Forever...

by Jude Deveraux

  13

  “YOU WANT TO TELL ME what that was all about?” Darci asked when she joined him outside on the sidewalk. “You left a bit abruptly, didn’t you?”

  “The kids,” Adam said. His voice was so harsh that she could barely understand him. “I didn’t know that they were still using children.”

  “‘Still’?” Darci asked. “What does that mean? Still? You never mentioned that these people ‘used’ children. What do they use children for?”

  “Only they know. Once the children disappear, they’re never seen again. Or if they are, they don’t remember what happened to them. You ready to leave this town?” he asked as he started off in a stride too swift for Darci to be able to walk beside him.

  Running, she moved next to him. “What children forget? How do you remember this? I don’t remember reading anything about any children in the research I saw.”

  “Probably wasn’t in there,” Adam said, still walking so fast she had to run to keep up with him. “Do those moles of yours connect into a shape?”

  “I have no idea. To tell the truth, I’ve never paid much attention to them. It was more, ‘There are moles on my hand,’ not, ‘Wow! I can’t believe that I have moles on my hand!’ Will you please slow down?”

  “Sorry,” Adam said as he slowed his pace. “It’s late so you must be starving. What do you want to do for lunch?”

  “Eat and talk. I want you to break down and tell me absolutely everything you know about these witches, and about Camwell, and especially why you were so upset when Susan Fairmont said that some children had disappeared. Don’t you read what’s on milk cartons? Don’t you get those flyers in the mail that show photos of missing children? Children go missing every day.”

  “And that should make me callous to what happens to them?” he said, his face and voice showing barely controlled rage. “Because thousands disappear every year, should I not care?”

  Darci was looking at him hard, and he could feel that she was using her mind to calm him down. Part of him wanted to yell at her that she’d given her word of honor not to use her power on him, but another part of him was grateful for the soothing effect she was having on him. He didn’t even mind the sharp pain her concentration was causing in his left shoulder blade.

  They didn’t speak again until they reached the rental car. By the time Adam started the engine, he was feeling much calmer and he wanted to lighten the mood. “I saw a little tavern on the way here. The sign said that the building had been there since 1782. Like to go there for lunch?”

  “Love it,” Darci said, leaning back against the headrest. “Maybe it will look like a pub in England. Have you ever been to England?”

  “Many times,” Adam said as he backed out of the parking space. Right now she was looking drained. Had what Susan told them done that to her? Or had calming him down taken her energy? He knew he should lecture her about breaking her word, but he couldn’t think clearly when he was consumed with rage. He knew that because he’d spent a great deal of his life too angry to be able to think.

  So maybe not mentioning that she’d just broken her word was the cowardly way out, but Adam couldn’t bring himself to chastise her.

  “Putnam says he’ll take me to England after I give him a son,” Darci said. “One week in England. But he said that if I have a girl first, I get two weeks in Nebraska. In August.”

  Frowning, Adam pulled onto the road. “When this is finished, I will take you to England. For six weeks. And I’ll spring for country-house hotels. They cost a fortune, but they’re worth it.”

  “Tell me everything about the country,” Darci said, her eyes closed as she leaned back against the seat.

  Adam saw that she was still holding the watch case in her left hand. Would she release it to take a shower? “What do you want to hear about first?”

  “About Cambridge. I heard it has fabulous bookstores and the colleges there are beautiful. And I want to hear about Bath. I’d like to see— Oh!” she said, sitting upright. “Could we stay one night at Clarendon? It’s terrifically expensive.”

  “Yes,” he said. “Clarendon. For three nights. The best room will be yours.” Smiling, he pulled into the gravel parking lot of the little tavern, and they went into the restaurant.

  But once they’d ordered the prime rib and had been told that it would take a while, Adam was feeling so much better that he made yet another attempt at a joke. Darci was thinking really hard, not with that look that she wore when she was subjecting him to her True Persuasion, but as though she was thinking about something with all her might.

  “I’ll show you mine if you show me yours,” he said in a jovial manner.

  Darci looked up at him. “I don’t have any hope that you’re talking about sex, so you must mean that I’m to show you or tell you my thoughts.”

  Adam gave a sigh. Had he always been this bad at humor? He seemed to remember having made people laugh in the past. So why did most of his jokes fail to make Darci laugh? “Darci, about this . . . this sex business,” he began awkwardly.”It’s not that I’m not attracted to you, it’s just that....”He trailed off.

  “That what?”

  “I think it’s better if we keep a strictly employer-employee relationship between us. We should make every attempt to keep personal feelings out of this.”

  “That makes sense,” she said. “So, tell me, does sleeping in the same room together come under this employee-employer relationship? What about picking me up and twirling me about? How about—”

  “Okay, you’ve made your point.”

  “There’s another reason you keep me at arm’s length, isn’t there?” she said, squinting at him as though she were trying to read his mind.

  “Just ten minutes ago you were talking about the children you and Putnam are to have together, and now you’re—”

  “I have to marry Putnam, yes,” she said. “But that doesn’t mean that I can’t—”

  “What does that mean?” Adam snapped. “Why do you ‘have’ to marry him?”

