Golden Vows

by Karen Toller Whittenburg

  Embarrassed by the compliment, Amanda swept him a curtsy. “Thank you, kind sir,” she quipped. “And may I say that you look rather handsome tonight yourself.”

  He bowed to acknowledge her tribute and then stepped closer, leaning toward her as if he were about to share a secret. “Is there a good reason why two such attractive people are hiding on the terrace?”

  Amanda relaxed a little, her senses tingling with the deliciously familiar scent of his cologne. “Of course,” she answered in a whisper. “Imagine what people would say if we were seen together.”

  “Ah, too much beauty in one place might overwhelm them, is that it?”

  His breath was a warm caress against her cheek and it occurred to her that if she turned her head just a fraction, their lips would touch, cling, burn with a kiss. She made a low sound that resembled a breathy laugh. “Wrong crowd. We’d barely merit a glance in this group.”

  “Wishful thinking, Amanda.” He moved away from her and leaned against the brick planter that bordered the terrace. “No man in his right mind could take his eyes off of you tonight.”

  Except you, she thought as she watched him with a vague hunger. But she couldn’t decide whether it was a true physical yearning or just a need to have an ally in this uncharted territory of solitude.

  “I still like you, Amanda.” His voice called her nearer and her body instantly took a step toward him...and then another. “I feel a little guilty admitting that. For some reason, I get the idea that we’re supposed to glare at each other from opposite corners of the room.”

  “I know what you mean,” she said, relieved somehow that he was ill at ease with the situation too. “But I don’t want to glare at you and they can’t make me feel guilty about it.”

  “The omnipresent they.” With a sly arch of his brow he turned his gaze to her. “Do you think they are out to get us, Amanda?”

  “Yes,” she whispered with a solemn nod. “It’s a plot to fix us up with blind dates.”

  “A fate worse than Chinese torture,” he agreed gravely. “Do you think we stand a chance of escape?”

  “Well, I intend to develop a burning interest in black cats, the number thirteen, and assorted other superstitions.” She smiled at his puzzled expression. “Don’t ask. Just keep it in mind in case Terri Henderson ever invites you to meet her sister.”

  “Cousin,” Dane corrected. “She doesn’t have a sister.”

  Amanda had difficulty controlling the surprised tilt of her lips. “You mean she’s already….”

  “Tried to fix me up?” He rubbed his chin in an oddly embarrassed gesture. “Yes, and I’m afraid I wasn’t very polite in refusing either. Come to think of it, Terri has been sort of cool toward me since then.” His eyes brightened with a tinge of devilry. “I told her I couldn’t meet her cousin because I had to stay home and finish reading a particularly boring book.”

  “Dane!” Amanda released his name on an amused breath, glad, very glad, that he had ungraciously declined Terri’s invitation. It was such a small, insignificant thing to please her so, but she couldn’t deny that it did. And she couldn’t deny the longing to reach out to him, but she made her fingers reach out to stroke a leaf in the planter box instead. “What book?” she asked.

  “How to Build Birdhouses for Fun and Profit.” His hand closed over hers and stilled her fidgety movements. “Did you think I would lie just to get out of a blind date?” The amusement faded from his voice as with his other hand he cupped her chin and pulled her gaze back to him. His eyes, serious and searching, questioned her. “What are we doing, Amanda? Tell me what in the hell we’re doing?”

  She didn’t pretend to misunderstand. “We’re making the best of a difficult situation. It’s hard to adjust to the idea of ... divorce. Terri and Meg and Jerry—well, they’re just trying to help.”

  “But no one can help, Amanda. No one except you. That’s the irony of it. I like being with you. I want to be with you, but I’m not supposed to want that anymore. We’ve been to dozens of parties together, and all of a sudden I’m supposed to pretend I like coming alone?”

  “I understand how you feel.” She knew it was inadequate and trite, but he had caught her unprepared and she didn’t know how to respond. “If it helps, I feel the same way.”

