“It’s enough,” she managed, struggling past the lump in her throat and, averting her face, thrust out her hand.
His fingers closed over hers and didn’t let go. “Then look at me, Sophie,” he commanded softly, drawing her round toward him, “and tell me why you’re choking back the tears. Is it something I’ve done—or not done?”
“It’s got to be the pregnancy,” she said on a pathetic little sob. “I never cry as a rule, but lately I’m an emotional mess.”
“How so?” he asked, his voice a murmuring caress.
She dashed the tears away. “I don’t know! If I did, I’d do something about it. I hate these wild emotional outbursts.”
She hated the aching need to be close to him, too—the vicious, ceaseless hungering that nothing but his touch, his kiss, could assuage. But she couldn’t control it, so when he opened his arms to her, she flung herself into them with an abandon quite foreign to her normal nature.
It didn’t matter, though. All that counted was that at last she was exactly where she wanted to be. She pressed her face against the soft flannel of his shirt and closed her eyes, drowning in the safe, masculine strength of him. He held her close, stroking his hands up and down her spine in long, sensuous sweeps and she thought that perhaps his heart started to drum just a little faster and his breath to emerge more raggedly.
She even went so far as to allow herself the luxury of believing that perhaps, one day, he might fall a little bit in love with her, too. Enough for her to dare say, “There’s so much that still has to be arranged, so much we haven’t yet talked about. I wondered if tonight—?”
Then the door opened and one of his workmen stuck his head into the room. “Call for you, boss,” he announced, holding out a cellular telephone. “It’s Mrs. Wexler. Thought I’d better let you know since you mentioned you were waiting to hear from her.”
“Yes, thanks.” Disengaging himself from Sophie, Dominic took the phone. “Hello, Gail, how are you?... No, of course I hadn’t forgotten.... Oh, sure, six-thirty’s fine.... Yes, looking forward to it....”
Sophie felt a chill where seconds earlier she’d absorbed warmth. Felt a mere yard stretch a mile of distance between her and Dominic. She saw the smile that turned up the corners of his mouth as he listened to Gail Wexler; heard the softening in his voice, the affection. And knew that nothing he’d ever offered her came even close to what he gave so freely to Barbara’s mother.
This evening she was moving into his apartment. They would be sharing breakfast, the morning paper, even a bed if that was what she wanted. Their wedding might still be two weeks away, but to all intents and purposes they were starting their marriage today. And tonight, when she’d hoped they might bridge the awkwardness of the transition with a quiet dinner for two, she found he’d already made plans to spend the evening with his late fiancée’s parents.
The message was clear. It would take a lot more than Sophie could offer to relegate Barbara to second place in his life.
As unobtrusively as possible, she edged toward the open door. When he noticed anyway and, without breaking the thread of his conversation with Mrs. Wexler, raised his hand and mouthed, “Hold on a minute,” Sophie pretended she hadn’t seen and kept on going.
Although the snow had gone from town, traces of it still remained under the trees bordering the paths of Heron Hill Provincial Park on the far shores of Jewel Lake. It was deserted that February afternoon, a bleak and lonely sort of place that echoed Sophie’s mood.
Down near the beach, she found a picnic bench sheltered from the wind playing briskly over the waves. Wrapping her arms around her knees, she huddled inside her coat and stared across the water to Palmerstown’s skyline squatting at the foot of the inland hills.
Dominic’s penthouse apartment crowned one of those buildings just coming alight as day faded into dusk. She had seen its spacious rooms: the self-contained guest suite that was to be hers for the next several months, the streamlined kitchen, the comfortable living area with its deep leather couches, the dining room austerely furnished in smoked glass and teak.
Those things she’d need in the immediate future, her clothing and personal items, waited to be unpacked from the suitcases and neatly labeled boxes stacked at the foot of the bed. In separate, sturdier cartons were a few special pieces intended to make her feel more at home: her favorite painting, a couple of lamps, Paul and Jenny’s wedding portrait.
Tomorrow her desk would be delivered, along with her houseplants. The key Dominic had given her a few days ago lay coldly in her palm. Everything she needed to take up residence was ready and waiting. Except her courage.
That was why she’d come out to this place of solitude: to try to drum up the fortitude to deal with the bald reality of her future. It wasn’t the fact that Dominic had made other arrangements for an evening she’d wanted to spend with him that had driven her to find this windswept, barren spot more than sixty miles away from town; it was the dull certainty that he would repeat the pattern.
There would be many other evenings and days—and perhaps even nights—when she would find herself not a part of his plans. If she hadn’t been so busy hiding from her real feelings, she might have seen that such an arrangement was probably part and parcel of every marriage of inconvenience and prepared herself for it.
A month ago, when self-deception had all been part of the game, she might have said it didn’t matter if they went their separate ways much of the time. She might have argued it was better that way and that the less they saw of each other, the easier it would be on both of them. But then, a month ago she hadn’t bargained on the jealousy and pain that came of unrequited love, any more than she had on finding herself its prisoner.
Only now, when it was much too late to change anything, did she discover that what bound her to Dominic was not the right he’d demanded to share fully in the upbringing of their baby, but the utter claim he’d staked on her heart.