  “Why else does a woman have to get married?” she said, looking up at him and batting her lashes. “I’m carrying his child.”

  Adam didn’t smile. “You don’t want to tell me the truth, do you?”

  “And what makes you so sure that I’m not telling you the truth?” she snapped at him.

  “Because you’re a....”Trailing off, he looked away.

  “I’m a what?” she asked, cocking her head at him, very much wanting to know what he wasn’t saying.

  “You’re a real pest, is what you are. Why don’t we confine our talk to the business at hand and stop getting personal?”

  “Sure,” Darci said, then looked down at her silverware on the table.

  They were in a booth that was a bad copy of something from England, what an American thought an English pub should look like, and the tables and seats were out of scale for Darci. The table was so high it was level with her collarbone. Right now, with her chin down, she looked about ten years old.

  On the other hand, her hair was beautiful, and Adam very much wanted to take her hand in his. Actually, he’d like to kiss the soft white skin and—

  “So when do you think your father will get here?” he asked to get his mind off that train of thought.

  Darci’s head came up and she was smiling, as though he’d finally made a joke that she could laugh at.

  “What?!” he asked.

  “You just said that we were to have no more personal talk between us, but in the next sentence, you ask about my father. It just struck me as funny.”

  “You know me, Make-a-Joke-a-Minute Montgomery,” he said, then when Darci gave a good laugh, he wasn’t sure whether to be pleased or annoyed. But something about Darci’s laughter was infectious and he found himself laughing with her.

  “Okay,” Adam said. “No more talk of a personal or business nature. Let’s talk about travel. Where else do you want to go besides England?”

  “Isn’t that p
ersonal?”

  “Only vaguely. Are you going to argue about words, or are you going to talk to me about countries? I’ve been everywhere.”

  “Sure. Right,” Darci said, then thought for a moment. “St. Lucia. Know where that is?”

  “Been there three times. Slow and easy. The conch soup is divine. Did you know that after they pull the conch out of its shell, they have to beat it strenuously to soften up the meat? The islanders have a saying, ‘She beat him like a conch.’”

  “He probably deserved it,” Darci said. “How about Tibet?”

  “Peaceful place. I have a prayer wheel from there back in the room. I’ll show it to you when we get back.”

  “Egypt.”

  “Lived there for three years. Loved the Egyptians. Great sense of humor, very intelligent people. Actually, the Egyptians are very much like Americans.”

  After that, Darci was insatiable in her wish to hear every word that Adam had to say about his travels. Their platters of food came, and they kept talking. She soon found out that he’d answer any questions about where he’d been, but no questions about why he’d traveled so much. “Bummed around the world” was all she could get out of him.

  “You didn’t want to settle down, have a real home?” she asked, incredulous.

  “No,” was the curt answer he gave, so she went back to asking impersonal questions about where he’d been and what he’d seen.

  “Tell me more,” Darci said when Adam seemed to slow down.

  “On one condition,” he answered. “You have to put that watch box down, open it, take out the watch, and put it on your wrist. Isn’t it difficult cutting that beef using only one hand?”

  “No,” Darci said. “It’s very tender meat.” At that she lifted a bite she’d cut using the side of her fork and the whole piece came up. She put the meat back on her plate. “Okay, watch on the arm.”

  For a moment Adam paused in eating as he observed her opening the box and removing the watch. She held the watch as though it were a holy object—just the way she’d looked at the clothes he’d bought her.

  “You’re not going to faint on me again, are you?” he asked, and it was yet another joke that fell flat. Quit while you’re ahead, Montgomery, he told himself; then he reached across the table, took the watch from her hand, and slipped it onto her wrist.

  Darci fell back against the booth, holding her left arm with her right hand, and staring at the watch. “It is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen in my entire life,” she said quietly.

  “Ah, well,” Adam said, looking down at his food and feeling his cheeks pinken.

  Darci leaned across the table toward him. “And when we get back to the room I’m going to thank you with wild sexual acts. I’m going to....”

  “Yes?” he asked, one eyebrow raised. “Go on. Fill in the details.”

  Darci sat up straight, put her arm with the watch on it on her lap, then started eating with one hand again. “Maybe we should stop by the library on the way home,” she said. “I have something I need to research.”

  “And what would that be?” he asked, his voice teasing. “Wild sexual acts, maybe? Are you trying to tell me that you and Putnam haven’t done any creative and innovative sex acts together?”

  Smiling, she looked back up at him. “No, we haven’t, but then we’re just kids. Maybe an old guy like you would be willing to teach me so I can teach him. Think of it as doing something to help the younger generation. A philanthropic act, so to speak.”

  Adam was saved from having to answer by the ringing of his cell phone. It had been Darci’s experience that when a person had a cell phone, they were always on it, but Adam had rarely used his.

  Instantly, he took the phone out of his jacket pocket and answered. “Yes,” he said, then listened. “Thank you for calling and telling me.”

  As Adam folded the phone up and put it away, he kept his eyes on Darci. “Your father has arrived and has checked into the Grove. I asked them at the desk to call me if he showed up.”

