The Novels of Nora Roberts, Volume 3

by Nora Roberts

It wasn’t a bad idea, Callie decided, to step back from one puzzle and use herself as the datum point for another. What was her pattern and how had she gotten there? What would her layers expose about her life, her personal culture and her role in society?

  She sat down at her computer and began a personal time line from the date of her birth.

  Born September 11, 1974

  Kidnapped December 12, 1974

  Placed with Elliot and Vivian Dunbrook December 16, 1974

  That part was easy. Jogging her memory, she added the dates she’d started school, the summer she’d broken her arm, the Christmas she’d begged for and received her first microscope. Her first cello lesson, her first recital, her first dig. The death of her paternal grandfather. Her first sexual experience. The date of her graduation from college. The year she’d moved into her own apartment.

  Professional highlights, the receipt of her master’s degree, significant physical injuries and illnesses. Meeting Leo, Rosie, her very brief affair with an Egyptologist.

  What had she been thinking?

  The day she’d met Jake. How could she forget?

  Tues, April 6, 1998

  The date of their first sexual consummation.

  Thurs, April 8, 1998

  Jumped right into that one, she mused. They hadn’t been able to keep their hands off each other, and had burned up the mattress in some cramped little room in Yorkshire near the Mesolithic site they were studying.

  They’d moved in together, more or less, in June of that year. She couldn’t pinpoint when or how they’d evolved into a team. If one of them was heading to Cairo or Tennessee, both of them had gone to Cairo or Tennessee.

  They’d fought like lunatics, made love like maniacs. All over the world.

  She recorded the date of their marriage.

  The date he’d walked out.

  The date she’d received the divorce papers.

  Not so much time between, in the big scheme, she thought, then shook her head. The point was her life, not their life.

  Shrugging, she keyed in her doctorate. She entered the day she’d gone to see Leo in Baltimore, her first day on the project, which included meeting Lana Campbell.

  The day Jake had arrived.

  The date Suzanne Cullen had come to her hotel room.

  Her trip to Philadelphia, her return. Hiring Lana, dinner with Jake, the vandalism on her Rover, Dolan’s murder. Conversation with Doug.

  Sex with Jake.

  Blood tests.

  The first visit to the Simpsons.

  Frowning, she went back, consulted her logbook and entered the date each team member had joined the project.

  The shot fired at Jake, the trip to Atlanta, the fire. Interviews with Dr. Blakely’s widow and Betsy Poffenberger, resulting data discovered.

  Bill McDowell’s death.

  Making love with Jake.

  Then the trip back to Virginia, which brought her to the present.

  Once you had the events, you had a pattern, she thought. Then you extrapolated from it to see how each event, each layer connected to another.

  She worked for a time shifting the data around into different headings: Education, Medical, Professional, Personal, Antietam Creek Project, Jessica.

  Sitting back, she saw one element of the pattern. From the day she’d met him, Jake had a connection to every major point in her life. Even the damn doctorate, she admitted, which she’d gone after with a vengeance to keep herself from brooding over him.

  She couldn’t even have an identity crisis without him being involved.

  Worse, she wasn’t sure she’d want it any other way.

  Absently, she reached for a cookie and found the bag beside her keyboard empty.

  “I’ve got a stash in my room.”

  She jolted, jerked around to see Jake leaning against the doorway.

  “But it’ll cost you,” he added.

  “Damnit, stop sneaking around, spying on me.”

  “I can’t help it if I move with the grace and silence of a panther, can I? And your door was open. Standing in an open doorway isn’t spying. What are you working on?”

  “None of your business.” And to keep it that way, she saved the file and closed it.

  “You’re irritable because you’re out of cookies.”

  “Close the door.” She gritted her teeth when he did so, after he’d stepped inside. “I meant with you on the other side.”

  “You should’ve been more specific. Why aren’t you taking a nap?”

  “Because I’m not three years old.”

  “You’re beat, Dunbrook.”

