The Summerhouse

by Jude Deveraux

  Roger’s boots were sticking out from under the bed and Madison kicked them. “Down, girl!” she told herself. “You’re married and . . . and . . .” She couldn’t think of anything else, except that a man like Thomas Randall, from a family like his, wasn’t for her.

  Madison lasted a whole twenty-four hours before she was bored out of her mind. For the last two years, she’d read nothing but medical textbooks and she’d desperately wanted to read something light and happy, something that didn’t go into detail about what awful things could happen to the human body. But as soon as she picked up what was best described as a “beach book,” she was bored. How could she believe in romance? How could she believe that an ending could be “happily ever after”? After marriage was nothing but work. After marriage, people didn’t even talk to each other anymore.

  She’d promised to give Roger his freedom and not interfere in his life while they were on this trip and, at the time, it had seemed like a wonderful idea, but as she lay in the hammock that was several feet away from the big heated swimming pool, she almost wished she could join the others who were noisily laughing and splashing. In the water, Roger was no longer handicapped by his canes, so he leaped and played like a kid. All done with “the girls” of course.

  Late yesterday, Madison had tried to join them. She’d been alone in their bedroom, trying to read her romantic novel, but she could hear the squeals of laughter from outside. So she’d put on her white swimsuit, a plain, one-piece thing, put on one of Roger’s shirts over it, and walked out to the pool. But her appearance had stopped all the laughter. Madison in jeans was a sight to behold, but Madison in a white swimsuit, the legs cut up to the waist, was a showstopper.

  Ten minutes after she arrived, Roger was pulling himself out of the pool. “Why did you have to ruin it?” he said, so Madison had turned away and gone back to their room. She hadn’t seen Thomas sitting on the outskirts of the group, a textbook open in front of him.

  Early the next morning, Madison edged out of bed, not that she was fearful of waking Roger, as he was snoring loudly, after all—once again, he’d been out all night—but she just wanted to slip out of the house unnoticed. She pulled on jeans, a T-shirt, an old corduroy shirt, then laced on her nearly worn-out hiking boots. But all her tiptoeing was almost for nothing when she opened the door and was nearly hit on the head by a long green canvas bag that some idiot had propped against the door.

  But Madison caught it before it fell and woke the household. And the minute she touched it, she knew that it was a new fishing rod. Even through the canvas she could feel that it was one of those divinely lightweight things that could pull in a marlin without snapping. It was the kind of rod she’d drooled over in sporting goods stores.

  And she knew exactly who had put it there.

  Tied to the handle with pink ribbon was a little envelope. She opened it. “This is an apology gift. Please accept it. Meet me at the hole. I have a proposition for you.”

  There was no signature, but there didn’t need to be one. In an instant Madison went from dreading a day of nothing to do to having excitement running through her veins. She practically ran through the house to get to the storage closet where Brooke kept the other gear she’d need. And when Madison opened the closet door, she gasped. Inside were new waders, and she knew without checking that they were her shoe size. The pair she’d used before had been so big she’d had trouble walking in them. Also, there was a new vest, the kind that had lots of little pockets to store lures and hooks. And on the floor was one of those old-fashioned basket creels, the kind that look so good but cost twenty times as much as a plastic bucket. Like the pole case, it had a pink bow tied around the strap.

  “I shouldn’t do this,” she whispered even as she tried on the vest and picked up the creel. “I shouldn’t accept gifts from strangers. I shouldn’t—Oh, the hell with it,” she said, then grabbed the tall boots and went out the side door, avoiding the kitchen, where she knew that people would be bustling.

  Within minutes she was near “the hole,” as Thomas called it, and as she neared it, she hesitated. What had he meant by “proposition”?

  As she stepped through the shrubs, she saw that he wasn’t there and immediately, her heart sank to her knees.

  “Good morning,” he said from behind her, making her jump.

  “Do you always have to do that?” she snapped, annoyed with herself that she was so happy that he really was there.

