C.J.'s Fate C.J.'s Fate C.J.'s Fate

by Kay Hooper

  C.J. thought that over. “What’s the other quarter?”

  “English.”

  “Oh.”

  “Are you going to walk three paces behind me?”

  “Only if we’re walking on thin ice.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  “While we’re being polite,” he said casually, “may I ask how you’ve managed to escape the clutches of a man for twenty-six years?”

  “The first sixteen years don’t count.”

  “The last ten, then.”

  “No one would have me.”

  His arms tightened slightly, and when he spoke, his voice was husky and not at all casual. “Then the men you’ve known were blind and stupid. But I’m glad. I’m very glad, pixie.”

  C.J. was surprised and somehow touched to realize that it did matter to him. There was a thread of awe in his voice, as though he felt that she had given him a precious gift. Moved by that, but unwilling to have him speculating on her reasons, she managed lightly, “I’m very inexperienced; you’ll have to teach me.”

  He chuckled suddenly. “You have a great deal of natural aptitude, believe me.” He seemed to understand that she needed humor, lightness.

  His hand felt around under the covers, zeroing in like a homing pigeon.

  “I thought I told you to stop that.”

  “When they put me to bed with a shovel.”

  “Quit it before you start something you can’t handle.”

  “Oh-ho! That’s touched my pride!”

  “Fate, stop it. We’ll be dead for the wedding. Fate? I don’t trust the look in your eyes. Stop that…what’re you?…I don’t want to…Oh, hell….”

  A long time later, C.J. barely found the energy to open her eyes as Fate turned out the lamp on the nightstand. “I just don’t see,” she managed to murmur, “how the Indians lost any battles. I’ll bet Custer ran into someone like you at Little Big Horn.”

  “Napoleon must have met you at Waterloo….”

  The sporadic ringing of a bell interrupted C.J.’s blissful sleep, and she opened her eyes reluctantly to gaze sleepily at a day-lightened ceiling. Lazily, her mind toyed with the meaning of the disturbing bell, finally coming to the conclusion that it was the phone. With a sigh, she started to roll over and answer the shrill demand.

  But there was a heavy, unaccustomed weight across her middle. Immediately, the night before came back to her in great detail, and she turned her head slowly. For a long moment, no longer paying attention to the phone that continued to ring, she stared at the handsome, sleeping face half hidden in the pillow beside her own.

  But the sound apparently got through to Fate. With a groan, he rolled over to fumble for the receiver. Eyes tightly shut, he finally managed to uncradle the thing and then rolled back to her side and buried his face back into the pillow. “What?” he demanded in a muffled voice, the receiver to his ear.

  Amused in spite of herself, C.J. watched as one dark eye opened and fixed itself on her face. There was puzzlement in the purple depths for a moment, then a tiny fire kindled. He handed her the phone, his arm returning to its earlier resting place and his face nuzzling into her neck. “For you,” he said.

  “Thank you,” she said politely.

  “Don’t mention it.” His lips found an earlobe and began toying gently.

  Trying to ignore a little shiver of delight, C.J. brought the receiver up to her other ear. “Hello?”

  “C.J.?”

  She wanted to giggle at the rattled sound of Jan’s voice, but bit it back. “Hello, Jan.” Apparently, she decided, surprise at a little sister’s coming of age wasn’t limited to big brothers.

  “Should I inquire into the state of your virtue, or just gracefully allow the subject to drop?” Jan asked wryly.

  “Let it drop. Is that why you called?”

  Jan sighed. “No, of course not. Do you happen to know what time it is?”

  “Can’t see the clock,” C.J. murmured dreamily, tilting her head slightly to allow wandering lips to explore her throat.

  “It’s noon.”

  “Noon!” She sat up abruptly, dislodging Fate who protested audibly. “But the wedding’s at two!”

