“No.” The protest sounded feeble even to Mallory. Because Liddy Bea held the pup close, and both girl and dog gazed up at her from large, anxious eyes. “All right. We’ll give him a try. But I’m warning you, Connor, this had better be your last earthshaking surprise.”
That statement seemed to make him hesitate. A guilty expression crossed his face two seconds before he dug a small square box out of his pocket. “Bear with me through one more,” he begged, more or less pinning Mallory to the wall.
Liddy Bea hauled her new puppy over to have a look. “I bet he’s brought you something to keep Ellie Elephant comp’ny,” she hooted.
Mallory felt her color drain and her heart start to flutter. She raised half-frightened eyes to lock with Connor’s unwavering stare. “Not a figurine, Liddy Bea. It…uh…looks suspiciously like a r-ring box.”
She didn’t take the box, so Connor popped it open. “I saw this in the window of a Kingston jewelry store this morning. “I intended to offer you my grandmother’s ring. The one I have in a vault. But I thought we’d save it for Liddy Bea, for when she’s older. This ring is you, Mal. It has fire.”
She dragged her eyes away from his. The ceiling light reflected off a many-faceted pink center diamond, surrounded by a cluster of rubies. A matching wedding band was a tangle of smaller pink and red stones that blazed in the light.
“Aren’t rubies bad luck?” she ventured, watching Connor push the engagement portion of the set onto the third finger of her boneless left hand.
“Old wives’ tale,” he assured her, bestowing a kiss on the back of her hand. “I love you, Mallory Forrest. Will you be my wife?”
The ring’s sparkle was refracted through the tears that suddenly filled her eyes. Mallory found herself tongue-tied. The objections she’d had to their marrying paled in light of the hope she saw on Connor and Liddy Bea’s faces, and Mallory stammered out her consent.
Following two additional trips to the car, Connor prepared a celebration he’d hatched while on his unplanned Jamaican trip. A cake, balloons, a small bottle of champagne, even a special chewy toy for Boo Boo. Also newspapers. A whole stack, which Connor distributed three-deep across the kitchen tile. The last item he carried up to the apartment was a child gate. He attached it to the kitchen door. “We’ll pen Boo Boo in here at night for a while, to save the carpet.”
“Why can’t he sleep with me?” Liddy Bea wailed.
“When he’s older and house-trained, kitten.” Connor brushed away her copious tears. “We’ve gotta train the little guy. It might upset Mom if he had an accident in your room.”
The ring, the smooth way Connor dispensed with Liddy’s tantrum, the easy way he called her Mom, coupled with his passionate kiss before they all trundled off to bed, lulled Mallory into thinking everything was going to be storybook perfect.
And life was idyllic for two weeks. During that time, she set an August first wedding date, blithely ignoring Alec’s dire predictions of doom. Her brother, Mark, could get leave for the big event and had agreed to serve as Connor’s best man. Bradford, though surprised, said he’d certainly be proud to walk Mallory down the aisle.
But then, sometime during the night of July 28, everything changed. A phone call from James Kirkpatrick rousted Connor before dawn. It was one of the rare times he was able to spend in Mallory’s bed. He wasn’t totally cognizant when he grabbed the phone. He and Mallory had indulged in passionate lovemaking more than once throughout the night—thanks to Fredric Dahl’s opting to keep Liddy Bea in the hospital after her regular dialysis to run a series of routine lab tests.
Mallory, slower to wake from love-sated sleep, didn’t realize it was Connor’s student aide on the phone. Flying out of bed, she began to dress. “Oh, my God, what’s happened to Liddy Bea? Fredric said this was just routine.”
Connor, naked as a jaybird, rolled out on her side of the bed and took Mallory’s arm. “Shh,” he warned, giving her arm a shake. “It’s not the hospital, Mal. It’s Jim Kirkpatrick. He says all our sensors along the Caribbean corridor have gone crazy. He’s afraid this is the storm warning we’ve been expecting.
Mallory clutched an unbuttoned blouse to her breasts. Connor saw it was the one she’d haphazardly discarded several hours earlier while in the throes of desire.
