Charlotte's Homecoming

by Janice Kay Johnson

  He growled, “Damn it, Charlotte. Let me…”

  For a moment it seemed they fought each other, but then he grasped her hips and lifted her. His body flexed and he went deep again, retreated and plunged, the strokes hard and fast. He was shoving her deep into the mattress.

  Just before she convulsed, she opened her eyes and looked at his face. His usual mask of calmness had been ripped away. His skin was stretched tight over cheekbones sharper than she remembered them. His lips were pulled back from his teeth into something like a snarl. Sweat dampened his hair. His eyes were almost black, any semblance of control gone.

  As was her own. She cried out as her body spasmed, the indescribable pleasure washing through her. Her release pulled him over with her. His whole body went rigid and he whispered “Charlotte” against her neck, as if her name was the only thing that anchored him.

  She lay lax beneath him, even her arms falling loose. She had never in her life felt so utterly boneless, so incapable of moving. Gray was heavy, but she didn’t want him to move, either.

  At that moment, she knew what had been wrong with every other relationship she’d ever had. This, she thought, stunned, wasn’t sex. It was something else entirely. It seemed as if every wall she’d ever built had cracked and fallen, leaving her completely vulnerable.

  This was intimacy. She’d forgotten to protect herself. Any part of herself.

  As her body cooled, as reason returned, Charlotte’s fear returned to her stronger than it had ever been. What she’d just done with him defied every rule she’d lived her life by.

  She wanted this. She wanted him.

  But she’d been born with a primal fear of a connection that went so deep she couldn’t deny it. What if she let herself love him, let him love her, and then that panic resurfaced? What if she couldn’t live without her defenses?

  She would hurt him terribly. And herself, perhaps past bearing.

  I have to think about this. Great wings of fear were already beating in her chest. I have to be sure.

  She couldn’t think when she was with him. Not the way she had to. Thank God she had an excuse to leave West Fork, to use distance to regain perspective.

  A thought niggled—she might be taking entirely too much for granted. Gray had never said a word about love. He’d been angry, earlier. He’d still wanted her, but now he had had her. Maybe now that he knew what ugliness she carried inside, this—what they’d just done—had been closure for him, not a beginning.

  Maybe she was the only one who would be devastated.

  SUNDAY MORNING ALWAYS STARTED SLOW. People in West Fork tended to be churchgoers. One early-bird browser had come and gone when Faith quit rearranging the display of jams, which had looked just fine before she began nudging and stacking and unstacking.

  “Rory called last night.”

  Charlotte had just pulled the feather duster out from under the counter. The dust from the parking lot had a way of seeping in and laying a gray film over everything, given a chance. They had to whisk it away constantly, especially from the vintage glass and china.

  Faith’s tone was so matter-of-fact, it took the content of what she’d said a second to sink in.

  Then Charlotte froze. “What?”

  “While you were out last night.” Her throat worked. “He said he’s in Idaho now and that he won’t be coming back.”

  “And you believed him?”

  “He said losing me made him crazy, and he’s sorry. He…he wanted to know how bad you were hurt. I think it really scared him, what he did to you.”

  “Why would that bother him any more than what he did to you?” Charlotte asked.

  Her sister met her eyes so reluctantly, Charlotte knew Faith wanted to believe him. Wanted it with all her heart.

  “Because it wasn’t you who made him so angry. He’s never attacked anyone before, you know. Only me.”

  Charlotte’s eyes narrowed. “Are you so sure? Haven’t you wondered about girlfriends before you?”

  “You mean, I’m the only one who didn’t have enough pride to ditch him at the first hint of violence?”

  “No, I’m saying that he wants you to think it’s his deep passion for you that makes him crazy. But I saw the look on his face when I ordered him off the property. I think he might have hit me if Gray hadn’t walked in right then. You can’t trust a word he says.”

  Faith sighed and her shoulders sagged. “I don’t. I’m not that big a fool, Char. Never again.”

