by Diana Palmer
“This is a big operation,” Tish remarked gently.
“And growing every day,” Russell told her. He moved toward the corral, outside which three horses were saddled and ready to go. Three—one for Russell, Eileen and Lisa. Tish breathed a sigh of relief. She’d had suspicions…
Lisa made a beeline for the small palomino mare she’d named Windy.
“Lisa Marie,” Russell called sharply, “keep your hands off that horse until I tell you!”
The child froze in her tracks and did an abrupt about-face. “Yes, Papa,” she replied politely. “Tish, are you coming with us?”
“No,” Tish said.
“Yes,” Russell said. “Eileen, go ahead with Lisa. But watch her closely. Tish and I will be along.”
“Sure, Russ. Come on, Lisa,” Eileen called, and quickly marched the little girl to the horses.
“Come back here, you traitor,” Tish called after Eileen.
“Bye!” Eileen waved as she and Lisa galloped slowly away.
Tish glared up at Russell. “I won’t get on that horse,” she said tightly, the memory of the accident flooding into her mind. “I won’t, Russell!”
“Yes, you will.” That look was in his eyes. She’d seen it too many times not to recognize it, and it always meant he would get his way. Resistance did nothing but make him more determined.
She looked up at him with pleading eyes. “Don’t make me,” she whispered anxiously. “Russell, you can’t know what it does to me…!”
“There’s nothing to be afraid of,” he said quietly. “You’ve got to get back on now, or you never will.”
“What does it matter?” she asked. “I won’t be doing any riding in the city!”
“You’ll be home on vacations,” he replied with determination in every line of his face.
“I don’t want to!”
He caught her gently by the shoulders. “Tish, have I ever hurt you intentionally?” he asked.
She dropped her eyes to the dusty boots she was wearing. “Yes,” she breathed involuntarily.
His hands tightened. “I don’t mean…that way,” he said tightly, and the memory was suddenly there between them of that summer at the beach house…“I mean have I ever caused you to hurt yourself?” he growled.
She had to shake her head.
“Then trust me. It’s for your own good. I won’t let anything hurt you, baby. Not ever,” he said at her temple, his voice deep and comforting.
She drew a shaky breath, her heart pounding at his nearness. “I can’t help being afraid. It hurt so.”
His big hand smoothed her long, dark hair. “We’ll keep to the bridle path, and I’ll be right beside you every inch of the way. All right?”
She swallowed down the fear. “All right.”
He tilted her face up to his, and the sudden darkness of his narrow, glittering eyes robbed her of breath. “Don’t try to throw the past between us again,” he cautioned softly. “Keep it light, Tish, or I’ll have to come down on you hard. I don’t want any more friction between now and Christmas if we can avoid it, for Lisa and Eileen’s sakes more than our own. All right?”
Flushing, she pulled away from him. “All right.”
He took a deep, harsh breath and turned away from her. “Has Nan called you about that damned party?” he asked suddenly as they walked toward the corral, where one of the stable hands had left a second horse saddled.
“Your birthday party at Jace’s?” she asked. “Yes. Eileen and Gus are coming, too.”
“I wish to God you girls would clear things with me before you set up parties like this,” he said curtly. “It’s going to cut me out of going to an auction down near Thomasville. I had my eye on some good farm equipment.”
“Do you ever,” Tish asked coldly, “think of anything except this farm? We thought you might appreciate having someone care enough to remember your birthday. I don’t know why we bothered.”
“I can remember my age without any help,” he said shortly. “I’ll be thirty-five.”
“You sound like it’s the end of the world. Remember that commercial, you’re not getting older, you’re getting…” she began.
“Leave it!” The words were like bullets, and the impact hurt. She stopped speaking immediately.
They were at the horses now, and she looked up at the restless animals with a sense of bitterness. It had been her fault, even if she had been thinking about Russell at the time. But the slow, whispering creak of saddle leather and the smell of horse brought it back. She closed her eyes, and a shudder went through her as she remembered the pain.