  “Do you? Do you really, Amanda?” The pressure on her chin increased with the intensity of his voice. “I don’t believe you understand anything at all.”

  Staring into the shadowy demands of his dark eyes, doubt swelled in her chest and she thought he might be right. What did she understand? How did she feel? Really?

  “I understand loneliness,” she said slowly, trying to find an answer for him and for herself. “And I feel out of place here. I’d like to pretend that nothing has changed, that you and I are the same couple who used to belong with this group of people, Dane, but I can’t. I don’t even understand why I want to.”

  The brush of his knuckles along her cheek was a rough velvet caress, and he encouraged her to say more by the soothing stroke of his fingers in her hair. Amanda recognized the need to talk and a part of her wanted to share her thoughts, her feelings, with him, but she was reluctant to lower the walls of defense.

  The closeness she felt could be an illusion manufactured by the events of the evening and the misleading softness of the moonlight. And even if it were real, what would it accomplish? She could tell him everything that was in her heart at this moment and it still wouldn’t change the past. No words would ever take away the empty emotion she had locked inside her, the grief that Dane could never share. That, at least, she did understand, even if he didn’t.

  His uneven sigh held traces of impatience and resignation as he placed his hand at her nape and pressed her head against his shoulder. “Stop fighting me, Amanda," he murmured half to himself, and she wondered if he realized he had breathed the words aloud.

  Her body complied with his request and relaxed into his warmth. She didn’t want to fight him. Maybe it would be easier for both of them if she could, but she lacked the ability to direct any bitterness or anger toward Dane. He was still too much a part of her for that.

  “We can’t go back.” Amanda whispered the warning to remind herself of the reality that existed outside his embrace. “We can’t change what’s happened.”

  He tightened his hold on her and then drew away to look down at her. “I just want to be with you now, Amanda. Is that too much to ask?”

  It was, but she knew she was about to tell him it wasn’t. Closing her eyes, she willed a lightness back to her voice and a smile to her lips. “What would you say to a walk along Baltimore’s inner harbor and then, maybe, an early breakfast someplace downtown?”

  The shadows were slow to leave his eyes, but at last Amanda saw the dawn of a smile. “Well, I intended to go home and read Birdhouses and the Men Who Love Them, but if you’re going to buy my breakfast....”

  “Did I say that?” Amanda feigned a frown and thought that now was the time to step out of his arms. But she didn’t. “This is strictly Dutch treat, take it or leave it.”

  His hands clasped at her hips and pulled her closer, stealing her opportunity to step away. “Would I be pushing my luck if I kissed you? No, don’t answer that, because it doesn’t make any difference.”

  Her breath fluttered wildly in her throat and her gaze dropped compulsively to his mouth. This was asking too much, she decided firmly, and yet her lips parted with anticipation, waiting like a thirsty flower for a morning rain.

  But he seemed in no hurry to erase the distance that separated them. Instead, his eyes lingered on her face, their message bringing a soft heat to her cheeks.

  Amanda wondered at the blush, wondered why she stood shy and acquiescent in his arms, wondered, too, why she had run madly from the mere mention of a blind date only to walk willingly into this far more threatening situation.

  She was insane to allow this and insane not to allow it. The hummingbird rhythm of her heartbeat made a paradox of her
thoughts. And then her breathing, her heart, her rational thoughts, stopped at the zephyr-soft meeting of their lips. It was a gentle kiss, reminiscent of other September nights under a sea of stars, and it graced her mouth for a moment as transient as the memory.

  When Dane raised his head and released her, Amanda knew she was well and truly captured. Had he kissed her with passion or demanded a response, she knew she would have withdrawn at once. But he’d entrapped her with her own longing to be with someone who understood how very alone she had been tonight... until he had come to her rescue. Dane. She clung to his name and all the things it represented as she pushed aside any lingering doubts.

  With a self-conscious movement she brushed at her hair and liberated a shaky laugh from her throat. “Do we make our escape one at a time?”

  “No, too risky,” he answered in a slightly husky voice. “I’m a little suspicious of them, you know. We’ve been out here for quite a while. No telling what they’ve been doing in our absence.”