  “No.” Charlotte dropped the feather duster on the counter and went around the end to hug her twin. “I can see how strong you are. You were ready to swing that baseball bat, and now you’re carrying a handgun and you know how to use it.” She shook her head. “What’s the world coming to?”

  Faith gave a laugh, if an abbreviated one. “Lord knows. Think about it. Here you are, back in West Fork living in your old bedroom, selling jams and hand-painted signs, and helping Daddy to the bathroom.”

  They both laughed then, shakily but with genuine humor. A final squeeze, and they stepped back.

  “Did you call Ben?” Charlotte asked. “Tell him what Rory said?”

  “No. I don’t really know anything. Rory could be lying about where he is. Not to mention his intentions. And…I don’t want to talk to Ben. Not for any reason.”

  After a moment, Charlotte nodded. She could understand that. She was feeling a little hostile toward Ben Wheeler herself right now.

  “Faith,” she said, then hesitated. “I have a couple of job interviews this week.”

  Faith’s eyes widened, then darkened. “Oh.”

  “Tuesday, at a company in Redmond. And then Thursday down in the Bay Area.”

  “Oh,” Faith said again.

  “I’m going to leave Tuesday morning. I have to get to a salon.” She tugged at her hair. “I’m hoping you have a suit I can borrow, by the way. Otherwise, I’ll have to add shopping to the agenda. I have a Wednesday-morning flight, so I’m just going to spend Tuesday night at an airport hotel.”

  “And then? After the interviews?”

  “I don’t know,” Charlotte admitted. “I think I’ll put my condo on the market. Even if I stay in San Francisco, any job is likeliest to be in Silicon Valley, and I don’t want that kind of commute.”

  “Daddy’s doing really well,” Faith said steadily. “We don’t need you as badly anymore. What you did for me…for us…” She drew in a breath. “I can’t ever thank you enough.”

  Charlotte made a rude sound. “He’s my father, and you’re my sister. I’ll be back, Faith. Often. Maybe even to stay. I just…have to do some thinking.”

  “About Gray.”

  “Yes.” She meant to smile, she really did, and make this breezy. She failed.

  “You’re in love with him.”

  “Stupidly.”

  “And he’s in love with you?”

  She closed her eyes. “I… Actually, I have no idea. I thought so, but…”

  “But?”

  She shrugged, although not carelessly enough. “He hasn’t said. Turns out he had a twin brother, Faith. Gerrit. He died in an accident when they were ten. I’d just told Gray how I felt about being a twin, and he went off the deep end. We had sex, but he just drove me home afterward. He didn’t say a word about love or even when, or if, I’d see him again.” She had to press a hand to her chest, where it hurt so much. “It’s probably a good time for me to take some time away. Lately I’ve been feeling like a cat that accidentally got shut in the dryer and thumped around a few times.”

  Faith flung her arms around Charlotte again. “But you will be back? Promise?”

  “Promise.” They hugged and held each other close. “I love you,” Charlotte whispered, and her sister whispered back, “I love you, too. I always have, even when I was hurt and mad.”

  Charlotte sighed, finally. “I don’t deserve you any more than that creep Rory did.”

  Faith’s chuckle was a pleasant vibration. “Yes, you do. He doesn’t.
”

  Just then, two cars pulled in and parked just outside the barn doors. The sisters separated, smiled at each other with a softness that hadn’t been there for a long time, wiped their damp eyes and turned to face the beginning of the Sunday afternoon onslaught.

  DISMAYED THAT GRAY HADN’T CALLED or come by since dropping Charlotte off Saturday night, Faith prepared to drop off her sister Tuesday morning. He could have stopped Char from going, and she couldn’t help wondering why he hadn’t. She’d seen the way he looked at her sister, and would have sworn he was in love with her.

  But what did she know? She wasn’t exactly the most perceptive when it came to men!

