Tidewater Lover

by Janet Dailey

  "Of course I'll wait." Mike promised, smiling that it was the least he could do after letting her down.

  Lacey hoped it would look to Cole as if they were going somewhere together but in separate vehicles. As she backed her car out of the garage, she glanced up to the second-story window looking out from the living room and saw Cole gazing out of it.

  A surge of anger washed through her and she reversed recklessly out of the driveway without looking for traffic. Immediately she shifted gears, and pressed the accelerator to the floor, the tires peeling rubber as the car shot forward, leaving Mike far behind.

  At the major highway intersection, Mike finally caught up with her. His honking horn made Lacey glance in her rearview mirror to see him motioning her onto the shoulder of the road. Grimly she pulled over. He parked behind her and climbed out of his car to walk to hers.

  Mike bent down to peer in her open window. "Who the hell do you think you are? A race driver?"

  "Is that why you stopped me? Just to criticize my driving?" Lacey challenged, in no mood for a lecture.

  "No … although it's a damned good reason for stopping you." He didn't back down completely from his stand. "It's just that … I feel responsible for what happened back there. Your whole argument with Whitfield started because you were defending me, whether I asked you to or not."

  "The argument was inevitable." Her fingers drummed the steering wheel. Lacey was impatient to be on her way, even if she didn't know where she was going.

  "I put you in an awkward position. I should have told you when I first arrived that I had a date with someone else tonight." Mike gallantly took the blame for her present dilemma.

  "It isn't your fault," Lacey denied. "I was the one who put my foot in my mouth. I didn't need help from anyone to do that."

  "What are you going to do tonight?" His look was sympathetic and compassionate.

  "I don't know." Her gaze skittered away from his face.

  "I don't like the idea of your being alone. I could round up one of my friends and make a foursome," he suggested.

  "I'd be rotten company for anyone, but thanks. Besides I wouldn't want to cramp your style." She attempted a smile, but it wasn't very successful.

  "What are you going to do, Lacey? You can't just drive around all night."

  She hesitated before answering. "Maybe I'll stop by to see Maryann."

  Her statement seemed to satisfy Mike. "You do that. And drive carefully, will you, Lacey?"

  "I promise." As Mike straightened, Lacey shifted her car into gear.

  She checked for oncoming vehicles before pulling into the traffic lane, waving to Mike. Obeying the speed limits, she drove sensibly to the apartment complex where Maryann lived. She parked her car in the visitors' lot and walked up the steps to her friend's unit. Lacey rang the doorbell and waited.

  The door, still secured by a chain latch, opened a crack. Through the narrow opening, Lacey glimpsed the washed-out brown hair, that peculiar dark blond shade, so distinctively Maryann's.

  "Hi. It's me, Lacey," she identified herself to her cautious friend.

  "Lacey, what are you doing here?" The door closed a moment, then swung wide to admit her. "I thought you'd be having your own private little clambake on the beach tonight."

  "My own clambake, huh?" Lacey's smile was twisted. "And I came to see if you had a hot dog to share." As she walked in, she noticed that her girl friend was wearing a housecoat. Only then did it occur to her that it was Friday night and it was very likely her friend had a date. "I bet you're going out, aren't you?"

  "No, it's just another Friday night for me and my cat to spend together. I was just changing out of the clothes I wore to work when you rang the doorbell. Both of us will be glad to have you for dinner," Maryann insisted as a pumpkin-colored cat sauntered from the kitchen to rub against his mistress's leg. "I don't have any hot dogs, but I do have some hamburger."

  "That's fine." Lacey really didn't have any appetite.

  Maryann closed the door, locked it and refastened the chain. "You never did say what you're doing here. Did it get too lonely out there in your luxurious beach house?"

  "No, it wasn't lonely. Far from it," Lacey declared.

  "What do you mean?" Maryann frowned. "I thought you didn't have any close neighbors."

  "It's a long story," was the sighing answer.

  "I have all night if you do." Her friend shrugged away that excuse.

  "It isn't lonely because I'm not staying in the house by myself," announced Lacey.