  Amanda’s eyes widened with the sudden realization that she and Dane were probably accountable for at least a portion of the conversational hum inside the room. “What do you suppose they’re saying?”

  “Nothing of any consequence.” He shrugged with deliberate nonchalance. “Besides, whatever it is will pale in comparison to what they’ll think when we walk out the door together.”

  A tiny thrill ran through her. Together. If only for a little while, she could be with Dane. To hell with what anyone might think. Her lips curved. “Lead the way,” she commanded boldly and then added a hopeful thought. “You know, there’s always a possibility that no one will notice.”

  His only answer was a slow grin as he took her hand and started for the door.

  Chapter Seven

  Anyone who had failed to notice the Maxwells’ astonishingly casual departure was either blind, deaf, or had not been in earshot of Meg. At least that was what Jerry told Dane who, in turn, repeated it to Amanda a few days later.

  Meg, of course, had been more subtle when she’d phoned Amanda the day after the reception. “You left the party so early that I had to call and make sure you were feeling all right.”

  Amanda had said she felt just fine, that on the whole she’d thought the evening a little on the dull side. Then she’d asked with pseudo-innocence if anything exciting had happened after she left.

  Meg took that as an open invitation to demand, more to the point, what exciting things had happened to Amanda after she left. Trying to avoid an answer had been futile and she’d finally given in to Meg’s persistence. Yes, she and Dane had left the party together. Yes, they had spent the night together…walking—yes, just walking along the inner harbor. Yes, they had talked about a lot of things. Yes, yes, yes. And no. No, nothing had changed. Nothing.

  It was the truth and, yet, it wasn’t. Amanda recognized that each time she said it, each time she thought it. It was a tiny, inconspicuous, and totally necessary lie.

  But still, it was a lie. Wasn’t it?

  * * * *

  Amanda juggled the opposing thoughts for a full month after the night in Baltimore. What she had told Meg was undeniably true. She and Dane had spent hours walking, talking about nothing in particular. They had eaten breakfast in a small, ail-night restaurant and afterward they had walked to where her car was parked. They had said good night, laughed together, and then traded the good night for good morning. He had smiled, told her to be careful. She had smiled, said thank you, and had driven home in the first light of dawn—alone. It had been a pleasant evening. An evening she might have enjoyed with anyone. But that’s what was a lie. She had enjoyed it with Dane.

  Nothing had changed.

  The truth.

  A lie.

  Something had changed in the past month. She knew it when Dane phoned to tell her of the stir their departure from the reception had created. She knew it when he called again the next day to ask her—what? Whatever he’d called to ask was buried under an exchange of light, bantering conversation. She knew it when he appeared unexpectedly to check the nearby boat dock for needed repairs and, for some reason, ended up staying for lunch. She knew it on the day she discovered him waiting for her after work.

  I just happened to be in town, he’d said. How about dinner? She had smiled, pretending to herself that it was a simple coincidence. I'd like that, she had answered, knowing her casual acceptance was deceiving neither of them.

  She had made a wonderful try at reasoning away all the coincidences, the phone calls, the unlooked for, but not unexpected meetings, the idea that she was the object of a subtle and strategic courtship. It was almost too easy to think of excuses—loneliness, force of habit, any port in a storm, a problem of adjustment. But slowly the truth, like a light through a prism, shone clear and pierced the security of her logic.

  Dane didn’t want the divorce.

  It was in his eyes when he looked at her, in his voice when he spoke, in his silence that told her heart what she wouldn’t hear. He wanted her back. Amanda knew it as well as she knew him. The knowledge filled her with a kaleidoscope of frightening emotions and trembling possibilities. What did she want? And what could she realistically hope to have?

  Nothing had changed. That was the truth that evaded her, the lie that wouldn’t fit into her careful rationale.

  She had been positive when she left Dane that she had chosen the only possible course of action. She had been certain that he, too, wanted to end the nightmare their marriage had become. And she had been sure, deadly sure, that he no longer loved her. How could she have been so wrong?