“Remember the first time I ever put you up on a horse?” Russell asked softly. “You almost fell off trying to catch the reins? I had to shorten the stirrups two feet to compensate for your lack of height.”
She smiled at the memory. Those had been good times, happy times. “You weren’t always yelling at me then,” she said.
“You grew up, baby,” he said in a strange, solemn voice. “Come on, I’ll give you a hand up.”
She let him boost her into the saddle, and she sat stiffly on the roan gelding with her heart threatening to burst out of her chest. Her lips set in a thin line as she remembered the horse screaming.
“I’m ready when you are,” she said quite calmly. Her fingers on the reins were white at the knuckles.
“Relax, honey,” he said gently, riding up beside her. “Just relax. I’m right here. Nothing’s going to happen.”
She let the tension slide out of her with a long, deep sigh.
“Bring your elbows in, that’s it,” he instructed. “Ride with your knees. He’s gentle enough, he won’t run away with you. Everything okay?”
Feeling the smooth, easy motion of the horse, the quiet pleasure of Russell’s deep voice at her side, the nip in the air, and the wonderful peace of the open country, she smiled. “I’m fine,” she said. And she was.
“Russell looks like a thundercloud,” Nan whispered to Tish at his birthday party, which, with all Russell’s office-holding friends in attendance looked more like a political party. “What’s the matter, Tish?”
The younger woman shrugged with a sigh. “He’s been like this for days,” she murmured. “I think it has something to do with not wanting to be thirty-five. I feel like it’s my fault, somehow.”
“That he’s thirty-five?” Nan asked, and she studied her friend with a curious intensity. “I wonder why it bothers him?”
“How should I know? I see you invited the Tylers,” she added brightly. “How’s it going with you and Frank?”
“He’s all right,” Nan said carelessly. “A little too conventional, but nice.” She smiled. “Looks like his sister found something to keep her little hands busy.”
Sure enough, Belle was standing so close to Russell she might have been a thread on the dark evening clothes he was wearing. Blood surged angrily through Tish’s veins and, unreasonably, she wanted to wrap Belle’s long black beads around her throat until she turned blue.
“Hi, Tish,” Frank said, joining the two women. “It’s good to see you. Feeling better?”
“Oh, much,” Tish said with a brightness she didn’t feel. “I’m the picture of good health.”
“You look it too,” he said with uncharacteristic boldness, and Tish wondered at the sudden flash of green in Nan’s big eyes.
“Thank you, Frank,” she said.
“Would you like to dance with me?” he persisted with a grin.
“Only because Fred Astaire isn’t here,” she replied lightly. “Excuse me, Nan.”
“Sure,” Nan said quietly.
They moved onto the dance floor and Frank held her close, lifting both her hands to his shoulders in an ultramodern style. “Do you mind?” he asked seriously. “We’re friends, and I think the world of you. But Nan…” He sighed heavily. “I guess it shows.”
She smiled. “Only to me. Did you have a fight?”
He nodded. “My fault. I always open my mouth and stick
my foot in it up to the ankle. She won’t listen to an apology.”
“So you’re going to try a little jealousy?”
“If I can make her jealous,” he replied, “at least I’ll know I’ve still got a chance. Are you game, Tish?”
She smiled up at him with understanding in her pale eyes. “Nan’s my best friend, and she’s not happy tonight. I’ll help.”
He drew her cheek down to his jacket. “Thanks, friend. Here goes.”
“Take an old cold tater and wait,” Tish murmured.
“Beg pardon?” Frank asked quickly.
“You need a crash course in how to speak Southern,” she told him. “Ask Nan when we get through turning her eyes greener.”
He laughed. “I’ll do that.”
It wasn’t until the end of their fourth dance together that Nan finally got tired of the back seat and gave in. But before she and Frank got their act together, Tish was already getting the benefit of a furious pair of dark brown eyes from across the room. Russell glared at her openly, contemptuously, from under a scowling brow.
“I didn’t rape him, you know,” she murmured under her breath as Russell joined her at the punch bowl.