  "You're not staying in the house alone." Maryann repeated the statement to be certain she had understood it. "That means someone is staying with you. Who?"

  "Cole Whitfield."

  "Who is Cole Whitfield?" Almost immediately a light dawned in her eyes. "Whitfield? You don't mean the sarcastic Mr. Whitfield?"

  "That is precisely the Cole Whitfield that I mean."

  Maryann's mouth opened in astonishment. For several seconds, she was incapable of getting any words to come out. Finally she managed to ask, "How? What is he doing there?"

  "It seems that Cole is an old family friend of Margo's husband. There was a mix-up. Margo asked me to stay at the house and her husband asked Cole."

  "But when you found out …"

  "It's all totally unbelievable, Maryann. I thought he was a burglar when he first walked into the house. He scared me out of my wits." Lacey went on to explain how she and Cole had come to the agreement to share the house.

  "And you actually agreed, after the things you said about him?" Maryann was incredulous.

  "In person, he really isn't so bad. What am I saying?" Lacey caught herself angrily. "He's worse. His alarm wakes me up in the morning. He sings in the shower. He works till all hours of the night, then is grouchy as an old bear."

  "Lacey —" Maryann gave her a long, considering look "— maybe you should tell me something about this Cole Whitfield. Like, for instance, how old is he and what does he look like?"

  "He's in his thirties," she admitted.

  "Unmarried," Maryann inserted with certainty.

  "Yes, unmarried," she nodded.

  "Good-looking?"

  "In a rough kind of way. He has nice blue eyes, though."

  "And all you are doing is sharing the same house." Her friend eyed her skeptically. "There haven't been any 'romantic' moments between you?"

  "I don't know what you mean by romantic. I sleep in my room and he sleeps in his."

  "And he hasn't made a single pass at you?" Maryann took one look at Lacey's face and had her answer.

  Lacey didn't try to conceal what she felt any longer. "It's all a mess. I'm half in love with him already. Lord knows he doesn't give me much encouragement."

  "What happened tonight? Does he have a date with someone else? Is that why you've come here? To show him that he isn't the only pebble on the beach?"

  "He doesn't have a date. He came home to have an early night." Lacey was unaware that she had referred to the beach house as home, but that was what it had become to her since she had started sharing it with Cole. "Mike was there. He'd stopped by for a beer. Cole got all hostile because he had called the office and Donna had told him Mike was working at another job site instead of explaining he had left early today. We started arguing and the whole thing became personal."

  "You lost your temper and stormed out of the house," Maryann finished for her.

  "Cole thinks I'm going out with Mike tonight. And Mike already has a date," Lacey explained.

  "When did you find this out?"

  "After I had stormed out of the house," she admitted with chagrin. Instantly her chin lifted to a defiant angle. "I couldn't go back then and endure Cole's gloating."

  "So you came here."

  "I didn't know where else to go." Lacey shrugged and glanced apologetically at the dark blonde girl.

  "What are friends for?" Maryann smiled. "Come on. Let's fix a salad, fry some hamburgers and have some wine."

  Lacey hesitate
d for only a second. "I'll fix the salad."

  After their meal, they sat around Maryann's small living room, talking and listening to records. A little after eleven, Lacey saw Maryann stifling a yawn.

  "I'm sorry. I forgot you have to work tomorrow morning, don't you?" Lacey remembered. "I'd better leave so you can get some sleep."

  "You don't have to go," Maryann protested, rising to her feet when Lacey did.

  "It's late. I think it's safe for me to go back now," she joked weakly.

  "Call me and let me know what happens," her friend urged, then clicked her tongue. "I forgot. You don't have a phone out there."

  "No, but I'll have lunch with you one day this next week and give you the blow-by-blow details. If there are any," she laughed. "More than likely Cole is in bed and won't have any idea what time I get in. Or care what time it is."

  "You can always make a lot of noise and wake him up when you come in," Maryann suggested with a conspiring laugh.