  Amanda resisted the idea. She had chosen to do what she perceived as being right and the decision had cost her dearly. It was impossible to simply accept that she had been mistaken.

  And yet the evidence was there in the tilt of his smile.

  The divorce hearing was still pending, but postponed by a dozen delays. First there had been a delay of several weeks while waivers and interrogatories were filed and answered. It had taken even more time to receive the inventory list from Dane. Then the court date had to be postponed once and then again because Jerry had other legal commitments.

  Amanda wondered if the seemingly trivial delays had been devised by Jerry at Dane’s request. It seemed increasingly possible. Dane was slowly, deliberately, maneuvering her toward reconciliation. She was aware of it and made no move to stop him. Torn by the conflict of what had once been and what now was, Amanda didn’t know what to do.

  She couldn’t go back. Too many hurts lay behind them. She was afraid to go forward. Too many uncertainties lay ahead. And still, she could not bring herself to say the words that would put a final and unalterable period to her past. Nothing had changed and yet, one small maybe — however cramped for space — took root in her heart.

  It grew into a fledgling hope on the day Dane persuaded her to come sailing with him. It was a perfect day of crimson gold in a world of blue; the weather was crisp with the nip of approaching winter. They anchored in a small cove and ate their picnic in the late afternoon sunlight.

  Relaxing on deck, Amanda savored the feel of autumn and the murmur of lapping water. The boat swayed, settled, swayed again, bringing a contented curve to lips that had known little else all day. A beautiful, perfect, unforgettable day. Her arms stretched up and up, pulling her Windbreaker taut across her breasts. Her head tilted back to face the sky. A bank of clouds scalloped the setting sun, jockeying for position along the horizon. It would storm tonight, Amanda thought, and sniffed the air for a promise of rain.

  A dozen scents were carried on the breeze, but if rain was one of them, she didn’t recognize it. How could she, when she inhaled the lazily sensuous fragrance that was so intricately Dane? Slowly her eyes sought him. Slowly her arms lowered. Helplessly she loved him across the red-checked distance of the tablecloth between them.

  He was stretched full-length on the deck, hands behind his head, eyes closed, lips barely parted. His chest rose and fell with
deep precision beneath the loose contours of his Windbreaker. His penchant for bare chest and cutoffs had given way to the October chill that necessitated jeans and a light jacket.

  She watched him for a long time, absorbing the comfortable quiet between them. It was nice to feel so at ease, so at peace with herself and with him. He had been a wonderful companion all day, and pleasant memories of other sails across the bay surrounded her with familiar feelings. It was easy, here on the boat where they had loved so many times, to forget the boundaries that fate had drawn. She knew she shouldn’t forget and yet, she wanted very much to remember the way she had felt about him then.

  I love you.

  The words were a thick, pulsing ache inside her. So many memories were wrapped in those simple words. How many times had she said them? Amanda wondered. Fifty? A thousand times fifty? How easily they had once tumbled from her tongue.

  I love you.

  She had whispered them to him in the still of night, called them above the wind, teased him with them, drowned in the sweet mystery of saying them. I love you. I love you. Would she ever feel free to say them again?

  Amanda tugged at the comb that held her hair. Deftly she pulled it loose and felt the slight breeze catch and tangle in the dark shoulder-length strands. She wished her hair were long enough to blow across her face and veil the image of the hard, male body that, even at rest, seduced her thoughts.

  It had been a very long time since she had made love with him. Why did she feel this traitorous desire now? Now, when to touch him in even the most innocent way would demand questions, explanations, emotions that she wasn’t ready to handle. Perhaps she would never be ready.

  The thought closed around her like a damp morning fog, bringing with it a misty pain. Her gaze pulled away from him, went to the clouded sky, moved relentlessly back to his still form. One year ago....

  The memory came swiftly, like a warning flash of lightning before the sharp clap of thunder. No. Oh, God, no. She didn’t want to remember. Not now. Not here.