by Joan Hohl
“Karen, it’s Charles. He’s had a heart attack!”
Charles? Karen’s mind went blank for a moment. Charles was not yet forty years old! “When?” She had to push the word past her frozen lips.
“Late last night. I’ve been with him since he was admitted to the hospital.” Judith paused for breath. “Karen, he’s asking for you and the boys. Will you come?”
Karen’s gaze flew to the man basking naked in the morning sunlight. Paul. Pain streaked through her mind and her heart. While she and Paul had been together, Charles had been fighting for his life. Shame and defeat decided the issue.
“Yes, Judith, of course I’ll come. I’ll be there as soon as possible.”
Raising her eyes, Karen found her gaze captured and held by Paul’s steady regard.
Chapter Five
Staring into Paul’s eyes, Karen heard herself respond distantly to Judith Mitchell. Her lips moved, forming words of agreement.
“Yes, I’ll leave as soon as possible.”
Paul rolled onto his stomach to relieve the unnatural twist of his neck. His eyes narrowed at the sound of her voice, and the content of her words.
“Yes, I’ll drive down and collect the boys on the way.”
Judith’s anxious voice rattled in Karen’s ear. Enmeshed by a pair of eyes shading to black, Karen heard without hearing.
“I don’t know.” Impatience clawed at her nerves, her mind, her emotions. “Judith, I simply can’t give you a definite time!” Karen could hear her own building anxiety and took a quick, settling breath. “I promise you, I will have the boys there as soon as possible.”
The panicky voice at the end of the line rattled again; Paul began to move. Karen’s control snapped.
“I have a lot to do, Judith! And unless I get off this phone, I’ll never get there! Yes. Goodbye.” Without turning to look, Karen moved her arm to replace the receiver. Plastic clattered against plastic before the receiver nestled into the cradle. Paul was moving; Karen stopped breathing.
Paul came up off the floor with the liquid agility of a man half his age, his muscles tensed, as if ready to spring into whatever action proved necessary.
Karen’s voice had been so low, so anxious, that he had heard only bits and pieces of her end of the conversation. But from her tone, Paul knew something was wrong, very wrong. Her face, moments before flushed with the soft glow of pleasurable satisfaction, was devoid of all color. Her eyes, recently slumbrous with repletion, were now wide and cloudy. Her mouth, seconds before full and moist from the caress of his lips, was now pinched and bracketed with lines of strain.
Her mouth.
The muscles lacing Paul’s stomach clenched. Alarm billowed to encompass his tightening chest.
Karen’s mouth was lost to him; he knew it. Despair invaded his mind and coiled deep down in his gut. He didn’t go to her—he couldn’t move, couldn’t think. In that instant, not understanding why or how, Paul knew that when Karen’s trembling white lips finally moved he would once again find himself outside in the cold, looking in, longing for warmth.
He wanted to curse. He wanted to scream a denial of the rejection not yet voiced. Paul stood motionless, unconscious of his nakedness, his narrowed gaze riveted to the stark expression on her face. Time froze for an endless instant. Encapsulated within that moment Paul felt the converging rush of anguished emotions and burgeoning, paralyzing fear. Supreme effort was required to form one word, a word that was like a death knell. “Karen?”
It was not unlike coming out of a trance. Karen blinked, and the timeless instant was over—everything was over. Pleasure and contentment were of a realm not intended for thirty-seven-year-old divorcees with teenage sons. Reality was shame, and selfdisgust and pain. The pain she was feeling was streaking through her body now—the pain Charles had suffered while she had been taking her pleasure.
Karen shivered. The spell was broken. The harsh light of morning poured through the windows of the alcove, gilding Paul’s tense body with spangles of gold. His nakedness was beautiful and so very natural, and yet it was an affront, an insult to her senses and shame.
“I must go.” Her voice lacked substance; her eyes lacked life.
“Go? Go where?” Caution curled around the edges of his carefully controlled tone. “What has happened?”