  The hour was early, the air still cool even as the sun climbed. No matter what else was happening in her life, Faith always loved the first day of school. She had when she was a student, and even more now that she was a teacher. She felt steady today, strong. A week ago, she would have been crumbling at the idea of Char going away again. But she was prepared now, in a way she hadn’t been.

  She couldn’t carry the handgun with her at school, of course, but she intended to have it in the car, hidden in the glove compartment. It would be in her purse at home, which she would keep close by even when she was in the barn. And when she slept, she had made a habit of tucking it under the extra pillow on her bed. She could slip her hand under there in a second. If Rory ever really surprised her—and she was a heavy enough sleeper that he could—she might not have a chance to open the drawer on the bedside stand.

  Faith hadn’t told her sister about the last part of her conversation with Rory. It was just more of the same, she’d thought. Nothing that would help the police catch him, or her predict whether he was really done with her or not. She wanted to believe he just had to have the last word, that it was his way of holding onto his pride.

  After sounding so repentant, he’d said, “If I’m back in West Fork visiting my parents, can I stop by and see you, Faith?”

  “Please don’t.” She groped for a way to tell him they really were done, and found it. “I’m in love with someone else, Rory.”

  Which was the truth. She didn’t have to tell her ex-husband that the man she’d fallen in love with didn’t return her feelings.

  There had been a long silence. She let herself hope Rory was accepting the finality of what she’d said.

  But then—and this was the part that worried her—he said, “What about your wedding vows? Do you ever think about what you promised?”

  Yes. That was why she’d forgiven him back then, and had continued to do so time and time again. But she’d finally run out of forgiveness. That last time, Rory had come too close to freeing her from those vows by killing her.

  ’Til death do us part.

  “I don’t like the idea of you with anyone else, Faith,” he said, his voice sounding raw, and ended the call.

  A threat? Or a last swelling of grief for what he’d lost? Faith couldn’t begin to guess. All she knew was, if he came back, she’d be ready for him this time.

  She and Char said their goodbyes in front of the car rental place in Marysville. It had seemed most logical for her to rent a car to get her to the salon, her job interview and then the airport.

  They hugged one more time, and Faith drove away, on her way to school. There seemed to be a fissure in her chest, both painful and sweet. She could hardly tear her gaze from Char, diminishing in her rearview mirror. Going back to California. And yet, Faith was amazed to understand that distance didn’t have anything to do with what they had recaptured.

  She had her sister back, and nothing else in the world meant more than that.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  EVEN BEFORE HE DROPPED off Charlotte at the farmhouse that night, Gray was already kicking himself for getting mad. His reaction to her story made no sense; she couldn’t help how she felt, and she’d clearly suffered enough anguish without him dumping more guilt on her. And his loss had nothing to do with hers.

  By morning, he realized was going to have some serious ground to make up to her. After they’d made love, she’d obviously wanted to go home. She had been quiet and withdrawn rather than prickly. Gray would a thousand times have preferred bristles. Charlotte shrinking inside herself worried him far more than her temper did.

  On his way to the airport, he’d left a message on her cell-phone voice mail, begging her to call him.

  By that night, she hadn’t.

  He wanted to believe she was ticked at him and determined to make him suffer, but he couldn’t, not quite. He tried her again from his hotel in Spokane, but this time she’d either turned the phone off or had let the battery run down.

  He lay on the pillow-top hotel bed and stared at the ceiling, frustration tying his stomach in knots. Was he back to “go” with Charlotte? Would she make an excuse when he asked her to dinner again? Whip out the back door of the barn if she saw his car pull in at the front? Would her eyes snap with blue fire if he edged too close and made her want something she was apparently highly resistant to having?

  The temptation to fly home in the morning was huge. But he was here now, and he should at least walk the site, show his sketches to the client and talk to the contractor to be sure his ideas were doable. The timing stunk, but his campaign to win Charlotte was ongoing anyway. A couple of days wouldn’t make that much difference. And maybe she’d cool off, even miss him. She knew when he was coming home.