  “I have work I want to do.”

  “If you’d been dealing with the schedule or the site records, you wouldn’t have been in such a hurry to close the file before I got a look at it.”

  “I have personal business that doesn’t involve you.” She thought of the time line she’d just generated, and his complete involvement in it. “Or I should have.”

  “You’re feeling pretty beat up, aren’t you, baby?”

  Her stomach slid toward her knees at the slow, soft sound of his voice. “Don’t be nice to me. It drives me crazy. I don’t know what to do when you’re nice to me.”

  “I know.” He leaned down to touch his lips to hers. “I can’t figure out why I never thought of it before.”

  She turned away, opened the file again. “It’s just a time line, trying to establish a pattern. Go ahead.” She got up so he could have the desk chair. “The highlights and lowlights of my life.”

  She plopped down on her sleeping bag while he read.

  “You slept with Aiken? The sleazy Egyptologist? What were you thinking?”

  “Just never mind, or I’ll start commenting on all the women you’ve slept with.”

  “You don’t know all the women I’ve slept with. You forgot some events in this.”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “You forgot the conference we went to in Paris, May of 2000. And the day we skipped out on it and sat at a sidewalk cafe, drank wine. You were wearing a blue dress. It started to rain, just a little. We walked back to the hotel in the rain, went up to the room and made love. With the windows open, so we could hear the drizzle.”

  She hadn’t forgotten it. She remembered it so well, so clearly, that hearing him recount it made her hurt. “It isn’t relevant data.”

  “It was one of the most relevant days of my life. I didn’t know it then. That’s the tricky thing about life. Too often you don’t know what’s important until the moment passes. You still have that dress?”

  She shifted on her side, pillowed her cheek on her hand as she studied him. He hadn’t had a haircut since they’d started the dig. She’d always liked it when his hair got just a little too long. “Somewhere.”

  “I’d like to see you in it again.”

  “You never noticed or cared what I was wearing before.”

  “I never mentioned it. An oversight.”

  “What’re you doing?” she demanded when he began to type.

  “Adding May of 2000, Paris, to your time line. I’m going to shoot this file to my laptop. I’ll download it later, play with it.”

  “Fine, great. Do what you want.”

  “You must be feeling awful. I don’t recall you ever telling me to do what I wanted before.”

  Why did she want to cry? Why the hell did she want to cry? “You always did anyway.”

  He sent the file to his e-mail, then got up and walked to her. “You always thought so.” He sat down beside her, trailed his fingers over her shoulder. “I didn’t want to leave that day in Colorado.”

  Ah yes, she thought bitterly. That was why she wanted to cry. “Then why did you?”

  “You made it clear it was what you wanted. You said every minute you’d spent with me was a mistake. That the marriage was a bad joke and if I didn’t resign from the project and go, you would.”

  “We were fighting.”

  “You said you wanted a div
orce.”

  “Yeah, and you jumped on that quick, fast and in a hurry. You and that six-foot brunette were out of there like a shot, and I got a divorce petition in the mail two weeks later.”

  “I didn’t leave with her.”

  “So it was just a coincidence that she left at the same time.”

  “You never trusted me, Cal. You never believed in me, in us, for that matter.”

  “I asked if you’d slept with her.”

  “You didn’t ask, you accused.”

  “You refused to deny it.”

  “I refused to deny it,” he agreed, “because it was insulting. It still is. If you believed that I’d break a vow to you, that I’d break faith with you over another woman, then the marriage was a bad joke. It had nothing to do with her. Christ, I don’t even remember her name.”

  “Veronica. Veronica Weeks.”

  “Trust you,” he muttered. “It had nothing to do with her,” he repeated. “And everything to do with us.”

  “I wanted you to fight for me.” She pushed up to a sitting position. She had her own wounds. “Just once I wanted you to fight for me instead of with me. I wanted that, Jake, so I’d know. So I’d know what you never once told me.”