“Connor?” Her eyes remained wide and still unfocused. “Connor,” she repeated. “Mark’s due to fly in to Pensacola tomorrow. We’re getting married Saturday. Tell me those readings are a mistake,” she pleaded. “You aren’t going to let a storm ruin our wedding, are you?”
“Mal, honey, calm down.” Connor tried to console her by pulling her into his arms. But he was stopped by the tether of a short telephone cord. “What, James? No, I wasn’t telling you to calm down. I hear the computers spitting reports like crazy. I’ll be there in ten minutes. Maybe twenty.” He’d been watching Mallory’s eyes grow more horrified, so he adjusted his arrival time.
Hanging up, Connor turned the lamp up a notch to see where his own shirt and pants had landed. He spoke evenly and quietly as he began to pull on the wrinkled clothes. “My system has recorded erratic readings for over a month in that region, Mallory. There’s nothing I’d like more than to dismiss this volatility as more of the same inconsistent underwater tremors we’ve been documenting. I hope that’s all it’ll turn out to be.”
Mallory sank back onto the bed. She hunched over her knees. “But you suspect not. I hear the worry in your voice, Connor.”
He knelt in front of her and gathered both her cold hands in one of his warmer ones. “It’s barely 4:00 a.m., Mal. Go back to bed and get some sleep. I’ll phone you at six—or before, if the shaking stops.”
“But what if it doesn’t? What about Liddy Bea? She’s due to be released at ten. I have that fund-raiser breakfast buffet with the Lady Lions. I have to attend. We agreed you’d collect Liddy Bea.”
Connor chewed on the side of his upper lip. “If this blows over like the other warnings, there won’t be a problem. If not, I’ll figure out something else. But Jim’s not the one who’s supposed to call outlying weather stations if this escalates. It’s my job to do that.”
“And Liddy Bea’s your daughter,” Mallory reminded him in a chilly voice.
“Yes, she is. What’s one fact got to do with the other?”
Shaking off his hands, Mallory pulled the tangled sheet up around her like a toga. “I should’ve listened when people told me you’d put your job before your family.”
“People? What people?” Connor, who’d reached for his socks and boots, stopped to glare at her through narrowed eyes.
A guilty expression crossed her face.
“Oh, I get it. Alec Robinson’s still feeding you lies.”
“Not just him. Dad had reservations when I announced our plans to marry. Anyway, does it really matter who cautioned me? You’re proving them right. You’re ready to foist Liddy Bea’s care onto someone else at a mere hint that your precious machines are acting up. What this says to me is that once again, your career supersedes our relationship, Connor.”
“Supersedes…? That’s not fair, Mallory! Listen to me. I’ve poured my heart and soul into seven years of research to develop an early-hurricane-detection system. Not for any personal fame or glory, which is what your tone implies. I thought the storm that killed my mom had the same kind of impact on you as it did on me. If these readings are on target, Mal, I have the potential to save lives. A lot of lives.”
“You know what, Connor? That’s noble of you.” She pounded her heaving chest. “I have a daughter to care about. She’s sick and she’s not used to being shuffled around to accommodate a job. You spit out Alec’s name like it’s a dirty word. He may not take Liddy Bea to play in the park, or…or…buy her a puppy. But he’s been understanding enough of my concerns to give me time away from work to look after her properly.”
“Good. Great. I have a potential crisis. Why can’t you cancel out on today’s fund-raiser to pick her up from the hospital?
You talk about my job interfering. What about yours?” He sighed, a frustrated sound. “I’d intended, if necessary, to call on Marta. She could sign Liddy out. But if that’s not good enough for you, Mallory, do it your way.” Shoving his sockless feet into his boots, Connor stomped out of the bedroom.
Dragging the satin top sheet off the bed, Mallory chased him into the hall. “Fine, Connor,” she shouted. “Maybe if you can’t leave your stupid equipment, you’d like someone to stand in for you at our wedding, too.”
He stood at the front door, with the pale light of a new morning filtering through the lace curtains that covered the living-room windows. As he scooped up his keys and wallet from the hall credenza, his eyes glittered dangerously. “If these reports are for real, and Jim thinks they are, the grandmother of all hurricanes could reach our shores before Saturday. Instead of decorating the church, Mallory, you may be organizing volunteers to carry evacuees…refugees…to places like it. As I said, I’ll call and keep you posted.” Reaching behind him, he wrenched open the front door.
