Dancing in the Dark

by Sandra Marton

  “Is that why you want to go through an experimental operation that’s risky as hell? So you can do something you hate?”

  “So I can compete. There’s a difference, Seth. Don’t twist my words!”

  “If the only reason you want to ski is to chase after medals, you might as well give up before you start.”

  “And what’s that supposed to mean, Dr. Freud?”

  “When we met, you didn’t only ski to compete. You skied because you loved it, because it was part of you.”

  “Past tense. Was part of me.”

  “It still is, even if you’re determined to deny it.”

  Wendy glared at him. How could he know what she felt? Her doctors had thought they did, too. One of her therapists had even brought a man who ran a program for handicapped skiers to meet her. Handicapped skiers? The phrase, she’d told him coldly, was an oxymoron.

  “Perhaps you haven’t noticed,” the man answered calmly, “but I’m an amputee.”

  Wendy had barely glanced at the empty sleeve that hung from his jacket.

  “What I noticed,” she’d replied with brutal candor, “is that you’re a cripple, the same as me.”

  She’d instructed the therapist to work with her body and forget about playing games with her head. After that, no one had tried to talk to her about skiing.

  Seth knew even less about how she felt than the therapist. He was convinced she’d devoted her life to winning and that she thought less of herself now that she couldn’t compete.

  But that wasn’t all of it. What would he say once he knew the truth?

  Wendy turned her face toward the side window and stared blindly at the forest flashing by. What a mistake she’d made, letting herself fall in love with Seth all over again. She hadn’t intended for it to happen, but when he’d kissed her outside the Purple Panda, he’d made her remember what love could be like. She’d wanted to taste it again, if only for a little while.

  What she’d told him about there being two Wendys was true. One had competed for medals; one had planned a future as a wife and mother. Neither had survived the accident. Now Dr. Pommier’s new technique offered hope that she might bring one of them to life again.

  She had to take the chance or die trying.

  Tears blinded her. She looked away from the trees and out the windshield...

  And saw Jiminy Peak straight ahead, rising from the trees.

  For a moment, she felt nothing. It was only a mountain and not a terribly high one at that. Jiminy was nothing but a steep hill compared with some of the places she’d skied in the West and in Europe, but it was where she’d learned to fly down a mountainside, feeling as if she could take wing and soar.

  Something seemed to tear free deep inside her. Seth was right. She belonged in a place like this, where mountain peaks pierced the sky, where the snow was deep and all you heard was the sound of the wind and the whoosh of your skis.

  Seth pulled into a parking space and shut off the engine. She felt his eyes on her, but she was riveted to the sight of the slopes and lifts ahead, and to a time when she’d felt truly alive.

  He got out of the truck and came around to her side. He opened her door and looked at her, his face pale beneath its year-round tan. Tension narrowed his eyes.

  He didn’t speak. He didn’t have to. She knew that the next move had to be hers. Slowly, she stepped from the truck. Tears welled in her eyes. She bowed her head and tried to blink them away before Seth noticed, but she wasn’t quick enough.

  “Oh, sweetheart.” His voice was rough with misery. “Baby, I’m sorry. I was wrong. I should never have—”

  Wendy lifted her head. He could hardly believe what he saw. Yes, tears were streaming down her cheeks, but her eyes were glowing. Her smile was radiant.

  “Wendy?”

  She laughed. Or maybe she cried. All that mattered was that she flung her arms around his neck and kissed him, and he was sure that his Wendy had come home.

  * * *

  LARRY COHEN WAS a great guy. He had a nice sense of humor and an easy way with the kids, who gathered around him on their skis, some of them so wrapped in parkas and pants that Wendy figured they’d never be able to get up if—when—they fell.

  But they did get up, and laughed, and tried all the harder. At first, there were six kids and Larry. By noon, there were a dozen tyro skiers having fun with Seth and Larry.

  Wendy stood around and watched. Then she offered a little help. By the time Seth suggested she put on skis and really get into things, she didn’t even hesitate. How else could she encourage the kids to try to do a snowplow, or sometimes just try and stand up?

  How else could she really remember how much she loved this sport?

  And when Ski Wee classes ended, what could she do but ride the lift with Seth, stand at the top of the Left Bank run, flash him a thumbs-up when he grinned at her, and then fly down the mountain?

  In late afternoon, Seth said he was exhausted. Wendy doubted it. He looked wonderful, his cheeks ruddy from the cold, his eyes bright, his smile stretching across his face. She knew the truth—that he was concerned about her. Her leg did ache, yes, but it was a wonderful ache, the kind she hadn’t had and couldn’t get from therapy workouts, no matter how strenuous. She felt alive in a way she’d all but forgotten. Last night, making love with Seth; today, skiing with him...

  Could life actually be like this? So filled with joy that you felt as if you might burst?

  “Me, too,” she said. “Let’s call it a day.”

  She sat as close to Seth as the bucket seats would permit all during the ride back to Cooper’s Corner. When he started to apologize for taking her to Jiminy without asking, she stopped him.