What made matters worse was knowing that, even though nothing but empty rooms awaited her, she would eventually drive back over the winding road to Palmerstown, past the turnoff to her once-and-future home, and all the way along Lakeshore Drive to the elegant white condominium building that Dominic had built and owned. And she would do so not because he would be waiting to welcome her to his luxurious topfloor apartment, but because she could not live without him and would take whatever crumbs he tossed her way as long as she could be near him.
She would let herself in with her borrowed key, unpack her suitcases, arrange her clothes in the mirrored closet, bathe in the deep marble tub and climb into the wide, empty bed. When tomorrow came, she would smile to cover her heartache and pretend that she didn’t care if he preferred to cling to the past by spending time with the Wexlers.
Instead, she would concentrate on the future and the baby. Their baby, hers and Dominic’s. Because a baby was the one thing Barbara had not given to him.
A sudden gust of wind sent the skeletons of last year’s leaves swirling around the picnic bench and drove the chill of late afternoon inside the folds of her coat. It was time to go.
About forty miles from the outskirts of Palmerstown, she stopped at a roadside inn for a meal. She had eaten nothing since breakfast, and although it was easy enough to ignore her own hunger pangs, she would do nothing to endanger her baby’s health. Apart from any other consideration, the baby was her passport to a future with Dominic.
The penthouse was dim and quiet when she stepped through the front door. Beyond the foyer, the floor-toceiling windows that lined one wall of the living room glimmered with light from nearby buildings, enough for her to find her way to the hall that led to the bedroom wing.
She was perhaps halfway past the open archway leading to the living room when the entire place was flooded with sudden light. From the depths of a wing chair that matched the leather couches, a voice demanded rawly, “Do you know what time it is?”
Badly shaken, she spun around, shading her eyes against the g
lare. “Dominic, you scared me! I thought you weren’t home.”
He rose to his feet, lithe and lethal in the rage he made no effort to hide. “I asked you, do you know what the hell time it is?”
“Ah...about eight o’clock?” she managed over her thundering heart.
“Try closer to nine-thirty,” he said, advancing on her with such deadly intent that she found herself backing away until, abruptly, she came up against the wall. “And what I want to know is where the F.—have you been until now?”
“Dominic!” Shocked, she stared at him and saw a black-clad stranger, a man so close to not being in control that she almost cringed.
The breath hissed between his lips as he fought for composure. “I’m waiting, Sophie. Where were you?”
“Out,” she said with a bravado that crumbled when she saw his fingers curl into fists. She swallowed and added hurriedly, “I drove out to Heron Hill Park.”
“At this time of year?” he sneered, skepticism blazing in his eyes. “You can do better than that, Sophie.”
She inched to the left, trying for a little distance between them. “Believe it or not as you choose, but that’s where I was. I stopped for dinner the other side of Beaver Creek.”
“I have been waiting for you to come home for the past two hours,” he said, the menace in his tone only slightly contained.
“No, you haven’t,” she replied, too outraged by his lie to weigh the wisdom of attacking him in his present mood. “You dined with your erstwhile future in-laws, the Wexlers, so don’t pretend you’ve been hanging around here waiting for me. I’m sure I was the last thing on your mind!”
Very briefly, he showed surprise at her outburst, although he hid it rather better than she had managed hers when he’d accosted her so suddenly. His shoulders stiffened beneath the black sweater, his brows drew together, his mouth assumed a grim line, and it occurred to her, in a flash of mental irrelevance, that he was all dark parallel bars of displeasure.
“The Wexlers returned today from a six-week cruise to the Orient—” he began in measured tones.
Her voice rang out, shrill with accusation, and not for the life of her could she silence it. “And you couldn’t wait to rush over and welcome them home, could you? I understand perfectly, Dominic. You don’t have to explain. Although it does strike me that all your talk about wanting to make a go of marriage with me amounts to a load of rubbish as long as your real allegiance lies with the parents of your late fiancée.”
“For your information,” he cut in, so icily that goose bumps prickled over her skin despite her heavy winter coat, “I spent precisely three-quarters of an hour with Barbara’s parents and that only because I thought it fair that I be the one to tell them I was shortly getting married to you.”
Dismay flooded through her. “Oh,” she moaned, covering her face with both hands.
“They send you their very best wishes and their love. Unlike you, my dear Sophie, they are able to separate the past from the present.”
“I’m so sorry! I’m afraid that once again I jumped to the wrong—”
“And then,” he continued remorselessly, “I came back here, assuming I’d find you and intending to act on your suggestion this afternoon that we make a fresh start. I thought perhaps dinner at Le Coq D’Or might be in order. I did not know you had taken offense because we were interrupted by a phone call. I had, after all, indicated to you that our conversation was not finished, that there still were things we had to say to each other.”
A spate of excuses bubbled up, but in the end all she could mutter again was, “I’m sorry,” because, pitifully inadequate though they were, they were the only words to express her remorse.
“So am I.” He sighed and turned away, leaving her blind with regret.