  “I like to keep the upper hand. You want something to eat? Or did you sneak around the kitchen before you came?”

  “Very funny.” As he walked off, she followed him, her hands full of his gifts. When he stopped at the stream edge and picked up his own pole, she said, “Look, about these things. I couldn’t possibly keep them. How about if I just use them while I’m here?”

  He didn’t look up from the tiny artificial fly he was attaching to the end of his line. “Whatever you want,” he said. “Food’s over there. I brought hot chocolate, so I hope you aren’t dieting.”

  “Never,” Madison said honestly, then put down the boots and pole and went to the cooler; a big thermos leaned up against it. She poured herself some of the steaming hot chocolate, then took a brioche from the cooler and a couple of strawberries. Thomas hadn’t moved from the stream edge, and now he had his back to her and was starting his first cast into the water.

  With her food in her hand, Madison sat down on a boulder near him. “So what’s this proposition?” She tried to sound lighthearted, but she could hear the edge to her voice.

  “It’s not what you think,” he said, concentrating on his fishing and not looking at her. “But then, I guess you get hit on a lot.”

  “Yes,” Madison said simply.

  His line became entangled in something, and it took him a few minutes to free it; then he put down his pole and walked to the cooler just behind her. After handing her another roll and taking one for himself, he sat down on the rocky shore. “I think that you and I are a couple of misfits.”

  Madison started to protest that, but she couldn’t, so she didn’t say anything.

  “At least here we are. This place is ruled by my little sister and brother and their friends. It wasn’t always that way, mind you. When I was a kid, I loved spending my summers up here. I’ve hiked every inch of this place in a twenty-five mile radius. And fished most of the streams. But as my siblings grew up . . .”

  Shrugging, he leaned back on his arms, and Madison looked at him. He had a beat-up old canvas hat on and it shaded his eyes, but she could swear that as he looked at the water, the frown lines between his eyes were less deep.

  “Anyway, they prefer parties to the great outdoors. In fact, there’s a party planned for tonight.”

  At that Madison sighed. To her parties meant drunken men trying to put their hands on her body parts.

  “Yeah, me too,” Thomas said. “I can’t stand parties. Look, I was wondering if maybe . . . I mean, I know that you said that all you want to do is lie around the house and read, but I thought maybe you’d like to go hiking with me.”

  Part of Madison wanted to yell, “Yes!” but there was another part that kept her silent. How many times had tourists passing through Montana asked her to go “hiking” with them?

  “On one condition,” Thomas said. “Nothing romantic.”

  “I beg your pardon?” Madison said, coming out of her reverie about her hometown.

  Turning his head, he looked up at her. “Women keep wanting to marry me.”

  “Really?” Madison said. “How awful that must be for you.”

  With a grimace, he looked back at the water. “I thought maybe you’d understand. What is it that Jane Austen said, ‘that a man with a fortune must need a wife’? Something like that. Well, I’m rich and the minute women find that out, they start planning the wedding. And from what I’ve seen about you, whenever a man sees you, he starts planning—”

  “The honeymoon?” Madison said.

  “Exactl
y.”

  She, too, looked at the water. “I hadn’t thought of it that way, but I guess you’re right, we are misfits. So what do you propose? Or is that a bad choice of words?”

  “Freedom for both of us. In my entire life I’ve never had what I’d call a ‘good time’ with a female. It’s all been so calculated. You can’t imagine how many women have told me they love to fish, but later I find out that they’ve ‘researched’ me and found out that I like fishing, so they . . .” He trailed off, then shrugged. “One woman I met had taken fishing lessons.”

  “So freedom would mean that we . . . ?” Madison asked, looking down at him.

  “Have a good time. No strings attached. You seem to dislike the same things that I do, so I thought that maybe you like some of the same things too. I can see that you like to fish, so I thought that maybe we could walk and fish and, well, just be people. You forget that I’m rich and I’ll not pay any attention to the fact that you’re the most beautiful woman I have ever seen in my life.”

