Love on Trial

by Diana Palmer

  “Is that true, Siri?” Kitty teased, a knowing smile on her face.

  “No, it isn’t,” she replied. “He’s trying to lead me into a life of sin.”

  “Don’t look at me,” Hawke protested nonchalantly. “You’re the one holding me down,” he added. “A man can’t be left alone in safety these days. Brazen young women leaping onto his lap, attacking him…”

  “And who attacked who?” Siri demanded.

  “Whom,” Hawke corrected. “I thought you were an accomplished journalist.”

  “Of all the…” she began.

  “Where are we going tomorrow?” Randy broke in with a grin.

  “That,” Kitty interpreted, “is called a ‘red herring,’ in case you didn’t know. In other words, time out!”

  Siri laughed, relaxing in Hawke’s loose grip. “Fair enough. Where are we going tomorrow?” she asked him.

  “To Fort Sumter. I’ll let you play with the cannons,” he added.

  “Will you stand in front of one while I play with it?” she asked coaxingly.

  Randy and Kitty burst out laughing, as Hawke tried unsuccessfully to turn her over his knee.

  It was a lovely, sunny day, and driving down the Battery on the way to Fort Sumter, the Atlantic had never looked bluer. Siri glanced at Hawke across the front seat, her eyes caressing the dark face and hair. He was wearing a red knit shirt with jeans, and she’d never seen him look more handsome. Her own white sundress emphasized her slenderness and her fairness. The contrast between them was striking. She paid so much attention to it that she missed most of the scenery between Graystone and the fort, and wasn’t at all sorry.

  Fort Sumter faced the ocean, a pale aging relic of an all but forgotten war. The big black cannons still stood guard over the harbor, but the fort’s walls were little more than crumbling brick over which an American flag, not a Confederate one, flew proudly. She looked out to sea, feeling the wind in her face, absorbing the faint sea smell as she watched the seagulls in the distance. It was awesome to stand here where so much history had been made. It was impossible to be unaware of those who came before.

  Fort Sumter was only one of many tourist attractions they made time to see. Siri’s favorite by far was Magnolia Gardens, with its unbelievable number of flowering trees and shrubs, its links with the Civil War and England, and its legacy of almost unworldly beauty.

  “It reminds me a little of Graystone,” Siri remarked to Hawke, as they strolled over the famous little bridge.

  “It should. My great-grandmother fell so much in love with it that her husband created a miniature garden in its image just to shut her up,” he laughed.

  Eight

  The story made her curious, and when they got back to Graystone, she had to go back and stroll through the garden again.

  Randy and Kitty borrowed the car to visit their relatives, leaving Hawke and Siri alone. He spent an hour or so with his new overseer before he joined her in the quiet garden, where she stood under one of the monstrous oaks that stood like sentinels beside the river.

  He came up behind her, pulling her back against him with his arms locked securely around her small waist.

  “What do you think of Graystone?” he asked.

  Her fingers curled over his forearms, tangling in the dark, wiry hair. She sighed, letting her body go limp against his. “It’s beautiful, Hawke,” she said wistfully. “Like something out of a postcard book—colorful and peaceful.”

  “And lonely,” he added quietly.

  “Is that why you stayed away so long?” she asked.

  His arms tightened, and she felt his warm, hard chest expand at her back. “The world was pretty black for me when I left here the last time. I’d just lost my fiancée—as Kitty told you, I’m sure. And my mother had just been buried. I could hardly bear the sight of this garden. She loved it so.” He drew a deep breath. “I had to get away. Somehow it was easier to let Jackson run the farm for me. Even when my father died, I only came home long enough for the funeral. This is the longest I’ve stayed since. It’s also the first time I’ve been able to enjoy being here.” His cheek nuzzled against hers. “You bring the color back into it for me, Siri.”

  “I’m glad,” she murmured, smiling. “Do you think you’ll ever come back here to live?”

  His body went taut. “Why should I? The house is too big for one man, even with the staff.”

  “You could get married, raise a family,” she said gently.