  “What? What didn’t I tell you?”

  “That you loved me.”

  She didn’t know whether to laugh or weep at the shock on his face. It was rare, she thought, to see him so unguarded, so baffled, so stunned.

  “That’s bullshit, Callie. Of course I told you.”

  “Not once. You never once said the words. ‘Mmm, babe, I love your body’ doesn’t count, Graystone. ‘Oh that, yeah, me too.’ I’d get that sometimes when I said it to you. But you never said it to me. Obviously you couldn’t. Because one thing you’re not is a liar.”

  “Why the hell did I ask you to marry me if I didn’t love you?”

  “You never asked me to marry you. You said, ‘Hey, Dunbrook, let’s take off to Vegas and get married.’ ”

  “It’s the same thing.”

  “You’re not that dense.” Weary of it, she raked her hands through her hair. “It doesn’t matter.”

  He took her arm at the wrist, lowered her hand. “Why didn’t you say all this before? Why didn’t you just ask me straight out if I loved you?”

  “Because I’m a girl, you big stupid jerk.” She punched his arm, pushed to her feet. “Digging in the dirt, playing with bones, sleeping in a bag doesn’t mean I’m not a girl.”

  The fact that she was saying things he’d figured out for himself in the past months only made it worse. “I know you’re a girl. For Christ’s sake.”

  “Then figure it out. For somebody who’s spent his adult life studying and lecturing and analyzing cultures, the human condition and societal mores, you’re an idiot.”

  “Stop calling me names and give me a goddamn minute to work this out.”

  “Take all the time you want.” She spun away, headed for the door.

  “Don’t.” He didn’t move, didn’t rise and didn’t raise his voice. Surprise, because everything in their history indicated he would do all three, stopped her. “Don’t walk out. Let’s at least finish this part without turning away from each other. You didn’t ask,” he continued quietly, “because in our culture, verbalization of emotions is as important as demonstrations of emotions. Free communication between mates is essential to the development and evolution of the relationship. If you’d had to ask, the answer had no meaning.”

  “Bingo, professor.”

  “Because I didn’t tell you, you thought I slept with other women.”

  “You came with a track record. Jake the Rake.”

  “Damn it, Callie.” There was little he hated more than having that particular term tossed in his face. And she knew it. “We’d both been around.”

  “What was to stop you from going around again?” she countered. “You like women.”

  “I like women,” he agreed, and stood. “I loved you.”

  Her lips trembled. “That’s a hell of a thing to say to me now.”

  “Can’t win, can I? Here’s something else, and maybe I should have told you a long time ago. I was never unfaithful to you. Being accused of it . . . It hurt, Callie. So I got mad, because I’d rather be mad than hurt.”

  “You didn’t sleep with her?”

  “Not her, not anyone else. There was no one but you, not from the first minute I saw you.”

  She had to turn away. She’d convinced herself he’d been unfaithful. It was the only way she could bear being without him. The only thing that had stopped her from running after him.

  “I thought you had. I was sure you had.” She had to sit again, so merely slid down the door. “She made sure I believed it.”

  “She didn’t like you. She was jealous of you. If she made a play for me . . . Okay, she did make one, it was only because I was yours.”

  “She left her bra in our room.”

  “Her what? Christ.”

  “Half under the bed,” Callie continued. “Like she’d missed it when she got dressed again. I could smell her in the room when I walked in. Her perfume. And I thought, our bed. He brought that bitch to our bed. It tore me to pieces.”

  “I didn’t. I can only tell you I didn’t. Not in our bed, not anywhere. Not her, Callie, not anyone, since the first time I touched you.”

  “Okay.”

  “Okay?” he repeated. “That’s it?”

  She felt a tear spill over and swiped it away. “I don’t know what else to say.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me about this when it happened?”