  "Cole sleeps through his alarm. I think he'd sleep through an atom-bomb explosion." Lacey started for the door. "Thanks for dinner … and the company."

  "It was fun." She reached down to pick up her cat. "Wasn't it, Oscar?" The cat purred and rubbed its head against her chin.

  "Good night." Lacey was smiling as she left the apartment.

  Once outside in the pleasant coolness of the night air, her expression sobered. She wasn't ready to return to the beach house yet. In her car, Lacey drove aimlessly through the streets. Finally she ended up on the Virginia Beach side of the bay along the ocean front.

  Disregarding the lateness of the hour, she parked her car and strolled along the silent beach. The time she had spent with her friend had been good, but Lacey still felt depressed. Finally the cool breeze drove her back to the car and she headed homeward.

  All in all not the best evening I've ever spent, but thanks to Maryann, not the worst, Lacey thought as she drove the car into the garage. She had left her watch on the bedroom dresser and the clock on the car's dash didn't work. She had no idea what time it was. She knew it was late because it had been dark for hours.

  Shivering at the coolness of the night air, she hurried through the connecting door from the garage to the house entrance. Wearily she began the tedious climb up the stairs.

  Three steps from the top, the back of her neck prickled in warning and she glanced up to see Cole towering above her at the head of the stairs.

  His white shirt was completely unbuttoned and pulled free of the waistband of his pants to hang loosely open. There was a forbidding darkness to his gaze, his rugged male features appearing to be permanently cast in bronze.

  "Where the hell have you been?" he snarled.

  "That's none of your business." Lacey attempted to brush past him, but his fingers clamped themselves vise-like over her wrist to stop her.

  "Do you have any idea what time it is?" Cole demanded harshly.

  "No, I don't, and I don't see that it matters," she retorted.

  "It happens to be nearly four o'clock in the morning," he informed her. "I want to know where you've been."

  Lacey strained against the steel-hard grip on her wrist. "I don't have to account to you for my whereabouts. Let me go, if you please," she ordered curtly. "I'm tired."

  "I'll let you go," Cole promised, "as soon as you tell me where you've been."

  "I told you it's none of your business where I've been," she repeated. She was tired and ill-equipped to engage in a slanging match with Cole Whitfield.

  "I know you weren't with Bowman," he snapped.

  Lacey paled visibly but challenged, "Wasn't I?"

  "No, you weren't," There wasn't a trace of uncertainty in his ironclad statement. "Because I went to his place to find you. Bowman told me you'd said you were in no mood for anyone's company and had left."

  Silently Lacey thanked Mike for inventing a face-saving answer instead of admitting that he had had a date with some other girl that night. But it still didn't get her out of her present situation.

  "And I'm still not in the mood for anyone's company — least of all yours! Now let me go!" She tried twisting her arm to free if from his grip.

  But Cole used the movement to curve her arm behind her back and haul her against his chest. "I don't care whether you're in the mood for company or not. You're going to answer my questions," he ordered angrily.

  "I am not!" Lacey protested vehemently.

  His other hand raked through her hair, his fingers gripping the short strands to force her head back so he could see her face.

  "You've been drinking, haven't you?" he accused.

  "I stopped at a friend's house and had a couple of glasses of wine," she answered truthfully. "Is that a crime?"

  "Considering the way you drove when you left here, it borders on attempted suicide," Cole snapped. "I've called the police half a dozen times, certain you'd had an accident, especially after I discovered you weren't with Bowman."

  "I didn't have an accident. I arrived safely." Tears were misting her eyes. "I seem to be more in danger of being hurt by you than in my car." And she meant that in more than one way. "Let go of my arm! You're going to break it if you keep twisting it like that."

  "I hope it hurts." He forced her more fully against his rigid length. "After what you put me through tonight, you deserve to be punished."

  "What I put you through?" Lacey choked in bitter laughter. "Why, you arrogant, bullheaded —"

  Cole gave her no time to finish the insult. His mouth bruised her lips into silence as his arms ruthlessly molded her to his body with an economy of movement. Yet the cruel kiss meant to punish ignited a bewildering response in Lacey. She had meant to struggle, to fight his embrace, but her hands were sliding inside his shirt, seeking the fiery warmth of his naked skin. Her head was whirling, throbbing painfully, confused by her reaction.