  In spite of herself, a little thrill at his words ran through her. She wanted to say, “Really? The most beautiful? Or just one of the most beautiful?” But Madison didn’t say anything.

  “How does that sound to you?” he asked.

  Madison cleared her throat for fear that she’d squeak. “Fine,” she said. “It sounds fine.”

  “Unless you’d rather stay at the cabin for the rest of your stay and read and go to parties with your husband. Or you could sit on the porch at night with Mom and Dad and—”

  “No,” Madison said quickly. “I’d rather spend time with—” She stopped herself from saying, “with you.” She wasn’t going to let him think that she was one of the many women who was chasing him. “With the outdoors,” she said at last. “What exactly did you have in mind that we’d do?”

  “Hiking. Unless you’re one of those city women who’s afraid of the wilderness.”

  At that Madison laughed. “I’m from Montana. What could you possibly have in these little New York mountains to rival my home state?”

  Thomas smiled at her, and when he did, his face softened. “Good. I need a break from studies and school. We could do a little white water-rafting. Nothing dangerous, so we wouldn’t need a guide, just the two of us. We could float down the river and camp out if you . . . Well, if you wouldn’t be afraid to be alone with me, that is. And if your husband gave his permission.”

  After what I’ve done for Roger! was the first thought that entered Madison’s mind, but she didn’t say it. “I’m sure it will be all right. Roger and I have a very adult relationship.” She almost choked on that lie.

  “That’s wonderful,” Thomas said, then got up to stand over her and stretch.

  Madison, still sitting on the rock, looked up at him, the early morning sun behind him, outlining his big, strong body, showing the way the muscles moved under his clothes. How long had it been since she’d touched a body that wasn’t in need of doctoring? How long—

  When he looked back down at her, Madison put her empty cup to her lips and looked down at the ground. She’d better hide what she’d just been thinking and feeling.

  “Have some more chocolate,” he said cheerfully as he took her cup, then poured more liquid out of the big thermos. “I think this is going to be a great vacation for both of us. No strings attached. No worries about any physical relationship coming between us. I know that things aren’t great between you and your husband, but I think that you’re the kind of woman who would respect her marriage vows.”

  When he didn’t say any more, she looked up at him and saw that he seemed to be expecting her to answer.

  “Oh, yes,” Madison said. “Great respect.” As she drank the chocolate, she wondered if Roger and little Terri were also respecting his marriage vows.

  “Perfect,” Thomas said. “Absolutely perfect. Now, what would you like to do first? Any suggestions?”

  “You know what there is to do better than I do,” she said, looking up at him.

  “I’m sure it was presumptuous of me, but I thought you might like this idea, so I did a little preplanning. In about two hours Pretty will meet us on the other side of that mountain—or maybe to you it’s just a hill—with a pickup full of supplies and a rubber raft. We’ll set off from there and take a little trip. Not too long. Three or four days. Think you can handle that?”

  All Madison could do was blink at him. Three or four days alone in beautiful wilderness with a man she found extremely attractive? Days away from constantly having to encourage a man to do his exercises? “I can’t,” Roger would whine, then Madison would have to tell him he could. Then when he did it, she’d have to praise him. And praise him and praise him.

  “Who cooks?” she asked, squinting up at Thomas.

  “We’ll split it. But most everything has been made by Adelia and put into little bags. She dries her own fruit, smokes the meat herself. She even makes the granola from scratch.”

  Part of Madison knew she should say no. A big part of her knew she should return to the cabin and discuss this with Roger. After all, he was still her husband. He didn’t act as if he was and he’d made it publicly clear that he—

  “Yes,” Madison said. “I would like that very, very much.”

  Nine

  “So what happened?!” Ellie demanded as she held her glass out for Leslie to refill.

  Madison lit another cigarette, then exhaled before speaking. “I had the most wonderful time of my life.”

