces of shell.

  David apologized very graciously again. The waiter left them, and David smiled at her.

  “Is he going to be glad to see us go!” Susan muttered.

  David laughed. “Don’t worry, we’ll see that he’s rewarded for his misery!”

  She returned his smile across the table, then their smiles slowly faded, but their eyes remained locked together. A knot seemed to form in Susan’s throat; she swallowed to clear it, and she saw something in his eyes beyond the laughter, beyond the war that had sprung instantly between them. A certain tenderness there. Wistfulness, almost pain. She wanted to tell him that he was wrong about her, but she couldn’t.

  When she did speak, her voice was soft and careful. “David, I … want you to know that Peter … Peter meant very, very much to me. That I—” Oh, she was floundering, making it worse. So much worse!

  And yet, for once, he wasn’t taking it that way. He reached across the table and his fingers entwined, strong and sure, with hers, and without mockery or malice he replied softly, “We’re both going to miss him very much, aren’t we?”

  “Yes, we are.”

  And then she lowered her eyes and drew her hand away. Nervously she picked up a claw. She was on such dangerous ground! She could never, never let him know that Peter had been dying, had known he had been dying….

  “I’d love some coffee. Do you think our waiter will dare come back to our table?” she queried lightly.

  “Sure. Maybe he likes to live dangerously.”

  The waiter did come back. Susan wondered if she was chattering too much, about anything that came to mind. She wanted to steer away from shaky ground, yet she was also a little desperate, wanting to remember the few special seconds of tenderness that had passed between them, wanting to hold on to them for some reason.

  At last David glanced at his watch. “We’ll miss the show if we don’t get going,” he reminded her. He paid the check—tipping their waiter very well for his pains—then helped her into her coat, and his arm remained lightly around her shoulder as they strolled to the theater.

  The movie was fun. They shared a large buttered popcorn and a lemonade and applauded Lugosi’s Dracula. But Susan’s mind often wandered while she stared at the screen; the entire situation was absurd. They had waged war like snarling cats, fallen into a night of intimacy and passion, and were just barely on the road to being acquaintances, much less friends.

  She should have refused to speak to him, to be in any way cordial or agreeable after the note he had left her. Remembering that was enough to start her blood boiling all over again. But she was sitting in the movies with him and they had gone to dinner together. Of course, she hadn’t expected to meet him a second time by thrashing him with an umbrella and finding herself on the floor. Nor had she suspected that Harry Bloggs would enter their lives, putting her life and safety once more into his hands. And so they were together, and she was enjoying herself, and the worst thing of all was that she did like him, and being with him. She liked the feel of his breath against her cheek when he bent to tell her something, as if they were really together. Yet all the while she felt the fiercest of warnings inside—any further involvement
with him would bring more disaster than she could imagine. He’d ignited his own flame of anger against her, and she’d done everything she could to fan that flame.

  His hand was very lightly on her arm as they left the theater. He yawned once they were on the street, laughed, and excused himself, asking her if she wanted to stop for a nightcap, coffee, dessert, or any combination of the above.

  Susan smiled, about to answer that she’d love tea somewhere, when another voice intruded instead.

  “Susan! David!”

  Looking over his shoulder, Susan was just in time to see Carrie hurrying toward them from the doorway of a restaurant down the street. Jerry, Lawrence, and Mindy were hurrying to keep pace with her, all smiling from ear to ear with pleasure.

  “David!”

  Carrie gave him an enthusiastic hug, which David returned, yet Susan sensed that he wasn’t particularly happy to have been interrupted. Seconds later, though, the others were there, and David was shaking hands with the men and being hugged and kissed by Mindy this time.

  Questions and comments seemed to shrill in a cacophony, all to David. He laughed and tried to answer them. But then

  Jerry mentioned that he had heard about the break-in at the beach house, and Susan was suddenly included in the conversation again.

  “Weren’t you just terrified?” Mindy asked.

  “It must have been just awful!” Carrie added. “Are you really all right?”

  “Yes.”

  “The sheriff was pleased as hell about the way you handled that guy, David.” Jerry grinned. “Our hero, as usual.”

  “What hero?” David said, scoffing impatiently. “I had a gun, he didn’t.” His gaze fell on Susan and he added softly, “The credit goes to Susan.”

  “Me?”

  “Well, of course. If you had panicked or passed out, we would have been in a mess.”

  She returned his gaze, smiling, because what was passing between them just then was very nice. It spoke of a new start; it made her feel that a time might come when she could tell him she had lied, or at least abetted his misconceptions.

  But just then Carrie laughed delightedly and innocently noted, “My, my, Susan! You do have a way with the Lane men! First the father, now the son!”

  The smile faded from David’s face. His change was subtle, but it was there and it was complete. Lawrence said something; David replied pleasantly, but he wasn’t really with the group any longer, even if Susan was the only one to realize it.

  “Hey, let’s go somewhere for coffee, shall we?” Carrie suggested.

  “I’m sorry,” David said instantly. “I’ve got to get back to New York early tomorrow. But I promise, the next time I’m coming up, I’ll plan in advance and see if we can’t all get together then.”

  Susan didn’t protest. She didn’t want to prolong the misery that had come to the evening. They chatted on the sidewalk a few minutes longer, then David silently led her to the Porsche. He didn’t speak on the drive back to the beach house; neither did she.

  Inside, Susan tossed her purse on the parlor sofa while David bolted the door. She noticed that he went into the library and checked the windows. When he came into the parlor, he was still silent and remote. Susan wondered if she should run up to her room and slam and lock her door; she didn’t much care for his brooding mood, and she certainly didn’t trust his temper. She had learned that it could be very explosive.

