The Thawing of Mara

by Janet Dailey

  When they arrived at the Lancaster area, she guided him onto the side roads, away from the commercialism of the main highway. The information she relayed about the area was never given as a means of defense; it flowed naturally and freely from her.

  They lunched at a local restaurant specializing in Pennsylvania Dutch dishes. Even when Sin mildly flirted with her, she never felt threatened by his advances. On tours in the area, they walked hand in hand or he curved an arm around her shoulders. The action seemed part of the natural order of things.

  After midafternoon Sin turned the car toward Gettysburg and home. Mara sat close to him, his arm around her shoulders, her head resting against his shoulder. Contentment warmed and relaxed her.

  Sam Jenkins was just leaving when they arrived at the house. Adam insisted he hadn't been aware of Mara's absence; his day had been too full. It was Adam who invited Sin to stay for dinner, an invitation that Mara seconded. Sin didn't need any persuading to accept.

  Afterward her father and Sin played chess in the living room while Mara washed the dishes. Adam had just scored a checkmate when she entered the living room. He was leaning back in his wheelchair, a knowing smile on his face.

  "I don't think your mind was on the game, Sin," her father declared. "That win was almost too easy."

  "You could be right," Sin acknowledged, his gaze sliding to Mara as if she was somehow the cause of his loss.

  She hadn't even been in the room, so it seemed illogical that she was to blame for his lack of attentiveness to the game. Still, the implied compliment made her feel all warm and shaky inside.

  "How about some hot chocolate?" she suggested.

  "Sounds good," her father was the first to agree. "Only I'll have mine in my room. It's been a long day and I'm beginning to feel the effects."

  He didn't look tired. In fact, Mara had the fleeting thought that she had never seen him looking more alert. But such impressions were often misleading, or at least Mara was willing to pretend they were since it meant being alone with Sin.

  "I'll help you, Adam," Sin offered before Mara had a chance to step forward, "while Mara makes the cocoa."

  His logic defied protest and Mara found herself returning to the kitchen she had vacated only moments ago. It didn't take long to heat the milk, and pour it over the cocoa and sugar in the mugs. Marshmallows bobbed and melted on top of the steaming liquid as she carried the tray of mugs into the living room. She left two mugs there and carried the third on the tray to her father.

  When she entered the bedroom, Sin retreated to let them say their good-nights in private. Her father was in bed. Mara set the tray on the bedside table within his reach.

  "Sin mentioned that you had a good time today," Adam commented.

  "Yes, it's been a while since I've been in Lancaster. It was interesting." Her response was deliberately noncommittal. Her emotional reaction toward Sin was too new to be discussed openly, and certainly not with her father. "Good night, Adam."

  "Good night."

  Soft music was being played on the radio in the living room. Sin turned as she entered and held out a hand to her in silent invitation. Mara hesitated, aware suddenly of the limitation of her experience.

  "I don't dance very well," she told him.

  "It isn't necessary for you to know," he returned.

  With casual purpose, he crossed the distance necessary to reach her hand and draw her into his arms. It seemed she had waited all day to be in his embrace, so naturally did her body fit itself to his.

  The hand at the back of her waist guided her to the slow tempo of the music in swaying steps that required little concentration. Mara was capable of little. An avalanche of sensations seemed to tumble on top of her. The lower half of her body was welded to his hard, muscled thighs, his heat burning her. His gaze roamed possessively over her upturned face, its look sending her senses spinning into orbit.

  The smell of him, the feel of him was boldly male and rawly disturbing. Sin carried her hand to his mouth, his white teeth nibbling at her sensitive fingertips. She lost all awareness of the music playing in the background. When he opened her hand to press a kiss into its palm, her limbs quivered. The sensual probing of his tongue against its hollow released a shuddering sigh of surrender from her throat.

  All pretense of dancing ended as Sin's mouth sought her ready lips, taking them with languid passion. A blind, unending yearning had her trembling in his arms. His caressing hands made a slow intimate exploration of her shape, their leisurely investigation kindling a hotter fire between them.