  When she didn’t say any more, Ellie looked as though she were going to strangle Madison. “Details! I want details. You were there with that lazy, no-good husband of yours; then you went off into the wilderness for days with a man who wanted a platonic relationship with you, and—” She broke off when Madison started laughing. “What?!”

  “Thomas was lying. Every word about his ‘proposition’ was a lie. Later he told me that he was so hot for me that I made his palms sweat. But when he saw that all men everywhere had that reaction to me, he knew he wouldn’t have a chance if he made a play for me.”

  “I see,” Ellie said “That makes sense. From a writer’s point of view, that is. So he wanted to give you time to like him.”

  “Yes,” Madison said softly. “That’s just what he wanted. He wanted me to get to know him, away from his family, away from every outside influence. And he wanted to get to know me, the me inside, not just the outside of me.”

  “Yeah, I have that problem too,” Ellie said. “You too, Leslie?”

  When Leslie was silent, Ellie turned to look at her. “Believe it or not, I did at one time. Not my face so much as my body. But now it’s hard to remember back that far.”

  Madison squinted through the smoke at Ellie. “Don’t you start acting like you’re not pretty enough to set men on their ears.”

  “Maybe. But I’ve never inspired men to great heights of lust the way you two have. You know what men like to do with me?”

  Madison lifted her eyebrows. “Sure you want to reveal that?”

  “Maybe your secrets are private, but all mine have been printed and published. Anyway, men have always liked to talk to me. No, it’s true. Give me ten minutes with a man and he’s telling me things he wouldn’t tell an analyst.”

  “With me, men wanted acrobatic sex,” Leslie said with a sigh. “You wouldn’t believe the things that the boys in college proposed to me.”

  When both Madison and Ellie looked at her expectantly, Leslie smiled. “Ellie may write all her secrets down, but I’m keeping mine to myself. So go on with your story.”

  But Madison didn’t speak for a moment. “If men only understood that one thing, they could win any woman in the world. The ugliest man could have the most beautiful woman.”

  “Did I miss something?” Ellie said. “What ‘one thing’ do men need to understand?”

  “To give a woman what she wants, not what he thinks she wants,” Madison said in a faraway voice; then she looked at the other two women and smiled
. “What Thomas realized is that, all my life, men had been making passes at me because of my looks. So of course what I hungered for was someone to talk to me. I used to fantasize about falling in love with a blind man, a man who couldn’t see me, so he’d treat me like other women.”

  Ellie gave a snort of derision. “And I’m just the opposite. I was in a gifted program all through high school, so everyone thought I was a ‘brain.’ What I wanted was physical. And now my life is spent thinking. If I had a romance—not that I will—but if I did, I’d just want feeling, emotion. Thunderous romance.”

  The way she said the last words made the others laugh.

  “Not me,” Leslie said. “I’d want hearts and flowers. Champagne. Tea in porcelain cups. Picnics while I wear lace. Hand kissing. And no groping. And absolutely nothing that thunders!”

  At that the three of them laughed together.

  “But at least you got what you wanted,” Ellie said to Madison. “You got a man to talk to you, but I’m still waiting for my thunder.”

  “And I can tell you that Alan isn’t the hearts-and-flowers type,” Leslie said. “For our tenth anniversary, he bought me an annuity.” When the other two looked at her in question, she shrugged. “It’s a very sensible thing. I’ll have it long after the flowers that I wanted died.”

  “On the other hand,” Madison said, “diamonds last longer than companies that hold annuities.”

  Again the three of them laughed; then Leslie’s face suddenly grew serious as she looked at Madison. “Pardon me for asking something so personal, but why didn’t you divorce Roger and marry Thomas?”

  For a moment, Madison turned away, and there looked to be tears in her eyes.

  “Okay,” Ellie said, lying back down. “Go back to the story. Tell us as it happened. Tell us every detail. Lead up to the punch line. If you didn’t marry him, I trust that you had a good reason.”