A Woman To Blame

by Susan Connell

  Pulling away from him, she tucked her hair behind her ears, then adjusted the buttons on her blouse. With her gaze darting nervously around the room, she said, "We ought to be discussing this fund-raiser, you know."

  Flustered and mussed and enchanting, she went on and on about their responsibilities. He ached for her more than he thought humanly possible, but what he saw when her darting amber eyes settled on his was enough to rock his soul. The biggest and neediest charity wasn't the ambulance fund, it was the emptiness of their own lives.

  Chapter 5

  In the surreal shimmer of the jukebox's bubbling lights, Rick had a sudden impulse to lean in close to Bryn and whisper, "Shhh. It's late and we could be putting this time to better use. What do you say we go back to my place and talk about our kinks. Then we can deal with this underlying tension until the sun comes up. Hell, Bryn, let's find a few new kinks and work on them too."

  Torrid scenes, taking place below a mirrored ceiling and over every square inch of red satin sheets, captured his mind. He pictured his meticulous exploration of her nakedness as she writhed in sensual abandon beneath his attentive mouth. The feel of her giving, wanting body spurred him on to discover that secret place that quivered at the touch of his tongue. When she couldn't bear another moment, when she cried out for him, he planted himself inside her and ended their emptiness in quick, hot strokes. All she had to do was give him the go-ahead and he'd redefine sexual fulfillment for the both of them. This need to have her was, after all, about a shared desire for erotic release, those strange moments of tenderness notwithstanding. If he began to doubt that, he had only to remember the needy way she responded to his tongue against her belly and his fingers against her slick heat. But he wasn't going to push it tonight. Too much had happened, and when their time together came, he wanted her total focus.

  Lifting his fingers to her lips, he silenced her complaints about a fishing tournament with a soft "Shhh. It's late and we could both use some time out. What do you say we get together tomorrow after my last charter? We can talk about your new idea for the fund-raiser over dinner." Removing his hand from the velvet warmth of her lips, he moved to unplug the jukebox. He said teasingly, "That is, if you can come up with a good idea by then."

  When he turned around to her again, she was taking her hand away from her lips. The sensual gesture replicated his own a moment before. The idea of her need to touch herself where he had touched her made his straining erection ache.

  "Not tomorrow, Rick," she said, hastily moving toward the wall to turn off the overhead light. "I have to go up to Miami to see a client. And I'll be busy for the next few days because—"

  "Just tell me when we can get together," he said in a way that refused to hear another excuse. Playing tickle and run couldn't go on forever. If she wanted games, he would oblige, but only when they were both buck naked.

  "I'm trying to figure out when we can, but I really do have a scheduling problem. I hate asking anyone for help, but I need a strong man for this. Maybe two strong men."

  There she goes, he thought, as he followed her out the door, stirring the flames inside me with those sable lashes, soft voice, and never-ending images. "Name it." But forget about two strong men. What needy, greedy thing can I do for you?

  "Rick, they're about to start physical therapy with my grandfather, but first they're going to let him come home for a short visit. He's been threatening to sneak out and wheel himself back up the Overseas Highway if they don't oblige him. Would you help me with him tomorrow?"

  He nodded, snorting uncomfortably at himself. What the hell had gotten into him? Was he so in lust for her that he would interpret everything and anything she said as a lead-in to sex? Had it been that long since he'd lost himself inside a woman's tight softness?

  "Of course I'll help you with him," he said, closing the door to the storage room.

  "That's great. You see, I can't bring him upstairs in a wheelchair by myself, and I know he'll want to see what I've done up here," she said, starting up the stairs.

  "Bryn?"

  "Yes?" she said, turning around to him.

  Planting a foot on the second step, he curved his hand around his knee and angled himself toward her. "Have you considered the possibility that he won't be pleased with what you've done up there?" Her smile deflated to a blank stare. He could feel her withdrawing in that way a woman did when a man least wanted or needed her to.