  “In a little over a month, I’ll be thirty-nine years old, little girl,” he said quietly.

  “Does that mean,” she asked with mock denseness, “that your advanced age won’t allow you to father children?”

  “You damned little irritant,” he chuckled. “What I mean is that, at my age, it’s hard to tell if a woman wants me or access to my wallet.”

  “Wear old gunny sacks and carry a dented cup around with you for a few weeks,” she suggested, “and you’ll be able to weed out the ones that want you for yourself.”

  “I thought Jared said he educated you. Where? At the funny farm?” he asked.

  She laughed softly. “Do you really wonder about women?”

  “Most men do.”

  “I mean, about if they’re after you because of what you can give them? You’re…not an unattractive man,” she said, faltering on the words.

  “You’ve already shown me that,” he said at her ear.

  She flushed hotly, and drew in a quick, shaky breath. “It’s…it’s very peaceful here. I like the sound of the river,” she said enthusiastically.

  “You’re hedging,” he said, and she felt rather than saw the smile on his dark face. His arms tightened.

  “Sometimes I think you enjoy embarrassing me more than winning cases,” she accused.

  “Yes, I do. You adorable brat, you wouldn’t give a damn if I didn’t have a dime, and I know it.” He let her go. “But the timing is all wrong, Siri. We’d better get back. Mrs. Simms will have supper waiting.”

  “All right.” She walked along beside him, enjoying the slow pace he set, enjoying the surroundings of the farm as dusk approached.

  “Thank you for letting me come home with you,” she said softly. “Everyone needs a green memory to take out and water when snow lies on the ground.”

  He bent his head to light a cigarette. “From now on, every time I come here, I’ll see you,” he said.

  “Is that good or bad?”

  “A touch of both,” he admitted with a lazy smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes.

  “Oh.”

  He caught her slender hand in his and pressed it gently. “Just enjoy today, Siri. Don’t try to live your whole life in a day.”

  She locked her slender fingers with his broad, warm ones. “Do I do that?”

  He smiled. “Constantly.”

  “I never pretended to be a patient person,” she reminded him.

  “It comes with age.”

  “Does it, Methuselah?” she asked with mock solemnity.

  His eyes narrowed, his lips compressed. “Methuselah, did you say?” He jerked her body against his, wrestling with her in the shade of a gigantic oak, while she laughed and struggled with him playfully.

  He caught the back of her head, holding it steady while he looked down at her. “Let me show you how old I am…” he threatened, crushing his warm mouth down on hers unexpectedly.

  With a whisper of a sigh, she yielded to him, her lips involuntarily parting to invite a deeper caress.

  He drew back instantly. “Not like that,” he whispered roughly. “It’s like striking a match to dry kindling.”

  She leaned back against his hard arms. “I’m sorry,” she said softly. “I…I’m not very good at this.”

  “You’re too good at it, honey,” he said, deadly serious. “Let’s go.”

  She walked quietly beside him, disappointed and a little shaken by his sudden withdrawal, and the hardness that returned to his dark face. He seemed to resent even the small e
ffect her nearness had on him, as if he hated anything that touched or threatened his near-perfect self control. She sighed wistfully. Any day now, it would be all over. They’d be back in Atlanta, and things would be the way they were before the trip began. She studied the ethereal beauty of the estate with eyes that longed for more than just a passing acquaintance with it. How lovely it would be to grow old here, with Hawke….

  Just as they reached the house, a silver Mercedes pulled up in the driveway and stopped. Hawke froze beside Siri as the door opened and a tall, slender, strikingly beautiful brunette stepped out of it with a practiced grace. In her clinging white dress and matching sandals, she was elegance personified.

  “Hawke, how nice to see you again,” the woman said softly, and Siri knew in a blinding flash who she was.

  “Hello, Nita,” he replied with a pleasant smile. “It’s been a long time.”

  “Too long,” she said, batting her long lashes up at him as she moved closer. “Kitty’s mother told me you were here. I just had to see you.”

  “How’s your husband?” he asked.

  “I divorced him three months ago,” she replied sweetly. “I’ve been so lonely…”

  “Have you moved back to Charleston?” he asked.