“Are you telling me to postpone our wedding?” Mallory’s voice faltered.
His face a harsh mask, Connor answered through gritted teeth. “Maybe. I don’t know yet. But our wedding won’t be the only thing disrupted. Houses and businesses will be boarded up to withstand eighty-to one-hundred-mile-an-hour winds. Shipping will be suspended due to massive swells. Even with early warning, boats will probably be lost and air traffic grounded. That’s a worst-case scenario, Mallory. I’ve got to go. So are you handling Liddy Bea’s hospital release? I repeat, it’s entirely possible that this is another false alarm, and I can go get her and take her back to my office. She loves stapling reports and playing computer solitaire.”
Mallory barely had time to croak out her consent, adding that Connor should phone Mandy and ask the secretary to page Mallory, before Connor slammed out of the apartment. He left her with satin pooled around her feet like the train on her wedding dress. A dress she might never get to wear.
Their entire exchange seemed impossibly surreal, especially after the fantastic night they’d spent together. What just happened was a lot like a replay of the argument that resulted in their first breakup.
Crumpling, Mallory sat in the puddle of satin, waiting for the tears burning the backs of her eyes to fall. They didn’t, though. Perhaps she’d shed all her tears over Connor O’Rourke. All she felt was a big, empty hole in the place her heart ought to be.
Minutes ticked by. At last, when it became patently clear that Connor wasn’t going to have second thoughts and come back, she rose with as much dignity as possible and stalked to the bathroom. Mallory went in to shower—to cool off and to prepare the explanation she’d have to give Alec for not staying until the end of the breakfast fund-raiser she’d worked so hard to pull together.
If Connor’s crisis proved to be real…
JAMES KIRKPATRICK GLANCED up from a desk overflowing with computer printouts. “Jeez, Professor O’Rourke, pardon me for saying so, but you look like something that crawled out from under a rock.”
“What do you expect? You jerked me out of bed. I’m not a night owl, James. Tell me, has anything changed since you phoned?”
“The surges appear to travel in waves. Is that good or bad?”
Connor went to stand behind his aide. He peered over James’s shoulder at the dancing graph. “Let me rerun the calculations. From what I can see, the activity doesn’t appear to be increasing. On the other hand, this time there’s some type of deep ocean disturbance from off the coast of Brazil, all the way to Cuba. Why don’t you take a break? Go grab us coffee and muffins or something.” Connor dug a twenty-dollar bill out of his jeans pocket and tossed it on the desk.
“Gosh almighty, I hate to leave if all hell’s gonna break loose.”
Connor managed a smile for the eager young meteorologist. One he really didn’t feel. Yet he wasn’t so old that he didn’t remember his student days. Too often all they dealt with was routine weather; aberrations were welcome. No longer an eager student, Connor would rather the weather stayed balmy and bright.
“You won’t be gone ten minutes, Jim. Even if something is building in the lower Atlantic, the point of my system is early warning. That means we can calculate the direction and magnitude before any of the satellites even register a tropical depression. If this is big, there’ll be a day or two, not merely minutes, to add to your education.”
“I guess so.” The young man snapped up the twenty and headed out.
“By the way, Jim, my daughter’s getting out of the hospital at ten. I’ve set my watch alarm for eight-thirty. If this storm remains steady, I’ll slip out for a bit, check her out and bring her back to the office. Otherwise, if it blows up in our faces, I need to notify Mallory in enough time so she can leave some big do she’s in charge of.”
“Oh. Is Liddy Bea sick again?”
Connor shook his head. “Routine tests. Dr. Dahl says she’s looking so good, he wanted to redo all the blood tests to see if there’s a decrease in her antibodies. An elevated antibody count ruined her opportunity to get a kidney last time.”
“That’s too bad. She’s a sharp little kid. And cute as a bug. I hope these tests show an improvement. She deserves a break. Her mom, too. Oh, and you, Prof.”
“Amen. Only, according to Mallory, perfect kidney matches don’t grow on trees. The list is miles long. Lydia may have missed her chance.”
