“Thank you for your support,” she told him, surveying the dispersing crowd. The words sounded so . . . inadequate.
She could tell he looked out over his student body, too, and not at her. “It wasn’t me. It was all Eric. He told me about the petition, and I simply suggested that he and Melody should start a groundswell of student support. They took it from there.”
So that’s why she’d seen Melody and Lydia deep in conversation yesterday. Charlotte hadn’t really done much for the girl at all. It was the principal who’d gotten Eric and Melody together again. It was because of him that Melody had come out of her shell and opened up to Lydia. Melody’s big breakthrough was all due to Lance’s behind-the-scenes plotting, and nothing to do with Charlotte. He’d fixed everything just the way he’d said he would, while all she’d done was fumble around.
“You did the perfect thing for them,” she told him. “Thank you.”
“I did it for you,” he said softly, “but it seems to have had that added benefit.”
“I certainly appreciate it.” She had her job. She had her practice. But she’d also lost something, too: her faith in her own abilities. He’d proven she wasn’t capable.
“My theory is that Smith was bad-mouthing you in order to discredit anything you might reveal about him.”
“That’s very plausible,” she agreed. It would appear that Charlotte was telling lies about him in order to cover her own butt.
Lance shifted and she could feel his assessing gaze on her. “I don’t suppose you’re going to tell me what his wife was threatening him with.”
Though she didn’t look, she could hear the smile in his voice, the teasing note in his words. “No, I still can’t tell you.”
“Not even if I tied you up and had my wicked way with you?” He kept his voice low, but there was no one close enough to hear anyway.
“Not even if you do that,” she answered softly.
“It would be worth a try, Miss Moore. After all, you are my sub.”
He thought things had changed, that since he’d solved her problems for her, they’d go back to the way they’d been, to the things they’d done, to the naughty little trysts.
But everything had changed.
Charlotte turned her head just enough to meet his gaze. “That’s over. We need to move on.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I was joking about you telling me what Smith’s wife said.”
He didn’t get it. She was his sub, completely, his subordinate. She’d failed; he’d had to rescue her. Everything she’d feared had come to pass. She was incapable and she needed a man—an older, wiser, better man—to fix her mistakes. She was not in control, he was. If she kept on playing the games with him, she would never regain the confidence she’d lost today.
Of course, she wouldn’t tell him any of that. He’d find a way to refute it. “We said everything there was to say in my office yesterday.”
He gazed at her a moment, as if trying to read between the lines of what she said. “But everything’s changed since yesterday.”
Yes, it most certainly had, but Charlotte didn’t let her weaknesses show. “It was a game. I’m tired of playing.”
“I’m not.”
Which meant it was still a game for him. “Then I think you need someone else to play it with.” The thought made her sick. She didn’t want to imagine him doing those things with another woman. But she couldn’t play anymore. “Since this isn’t one of my school days, I assume I’m free to go. Have a nice holiday, Lance.” She didn’t call him Principal Hutton. That was part of the game.
She simply walked down the steps and crossed the quad, pretending all the while that nothing had broken inside her.
* * *
LANCE WATCHED CHARLOTTE DISAPPEAR AROUND A CORNER.
He didn’t get it. Unless she was still pissed about yesterday. He fully admitted he’d been out of line, trying to seduce her into giving him the information he wanted. He should have told her that before she walked away. It would have solved the issue. Wouldn’t it?
He backed up a step, stopped again. Perhaps he should have told her that it wasn’t just the situation with Smith and the Wrights that had changed, but everything. He didn’t want to play games anymore. Well, of course he wanted to play games, but the relationship he wanted with her was no game at all. He wanted something that was far more permanent. He wanted to spend the night. Many nights. All his nights. If she let herself go for half a minute, he knew she wanted it, too.
He returned to his office by way of the hall that passed hers. The door was closed. He knocked, but no one answered. He tried the knob; it was locked. She’d probably turned that damn corner, then run like hell so she could beat him in and out of the building.