  Staring at the steps separating them, she appeared to wait until the question melted away in the strained silence. "Do you want the jukebox, Rick?"

  "The jukebox?" Standing straight, he lowered his foot to the landing. Nodding, he slipped his hands into his trouser pockets. "Yes. Yes, I do. I'll drop the check in your mailbox and have the thing out of your way by the time you get back from Miami. Pappy gave me an extra set of keys to this place. Is that okay with you?"

  "That'll be fine," she said, before running her tongue over the edges of her teeth. He thought she was about to say something or ask him something, but with an almost imperceptible shake of her head, she said, "Good night, Rick," then fled upstairs.

  * * *

  Next afternoon, despite the perfect weather, his easygoing customers, and the knowledge that Pappy Madison would be coming home for a visit, Rick was feeling decidedly uneasy as he headed over to Pappy's. All the quirky pieces of his recent history kept bumping together like unrelated flotsam. He prided himself on a clear head, so his scattered thoughts irritated him. By five that afternoon, after slamming mackerel, yellow-tail snapper, and grouper onto the display spikes, then posing beneath the day's catch with his smiling customers for the obligatory snapshots, he'd finally figured it out. The weighty combination of his recent visit to Angie's parents, accepting that the Crab Shack was gone, finding out about Pappy's injury, and ending his relationship with Sharon, had shaken his once uncomplicated world.

  Then there was Bryn.

  Despite their strong differences of opinion, he knew the sexual attraction between Bryn and him could not be denied. He knew it as well as he knew his reef charts. As for the rest of Bryn's life, that was none of his business. Especially the mess over the restaurant conversion. If she insisted on demolishing Pappy's Crab Shack simply to hang a few copies of Monet and serve expensive wine, so be it. When she left Malabar Key, and she would, he would see what he could do to help Pappy.

  In the meantime, if she wanted to wrap those gorgeous legs around him and sail off with him to heaven for a few lost hours, he could accept that too. But that was it! All he wanted was to feel the pressure of her knees hugging his hips, to see her head thrown back in ecstasy, and to hear her crying out with pleasure before he melted into her essence.

  "Cripes, Pappy, what have they been feeding you in that hospital? Stones?" Rick asked while he and Jiggy carried the old man in his wheelchair up the stairs.

  "Tasted like stones. Careful you don't flip me out of this," he said, his knuckles tense and white on the armrests.

  From the restaurant's upper entrance, Bryn bit back advice, but gave in to the urge to direct the maneuvers with her hands. When they lowered the wheels to the floor and set the brake, she breathed a loud sigh of relief.

  "Rrrrawkk! Oh, baby, baby, baby!"

  Pappy turned to his right to look at Jiggy. "You had Miss Scarlett at your place, didn't you?"

  "Hey, Pappy. How'd you know that?" Jiggy asked, nervously patting the old man's arm.

  "Because the evangelist I got her from never taught Miss Scarlett anything but scripture. And I wouldn't let anyone talk that way around her." Pappy slapped Jiggy's hand away. "I leave for a while, and when I get back, my bird's talking like she's been watching X rated stuff. Is there nothing sacred to the younger generation? And look at Bryn. She's red as Miss Scarlett's feathers!"

  Just when Bryn thought she'd survive the flashback to Rick's total body kiss, Miss Scarlett let loose with another bawdy line. Bryn stole a quick glance in Rick's direction, and even though he was laughing with the oth
ers, his knowing gaze was there to meet hers. He had to be remembering that hot moment when his fingers came close to entering her. As insane as it seemed, his laughing with the others was the only acceptable thing he could do. The only acceptable thing she could do was roll her eyes in mock disapproval and wait for someone to change the subject. That someone was Rick.

  "Come on, Jiggy, we've got work to do. Pappy, give me a call when you want to come down. We'll be over in a minute."

  Bryn didn't know whether to feel relieved or hurt when Rick didn't look at her again before he headed down the stairs behind his employee. There were other, more important matters to concern herself with, she chided herself. "Ready, Grandfather?" she asked, getting behind his wheelchair.