“To New Hampshire to collect my boys, and then to Boston,” she responded woodenly, her manner relaying unspoken words that pierced his heart with tiny poison darts. “Charles has had a heart attack, and he has been asking for me and his sons.” Her throat worked, indicating more than the need to merely swallow. “I must go at once.”
“Yes, of course you must go, but—”
Karen shook her head sharply, cutting off his words, cutting off his breath.
“There are no buts, Paul!” Her arms moved aimlessly. “I must leave at once!” As she moved, her bare sole made contact with a section of floor tile that had not been warmed by her flesh. A frown drew her eyebrows together as the sensation of chill enveloped her foot. Reluctantly, as if fearing what she’d see, Karen lowered her gaze.
Her glance skimmed, shied away, then came back to slowly examine her own unadorned body. She swayed from the strength of the shudder that tore through her. Memory flashed, too clear, too sharp, too damning.. Vividly, as if rolled across a movie screen, a picture formed in her mind, a picture of two people, two middle-aged people, washed by sunlight, consumed by each other while in the throes of making love on the floor—no!—indulging their physical hungers!
The mental reenactment was demeaning, and it was demoralizing. What had seemed beautiful at the time took on shadings of ugliness. Karen swallowed against a rising tide of bitterness.
He had to stop her!
The silent inner command unlocked Paul’s frozen muscles. Not even certain exactly what he had to stop Karen from doing or thinking, he knew he had to put a stop to it at once. Three long strides were all that were required to propel him from the dining alcove and across to where she stood, still hovering near the wall phone. Paul extended his hand as he took the third step. Karen flinched and shrank back.
Her act caused the second toll of the death knell sounding inside his head.
“Don’t touch me, Paul, please.” Karen knew she couldn’t let him touch her. She couldn’t bear to have him touch her—she’d collapse, fall apart, and she didn’t have time to fall apart.
“Karen, what in hell is going on inside your head?” Paul’s voice held more plea than demand.
“I’m naked!” Karen shouted. “You’re naked!” “So what?” he shouted back, frustration heavy in his voice. “What do clothes have to do with anything?”
Karen’s head moved awkwardly as she glanced around, seeing nothing, feeling everything. “I’ve got to bathe and dress.” Her breath lodged in her chest. “I’ve got to pack. I’ve got to go for my boys!”
Paul’s hand flashed out to grasp her wrist as she spun away from him. “Hold it.” His fingers tightened when she tried to yank free. “I said hold it, dammit!” His harsh tone stopped her frantic bid for release, but she refused to look at him. Paul’s chest heaved with a soundless sigh. “That’s better. I want you to tell me who you were speaking to on the phone and exactly what that person said to you to cause this hysterical reaction.”
He wanted? He wanted? Hysterical? Anger ripped through Karen with the devastating force of a flash fire. She could look at him now; she could glare at him.
“Who do you think you are?” Karen’s tone was scathing. God! She hurt, in her mind, in her heart and, worse, deep down in her soul—her so recently blackened soul. Her slicing tone cut into another soul, leaving it wounded and bleeding. “Just who in the hell do you think you are to question me?”
“Your lover.”
Anger receded. Senses ceased rioting. Karen’s brain switched to stun. It'was an irrefutable fact: Paul Van-zant, wanderer, vagrant, whatever, was her lover. Conflict ascended. She was torn between two separate needs. Her arms ach
ed to curl around his trim waist; her palm itched to slap his aristocratic face. She did neither. In a tone that was free of expression, Karen related the phone conversation to him—at least what she could remember of it. Paul’s features settled into austere lines as she spoke.
“It’s a flagrant imposition on ties that no longer bind.” Breeding, culture and sheer male arrogance were expressed by Paul’s tone.
“He’s their father!” Karen protested, beginning to tremble. “Suppose it were you lying there in that hospital bed. Wouldn’t you want your son, your daughter?”
Paul conceded the point with a slight inclination of his head. “Yes, of course. And I understand your willingness to take his sons to him.” His lips flattened. “What I don’t understand is your intense reaction to the news of his attack.” He paused, as if hesitant to voice his suspicions. Then he squared his shoulders. “Are you still in love with him, Karen?”
