She extended her arms and turned slowly, to let him take in the full effect of the dress.
“I’d like to stand and look at you, but I’m later than I thought I’d be. I’ll just grab a shower and change. You amuse yourself for a few more minutes.”
“Right,” she said to the empty room, as Bruce disappeared. She heard him pounding up the stairs, then, somewhere a door opened and banged against a wall.
She’d make them a couple of drinks! That would help. Donna pushed open the big sliding doors that separated the living and dining rooms and opened a stained-glass cupboard door. This was where she’d seen Bruce get liquor. Vodka, vermouth. A vodka martini. That would do it. Glasses? Clutching the bottles, she hurried into the kitchen.
When Bruce came clattering down the stairs, she had everything ready. He entered the living room, smoothing his tie.
“Hey, what’s this? We’re running awfully late, sweetie. Have we got time for this?” He crossed the room and took up the short, squarish glass she offered him. He looked down into it, then sniffed it. “What am I looking at?”
“A vodka martini. That’s probably the wrong kind of glass. I couldn’t find any with stems, but it’s exactly the same drink I saw you make one night when you said you needed a lift.”
“True. As I recall, I offered you a carrot-juice-on-the-rocks or something to give you a lift and you said you didn’t need one. That was the understatement of the month.” He took a cautious sip. “Good girl. Perfect. Live well. That’s my motto.” He lifted his glass in a toast. “Here’s to us, kiddo.”
“I’ll drink to that,” she said, taking a tiny sip from her own glass. Boy, would she drink to that! “Bruce, we’ve got a couple of minutes. There’s a little something I wanted to mention to you.” Dammit, she’d said her line wrong.
“Okay, shoot.” He was standing there, his drink poised halfway to his mouth again, waiting. A small silence developed, during which the glass-domed pendulum clock on the mantel ticked loudly. “Well,” Bruce pressed, “mention it. That was a very attention-getting opening remark, but where do we go from there?”
For a full minute Donna simply couldn’t think of a thing to say. Why hadn’t she rehearsed a second line? Oh, stupid, stupid!
“Maybe you’d better sit down for this.” She tried to keep her tone light, but failed. “I have a couple of things to…” She quickly rejected the word “confess.” “…to clarify with you. I want you to know I’ve loved all this running around we’ve done, this digging into my Chinese ancestors’ past. And I’ve really had a grand time. I can’t thank you enough for all the effort and…” Good grief, this sounded like a farewell speech. She swallowed hard.
“Donna. Sometimes you have a problem communicating. Did you know that? Just pause, take a deep breath, and say it.”
Feeling like a robot whose correct button had been pushed, she took a deep breath and started again.
“Bruce, the reason I’m having a problem with this is that I’ve done something I’m not exactly proud of.”
He gave a quick laugh. “Don’t we all?”
“Well, this is something that may upset you a bit, possibly make you…annoyed with me.” She had hastily substituted “annoyed” for “furious.” She would prefer not to think of Bruce as furious. She had paused again.
He gave a gentle sigh. “The minutes are passing. We have a reservation for eight. Just thought I might mention that.”
She smiled a tight little smile. “You see,” she said, scarcely moving her lips and speaking rapidly, “I had a hidden agenda for this summer in San Francisco. And I have the feeling that now is the time to…to…to…get it all out in the open.” Her mouth had gone as dry as paper. She tried licking her lips, but it didn’t help. “I have been completely selfish in my use of Raymond Tsung.” She took another tiny sip of her drink and realized she was clutching the glass tightly.
“Use of Raymond Tsung?”
She sipped again, keeping her face down while she tried to quiet her thoughts. She wasn’t doing this well. He wasn’t going to understand. “Yes,” she said, nodding, still staring down into the glass. “Raymond Tsung…and you, too…in a way.”
“I don’t have any idea what you’re talking about. Donna, look at me.”
The vodka burned her throat. She hated the smell, too. Why hadn’t she made something else?
“Donna?” He sounded exasperated now.
“Oh, Bruce.” She raised her chin, then pushed back her hair. “You aren’t going to like what I’m going to say, at least not all of it. If you think about what I’m telling you, you’ll agree…well…you’ll have to think about it, but you’ll know I did what was best for both of us. It’s just…”
“Donna! Stop this. You’re driving me mad. Spit out whatever you have to say, now.”
He was angry. She’d managed to do what she’d been so afraid of doing; she’d made Bruce angry. “I’ll tell you.” She pulled herself up as tall as she could and met his eyes. “The first thing we have to get straight is Raymond Tsung, I suppose. The way I’ve taken advantage of him.”