  “Yes, well, I wondered if you remembered that,” Jan responded affably. “Do you think you could desert the lovenest long enough to participate? Kathy’s sort of counting on you and Fate, you know. Of course, if you’re too busy…”

  “We’ll be there. Don’t start without us.” C.J. leaned over Fate to replace the receiver, cutting off Jan’s laugh. Fate pulled her completely on top of him and drew the covers up around them both, with all the air of a man making himself comfortable.

  “Carolyn Jennifer,” he murmured, nibbling on her chin.

  “My word, the man doesn’t even know my name,” she accused in a shocked voice, temporarily putting aside the urgent matter of getting ready for a wedding.

  He sighed, his fingers threading among her curls in order to pull her head down for a kiss. “I should have caught you last night while you were weak with passion,” he declared. “You would have told me then.”

  “Why didn’t you?” she breathed, catching his lower lip teasingly between her teeth.

  “I was too weak with passion to think of it,” he confessed.

  C.J.’s soft laugh trailed away as she felt his hands slide beneath the covers and begin moving over her back in a disturbing way. “We have to get up,” she protested reluctantly.

  The purple eyes were smiling up at her. “I love you, you know.”

  She felt a curiously hot-cold chill shoot through her body, felt her heart begin to pound with a wild rhythm. He loved her? But that wasn’t possible; it didn’t make sense! There was nothing special about her; she was too ordinary for a man like Fate to fall in love with her.

  But maybe he felt that a declaration was obligatory? That after their night together, she would need to hear the words, however false they may have been?

  Before he could prevent her, C.J. had rolled away from him and sat up, looking pointedly at the clock. “We have less than two hours to get ready for the wedding,” she reminded him lightly. “We’d better get a move on.”

  “C.J.?” He sat up, too, one hand catching her arm when she would have slipped from the bed. “You don’t believe me, do you?”

  Continuing to strive for lightness, she asked, “Does it matter?”

  “Damnit, of course it matters!”

  She shook her head slowly, feeling the sting of absurd tears in her eyes and not knowing why.

  His free hand reached out to grasp her chin, turning her face gently until she met his eyes. In an altered tone, he asked softly, “What are you afraid of, honey?”

  “I don’t know,” she whispered. “Fate…it’s all happening so fast. I—I don’t want to think about tomorrow. I feel—new. Raw. As if I’m beginning all over again. I need time to get used to that.”

  Fate searched her uncertain face for a long moment, then leaned over and kissed her softly, sweetly. “All right,” he said huskily. “But I’m going to do my damnedest to convince you that I love you. Don’t deny me that right.”

  “I wouldn’t think of it,” she managed, torn between laughter and tears.

  He brushed a single tear from her cheek, then caught her in a fierce bearhug. “Just don’t cry,” he groaned. “I can take anything but that.”

  A hiccupping little laugh escaped her, her sense of humor coming rapidly to the fore. “Can’t stand to see a woman cry, huh?”

  “Any other woman, I probably could. But not you. It tears me to pieces.” He sighed roughly. “You don’t seem to realize it yet, honey, but I’m putty in your hands.”

  Surprised at the wry admission, she watched as he slid from the bed and began to dress. Hugging her upraised knees, she let her eyes drink in the sight of him. “Aren’t you taking an awful chance by telling me that?” she asked softly.

  “Maybe.” He shrugged into his white shirt, and t
hen leaned over to kiss her one last time. “But you see…I love you.”

  “You’re not playing fair,” she whispered.

  “I’m not playing at all. I’ll give you as much room as I can, C.J., as much time as you need.” He straightened and picked up his jacket and tie, going toward the door. Then he hesitated and looked back at her. “Just don’t expect me to be quiet about how I feel, love. I want to shout it from the rooftops.”

  C.J. barely heard his promise to return to pick her up as soon as he’d changed. She stared almost blindly at the door for a long moment after he had gone, feeling the sudden emptiness of the room like a physical blow. Then she slid from the bed and headed for the shower.

  Why hadn’t she responded to his admission of love with her own love for him? The thought haunted her as she showered automatically. Fear. What was she afraid of?