  “Because I was afraid. I was afraid if I showed you the proof, what seemed like undeniable proof, you’d admit it. If you’d said, yeah, you slipped but it wouldn’t happen again, I’d’ve let it go. So I got mad,” she said with a sigh. “Because I’d rather be mad than hurt or afraid. I got mad because if I was mad I could stand up under it, I could stand up to it. I don’t know what to do anymore. I don’t know how to do it.”

  He sat down in front of her so their knees bumped. “We’ve been making some progress on being friends this time.”

  “I guess we have.”

  “We could keep doing that. And I can work on remembering you’re a girl while you work on trusting me.”

  “I believe you, about Veronica. That’s a start.”

  He took her hand. “Thanks.”

  “I still want to yell at you when I need to.”

  “That’s fine. I still want to have sex with you.”

  She sniffled, knuckled away another tear. “Right now?”

  “I’d never say no, but maybe it could wait. You know, we never got around to taking that trip west and seeing my family after we got married.”

  “I don’t think this is a good time to zip out to Arizona.”

  “No.” But he could take her there, with words. Maybe he could show her a part of himself he’d never thought to share before.

  “My father . . .he’s a good man. Quiet, dependable, hardworking. My mother’s strong and tolerant. They make a good team, a reliable unit.”

  He looked down at her hand, began to play with her fingers. “I don’t remember ever hearing either one of them say they loved the other. Not out loud, anyway. I don’t remember either of them ever saying it to me. I knew they did, but we didn’t talk about it. If I were to phone my parents and tell them I loved them, they’d both be embarrassed. We’d all be embarrassed.”

  She’d never considered the three most basic words in the human language could embarrass him, or anyone. “You’ve never said it to anyone?”

  “I’ve never thought about it but, no, I guess I haven’t—if you’re sure the I-love-your-body thing doesn’t count.”

  “It doesn’t.” She felt a warm, unexpected wave of tenderness for him, and brushed his hair away from his face. “We never told each other much about our families. Though you’re getting a crash course on mine these days.”

  “I like your family. B
oth of them.”

  She rested her head back against the door. “We always talked about our feelings in my house. What we were feeling, why we were feeling it. I doubt a day went by when I didn’t hear my parents say I love you—to me or to each other. Carlyle did a better job than he could possibly know in connecting the Cullens and the Dunbrooks.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Big emotions, verbalized. I’ll show you.”

  She got up, took the shoe box out of her duffle. “I’ve read them all now. I’ll just pick one at random.”

  She did so now, then brought the letter back, sat on the floor.

  “Go ahead,” she told him. “Read it. It’ll make my point. Any one of them would.”

  He opened the envelope, unfolded the letter.

  Dear Jessica,

  Happy birthday, sweet sixteen. How excited you must be today. Sixteen is such an important birthday, especially for a girl. Young woman now, I know. My little girl is a young woman.

  You’re beautiful, I know that, too.

  I look at young women your age, and I think, oh, how lovely and bright and fresh they are. How thrilling it is for them to be on the brink of so much. And how frustrating and difficult.

  So many emotions, so many needs and doubts. So much that’s brand-new. I think about what I’d like to say to you. The talks we might have about your life and where you want it to go. The boys you like, and the dates you’ve gone on.

  I know we’d quarrel. Mothers and daughters are bound to quarrel. I’d give anything just to be able to fight with you, have you storm up to your room and slam the door. Shut me out and turn your music up to annoy me.

  I would give anything for that.

  I think how we’d go shopping, and spend too much money, and have a ladies’ lunch somewhere.

  I wonder if you’d be proud of me. I hope so. Imagine Suzanne Cullen, businesswoman. It still amazes me, but I hope you’d be proud that I have a business of my own, a successful one.

  I wonder if you’ve seen my picture in a magazine while you’re waiting for a dentist appointment or to have your hair done. I think about you opening a bag of my cookies, and what sort you like the best.

  I try not to grieve, but it’s hard, it’s so hard knowing you might do these things and you’d never know who I am. You’d never know how much I love you.