  At some point they must have gravitated toward the nearest chair, because when Mara surfaced briefly she was on his lap. His deliberate and total mastery of her senses had turned her into modeling clay, and she could think of nothing more exquisite than to be shaped according to his will.

  There was a ragged edge to his breathing as Sin ended a lingering kiss. Her hand curved along his chiseled jaw to draw him back, but he resisted her appeal, a bemused yet firm light in his charcoal-blue eyes.

  "The hot chocolate is getting cold," he murmured.

  "I don't care," Mara admitted with a total lack of inhibition.

  He removed his hand from beneath her sweater and turned her so that her feet were on the floor. "Neither do I, but I think you'd better reheat it just the same." Ignoring her resistance, Sin stood her up and pushed her toward the kitchen as he rose from the chair.

  Reluctantly Mara took their hot chocolate into the kitchen and warmed it. Sin joined her within a few minutes. They talked of trivial things and avoided any reference to the passionate embrace in the living room. Before he left, Sin kissed her good-night and said he'd see her in the morning.

  THAT WEEKEND became the pattern for the weekends that followed. Almost every waking moment was spent together. Some part of the weekend included a few hours away from the farmhouse, either touring a local point of interest or having dinner. For Mara, the weekdays were spent waiting for the weekend and Sin's arrival.

  The weekend before Christmas arrived on the heels of a snowstorm. On Saturday morning Mara waited anxiously for Sin to appear at the house, wondering if he had even driven up the night before on the snowy roads. She had made a dozen trips to the window above the sink for a glimpse of him.

  As she started toward it again, Adam remarked, "A watched pot never boils."

  Self-consciously Mara turned away before reaching her destination, and murmured a stilted, "I don't know what you're talking about."

  "You don't, huh?" he teased with a half smile. "My mistake. I thought you were looking for Sin."

  She glanced at the kitchen wall clock. "That's right. He usually is at the house by this time, isn't he?" she replied as if it was the first time she had realized it.

  This ploy didn't fool her father. "Mara, I'm not blind." He shook his head and smiled. "For three consecutive weekends you two have been inseparable. I'm getting used to losing my daughter at the weekends. If you're worried about Sin, why don't you walk down to the cottage and see if he's there?"

  She abandoned her pretense of mild interest to ask, "Do you think I should?"

  "Anything is better than having you pace the floor like an expectant father," Adam replied.

  Mara hesitated, torn between the aggressiveness of such an action and her anxiety. Finally she started for the coat rack where her parka was hung.

  "I think I will," she decided.

  "If he's there, don't hurry back on my account," her father told her, watching indulgently as she hurriedly put on her coat.

  Half of the buttons were fastened when the back door opened and Sin walked in. Mara turned, her face lighting up at the sight of him. At the slightest invitation from him she would have run into his arms.

  A shutter seemed to close over his gaze as he noted her expression. Sin swung his attention to her father, a smile of greeting touching his mouth.

  "Hello, Adam." He spoke to her father first, then glanced at her. "Were you going somewhere?"

&n
bsp; His aura of aloofness kept Mara from admitting her destination. "Just for a walk." Hurt twinged through her as she began unbuttoning her coat. "The coffee is fresh. Would you like a cup?"

  "Please." Sin walked to the table and sat in a chair near her father.

  While she hung up her coat and poured him a cup of coffee, the two men discussed the weather and the condition of the roads. Mara took a chair opposite Sin at the table. He smiled at her once, but continued conversing with her father.

  "One thing is for sure—we're going to have a white Christmas this year. This snow isn't going to melt in five days," Adam stated. "Will you be staying over until after Christmas, Sin?"

  "No, I have to drive back to Baltimore tomorrow afternoon, but I'll be back on Christmas Eve. I'll be staying until the following Monday," Sin explained, and joyful relief warmed Mara's blood.

  Guessing her reaction to the news, her father sent her a smiling look. "At least Sin will be here long enough to help you hang the decorations and trim the tree."

  "Yes," she agreed, trying to contain some of her bubbling pleasure.