She wished for so many things. That she could go back to that moment just before she’d fallen in love with him—that time of utter self-containment. That just once he’d look at her with desire smoking in his eyes and let his smile warm her...secret, knowing.
To her shame, that familiar flush of jealousy attacked again at the thought that Barbara, for however short a time, had known Dominic’s love and the outpouring of his passion. It lessened the tragedy of her death somehow, and left Sophie numb with horror at her own mean-spirited, unfeeling envy.
Dominic swung back toward her. “We seem to spend a great deal of time apologizing to one another, Sophie, and yet somehow there’s never a sense of real regret. We don’t change, we don’t make things better. You continue to resent me, blame me—”
Why couldn’t she tell him that wasn’t true, instead of aiming the accusation back at him and insisting, “No, it’s the other way around. You feel trapped, and if you could, you’d find a way to get free of me. I know it, here—” she clutched a fistful of coat in front of her heart “—and that’s why I thought you’d chosen to spend the evening with people you associate with...” She wanted to speak Barbara’s name, to spit it out like the bad taste it was in her mouth, but she didn’t. She’d done enough already, leaping to false conclusions and hurling accusations. “...happier times,” she finished lamely.
He strode to the bar at the far end of the living room and poured a dollop of whiskey into a heavy crystal glass. “I asked you once before not to try to second-guess how I feel or what I’m thinking. I have many faults, as a lot of people in this town will be only too glad to tell you, but I like to think that moral dishonesty of the kind you describe is not among them, so let me spell it out for you one last time. Barbara is dead and you are not. You, not she, will be my wife. As such, you will never have cause to question my loyalty.”
He made her feel small and unworthy and so lacking in generosity that she wanted to curl up and die. If ever there was a time to call forth that simple honesty Elaine had prescribed, it was now. But not with words. All words had ever done was create barriers between the two of them.
Swirling the whiskey in his glass, he paced restlessly back and forth in front of the fireplace. She hovered just within the room’s entrance, despair a leaden weight rooting her to the spot.
It wasn’t the silence stretching unbroken between them that daunted her; it was the invisible shield of aloofness separating her from him. Either she broke through it now or she looked into a future bereft of any sort of closeness between them.
Whoever had decreed that the first step was always the hardest forgot to add that it went beyond difficult to sheer torture. The way was not straight and easy but a tightrope of uncertainty swinging without benefit of safety net above a chasm of fear.
Sophie lifted one foot, and then the other. Prayed for endurance and fortitude. Fought the temptation to turn tail and run to the safety of her solitary room. If only he’d reach out and draw her past the obstacles and into the haven of his arms! If only she could read the thoughts inside his dark, handsome head, see beyond the unsmiling dispassion that carved his beautiful face!
His gaze raked over her, deep and mysterious as a forest pool. She paused, hoping for some sign from him—even rejection—because nothing could be worse than this, with her teetering midway between heaven and hell.
He heaved a great sigh and, as though he couldn’t bear the sight of her, swung away to face the mantelpiece.
His dismissal broke her heart. Blinded by tears, she stumbled toward him and pressed her cheek against the unyielding line of his spine. “Dominic!” she begged, naked yearning tearing at her voice, and for once it was the right thing to say.
She heard the groan deep in his throat, the crack of Baccarat on marble as he slammed down his glass on the mantelpiece and swung toward her. A string of words escaped him, four-lettered every one and laced with frustration.
They sang in her ears like music and her heart lifted just a little. A man didn’t curse like that, did he, unless something... someone had slipped past his guard and found the sweet, vulnerable soul he kept so well protected?
She felt his hands in her hair, his lips at her temples, a
t her tear-streaked eyes. And then, at last, at her mouth, demanding, asking and finally begging.
She wrapped her arms around his waist and clung to him. At his urging, she sank with him to the carpet. She stretched beside him and, without saying another word, told him in a thousand different ways that this was what she wanted: to be here, with him, and that if he wanted her, all he had to do was take her.
He wanted her. Too badly to try to hide it. His kisses trailed fire down her throat. He wreaked havoc with her clothing, shoving aside her coat, pulling her free of its confinement and flinging it behind him. She heard buttons wrench free from the fabric securing them; felt sudden coolness on her skin as her blouse fell away, swiftly followed by the warmth of his mouth at her breast.
Her skirt rode to her hips. His palm stroked up her calf, swept along her thighs, nudged them apart. She knew the instant he encroached beyond the frail barrier of her panties to reduce her to searing, flooding delirium, but had no idea when audacity guided her to exact a similar revenge and take the silken weight and vigor of him in her hands.
Somewhere from the back roads of memory, she recalled that first time on St. Julian and the hurried, furtive coupling that had taken place. Even then, there had been magic of a kind. But this time it was intensified a thousand times because, whereas then they had not acknowledged each other except in the most primal way, this time the connection was more complete, a physical union cemented by shared hope for the future. Along with their clothes, so many layers of fear and misunderstanding melted away.
“I had no idea you had changed so much,” he muttered hoarsely, his eyes devouring the lush contours conferred on her by pregnancy. “Do you know how beautiful I find you?”
He made her heart sing. She—slight, unremarkable Sophie Casson—felt voluptuous. Desirable.
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