  “I’m thinking about it,” she cooed. Her eyes darted to Siri, as if she’d just realized she was there. “Who’s this?” she asked with a poisonous smile.

  “My partner’s daughter. Siri Jamesson, Nita Davis,” he introduced them. “Kitty and Randy are with us on this trip.”

  “You’ll be in town for a while, won’t you?” the brunette asked hopefully.

  “Until tomorrow,” Hawke said, and Siri felt herself doing a double take. He hadn’t mentioned that before.

  “Please have dinner with me, Hawke,” Nita pleaded with one silky hand caressing his arm. Her eyes were bright blue and extremely seductive. “For old time’s sake?”

  Siri imagined that he hesitated for just a second before he answered her. “All right.” He turned toward Siri, his face impassive, his dark eyes telling her nothing. “Don’t wait supper. I’ll be late.”

  “Oh, darling, it’s been so long,” Nita breathed as she led him back to the Mercedes.

  He put her in on the passenger side and slid in under the wheel. Siri didn’t wait to watch them drive off. She turned and went quickly into the house. If he’d needed to emphasize how little she meant to him, that was enough. She got the message.

  Supper was quiet. The Hallers still hadn’t come home, when Siri finished eating and went into the kitchen with Mrs. Simms to help the elderly woman with the dishes.

  “Lass, I don’t need help, you know,” Mrs. Simms told her with a smile.

  “I helped mess them up,” Siri pointed out reasonably, “and it’s only fair that I help clean up. Besides,” she added with a grin, “I like the feel of warm soapy water. I never let Dad buy me an automatic dishwasher for that reason.”

  “A homebody, are you?” Mrs. Simms deftly washed plates and passed them across to be rinsed and dried. “No young man?”

  Siri paused. “A friend,” she corrected. “No one I want to marry.”

  “No one except that blind man who comes to visit me every year or so, is that it?” the older woman probed.

  “Blind man…?”

  “Mr. Hawke,” came the bland reply. “Because if he can’t see what’s written all over you when he walks into a room, he has to be blind.”

  “He…he doesn’t know,” Siri said quickly. “He can’t, not ever. He’s already made it very clear that he doesn’t have any interest in marriage or a family, and I’ve made it clear that I can’t settle for anything less.”

  “Ah, a standoff.” Mrs. Simms laughed. “Not for long, though,” she added with a sly, teasing glance. “I’ve seen the way he looks at you when you don’t notice. It’s as if his eyes touch you, lass. I’ve seen that look in a man’s eyes too often to mistake it, but not since that baggage broke their engagement have I seen it in Mr. Hawke’s eyes.”

  “Nita, you mean?” she asked, wiping the last of the plates dry.

  “That baggage,” Mrs. Simms repeated, “never cared for him, she never did. And now here she comes back like it’s been days instead of years and carries him off again. Nothing stupider than a man. I thought he’d had better sense,” she added vehemently. “She’ll have him trapped again before he knows it, poor thing. You mark my words, men are too susceptible to a woman like that. She gets him so hungered that his mind breaks down. Aye, you can laugh, but it’s what happens.”

  Siri drew a deep, sobering breath. “Maybe that’s what I should have done,” she said with a wry grin, “but I don’t know how.”

  “You look like you’d be a fast learner,” Mrs. Simms teased. “And if you love the man, lass, it comes natural.”

  But what if the man doesn’t love you? She thought it, but she didn’t say it. Instead, she sang the praises of the Scotswoman’s pudding, and went away with the secret recipe for it.

  It was late evening when the Hallers came back, and Hawke still hadn’t put in an appearance. Siri knew without being told that he and Nita weren’t just talking all this time, and the pain caused tears to form in her eyes as she sat quietly on the porch listening to the night sounds. Had it only been last night that she’d been sitting here when Hawke reached for her and kissed her so passionately that the breath left her body? She drew a shaky sigh. What a bittersweet memory that was going to be.

  Randy and Kitty came up the stairs running, laughing, and she envied them their lightheartedness.