“No.” Simple truth rang in her voice. She shook her head. “No, Paul,” she said more strongly, “I am not still in love with Charles. He very effectively killed the love I felt for him by confessing—or, more accurately, bragging—about his other women.”
Paul’s shoulders didn’t slump with relief, though the urge was great. “All right. Then why all this panic?” “My boys—” she began, her tone heating again.
“I understand that,” he interrupted, slashing his hand through the air. “What I don’t understand is your withdrawal.” She opened her mouth; his hand slashed the air once more. “And you are, already have, withdrawn from me. I want to know why.” Why? Karen gaped at him. Didn’t he know? Didn’t he feel the slightest twinge of remorse? Couldn’t he see exactly how that phone call had exposed their behavior? They were strangers—strangers! And yet, while her sons had gone innocently about their business and her sons’ father had fought the pain of a heart attack, two strangers to one another had gone at each other like alley cats at mating time!
Didn’t Paul see or understand that?
Karen’s breath trembled from her quivering body on a sigh. No, of course Paul couldn’t see or understand. He was a man, after all. And men viewed these things differently than women. Hadn’t she had proof enough of exactly how men viewed the male-female relationship?
Her response was too long in coming. Paul’s fingers tightened around her wrist.
“It was a mistake.”
His fingers flexed, and Karen flinched.
“I’m sorry.” The pressure was immediately eased. “What was a mistake?”
He knew. Karen was positive that though he had asked, Paul knew what her answer would be. She didn’t hesitate.
“Us,” she said, repressing a shudder. “The entire situation.” Her gaze crept to the sunlit spot on the alcove carpet, then skittered away again. “Our, our—” She couldn’t force the words past her lips.
“Our lovemaking, dammit!” Paul barked.
“It was all an enormous, dreadful mistake,” Karen went on, as if his harsh definition had never reached her ears.
Paul’s perfectly defined features grew taut with impatience. “Why?” he demanded harshly. “In what way was it a dreadful mistake?”
Though Karen trembled visibly, she met his drilling stare without flinching. “It all happened too soon. We don’t know one another.” Her trembling increased. “In simple terms, we were both motivated by lust, sex for sex’s sake alone.” Her trembling gave way to a violent shudder. “I—I feel as though I’ve not only betrayed myself but the trust of my children, as well,” she said in a stark, shaken tone.
“And now you’re drowning in guilt and shame and God knows what else.” Paul’s fingers loosened, releasing her imprisoned wrist. “You’re wrong, you know.” His voice held little hope of her hearing, or of her believing him if she did register his words.
Karen shook her head, confirming his lack of hope. She felt his sigh to the depths of her being—felt it, but could offer no solace to him, or to herself.
“I must go.” Clutching the clothing to her now-chilled body, she turned away.
“Wait.”
As had happened before, Karen found herself unable to disobey his commanding tone. She stopped but refused to look at him. “Paul, I must...”
“You must think about what you’re doing,” he finished for her. “You can’t simply toss on some clothing, pack a bag and run out the door.”
Since that was precisely what she’d been prepared to do, Karen glanced over her shoulder to frown at him. “Why can’t I?”
“Has the house been secured?” he asked, oddly detached.
“No, but—”
“Do you have any idea of how long you’ll be gone?”
“Well, no, but—”
“Have you notified the authorities at the boys’ school to expect you?”
“You know I haven’t!” Karen snapped, impatient with him and with herself. “But—”
“But what?” Paul’s tone, his eyes, his attitude, were cool. He had accepted her decision; he had little choice at that emotional moment, but he couldn’t accept hasty disorganization.
“I—” Karen’s hands lifted, then fell. “1 don’t know.”
“I do.”
Her mind a whirling mass of feelings and confusion, Karen stared at him with dulled eyes. “Okay,” she finally said. “If you know, tell me.”