  “You’re right,” she said. “You did a terrible thing...but I’m happy you did. I guess I’d blanked out how it feels to ski and how much I love it.” She lifted his hand from the wheel and pressed it to her cheek. “Thank you.”

  “We can try a tougher trail next time, if you like.”

  “If I like?” She grinned at him. “Is tomorrow too soon?”

  Seth smiled back at her. It was wonderful, seeing her like this.

  “You’re happy,” he said softly, “aren’t you?”

  She nodded. “Yes. Very.” She took a deep breath. “Seth? I’ve been a coward.”

  “No, babe, you haven’t. I understand why you didn’t want to ski. Anybody would have felt—”

  “I’m not talking about skiing. I’m talking about...about how I turned away from you. How I sent you away when you came to Norway to be with me after the accident.”

  “You don’t have to explain it to me, sweetheart.”

  “Yes. Yes, I do. You’re entitled to know the reasons.”

  “I already do.” Seth wound his fingers through hers and placed their linked hands on the gearshift. “The accident devastated you. If I hadn’t been so self-centered, I’d have figured that out right away.”

  “It did, but that isn’t—”

  “Babe.” They’d reached the town. Seth pulled into the driveway at Twin Oaks and parked next to the car Wendy had left there the night before. He shut off the engine and turned to her. “You want to talk about things? Fine. But let me go first, okay? I have something to tell you.”

  Wendy smiled. “Not another surprise?”

  “Yeah. Another surprise.” Seth cleared his throat. He took her other hand and held both tightly. “Why did you come back to Cooper’s Corner?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “What did you come back for, Wendy? What do you want that I—hell, let’s be blunt—that I tried to convince you not to want?”

  “The operation?”

  “Yes, sweetheart. The operation. Specifically, a chance to meet Rod Pommier and convince him to accept you as a patien
t.”

  Wendy sighed. “I’m close to giving up hope. My father thought he’d be able to get me a few minutes of Dr. Pommier’s time, but—”

  “I can do it for you.”

  She stared at him. It wasn’t a joke; Seth’s expression was completely serious.

  “You? I don’t understand. How could you connect me with Dr. Pommier?”

  Seth hesitated. His news was going to make her happy. He just wished it was doing the same thing for him.

  “I know him,” he said, after a minute.

  “You know...” Wendy looked puzzled. “You mean, you’ve seen him on the slopes?”

  “I mean we’re friends. Well, more or less. We’re not pals or—”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Rod is—”

  “Rod?” Wendy blinked. “Rod?”

  There was a note in her voice he didn’t quite understand. An edge. A hint of anger.

  “Uh-huh. See, he bought a cabin. An old ski chalet up on—”

  “Rod did,” she said coldly.

  Seth frowned. Things weren’t going exactly as he’d anticipated. There was definitely an edge to her words and a look in her eyes he didn’t like.

  “Yeah. And I’m doing the renovations for him.”

  “Since when?”

  “Since he bought it. I don’t know, maybe ten days, two weeks ago.”

  Wendy jerked her hands from his. “Let me get this straight. I’ve been going crazy waiting for a chance to meet this man, and all the time you’ve been working on his cabin?”

  “Well, yes.”

  “I suppose you have coffee with him, too, and discuss the work as it progresses.”

  The edge to her voice took on the sharpness of a paper cut. Oh, yeah. Something was definitely wrong here. Seth reached for her hands again but she pulled away and sat rigid, her spine tight against the door.

  “He’s been out of town, babe. Your father must have told you that.”

  “My father isn’t on a first-name basis with the doctor, Seth.”

  Let that go, he told himself. Just let it go.

  “What I’m trying to tell you is that I talked to him this morning.” She didn’t answer and he plunged on to fill the silence. “I called him on his cell phone.”

  “You called him on his cell phone,” she repeated, so coldly that he almost shuddered. Slowly, the light began to dawn. She was upset because he hadn’t told her sooner.

  “Babe,” he said gently, “you’re ticked off because I didn’t tell you about Pommier before now. But I had my reasons.”

  “Which were?”

  “Well, I thought you were making a mistake. You want the truth? I still think that, but I finally realized you have to make your own decisions.” He was quiet for a few seconds. “Okay. I guess I can see how this looks, but—”

  “How it looks,” she said softly, far too softly for his comfort, “is that you could have helped me but you didn’t.”

  “Babe, you’ve got it all wrong. I thought about this a lot. I even talked to Pommier about you.”

  “How generous of you.”

  “Damn it, will you try and see this from my viewpoint? I’ve already admitted that I didn’t think you should have the surgery.” Her eyes flashed with condemnation and he winced, suddenly realizing that this wasn’t coming out as the gift he meant it to be. “Try to understand, Wendy. I was afraid for you, and afraid you wanted the surgery for all the wrong reasons.”

  “So you decided to eliminate that possibility by thinking for me.”

  “Yes. No!” Seth slapped the heel of his hand against the steering wheel. “It’s not that simple.” She was still looking at him as if she’d never seen him before. “Okay. I blew it. I made a mistake, but I did it out of love. Doesn’t that count for something?”