  "Am I ever!" he said, clapping his hands together.

  Her hands were shaking as she rolled him around the screen carved with egrets and ibises and into the dining room. What she had to show him wasn't the macaroni necklace she'd made for him at age five or the pie-tin crown she'd presented to him that last Christmas before he left, but all things being equal, she felt the same anxiety. Hell, exacting real estate moguls in New York didn't produce this much trepidation. "Now, Grandfather, it's not finished. Those chairs are getting returned to the store because there's too much yellow in the room. Yellow is a very uplifting, cheerful color, but too much is too much."

  Pappy Madison wasn't saying a thing.

  "Try picturing tables filled with people, and piano music playing softly in the background." She kept on talking, knowing she was filling her need to justify the changes more than his need to understand the particulars. Pangs of desperation filled her chest, and no matter how cleverly she tried steering his thoughts, the moment of truth couldn't be put off any longer. Coming around the side of the chair, she squatted down by his good leg and patted it with a shaky hand. "Go on, you can tell me what you think. Be honest, Grandfather."

  The old man leaned forward in his chair, steepling his fingers and pressing them against his mouth. Bryn attempted to read his reaction by studying the steady blue gaze beneath furry white brows. When her fears kept creeping in, she gave up, shut up, and waited. After a while he leaned back and grinned.

  "Girl, you've been working awfully hard, haven't you?"

  She nodded, trying to weigh the ambiguous remark in her favor with a matching grin. Both of their smiles, she realized, were strained attempts to please each other. She felt a sinking sensation in her stomach.

  "Yes, and I've enjoyed doing it for you, Grandfather."

  "Hmm. Rick still giving you a ration about it?"

  Standing slowly, she walked the few feet to the carved screen and began tracing the pencil-thin legs of an ibis with her fingertip. "He believes Chez Madison is too upscale for Malabar Key," she said, turning back to her grandfather. "You'd think he had a financial interest in the place."

  Pappy Madison tugged on the wheels on his chair, turning himself first to the left and then the right. He cleared his throat noisily.

  "He'd never admit it, Brynnie, but in a way he does have a financial interest."

  "What?" She walked quickly back to the chair. "What are you saying? Is Rick your silent partner? Is that why he's so..." She stopped to think of the right word "...opinionated?" A huge range of new problems suddenly loomed as she considered his involvement. She settled down on her heels beside the old man again. "Is it?"

  "Nothing formal as that. In fact, he'd be the first to insist he had nothing to do with Pappy's Crab Shack, but if it weren't for Rick, this place most likely would be just another expensive souvenir shop in a resort complex."

  "But why?" she asked, dipping into that guarded well of curiosity, the one marked Rick.

  "Remember a few years back when you didn't make it down for a visit because you took that business trip to Hong Kong? Well, Hurricane Lula paid us a visit instead. She didn't do diddly-squat to the rest of Florida, but she practically destroyed the Middle Keys. Until that happened, I'd been living in a fool's paradise and hadn't increased my insurance as I should have. A lot of us hadn't. I was about to give up and go live in the back country. Rick showed up with his checkbook and helped me put this place back together. He helped out just about everyone along Petticoat Channel. Of course, we've paid him back since then."

  "Other people? He's never mentioned any of this to me," she said.

  "Are you surprised at that, Brynnie?"

  "I don't know enough about him, at least about his past, to be surprised one way or the other. Most of our conversations consist of shouting matches over the fund-raiser, or this place." She swallowed and looked away, remembering their other modes of communication. Sometimes we don't talk at all. Before the hot images could take over, she rushed on to another subject. "Does he make that much money off the fishing charters and boat slip rentals, or is he independently wealthy?"

  Pappy eyed her carefully. "You told me you didn't want to hear about Rick. Have you changed your mind?"

  Slowly getting to her feet, she pulled up a chair and sat down in front of her grandfather. "No, I haven't changed my mind. Just tell me about him where it concerns you and the restaurant," she said.