Mrs. Rivers was at her post, steadfast as ever.
“You can go like everyone else,” he told her.
“Congratulations on a problem well solved, Principal Hutton.” She rolled open her lower drawer and withdrew her purse.
He stopped in his doorway. “Thank you, but Miss Moore didn’t do anything wrong, so it was easy to defend her.”
“Thank goodness she had you as her champion. Or she would have lost her job for sure.”
“It wouldn’t have come to that.”
She tut-tutted. “It was definitely coming to that.”
He would never have let it happen.
“Well, I, for one, am glad you stepped in. She’s an asset we can’t afford to lose. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving, sir.” She locked her desk and smiled once more before leaving.
Mrs. Rivers was wrong. Charlotte would have fixed the issue on her own eventually. She was a capable woman. An admirable woman. He had all confidence—
Except that he hadn’t shown full confidence. He’d insisted on having a hand in fixing it.
He had a duh moment. Of course. He’d taken care of everything regardless of the number of times she’d told him to butt out. He’d decided how it should be handled. He hadn’t even told her about Eric’s visit. He’d withheld a crucial bit of information and tried to bend her to his will instead.
No wonder the woman was pissed.
All he had to do was explain. Apologize. Even grovel. He didn’t have a problem with that. She was worth groveling for.
But she didn’t answer her phone. Saying all that in a message wouldn’t cut it. Nor would a text. Not even an email. Groveling required face-to-face.
“Call me,” he said to the phone. “I would really like to discuss things with you.”
There, it wasn’t dictatorial. In fact, it was rather pleading. He would really like to talk to her. Just the right word for the situation.
Except that she didn’t answer any of his calls, and she didn’t call him back. Not on Wednesday, not Thanksgiving Day, not the day after. He was home; he traveled at Christmas to see his family in Colorado. He thought about driving by her house, but she’d said she was inundated with family stuff, and sure enough, he never saw a light on in her front window or the car in her drive.
Okay. She’d said she wanted a break until after the holiday. He would give it to her. But Tuesday, when she was back at work doing the job she was so very good at, he would help her see things his way.
* * *
“ARE YOU TOTALLY INSANE, CHARLOTTE MARIE MOORE?”
All the way from Tahoe, Lola still managed to sound just like her mother had when Charlotte was a child, using her full name in that exact same tone of exasperation.
Charlotte sagged on a wooden bench in the aquarium’s lobby. She loved the wide-eyed amazement of children, how they were curious about everything, asking a million questions, most of them unanswerable, and could stand for hours watching sharks go round and round in the huge tanks. She’d been resting her tired feet for a couple of minutes when Lola called.
“No, I’m not crazy,” she said reasonably. “By the way, where are Gray and Rafe?” It was Saturday; Lola should have been out skiing. Of course, it was also a lame attempt at changing th
e subject.
Lola, not being lame, at least not all the time, didn’t fall for it. “You answer that man’s calls right now. He is absolutely perfect for you.”
“I beg to differ. He’s autocratic and dictatorial. Just like Martin was. No, worse than Martin.” Because Martin had been wrong. And Lance was completely correct; she couldn’t have fixed her problems without him.
She also didn’t tell Lola that not answering all his calls and messages was the hardest thing she’d had to do in a long time. Because honestly, she wanted to hear his voice, not in a message, but right there next to her while his hands were all over her.
But she couldn’t be weak.
“So what if he took care of Smith? I don’t get what’s so wrong with that?”
Charlotte had told Lola the story, or at least as much of it as she could without divulging any confidential material. “He’s not supposed to step into my work life or my personal life.”
Lola snorted. “He’s definitely in your personal life.”
“He was in my sex life. There’s a difference.”
“Only you could parse things down to saying your sex life and personal life aren’t the same.”
Charlotte had to admit she was a bit compartmentalized. “I can even parse my work life between therapy and guidance counselor.” It only made sense to do that.