  “Love isn’t an excuse for trying to run someone’s life. Isn’t that what you once said when you were trying to convince me that my father was running mine?”

  “It’s not the same thing,” he said, making an effort to sound patient when what he felt was that he was sinking deeper and deeper into a pit of his own making. “Howard’s willing to let you risk everything for a medal.”

  “And you’re not willing to let me risk anything. Either way, I don’t seem to have much to say about what happens to me.”

  “Sweetheart, I wanted to protect you, that’s all.”

  “But you can’t. Don’t you understand that? The accident changed my life. Nobody can protect me, not unless they can find a way to turn back the clock.” Wendy wrenched open the door and stepped from the truck. She looked back at Seth, her eyes hot with anger. “The fall took everything from me. I’ve spent all these years trying to live with the realization that the Wendy Monroe who left Cooper’s Corner doesn’t exist anymore. Now I have this one slim chance of regaining at least part of who I once was, and you took it upon yourself to deny it to me!”

  “That’s not the way it was, damn it!” Seth jumped down from the truck and strode toward her. “And it’s exactly why I think you’re making a mistake. The surgery’s not just experimental and risky, it’s wrong.”

  Wendy slapped her hands on her hips. “I see. You know what’s right, not me.”

  Seth grabbed her by the shoulders. “Listen to yourself! The fall took everything from you? Huh? Is that what you really think?”

  “Let go of me!”

  He didn’t. If anything, his hands tightened on her. She was angry? Well, so was he. And, damn it, maybe he had more to be angry about. He could feel it rushing through his blood, vibrating along his nerve endings, something live and palpable that he knew he’d kept bottled inside him from the minute he’d opened the note that told him the woman he loved didn’t want him anymore.

  “You almost died,” he said roughly, “but you didn’t.” She tried to twist away but he wouldn’t let her. “They said you wouldn’t walk, but you did. The truth is that you came through that accident better than anybody could have imagined.”

  “You have no right to say these things to me!”

  “I have every right, damn it!” He lifted her to her toes, his face dark with anger. “When did you get so selfish? When did you forget the people who love you?”

  “Damn you, Seth—”

  “No. This time, you’re going to listen. Your mother still cries for you. Do you know that? Do you even care? Gina misses you, but you’d rather nurse your wounded pride, your ego, whatever you want to call it, than think about what it’s like for her to spend every day thinking about you, four thousand miles from home, and wondering if you’re okay.”

  “That’s between my mother and me. It has nothing to do with you.”

  “The hell it doesn’t!” Seth bent toward her until he was all she could see. “It has everything to do with me. You were the best part of my life. You were my life, my dreams, my future—and then you had that accident and suddenly nobody else mattered except you.”

  Wendy shook her head. When she spoke, her voice trembled. “That’s not true.”

  “It damn well is! You didn’t lose everything. It was the rest of us, the people who loved you, who came out the losers.”

  “You don’t know what you’re saying.”

  “Oh, I know, all right.” Seth dropped his hands to his sides, the anger gone and nothing but emptiness in its place. “Well, I’m done trying to figure it out. Pommier’s meeting me at Twin Oaks tonight at seven. Figure on showing up at seven-fifteen or so. That’ll give me enough time to talk to him and get out of there before you show up, because you know what, babe?” The corners of his mouth curved down. “I don’t want to see you anymore. Hell, I don’t want to see you ever again.”

  Wendy recoiled as if he’d struck her. A sob broke from her throat as he got into his truck and
started the engine.

  “Seth,” she whispered, “Seth...”

  He drove away, the truck picking up speed as it went down the driveway toward the road. After a while, all she could see were the bright red dots of its taillights growing ever dimmer in the encroaching dark of the midwinter afternoon.

  And then, finally, even those tiny beacons blinked out, and were gone.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  GINA MONROE SIGHED as she tied her apron strings and then turned on the kitchen lights.

  The days were so short this time of year. Darkness crept in before you expected it.

  She glanced at the clock. It was after six. Time to get dinner on the table. She’d spent the afternoon baking, something she’d done a lot more of now that Wendy was home.

  She didn’t know how long her daughter would be here. The operation, assuming the doctor agreed... The risks...

  No. She wouldn’t think about it. Not now. She’d think about how glorious it was to have her here—and what the protocol was for facing your adult daughter after she hadn’t come home all night.

  “Isn’t Wendy here yet?”

  Gina looked over her shoulder. Howard had been napping on the sofa. His hair was standing on end and his eyes were puffy. She knew he was upset, but she had no idea whether it was because Wendy hadn’t come home all night or because she’d been with Seth. Both, probably, she thought with a little sigh. Knowing that your daughter had spent the night with a man was a delicate issue for a mother, but it had to be twice as difficult for a father.

  “Not yet, no.”

  “You told me she called and said she’d be here for dinner.”

  “I’m sure she’ll be here soon, Howard.”

  “I don’t know how you can be so calm about this. Don’t you care that our daughter didn’t come home last night? Aren’t you concerned?”