James went quietly out. But really, Connor thought, what else was there to say? At times, sorry didn’t cut it. Still, at times sorry went a long way. Looking back on his rift with Mallory, he realized he’d acted like an idiot because of his jealousy over Alec Robinson’s attempts to turn her against him. Connor reminded himself that she’d said stuff, too. Still, when he phoned Mallory, he’d have to apologize.
He’d plowed through all the old data and half of the new that rolled in by the time James returned from a nearby coffeehouse. He’d set down two steaming cups of chicory coffee and piping-hot muffins.
“Hey, Prof. You have sort of a frantic look. Something big brewing?”
“Could be.” Grabbing one of the coffees, Connor wrenched off the lid and swore after taking a hot swallow. “Pull up a chair and give me your take on these latest readings. There are chips imbedded in the devices to measure noise levels along the corridor, and they’ve come to life in the last few minutes. They have a high threshold. I think if this doesn’t stop in another half hour, I’m going to start notifying weather stations from here to the West Indies.”
“That’s sticking your neck out, isn’t it? I’m here to tell you the sun is out and there’s not a cloud in the sky. I have a broadband in my car that gives weather reports from Puerto Rico, Haiti and the Bahamas. What I heard is they’ve all got the same conditions. Sun, blue skies, slight breeze. Perfect beach weather.”
“Yeah, well, last year the national weather guys hosted me at a seminar for all the heads of the major weather stations. They’re aware of my system. Most of ’em were pretty interested in the documentation I handed out from my South Pacific research. I think they’ll listen. After all, this baby is breathing down their back door.”
“I see what you mean.” James tried to whistle through his bite of muffin. “All the checkpoints have risen in intensity since I left.” He pulled off two new data sheets. “Wow, take a gander at this jump.”
Connor did a quick survey, set aside his coffee cup and reached for the phone just as his watch alarm sounded. “Damn, I hate asking Mallory to interrupt her work to go after Liddy Bea. But I predict things are going to get crazy for us real soon. Too crazy to bring my daughter here. I’d hate to frighten her.” Connor started dialing Mallory’s secretary.
“Mandy, Connor O’Rourke here. Will you page Mallory at her breakfast and have her call me ASAP? It’s really important that I talk to her. I’ll wait to make sure she gets the message.” Breaking off a cap of the tempting muffin, Connor tucked the receiver between his shoul
der and ear, planning to eat a bite while he waited for Mandy to come back on the line. When she did, he dropped the muffin, spreading crumbs all over his charts. “What do you mean, she left the Lady Lion’s breakfast? Dr. Dahl phoned at eight? What for?”
Straightening, Connor rubbed at a furrow between his brows. “Why would Fredric need her at the hospital ASAP? Dammit, didn’t he say why he wanted you to interrupt her?” Connor stood up and began edging around the desk. “I’m sorry, I’m not yelling at you, Mandy. I’m concerned. If something’s happened to Liddy Bea, I don’t understand why Mallory didn’t notify me.”
He held the phone away from his ear as Mandy’s voice grew hysterical.
“Okay, okay, don’t worry about it. Do me a favor, please. If Mallory checks in with you, tell her to stay put at Forrest Memorial. I’m on my way.” He slammed down the phone and raced toward the door.
“Wait!” James called. “You’re not leaving me with this mess, are you?”
Indecision crossed Connor’s face. Then he blew out a breath and loped back to the desk to snap up his cell phone.
“Write down this number and put me on speed dial. Hand me that list of weather-station numbers. I’ll start phoning directors on my way to the hospital. If for any reason this activity eases up in the next thirty minutes, you and I can split up the list and cancel our warning. I don’t think we’ll have to, though. I promise, Jim, as soon as I find out what’s going on with Liddy Bea, I’ll scoot right back here. I’m afraid things’ll be getting real rough over the next day or so.”
“That’s for sure. Say, you’d better take your java along, Prof. In fact, I think I’ll call my mom and have her bring us a big thermos of coffee.”
“You do that, Jim, and thanks.”
Connor tried calling the pediatric ward as he hurried to his car. The only number he remembered was busy on two tries. Cursing, he backed out of the college parking lot and began phoning the heads of the larger weather stations along the corridor from the Florida Keys to Panama.
The Seven Year Secret Page 24