  It came to her slowly as she was dressing that she had not voiced her love aloud because by doing so she would be committing herself. Putting a name to her feelings would be to admit that they were real, and she still wasn’t sure. In spite of everything that had happened, everything they had shared, she was still raw and tender from the newness of her emotions.

  Independent all her life, emotionally alone in spite of the friendship of the magic circle, she wasn’t sure how to open herself fully to another human being. And the very thought of that kind of vulnerability frightened her.

  What if it didn’t last? He would take away a part of her; she would lose something that she could never get back, never replace. Nothing would ever be the same again….

  But nothing will ever be the same again now, a little voice inside her head whispered.

  She shied away from the thought, realizing abruptly that trying to get everything clear in her mind now was like probing a raw wound with rough hands. Just as she had told Fate, she needed time. She would take one day at a time and try to understand what had happened to her. Try to find out whether or not her relationship with Fate was real and would last.

  That resolve enabled her to greet him calmly when he knocked on her door sometime later. “Good—you can zip me up,” she informed him, catching his hand and pulling him inside the room.

  “I’d rather unzip you,” he countered cheerfully.

  “Funny man.” She presented her back. “The wedding starts in half an hour; Kathy’s probably spitting nails.”

  Obediently, he pulled the zipper of her dress up, dropping a kiss on the nape of her neck when he had completed his task. “You look beautiful. That rustly stuff is very becoming.”

  “This ‘rustly stuff’ is chiffon,” she said, moving over to the dresser to pick up her bouquet. “And thank you.” She glanced down at the floor-length dress, colored a soft pastel yellow, and then looked appraisingly at his tuxedo. C.J. allowed her eyes to wander over him slowly, from the sleek black hair to his gleaming shoes. Hastily, she swallowed the lump in her throat. “We’d better go.”

  They were silent as they made their way to the chapel on the top floor of the lodge. But, oddly enough, it wasn’t an uncomfortable silence. Fate held her hand firmly, looking down at her from time to time with a smile. And C.J. couldn’t help but respond to the warmth of that caressing look.

  She wondered vaguely if she would look different to her friends, then dismissed the thought as fanciful. But she would have been astonished to have been told just exactly how different she appeared. All five of her friends immediately noticed the change in her from the moment Fate opened the door of the small room just outside the chapel and led her in. Though there were still shadows of uncertainly in her tawny eyes, her face was radiant, and her fingers twined with Fate’s in an unconscious gesture of trust and devotion.

  “At last!” The bride, surrounded by her attendants, swung around to confront the tardy couple at the door. “So you finally decided to come?” She swept forward, detaching Fate from C.J. and shoving him toward the door. “You can hold hands with C.J. later—right now go next door and help the guys give Patrick their moral support. I think he’s going to turn chicken on me and run.”

  Laughing, he was shoved out the door. C.J. found herself the cynosure of all eyes as soon as the door was closed, and managed a faint, rueful smile. “Hi,” she offered brightly.

  “Just one question,” Jan said amiably.

  C.J. gave her a guarded look. “What?” she asked warily.

  “Have you eaten lunch?”

  Surprised, C.J. started to laugh. “I haven’t even had breakfast,” she confessed.

  Jan gestured toward a table in one corner. “Well, since we don’t want you fainting during the ceremony, help yourself.” She nodded at the tray of canapes resting on the table. “Kathy got the munchies a little while ago, so Tami went down and raided the buffet.”

  C.J. moved to the table. “I thought brides were supposed to refuse all sustenance due to nerves,” she said, with a sidelong, teasing look at Kathy.

  “Not practical ones,” Kathy retorted dryly. “Jan, this veil isn’t right. I think you put it on backward.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. I’ve put on five veils, friend, including my own. I should know how to do it by now.”

  “Well, it isn’t right.”

  “It’s fine. Susan, what did you do with the garter?”

  “It was here a minute ago. I gave it to Tami—”

  “And I gave it to Ann.”

  “C.J., you’re sitting on it.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Kathy, don’t sit down, you’ll crush your dress. Just stand there; I can get the garter on.”