“I intend to.” Paul swept a cool glance over her, then shifted his gaze to his own body. His lips twitched into a smile that was completely without humor. “The first thing we’re going to do is dress. After that we’re going to make fresh coffee, sit down and discuss what has to'be done.”
Karen launched into an argument. “But—” “Karen,” Paul snapped impatiently, “the only way to get started is to get started. Now please stop arguing and go get dressed.”
Karen went, quickly, if not exactly at a dead run. By the time she was once more clothed and protected by the concealing garments of respectability, she felt more like herself. She was ready and able to cope with the situation—but she wouldn’t allow herself to consider which situation.
As she rushed downstairs and into the kitchen, the realization hit her that Paul, on the other hand, was supremely ready to cope with any and all situations.
He was dressed in a knit pullover and faded jeans, jeans that should have looked odd on his elegant body but somehow looked perfect—perfectly fitting, perfectly appealing, perfectly sexy. And as if his attire wasn’t demoralizing enough, he had cleared away their uneaten breakfast, loaded the dishwasher, brewed a fresh pot of coffee and warmed the blueberry muffins she’d planned to serve at lunchtime. Karen’s renewed sense of confidence ebbed considerably.
“You didn’t shower,” she accused peevishly, trying to bolster her flagging ego.
“Of course I did.” Paul spared her a chiding look as he carried the glass coffeepot to the table. “Sit down, have some coffee, and we’ll plan the day.” It wasn’t an invitation, it was a direct order. “And bring the basket of muffins with you.” He didn’t bother glancing back to see if she’d comply; he obviously took it for granted that she would.
Karen bristled while she toyed with the idea of telling him precisely what he could do with the muffins, but on reflection decided it wasn’t worth the effort. She had more important things to do than start a yelling match with a man she was unlikely to ever see again after they left the house and parted company.
Unlikely to ever see again. The echoing phrase induced a weakness that conflicted with the nervous energy urging her into constructive action. Wanting to run, possibly in several different directions at once, Karen snatched up the basket and followed him to the table.
Silence prevailed for long moments; tearing silence, brittle silence, an “I’ll scream if it doesn’t end” silence. Yet, when Paul quietly broke the silence, Karen started as though he’d shouted.
“You are taking the car?’’
“What?” she asked blankly.
Paul regarded her with infinite p
atience. “The car, Karen. I assume the compact I saw in the garage earlier is yours.”
“Oh! Yes. It is mine, and I am taking it.”
“Where in New Hampshire is this prep school?” The school. Her boys. Karen fought back a resurgence of shame and guilt.
“Karen?” His patience was not quite as infinite. “Ah... halfway,” she replied vaguely.
“Hmm.” Paul murmured into his cup before very casually placing it on the matching saucer. “Halfway from where to where?” His lowering tone and brow finally got through to her.
“I’m sorry!” She flushed. “The school is approximately midway between here and Boston.” Her shoulders tilted in a helpless shrug. “The location of the school was a symbolic concession under the terms of the divorce.” Her smile didn’t quite make it. “An indication that, symbolically at least, Charles and I are still sharing the children.”
“I wouldn’t touch that statement with a forked stick,” Paul commented, knowing full well his derisive tone said it all.
“I know.” Karen sighed her weariness. “Could we get on with the plans, please?” Arching her brows, she reached for a muffin she really didn’t want.
Paul continued. Succinctly, concisely, he outlined exactly what he considered had to be done; naturally, he was absolutely right on every point. While he spoke, Karen nodded, agreeing with every suggestion, and crumbled the muffin onto her plate.
“Fodder for the gulls?”
Karen trailed his gaze to the tiny pile of crumbs on her plate. “I’m not hungry,” she said defensively.
Paul’s lips curved into a small smile lightly tinged with tenderness. “A dead giveaway to your emotional condition,” he observed, referring to her earlier admission regarding her love of food.
“I suppose.” Karen tossed the agreement out carelessly, making it clear she was not about to allow him to reopen that particular topic. Paul got the message.
“You have friends in Boston?” he asked with a fine display of restraint. “People you can spend time with while you’re there?”