“Of all the damned exhibitions I’ve ever seen, that one could win a prize. Come with me!” He caught her wrist in a strong, merciless hand and drew her out the door onto the cold front porch. He closed the door behind them with a sharp click and looked down into her wide, misty eyes under the porch light.
“What the hell were you trying to do in there,” he demanded coldly, “start the gossips on a field day? By God, don’t you ever let a man hold you like that again on a dance floor!”
“But, Russell, everybody does it…” she stammered.
“I don’t give a damn what everybody does,” he shot back. His eyes were glittering with anger, dark and narrow and dangerous. “I don’t want the whole county turning back the pages on you.”
“To my dirty past, you mean,” she flashed. “You’re the one who always wanted me to dig it back up and show the world how poor my people were! Was it so you could demonstrate your own generosity and American nobility by taking a sow’s ear and making a silk purse out of it?”
“Shut up, you little savage,” he said in a tone like ice.
The word hurt. It was what the children at school had teased her with when she went to school in flour-sack dresses.
She literally shook with the rage. “Why don’t you slap me, Russell?” she choked. “It wouldn’t hurt any worse. Thanks for telling me what you think of me. I wish you’d done it years ago…” Her voice broke, and she spun away to jerk the door open.
“Tish…!” he called.
“Go to hell, Russell!” she cried. She ran straight up the stairs and into Nan’s shocked arms.
“I can’t go home,” Tish said when the party was finally over. She was sitting on Nan’s bed with a red face, red eyes, and tear stains all over her cheeks. She hadn’t moved from the spot all night.
“You know you’re welcome to stay,” Nan said sympathetically. “It’ll be all right in the morning. You and Russell have always fought like this, but you’ve always made up, too.”
“Not this time,” she choked. “Did you tell him what I said? That I wasn’t going home tonight?”
“I told him, Tish.”
“Well? What did he say?”
Nan looked down at the red patterned skirt she wore. “He didn’t say anything.”
Tish managed a shaky smile. “As usual, nothing he feels ever shows. If he feels anything.” Tears welled in her eyes. “You told Eileen I didn’t want her to come up, didn’t you? I just…just don’t want family.”
“There’s nobody here but me,” Nan said with a quiet smile. “Just your old jealous friend. You stinker, playing a trick like that on me,” she laughed. “Frank told me all about it. Finally I had to let go of my pride and admit that I loved him. But it wasn’t easy.”
“It never is, I guess. Russell really didn’t say anything?” Tish asked hesitantly.
“I wish I could figure you and him out,” Nan said wearily. “No, Tish, he didn’t say anything at all. He just took a shot of Dad’s gin.”
“Oh.”
“What do you mean, ‘oh’?” Nan asked. “Don’t you know Russell never drinks gin? He hates it; you know that.”
She stared at her friend blankly.
Nan sighed wearily. “I’ll get you some pajamas, my stupid friend.”
Tish bit her lip. “It was his birthday, you know.”
“I know.”
“I didn’t even give him his present. Oh, Nan!” she wailed, burying her face in the pillow.
Nan came back with pajamas and a wet cloth. “Tomorrow it’s going to be guns at twenty paces. I refuse to referee you people any more. Honestly, for two grown up adults…”
She went on and on, but Tish wasn’t listening. She hurt deep in her soul, and all she wanted to do was cry.
A good night’s sleep helped the ache, but it was replaced by honest panic when Nan told her that Russell’s big town car was pulling up at the front steps. She couldn’t face him, not yet. Oh, she’d have to go home some day, it was inevitable, and she’d face it when she had to…but not now!
Hoping to avoid him, she went down the stairs gingerly, her eyes searching the foyer cautiously, but there was nobody there. Not a sound met her ears.
With a sigh of relief, she turned and went through the deserted kitchen, out the back door, and walked out under the huge pecan trees—just in time to see Russell turning the corner of the house. Her heart skipped a beat and then pounded furiously.
Vaguely embarrassed, she stood there, her hands folded nervously behind the pair of faded jeans Nan had loaned her. Russell was casually dressed in slacks and a beige knit pullover shirt. He wasn’t smiling, but he wasn’t angry. She could tell that by his long, measured stride. When he was angry, he moved slowly, deliberately, and his eyes could singe. Now they were dark but calm, as he stopped just in front of her and looked down into her flushed face.