“Answer one thing. Are you tired of him? Is he boring you in bed? Is he boring you out of bed?”
“That’s three things.” Still, there was keeping thoughts to herself, and then there was outright lying. She couldn’t lie to Lola. “But no, I’m not.”
“Are you angry with him?”
“That’s a fourth thing.”
Lola huffed loudly.
Charlotte sighed and answered, “No.”
“Does he blow his nose in the shower?”
“I haven’t taken a shower with him.” She felt a sudden wave of sadness. There were so many things she hadn’t done with Lance. She’d never even eaten a meal with him. Or cuddled in the corner of the couch while they watched a chick flick or an action movie, depending on who had control of the streaming queue.
But those were things she’d never asked for. Plus, they were almost as intimate as spending the night with him.
“All right, are you aware of any habits that you hate?”
Charlotte shook her head, then said, for Lola’s benefit, “No. Except the thing about being dictatorial.” She’d loved that in the bedroom compartment.
“So the only problem is that you had a disagreement on how to handle the chairman of the school board.”
“It was the whole scenario, the way he dictated Melody’s punishment, sentencing her to counseling, calling all the meetings, getting Eric and Melody together.” Worse, he’d been right about everything.
“That sounds like he was just doing his job.”
“No. He was doing Alice’s job.”
“So it would have been okay if Alice did all those things?”
Well, yes, probably. It would have felt more like she and Alice were solving the issue together. “He only stuck his nose in because we were sleeping together.”
Yet Lola brought up a larger question. Would she still have felt like a failure if Alice had helped her instead of Lance?
“You’re so terrified of losing control of your life that you can’t even accept help without thinking someone’s trying to take over.”
Charlotte ignored the rest and answered the only thing that mattered. “Taking over is exactly what the principal does.” The gut-wrenching issue was that he’d been right. She couldn’t handle Smith on her own. She hadn’t handled anything correctly.
“Did you ever think that maybe his job was on the line just as much as yours?” Lola ventured.
“Of course it wasn’t.” But David Smith was the chairman of the school board. “You’re mixing me up,” she said.
“Good. You need to be mixed up so you can start to think clearly.”
“That doesn’t make a bit of sense.”
“I’m in love. I’m not supposed to make sense.”
“Does that mean you’re going to move in with Gray?”
“I told him I’d give him an answer when we get back.”
“Don’t be an idiot. Just do it.”
“And don’t you be an idiot. Call the principal.” Lola paused, softened. “You do realize that you’re overanalyzing again, right?”
“Yes. But the answer is still the same.”
Pigtails flapping, her eight-year-old niece Sasha flew across the aquarium lobby, sliding to a stop in front of Charlotte. “Mom won’t touch the bat rays in the touching pool, Aunt Lola. Will you come touch them with me, please, please?”
“Yeah, sweetie, but just a minute.” She put a finger on the tip of the girl’s nose to hold her still. “I hear the call of the bat rays,” she told Lola. “They aren’t the stinging kind.” Although she wasn’t sure if stingrays actually stung. Sasha had probably already learned the answer. She was a sponge for fish facts.
“I’ll call you when we get back,” Lola said, “and we can analyze the whole thing again until you admit I’m right.”
Charlotte didn’t need further analysis. With the principal, she wasn’t in control, and she never could be.
24
“THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT LAST WEDNESDAY, JEANINE. I WAS very proud of you for handling your husband the way you did.”
Jeanine had arrived for her regular Monday appointment. She still tended to look at her knees when she talked, but she hadn’t brought out the tissues, and they were already fifteen minutes into the session.
Charlotte had great hope for her. “I’m not sure we have a lot more to work on. You needed the confidence to stand up to your husband and you did.” It could have gone badly. They might have been on the verge of divorce after the way Jeanine had challenged him. But oddly, David Smith apologized to his wife later that same day. “You’ve paved the way for having a mutually satisfying discussion on the rest of your issues.”