  "I'm an expert at putting stars on the top of Christmas trees," Sin admitted, half in jest.

  "Good, because Mara can't reach it, and I certainly can't." Her father patted the arm of his wheelchair to affirm his inability.

  "Have you bought the tree?" Sin asked the question of Mara.

  "Not yet." There was a breathless ring to her voice. "I was going into town today to pick one out."

  "We can do it together," Sin suggested, which was just what she had wanted to do.

  The day was spent purchasing the tree, carrying the boxes of decorations from the attic, setting the tree in its stand, trimming it, and arranging the Nativity scene on the mantel amid boughs of evergreens and holly. In the bottom of one of the boxes of Christmas decorations Sin found a sprig of mistletoe. Tying it with a ribbon, he hung it in the living room archway to the entry hall.

  He stood beneath it, his gaze dancing in wicked invitation to Mara. Too self-conscious of her father's presence, Mara tried to ignore his message, laughing it away as a joke. Sin walked over, picked her up and ignored her embarrassed protests to stand her beneath the mistletoe, where he soundly kissed her into silence.

  But it was the only kiss she received that day, a fact that gnawed at the back of her mind. The previous weekend she had had the impression that Sin was keeping her at arm's length even when he was kissing her. She had tried to ignore it by blaming it on her imagination, but the feeling of a distance between them was becoming too strong to ignore.

  It returned on Sunday when she was lying beside him on the rug in front of the fireplace at the cottage. They had gone for a walk in the snow-covered woods and had stopped at the cottage to get warm. They had all the privacy they could want, but Sin had done little more than kiss her.

  The silence between them was broken only by the crackling of the flames. Mara wasn't comfortable with the silence stretching into the room. Her head was resting on a pillow from the sofa. She turned onto her side to study Sin's profile. An arm was crooked beneath his head to serve as a pillow. His eyes were closed, but she knew he wasn't sleeping.

  "Did you love your wife, Sin?" she asked, tracing the woven pattern of his sweater with her fingertips. She struggled to maintain an attitude of only curious interest.

  Thick male lashes lifted partially, laziness in his look. "Yes, I loved Ann. There are varying degrees of love, though, Mara. Your father loved your mother, but in a lesser degree than he loved the woman he left her for."

  It wasn't a satisfactory answer, but Mara wasn't entirely certain what she had hoped to learn. She let the subject drop and rolled onto her back to stare once more at the ceiling.

  "We should have brought some of your Christmas decorations from the house down here to the cottage." Sin changed the subject. "The place doesn't look very festive with Christmas just around the corner."

  "We should have thought of that," she agreed, and glanced idly around the room. "I like the improvements you've made. Did you pick out the furniture or did Celene?"

  "I did. Celene made a few suggestions, but the decisions and choices were mine." There was a hint of drawling amusement in his voice.

  She felt slightly better about liking the place. Turning her head on the pillow, she looked at him. "Did you get bored with Celene?"

  "Yes, I guess you could say that," he admitted with marked indifference for the subject.

  She looked away, a frightening tightness in her throat. "Are you bored with me yet?"

  Uncurling the arm from under his head, Sin used it to lever himself onto his side. He removed the pillow from beneath her head, a dark light in his gray blue eyes.

  "What do you think?" he countered, an instant before his mouth covered hers.

  His response told her nothing. His kiss lacked the persuasive mastery that had once fired a response from Mara. He was becoming bored with her: the knowledge burned its pain into her heart. Perhaps he wasn't already bored with her, but it was starting. Mara knew she didn't have the strength to wait until he decided to cast her aside. She wouldn't survive.

  Turning away from his kiss, she twisted out of his arms and hurriedly stood up. She couldn't bear for him to go through the motions of making love to her when he felt no desire. She heard him rise and stiffened when his hands touched her shoulders.

  "What's wrong?" His voice sounded puzzled.

  She shrugged free of his touch. "Please don't," she asked stiffly.

  "Why?" The one word carried the hint of demand.