  But she didn’t race past him and up the stairs. In a voice she managed to keep deceptively steady she asked if he’d like a cup of tea.

  “No thanks,” he said briefly. “I’m going up. Are you coming with me in the morning or not?”

  His hands were in his pockets, his eyes remarkably like blue ice. Susan didn’t know if he was longing to reach out and shake her or reach out and hold her and demand she tell him that it was all a lie….

  But what was a lie? What he believed was truth—or what had happened between them?

  “I don’t really see how I can change my plans. I—uh—I’m not sure that I can get reservations.”

  “Miss Anderson, you certainly don’t need reservations for my plane.”

  “Your plane? You fly?”

  “Well, so they promised when I started doing so in the Air Force.” A slight smile curled his lip. “I promise, Miss Anderson, I’m quite competent. Are you afraid?”

  “No, of course not! I love the air, and you’re—”

  He laughed. “Still alive and well? Yes, I am. I’d like to be on the way to the airfield by nine. Does that suit you?”

  Why was she going with him?

  “Yes.”

  “Good night, then.”

  He turned around, and seconds later Susan heard his light tread on the stairs. Pensively she made her cup of tea, drank it, and crawled up the stairs herself.

  It was a miserable night. She awoke constantly and was aware of one driving truth all night: He was there, not thirty feet away, sleeping, stretched out naked on his bed.

  And she hated herself for her fantasies. But then, she mused, they weren’t fantasies, were they? They were memories.

  You can’t write on memory forever, Miss Anderson! The words came back to haunt her again and again during the night. Oh, God! What did the man really want?

  In the morning, he was all business. From his three-piece suit to his brusque manner, he was business; proving, perhaps, that professionalism could be the name of the game.

  He was reading the paper and drinking coffee when she came down to the kitchen. At the sight of her he rose, washed out his cup, and said that if her things were ready, he’d put them in the car. Susan said that her luggage was in the foyer, and he left her to retrieve it.

  She quickly poured a cup of coffee, musing that she had expected to see him in some sort of old-fashioned aviator’s costume. She’d worn a tawny jumpsuit herself, and next to him she felt frightfully underdressed. But she wasn’t about to go change just to complement his attire.

  She realized that he hadn’t returned to the kitchen, so she quickly finished her coffee and rushed out. David was leaning against the Porsche.

  She started to hurry out to the car. “The bolts!” he called to her, and with a sigh she hurried back to use her key to twist the top locks.

  He had only one comment when she reached the car.

  “I called Jerry this morning, and he’s promised to get someone out to install an alarm system. It should be in when you get back; check with him.”

  She didn’t try to tell him she thought it was ridiculous to install an alarm system when an incident like a break-in at the beach house would be like a sighting of Halley’s comet—one that could only possibly occur every seventy-six years. After all, he did own half the house.

  “Fine,” she murmured, settling into the passenger’s seat, wishing once again that she had the nerve to ask him if she could drive. She didn’t know why she didn’t, and that annoyed her too—so much so that she at last broke the uncomfortable silence between them, asking, “Why do you hate women, Mr. Lane?”

  He gazed her way, obviously startled, then he frowned, shaking his head and returning his focus to the road. “I don’t hate women, Miss Anderson. I’m rather fond of them in general, as a matter of fact. I’m rather decent for this day and age, I think. I send candy and flowers—”

  Susan interrupted him with a laugh. “I’m willing to bet your secretary sends the flowers! And those, Mr. Lane, are nothing but appearance. I believe that you are not at all fond of women and that you automatically think the worst of us!”

  His gaze flashed back to her quickly—too quickly to search for meaning in his sharp frosty eyes. “Hardly, Miss Anderson. I don’t tend to ‘think the worst.’”

  “Like hell you don’t,” Susan muttered.

  She didn’t know if he heard her or not; he didn’t reply. Moments later they were pulling the Porsche into a private airfield. The mechanic on duty apparently had the responsibility of returning the car; he took the keys, spoke
casually about the weather being great, then assured David that his plane had been thoroughly maintenanced and that his flight plan was logged.

  It was a small, sharp-looking Cessna that could seat six at most. Susan did love planes and the wonder of flying. She must have looked disappointed when David suggested that she sit in back, because, despite his formal coolness that morning, he relented and said that perhaps she would prefer sitting up front.

  The flight took them two hours; two nice, peaceful hours. The weather was beautiful, and her enthusiasm was such that David Lane couldn’t help but be the perfect host, pointing out landmarks, explaining the power of the wind on such a small craft. He stayed out over the water for most of the flight, yet she could see Manhattan to the west when he pointed it out to her. She saw Statue of Liberty and the great rise of the indomitable buildings against the horizon.

  He landed in another private field in New Jersey. There was no rental car here but rather a chauffeur-driven limo awaiting them, one that was equipped with the works—phone, bar, stereo, even a small television.

  Susan wished they’d taken the train or a bus, anything but the chauffeur-driven limousine. She found herself wondering about David Lane’s use of the car. Was this where he entertained the women of whom he was fond? She felt terribly penned in with him; terribly aware of him. And painfully aware that the camaraderie they had shared in the plane was gone, erased, as if it had never been. He was polite, offering her a drink, asking if she was comfortable. That was all. They went from New Jersey to New York almost touching, yet they might as well have been miles away.

  In the city, David tapped on the window to the front. “The St. Regis first, please, Julian. That’s right, isn’t it, Miss Anderson?”

  She didn’t bother to ask how he knew where her hotel reservations were—John had obviously mentioned the hotel, just as he had mentioned her other plans. And, of course, it was true—her whereabouts could hardly be considered a state secret.