Jeanine’s eyes darted up. “You can’t leave me yet. I’m going to talk him into couple’s counseling if it’s the last thing I do, and I can’t bring up all this stuff with anyone else now. It was hard enough telling you the first time.”
“There’s a problem with that.” Charlotte had to be diplomatic. “Your husband and I don’t have a good relationship, and I don’t believe I’m the right therapist to mediate for the two of you.” In addition, Charlotte wasn’t sure she could work with the man after what he’d tried to do to her.
“I don’t want someone to mediate. I want someone to challenge him.” Jeanine leaned forward, lowering her voice. “You know his secret.”
“About the other men?”
“About the impotency,” Jeanine said, eyes widening as if it was patently obvious. “That’s what he was afraid you were going to tell.”
“He was worried I’d tell someone he suffers from ED?” That’s what this was all about, not even the fact that he wanted his wife to have sex with other men? It was mind-boggling.
“Of course. If Principal Hutton knew, he’d have made David a laughingstock.”
“That’s ridiculous. The principal isn’t like that. He’s a man of integrity.”
“Well, David thinks he’s out for his job. He says Principal Hutton fights him at every turn. So he was fighting back.” She puffed up her chest and deepened her voice. “‘It’s a dog-eat-dog world, Jeanine.’”
Charlotte was taken aback. “Principal Hutton isn’t interested in being on the school board. He prefers working directly with the kids.”
Jeanine raised one brow. “He strikes me as someone who always needs to be in charge.”
“Perhaps. But when it comes to his students, he’s always got their best interests in mind.”
“It must be hard working for him.”
“No, it’s very easy.” It had been easy until that day in detention hall when she’d goaded him into spanking her. Th
en again, she didn’t actually work for him. She worked for Alice.
But they were straying from the point. This wasn’t about Lance. Or her. It was about Jeanine and David Smith.
Charlotte turned it around on her. “It sounds like you’re transferring all your husband’s qualities onto the principal. Isn’t David the one who needs to be in charge?”
Jeanine shrugged. “Not really. It appears that way, but that’s only because he’s been under pressure, feeling that his reputation was being threatened.”
Charlotte remembered their earlier discussions, that Jeanine’s husband wore two personas, one for everyone at work and a much easier-going side for home. This was the man Jeanine had fallen for, the man she lived with, the man she wanted back.
“Come to think of it,” Jeanine mused, “all his current behavior stems from my having threatened his reputation by coming to you in the first place. Actually it’s my fault. If I’d told him that I wanted to see someone, if I hadn’t kept you a secret from him, then none of this would have happened.” She focused on Charlotte’s face. “You always encouraged me to come clean. I should have done what you suggested.”
She couldn’t have Jeanine start playing the blame game now. It would be totally counterproductive. “You didn’t tell him because you knew how he’d react. You didn’t want to add a fight about our sessions to the arguments you were already having about sex. You had a legitimate reason.” And Jeanine was proven correct. David Smith’s reaction had been near devastating. “So don’t start taking blame yourself for how everyone else reacts.”
Jeanine heaved a great sigh of relief that blew out her lips. “Thank you, Doctor. For a minute there, I was actually letting myself get carried away again.”
But her own words, in addition to Jeanine’s, made Charlotte stop. She was taking blame for everyone else, too. She was the therapist, so she was supposed to fix them all. If she’d fixed Jeanine, then David Smith wouldn’t have started all the trouble. If she’d fixed Melody, then the Wrights wouldn’t have started the petition. If she’d handled Kathryn Wright more diplomatically in that first session, she wouldn’t have gotten her back up. That had been her thinking since the rally in the quad. Charlotte had taken all the blame. But in reality, they had to fix themselves. She was merely the conduit. Maybe all the weeks with Charlotte were the reason Jeanine had finally stood up to her husband. And why Melody was suddenly holding hands with Eric. Charlotte had given all the credit to Lance and taken all the blame for herself, but they’d all played their roles, and each of them had had an effect.
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