  “Whose wedding is this, anyway?”

  “Yours, and don’t be difficult. There. Something borrowed. And something blue. The bracelet Patrick gave you, that’s something new. And you have your grandmother’s pearls for something old.”

  “Can I get married now, mother?”

  “Oh, shut up! I was the first to marry, so naturally I have to make sure the rest of you do it right.”

  “Naturally.”

  “Here are your flowers. I meant to ask, by the way, why we’re all carrying different flowers. Your bridal roses are traditional, but what about the rest of us?”

  Kathy grinned. “I wondered when somebody’d ask. If you’ll remember, I chose the flowers months ago—and I chose them very carefully. You’re carrying goldenrod, which means ‘encouragement’—little mother Jan. Susan is carrying laurels, which means ‘glory.’” She lifted a brow at beautiful, regal Susan. “For obvious reasons.”

  Susan inclined her head slightly. “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome. Ann is carrying China asters, which means ‘I will think of thee.’ She’s the most loving of us all.”

  Ann smiled, her violet eyes showing pleasure at the tribute.

  “Tami is carrying coreopsis, which means ‘love at first sight.’ I’ve never seen anybody fall as hard as she did for John.”

  They all laughed, and then Jan lifted a questioning brow. “What about C.J.?”

  “Well, now, there I lucked out.” Kathy turned brown eyes brimful of laughter to the sixth member of their group. “C.J.’s carrying coral honeysuckle—which means ‘color of my fate.’”

  “Good Lord,” C.J. said faintly.

  A maverick in most matters of tradition, Kathy had planned a wedding which was both simple and traditional. That was, aside from a chorus of five voices exclaiming “We do!” when the minister asked who gave this woman in marriage.

  C.J.—who had been oddly moved by walking up the aisle beside Fate—paid unusually close attention to the vows exchanged at the altar. Having attended both the weddings of her friends and the wedding of her sister, she had heard the words many times before. But never before had they touched her so deeply.

  She glanced back once at the crowded chapel, seeing the solemn faces of fellow guests at the lodge, most of them strangers to her. Their presence was mute testimony to Fate’s belief that everyone enjoyed weddings, and C.J. decided that apparently all the
world did love a lover.

  Listening to the words that were heavy with the weight of ages, watching the two serious, glowing faces of the couple standing tall before the minister, she wondered how anyone could doubt the future existence of weddings and married life. As long as the human heart could look to the future with hope, there would be weddings. As long as men and women met and fell in love, there would be weddings.

  C.J. felt an odd quiver go through her at the thought, an elusive fear which darted too rapidly to be caught or even seen. Unwilling to probe for the truth, she hastily turned her mind back to the ceremony. And heard the happy couple pronounced husband and wife.

  Since Kathy wasn’t one to stand on her dignity, and since the magic circle was an effusive group, there was an immediate rush for the altar once the ceremony was duly concluded. Pandemonium reigned for some time, and then the bridal pair was borne on a tide of good wishes to the buffet set up downstairs in one of the dining rooms.

  C.J. found Fate close beside her as they waited their turn for the elevator, and a warm feeling stole through her when he caught her hand and held it firmly.

  “At last!” he murmured into her ear. “It’s a funny thing, but I seem to get withdrawal pains whenever I go too long without touching you. You’ve obviously bewitched me, pixie.”

  “Pixie’s don’t bewitch,” she informed him calmly, “they enchant.”

  “Same thing.”

  “Not at all. Bewitching suggests witchcraft, which suggests black cats and boiling caldrons and spells. Enchantment, on the other hand, suggests elves and fairies and magical kingdoms and wizards with stardust.”

  “I stand corrected.”

  “Very gracious of you.”

  “Nice of you to notice.”

  “I’m a noticing kind of woman. As a matter of fact. I’ve been meaning to tell you that I read minds. But I was afraid that it would scare you off. Does it?”

  “Of course not,” he denied stoutly. There was a short silence, then he asked uneasily, “Do you really read minds?”