“They want to know when you’re coming home,” he said without preliminaries.
Tish swallowed nervously. “I…hadn’t thought about it,” she admitted, her voice subdued. She stared down at the dark brown leather of his dress boots. Beside them, ants were crawling in curvy lines between two small anthills made of red dirt in the sparse grass. She felt something stick in her throat and knew it was her pride. It was horrible to have to apologize.
“I wanted to call,” she murmured, “but I didn’t know if you’d even speak to me.”
She felt his big hand at her temple, smoothing back the loose strands of dark hair that played in the nippy breeze. “I don’t sulk, baby,” he reminded her, his voice deep and quiet. “My temper’s like flash fire; it comes quick, it goes quick. You know that.”
She shook her head, tears threatening. “I only know that it was your birthday, and I…I…” She looked up at him miserably, helplessly, her eyes swimming, her full lips trembling moistly, her cheeks as pink as the inside of a seashell.
His eyes darkened suddenly, and he looked down at her as if he wanted to grab her and take several bites. The tension was visible in his taut muscles.
“Russ, I’m sorry!” she whispered brokenly. “Don’t be mad at me anymore!”
“Oh, God…!” he breathed roughly. He swept her up in his hard arms and crushed her body against his, burying his face in her hair. His fingers bit into her soft flesh cruelly. “God, baby, don’t ever run out on me like that!”
Tears streamed down her cheeks as she returned the fierce, hungry embrace, feeling as if she’d been half a person all her life until this minute, when she wanted more than anything to stay where she was forever. She might have sprouted wings for the sweetness of the peace she felt. She pressed closer, her arms tight around his neck.
He smelled of cologne and tobacco where her face rested against his cheek, and she could feel the deep, powerful beat of his heart.
His arms contracted, hurting her, and it was sweet, sweet pain. A hard, deep sigh passed his lips, and he loosened his hold on her, drawing back to look at her.
She met his searching gaze squarely and felt her heart fluttering like a trapped butterfly in her chest.
Russell’s eyes went to the long, slender fingers pressed against his soft, warm shirt. “Your hands are trembling, Tish,” he murmured deeply, catching her misty gaze.
“I…I’m a little cold,” she whispered shakily.
“So am I.” His head bent to hers. “Come here, honey.”
“R…Russell,” she whispered in token protest as his hard, lazy mouth brushed against hers.
“Surely I’m entitled to a birthday kiss,” he murmured, “even if I am damned near old enough to be your father.”
“Of…of course, and you aren’t old, but…”
He nipped at her soft lower lip, his arms bringing her close, safe, in their hard circle. “But what, honey?”
Her hands linked behind his head. “Never mind…” she breathed. “Oh, kiss me…!”
“Oh, good, you’re making up!” Nan’s sweet voice fell like a bomb on the silence just as Russell’s hard mouth touched hers.
“Damn!” Russell said under his breath, and a shudder went through him as he let Tish out of his bruising arms.
“Russell!” she whispered accusingly, her eyes bright with emotion as she looked up at him.
“I told you, Tish, didn’t I?” Nan beamed, her pleasure at the reunion making her oblivious to the trembling undercurrents of emotion. “Do come in and we’ll have coffee.”
The tension was still between them when they left Nan’s house. Tish could feel it as she climbed into the big black Lincoln beside Russell and leaned her head back against the seat while he put a tape in the deck. The sweet strains of “Remember Me” filled the car, and she wanted to moan out of unfulfilled longing. In the back of her mind she nursed mingled hope and fear that he might stop the car on a long stretch of road and finish what he’d started when Nan interrupted them.
But the big car kept going, like a missile over the dusty roads, swirling up yellow dust in a cloud behind it, and Russell drove straight toward home. Only a minute after he’d put the tape in, he hit the switch and changed tracks and the heartbeat rhythm of “Forever in Blue Jeans” throbbed through the interior of the car.