  Mara couldn't tell him the truth. There was too much chance he would argue and she would allow herself to be mistaken about her conclusion. Her only chance to stay in control of the situation was to brazen it out.

  "I think the truth is that I'm becoming bored with you," she lied.

  "What?" Sin caught her by the shoulders and spun her around, holding her in front of him while his gaze scanned her face.

  "You said at the beginning it could possibly happen, that physical attraction waned after prolonged exposure." Mara used his theory to back up her story. "I don't feel the same thing when you hold me now as I did at first." Which was true, since her emotions had grown stronger and ran deeper.

  His head was drawn back as if he didn't quite believe her. There was almost a wariness to his look. Grimness was in the thin line of his mouth.

  "I know I said that," he admitted, but his tone discounted the worth of that remark in the same breath.

  "I wasn't going to tell you how I felt. I know how fragile the male ego is," Mara went on, noting the way his jaw tightened at that statement. "But I decided it was better to be honest."

  "What is it you're trying to say?" Sin demanded.

  Staring at the front of his sweater, Mara tried not to betray how much pain it was causing to tell these lies. "I'm trying to say that there isn't any need for you to drive all this way for Christmas. There isn't anything to be gained by seeing each other anymore. If you want to come to the cottage for Christmas, that's your business. And I'm sure Adam will welcome you at the house, but…" She let the rest of the sentence trail into silence, unable to tell the ultimate lie that she wouldn't be glad to see him.

  "But you wouldn't," Sin finished the sentence for her. The air of finality rang in his voice, slicing into her like a sword.

  "I…I don't have any reason to be," she responded in a tightly quiet voice.

  "No, I don't suppose you do." His hands fell away from her shoulders as he took a step away. "I guess there isn't any point hanging around now, either. All my things are packed. If you don't mind waiting a couple of minutes, I'll drop you off at the house on my way back to Baltimore."

  Now that the moment had come, Mara would have preferred walking back to the house alone rather than riding with him. But a little voice dictated that she should accept his offer to prove that his company meant nothing to her, that she could get along without it or simply tolerate it.

  "I
don't mind waiting," she said. "It's cold outside."

  "I'll only be a few minutes," he promised curtly, and walked toward the bedroom.

  While he was gone, Mara picked up the poker and scattered the burning logs so the fire would die. But she knew it would never be that easy to put out the fire that burned for him in her heart. The full enormity of her decision was only just beginning to sink into her.

  When Sin reappeared, she was able to turn and face him. Her expression was coolly composed, but she was the only one who knew how thin and brittle the ice was.

  "Shall we go?" A small weekend suitcase was in his hand, and a hint of steel was in his voice. Mara walked to the door in answer.

  Silence hung between them like a heavy curtain during the drive to the house. Its weight pressed on Mara until she wanted to scream away its presence.

  Sin pulled into the driveway and stopped in front of the red brick house. As Mara quickly stepped out of the car, he said, "Say goodbye to Adam for me."

  "I will," she agreed stiffly, and shut the door.

  Chapter Ten

  THERE WAS A LUMP as big as a Pennsylvania apple in Mara's throat as she entered the house. The sound of Sin's car pulling out of the driveway echoed painfully in her ears. Her eyes smarted with large, unshed tears.

  The multicolored fights blinking on the Christmas tree seemed garishly bright. The satin balls and silver tinsel looked ludicrously cheerful when her heart felt as if it were splintering in a million pieces.

  The draft from the closing door sent the clump of mistletoe swaying above her head. Mara glanced up and an excruciating pain stabbed her breast as she remembered the way Sin had maneuvered her under it only yesterday.

  Shuddering away the memory, she grabbed the nearest chair and pulled it under the mistletoe. Her eyes were so blurred with tears that she could hardly see as she stepped onto the chair seat and tugged the ribboned mistletoe from its place.

  "What are you doing, Mara?" Her father wheeled his chair in from the study.

  "I'm taking the mistletoe down. What does it look as if I'm doing?" She spoke harshly to keep her voice from trembling. Carefully, she avoided looking at Adam as she pushed the chair to its former place.