  “That’s nice,” Darci said as she moved a bit of beef around on her plate. After a while she put her fork down and looked at him. “You know, I really would like to see more of Connecticut. You were going to show me Bradley, but that was all a trick, one of your schemes to—”

  “You are not going to be able to start a fight with me,” he said calmly. “One argument per day is my limit. I suggest that we go back to Camwell immediately and meet your father. Obviously, he wants to meet you. Do you think he took a private plane to get here this quickly?”

  “Don’t know,” Darci said, leaning back against the booth and looking at her new watch.

  “Come on, then, eat the rest of your lunch and we’ll go.”

  “I’m not hungry,” she said.

  “Should I take you to a doctor?”

  She glared at him, not laughing at his attempted joke.

  “I’ll be right there with you,” he said.

  “Is that supposed to make me feel better? You’ll probably tell him I’m a Kentucky hillbilly and that I freeze people with my mind. You’ll probably tell him you were surprised to find out that I can read, much less—”

  “Go ahead and say any insulting thing you want to me, but you are not going to goad me into an argument. So if you’re finished, let’s go. I’m sure your father’s a very nice man, and he wants to meet you.”

  “What kind of man impregnates a sixteen-year-old girl then leaves her?”

  “Let me guess: Aunt Thelma said that?”

  “Actually, all of Putnam said it.”

  “How about a man who was never told that he was leaving a pregnant girl behind? The man stopped to put gasoline in his car and there was this gorgeous woman”—he emphasized the word— “in pink overalls who was. . . . Well, what comes to my mind is that movie Cool Hand Luke, where the well-endowed girl is washing her car and driving all the prisoners insane with— Well, anyway, did you see that movie?”

  Silently, Darci nodded. “My mother would do that. She’d do most anything to get the attention of a man. She says that male attention is the only thing in life that matters.”

  “But you know that that isn’t true, don’t you?”

  Looking up at him, Darci thought for a moment. “No, I’m not sure that I do know that. And how long are you going to talk to me as though you think you are my father?”

  At that Adam threw up his hands to signal that he was giving up, grabbed the check, waited for her to get out of the booth, and paid on the way out.

  On the short drive back to Camwell, he could feel Darci’s tension, and he wanted to make her relax. “Too bad you can’t True Persuade yourself,” he said, smiling. “You could calm yourself down, as you did me today after we left Susan’s house.” He couldn’t resist letting her know that he knew what she’d done.

  “It is,” she said, without much interest. “Do I look okay?”

  “Darci, you are beautiful!” Adam said, and his words were so heartfelt that he was a bit embarrassed.

  “Good. I guess,” Darci said without much energy. “If he likes beautiful women. What do you think our meeting will be like?”

  “I think it’ll be cautious at first,” Adam said, trying to prepare her for what he imagined was ahead. “Neither of you know each other. When I spent the night on the Internet, contrary to what you seem to think I was doing, I was reading about Taylor Raeburne. There’s very little about him personally. He’s a professor at a university, and—”

  “That right there! What’s he going to think of a daughter whose degree is from Mann’s Developmental College for Young Ladies?”

  “Are you asking me honestly?”

  Darci looked at him in disbelief. “What does that mean?”

  “I just want to say that if the other young ladies who got degrees from that school are half as well educated as you are, then I’d say that that school may be in the top five in the country.”

  “Oh,” she said but still with no energy. “B
ut he doesn’t know that, does he?”

  “Nor did I when I first met you. At least now you have on decent clothes and you no longer have that hungry-waif look.” The minute it was out, he wished he hadn’t said it.

  “Is that what you thought of me? I bet you were upset when that psychic friend of yours said, ‘She’s the one.’ I bet you said, ‘Not that starving girl! Oh, no! Why couldn’t I have some tall, gorgeous girl with a degree from Yale?’”

  What she said was so close to exactly what Adam had thought that he could feel the blood creeping all the way up into the tips of his ears.

  “You did!” Darci said under her breath. “That’s just exactly what you did think. Adam Montgomery, you are the biggest snob who ever lived on the face of this earth. You think that because you were born rich that you—”

  “Do you think that’s him?” Adam asked.

  Darci had been so busy ranting at Adam that she hadn’t realized that they’d reached Camwell and were pulling into the parking lot of the Grove. Glancing out the front window, Darci saw a man standing under a tree that was festooned with dark red leaves. Since he had his back to them, she couldn’t see his face, but she knew she hadn’t seen this man in his perfect navy wool topcoat at the inn before.

  Putting her hands over her face, Darci dropped her head onto Adam’s lap. “I can’t do it,” she said. “I can’t do it. He won’t like me. What do I say to him? He’ll want proof that I’m his daughter. He’ll think—”

  When she’d first put her head on his lap, Adam had felt such a charge of electricity go through him that he’d immediately wanted to grab her, pull her up, and . . . well, he thought, probably ravish her on the car seat. But after a moment of keeping his hands raised and forcing himself not to touch her, he began to hear her words.

  He put his hand on her head, on her soft, silky hair, and after exhaling a couple of times to calm himself, he stroked her hair. “Come on, be brave. I told you that I’ll be there to protect you.”

  Darci’s head came up so quickly she almost hit his chin. Her face was level with his, her lips near his.”Promise me?”