  The old man nodded slowly. "Representatives from a major hotel chain came in the day after the storm and offered everyone on Malabar Key big bucks for their properties, or what was left of their properties. Let me tell you, Brynnie, people were torn in several different directions. Some wanted off the island for good, so those big offers looked mighty tempting; others simply didn't have the insurance to start rebuilding. I'm not talking about big businesses. I'm talking about the bathing suit shop, that mom-and-pop motels, you know, places like that. Ah, Brynnie, it was a terrible mess all around." The old man reached toward his elevated leg, rubbing the top of his thigh in silence.

  "How are you feeling? Is your leg bothering you?"

  Pappy continued staring at the place where the jukebox had been. "I'm okay." After a while, he looked up at Bryn as he slid a knuckle under one eye. "If we hadn't had Rick Parrish call that meeting at his house and insist everyone hold off making a decision for a few weeks, I don't know where we'd be today. He reminded us that we had a special piece of the American dream down here and that once we gave it up, we'd never get it back. He said those of us lucky enough to have children and grandchildren wouldn't be able to look them in the eye when they found out we sold out to a corporation. Reps from the hotel chain showed up at Rick's during another one of his meetings and tried taking it over. They yapped on and on that prosperity was sure to come for all of us in the wake of their bulldozers. When they handed Rick a check for his marina property, the whole room went dead silent. Guess those reps thought if they could get Rick, they'd have all of us." The old man paused to remember. Shaking his head, he said in a fierce whisper, "Damn, what a man."

  What a man indeed, she thought, finally understanding why Rita and Millie and virtually everyone else she'd met had nothing but praise and adoration for Rick Parrish. He'd kept his head when the rest of them were consumed with fear. He'd stood up to big business and conquered them at their own game. He'd even taken money from his own pocket to back his cause. What she didn't understand was the reason behind Rick's legendary stand against the interlopers. It would be easy enough to ask her grandfather, but somehow she knew the answer had to come from Rick himself. "What happened next?"

  Her grandfather winked. "You don't think he backed down, do you? No, siree. He tore up the check, tossed it over his deck rail, and showed them the quickest way off the key." Waving toward the breezy palms and the sparkling ocean, Pappy added, "You see, Rick knew we'd all regret it if we sold out this place. Thank God he wasn't in shock like the rest of us. He knew when to rally us, and even when a few looked as if they were going to cave, he was there with an understanding ear. Hell, Brynnie, he even put his money where his mouth was."

  "How did he come up with enough?"

  "I don't know and it didn't seem right to ask. And now it's not important because it's all pai
d back." He caught her gaze and held it steady. "At least, it's not important to me, Brynnie."

  His cryptic silence had her more curious than ever, but the old man's shoulders were rounded with fatigue. And if she wanted to know more, she could ask Rick. Leaning forward in her chair, she took his hands in hers. "You're tired, aren't you?"

  "A tad."

  "I'll call Rick and Jiggy to come help us get you down the steps and back to your own bed. We never should have come straight here from the hospital." She was halfway to the phone behind the bar when he called to her.

  "Brynnie, wait up."

  "Yes?" she said, turning toward the odd tone.

  "Why don't you walk over. I'd like to be alone here for a while, if you don't mind."

  "Okay," she said, staring at his profile as he wheeled himself across the room. He'd never looked older or smaller or lonelier than he did at this moment. Tears stung the backs of her eyes. She moved past him toward the stairs, but couldn't resist squeezing his shoulder. He caught her hand and pressed it to his cheek. "Brynnie, where's the jukebox?"

  "I sold it."

  His chin came up and he looked away. "Oh," he managed to whisper before swiping his nose with his other hand. "I'm sure it's still making music somewhere."

  "Rick bought it."

  The old man's head swiveled in her direction. "He did?" His shocked expression disappeared into a grin before laughter cackled out of him. "I should have known," he said, slapping his good leg. "That's good."