  When Cole lifted his head, she could not open her eyes to look at him, quivering with the response his kiss had evoked. She felt his mouth and chin rubbing against the hair near her forehead.

  "For God's sake, Lacey, where were you all this time?" There was a funny throb in his voice, almost like pain, as his mouth moved against her hair while he spoke, roughly caressing. "I've been half out of my mind worrying that something had happened to you."

  "Really?" she breathed, almost afraid to believe him.

  "Yes, really." He smiled against her cheek and she felt the uneven thud of his heart beneath her hands. "Your friend, the one you had a drink with —" his arms tightened around her, demand creeping back into his voice "— was it a man or a woman?"

  "It was Maryann, my girl friend," Lacey admitted, tipping her head to the side as he began nuzzling her ear.

  "And I suppose you've been gossiping with her all night while I've been pacing the floor," Cole grumbled with mock anger.

  "Not all the time." His hands were roaming over her bare shoulders and Lacey was shamelessly enjoying the sensations they were creating. "I left there some time past eleven."

  He lifted his head, frowning, his gaze narrowing. "Where have you been since then?"

  "I … I went for a walk on the beach."

  "Alone?" Cole accused.

  "Yes," she nodded, knowing it had been foolish.

  "You deserve to be whipped within an inch of your life!" he stated gruffly. "You were actually walking on the beach for more than three hours?" He repeated her statement as if he still couldn't believe she had said it.

  "I guess so, if that's how late it is." She couldn't bring herself to worry about the risk she had taken at this late date.

  "Oh, Lacey …" He sighed heavily in exasperation and crushed her tightly in his arms. "I knew I shouldn't have let you walk out of that door with Bowman."

  "You couldn't have stopped me," she laughed softly. "I was so mad when I left that a brick wall couldn't have stopped me. And that's all your fault."

  "My fault?" Cole tucked a finger under her chin, tilting her face up and gazing at it quizzically.
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  "You started the whole thing," she reminded him. "If you hadn't been so rude to Mike, I would never have lost my temper."

  "What was I supposed to think?" An eyebrow twisted arrogantly at her answer. "I call his office and his secretary tells me he's out on a project. But when I get here, I find him carrying you around in his arms."

  "You could have given him the benefit of the doubt," she pointed out, feeling the old resentment building again, "instead of jumping to conclusions that were completely wrong and unfair."

  "How can you be so sure that my conclusion wasn't right?" Cole argued complacently.

  "Because Mike isn't like that." Stiffening her arms against his chest, Lacey arched away from him. "He's honest and intelligent and works as hard as you do. Yours isn't the only project he's in charge of, and the delays on yours have been caused by suppliers and labor unions, things he has no control over."

  Cole's mouth thinned grimly. "There you go again, defending him!"

  "Well, what am I supposed to do when he isn't around to defend himself?"' She twisted completely out of his arms.

  When she would have walked away, he caught her wrist, holding it firmly. "Lacey, I don't want to argue with you." His voice was husky, its demand low.

  "No?" Looking into his dark blue eyes, Lacey knew that wasn't what he really wanted. "No, you want to make love, don't you?"

  His gaze searched her face with unnerving thoroughness. "Don't you?" It was less a question than a request.

  Lacey's pulse hammered in instant reaction, a heady intoxication filling her senses. She felt the pliant weakening of her flesh, but her mind refused to let its rule be overthrown by physical attraction.

  "No." Her answer was faintly breathless, then firmer as she repeated it. "No, I don't."

  "Liar," he accused, one corner of his mouth curving into an oddly bewitching smile.

  Its charm was potent and Lacey had to breathe in deeply to keep it from weaving a spell around her. It took all of her willpower to remain impassive to his subtle and powerful appeal.

  "You've accused me of that more than once, Cole," she said tightly. "And you're as wrong this time as you were all of the others."