  He’d have laughed, if he hadn’t had that sick feeling in his stomach. He recognized it as considerably more than just frustration. Damn it, he missed her. He wanted to touch her, kiss her, have the hair at his nape stirred by the energy force field that she exuded.

  Right now, he would have been content to hear her voice.

  Moira had called twice on Monday and once on Tuesday with various questions. Gray had taken phone calls from the West Fork public works department, from parks maintenance and from the city clerk’s office.

  But none from Charlotte.

  He got in at SeaTac at eight-thirty Tuesday evening. His drive home took him by the Russell farm, but by then the lights in the house were out, and although his foot momentarily lifted from the gas pedal, he made himself continue on. At nearly eleven o’clock, it was too late to stop by. The moment he let himself in the front door at home, Gray went straight to his home phone and checked messages. There were a couple, including one from his mother, who didn’t like to call his cell phone because she was sure she’d be “bothering him.” None from Charlotte.

  He carried his suitcase down to his bedroom and set it on a chair. He knew he should take a shower, but he couldn’t seem to move. All he was doing was standing there, staring at the bed where he’d made love to Charlotte. Nothing in his life had prepared him for what he felt when he joined his body with hers. Technically, he’d been the one inside her, but she had filled an empty well in him. Despite friends, even a few semiserious relationships with women, he had been lonely most of his life until he met Charlotte. Why she, and only she, completed him, Gray had no idea, but that’s what it felt like.

  The idea of getting in that empty bed by himself was nearly unbearable.

  A raw sound escaped his throat, and he turned and blundered for the bathroom. This was ridiculous. He’d see her in the morning. Impatient city officials could damn well wait for their mayor to put in an appearance. He needed to know how much damage he’d done to his courtship—and he couldn’t think of a better word to call the delicate construction of a relationship with her. He would know when she saw him and her eyes betrayed what she felt.

  He slept poorly and was up early. So early that waiting until anything approaching a respectable time just about killed him. At eight, he lost patience and drove to the farm, pulling in just as Faith was opening her car door, about to get in.

  When she saw him, she waited until he parked and got out. Her expression seemed cool. “Gray.”

  Noticing that she wore slacks, a blouse and real shoes rather than summer flip-flops, he nodded
. “You’re back to school.”

  “That’s right. Did you need something?”

  “I came to talk to Charlotte.”

  Her gaze flicked over him, reminding him uncomfortably of her sister’s. “You might have wanted to do that a few days ago.”

  The nerves in his stomach congealed into a hard ball. “What do you mean?” he asked, hearing the roughness, the panic, in his voice.

  “She’s gone,” Faith said.

  “Gone?” Dazed and sick, he waited for the hammer stroke her confirmation would be.

  Faith’s expression changed. “Gray, you dropped her off Saturday night. That was three and a half days ago.”

  “She knew I was going to be out of town.”

  “She sounded like she hadn’t heard from you. She said she didn’t know when or if she’d see you again.”

  The burning in his gut could have been an ulcer. Charlotte had felt rejected. He’d done that to her. Not sure it was any excuse, he said, “I called Sunday morning. I left her a message asking her to return my call.”

  Faith studied him, frowning. “I…see.”

  “Where is she?” he asked desperately. “Where were you?”

  “I do out-of-town jobs sometimes. I’m designing a house for this guy in Spokane. It never occurred to me that Charlotte wouldn’t still be here….” But that was a lie, he realized. Or an untruth, anyway. He had been afraid that she’d decide to run. That she would just disappear.

  Apparently taking pity on him, Faith said, “She had a job interview yesterday, at a software firm in Redmond. She has another interview tomorrow, down in the Bay Area. San Mateo, or Palo Alto. I can’t remember. She spent last night at an airport hotel, and she’s flying to San Francisco this morning.”

  He felt flat-out fear. If Charlotte left now, went back to her condo and the emotionally barren life that she’d built to protect herself, she’d never come back. Not to him. To see her sister and her dad, sure. But Gray would have lost her.