  “We’ve been nightclubbing,” Kitty laughed. “There’s this great little dinner theater downtown, and I don’t think I’ve ever laughed so much in my life. The players were just fantastic!”

  “Hawke not home?” Randy asked.

  Siri shook her head. “He went off somewhere with Nita.”

  Kitty stopped in her tracks and the smile left her face. “Nita came here?” she asked.

  “This afternoon. Hawke said not to expect him until late,” Siri told her with a forced smile. “Don’t worry, he’s a grown man, he can look after himself.”

  “How about a drink?” Randy asked.

  Siri got up out of the rocking chair and followed them inside for a nightcap. It was after midnight when they stopped talking and went to bed. But Siri lay awake involuntarily until she heard the sound of a car coming up the driveway. When she glanced at the clock, it was three in the morning. And in spite of all her efforts, she listened intently for Hawke’s footsteps coming up the stairs, slowly passing her room, before she could let herself go to sleep.

  The Hallers decided to spend a few more days in Charleston with Kitty’s people, so Siri and Hawke flew back to Atlanta alone. She’d barely spoken to him since their late breakfast at Graystone, instead sharing her bits of conversation with the Hallers and Mrs. Simms, while Hawke sat brooding in his chair.

  He unloaded their luggage from the plane and led the way quietly to the parking lot where he’d left the black Mercedes parked when they departed for Panama City. He put the suitcases in the trunk before he unlocked the car doors and turned to Siri. He looked unusually tired, and his eyes were bloodshot, as if he hadn’t had any sleep at all—which, Siri thought angrily, had probably been the case.

  “Would you like to have a cup of coffee before we leave?” he asked with a stranger’s cool politeness.

  The temptation was terrible, to spend just a few more minutes alone with him, talking to him, looking at him. It would never again be as intimate between them as it had been during those days on the beach and in Charleston. But she believed in quick, clean breaks, not painful little cuts, so she shook her head.

  “Thanks, anyway,” she replied with equal politeness and a strained smile, “but I’d better get home and call Bill. What can I tell him about a release date for the information you’ve given me on the Devolg murder?”

  “Give me a day or two,” he replied. “I’ll send word to you b
y Jared.”

  “All right,” she agreed.

  As she slid into the passenger seat, she realized what he was telling her. When we get to Atlanta, I’m going to walk away from you and never look back. Figuratively speaking, he’d just done that.

  “Well, when then?” Bill Daeton was growling at her in his office. “My God, Siri, it’s been days. I can’t wait forever! Do you realize how much it cost us in expenses and your salary to send you on that trip?”

  “By the time you deduct it off the paper’s taxes,” she replied calmly, “probably about thirty-two cents.”

  “Oh, hell,” he grumbled, turning toward the window with his hands jammed in his pockets. “Have you heard from Hawke at all?”

  “Not yet,” she replied, feeling the pain of having to admit it. “He said he’d let me know, and he doesn’t go back on his promises. If you’ll remember,” she added, “I didn’t want to go on the trip in the first place.”

  “Don’t remind me.” He turned back. “I’ll give you until tomorrow to convince him to let you release that information. If he puts us off any longer, we’ll run it anyway.”

  “Oh, no, we won’t,” she replied curtly. “I gave my word, and I’m not going back on it for you, this paper, or anything else!”

  “It’s your word, or the flower show circuit,” he said firmly.

  “I told you before, I like flowers.” She stood up. “I’ll see what I can do. But no promises.”

  “You haven’t been the same since you got back from the trip,” he said quietly. “Want a day off?”

  She gaped at him. “I haven’t changed,” she protested.

  “You did that opinion poll for me yesterday without an argument,” he replied with a kindly smile. “That’s when I knew something was wrong.”

  She shrugged with a smile. “I just got my feet wet, that’s all.”

  “Keep your shoes on next time.”

  “You can bet on it.”

  Nine

  Jared wasn’t looking well. She watched him at the supper table, really seeing him for the first time since she’d been home. He was pale and quiet, and it wasn’t like him not to make conversation.