“This isn’t making any sense. In what way could you have taken advantage of the man? You haven’t even met him yet.”
“Yes. Right. True. And I don’t want to. There’s no need to. I’d rather just…level with you.” Then, as if uncorked, the words came out in a rush.
“You see, I wanted to make sure I could see you this summer. I mean see you all the time. Constantly. So I chose to tell you about my biological father and I said that I wanted to find him. I don’t want to find him, Bruce, not really. But I had to stay near you, you see? And I thought that was one way to do it.”
He looked utterly blank. Donna plunged on recklessly.
“I never expected you to actually come up with the man. I thought it was a safe way to be near you. I did it because I love you. And I think you’d love me too if you would just stop and think about it a minute. We’ve been together, well, in a manner of speaking, for years and years. I thought if you and I had a summer together, really together, you would…uh…get the message. I love you, really love you. And to make you…uh, aware of me, I used this silly Raymond Tsung idea. I regret that. I apologize for it. I should have been more up-front with you.
“And you love me, Bruce. You’ve proved it in a million ways. For years. Look, we’re both mature adults. I don’t know why I made such a production of telling you this, when it’s really such a simple thing, two people loving each other. I love you and you love me. It’s just as simple as that, isn’t it?” She paused, breathless, waiting for an answer. “Well, isn’t it? Isn’t it, Bruce?”
CHAPTER FIVE
THE GLASS STARTED to slip through Bruce’s fingers. “You’ve got to be…” As his voice trailed off, his incredulous blue eyes darted from her face to the glass, and he adjusted his grip. Donna saw his Adam’s apple move before he looked at her again. Despite his tan, he looked pale. “You’ve got a strange sense of humor, Donna. I don’t think I want this drink.” He set down the glass, then picked it up again when the liquor slopped on the table.
“I’m not joking,” Donna said, disgusted with the tremor she heard in her voice. She’d unnerved him completely, and now she had to help him, settle him down, convince him that what she’d suggested was right for them both. “We have to talk, Bruce.”
He fished an immaculate linen handkerchief from an inside jacket pocket and mopped up the droplets on the polished mahogany. He’s stalling, Donna thought, almost amused. She’d really knocked him off his horse. Good. Now she’d close in for the kill.
She arranged herself on the couch. The turquoise satin of her dress, the long expanse of her tanned leg visible at its slit side, glowed against the ivory damask. “Come here,” she beckoned persuasively. “Sit by me.”
Bruce crumpled the handkerchief and stared at her. The usual warmth in his eyes had turned frosty. “Knock it off, Donna. This act doesn’t suit you. Is that your first drink, or did you get a
head start?”
Donna’s skin stung, first cold then fiery hot. “I’m perfectly sober, Bruce,” she said deliberately, “if that’s what you’re asking. I’m also quite calm, which is more than you appear to be. I’m sorry if I’ve shocked you. But it’s easier for me to be honest about all this because I’m not the one who’s supposed to be safe and sane. Spontaneity’s expected of someone my age…I…” Damn. She shouldn’t have taken that approach. Suggesting that he was the mature one while she was the flake wasn’t the thing to do at all.
His mouth came together in a harsh line, and he yanked his tie loose, then unbuttoned his collar. “All right,” he said slowly. “Let’s take this one point at a time. First, Raymond Tsung. You don’t really expect me to believe you were only pretending to be interested in the man, do you?”
Donna took a long swallow of her drink, and coughed. Making Bruce see things her way wasn’t going to be easy.
“Donna,” he said, with a frightening intensity, “I asked you a question.”
“Hmm, yes.” Donna cleared her throat. “Well, actually, yes, I did pretend.” She held up a hand as he opened his mouth. “Please don’t stop me. I was wrong. It was a dumb approach. Laura warned me that this would happen—that you’d be mad—”
“Laura knows about this?” he exploded. “She knows and she hasn’t told me? God damn it. Wait till I get hold of her.”
He lifted the telephone receiver, and Donna shot from the couch to stop him. “Don’t,” she ordered. “Laura had nothing to do with my decisions. I’m an adult. She knows better than to tell me what to do.”
“In that case, she knows wrong. Someone should have told you before you made fools of both of us.”
Donna eased the phone from his fingers, setting her drink on a coaster at the same time. “What do you mean, made fools of both of us? I may have made myself look foolish with you, until you accept the truth, but that’s all. It was the only way to make you face up to the obvious.”
“The obvious,” he snorted. “It’s all so simple, isn’t it, my little friend? You really take the cake.” He shook his head, muttering, and put his glass down. Still talking indistinctly to himself, he shrugged off his jacket and tossed it, over one of the Victorian chairs by the fireplace.
“Bruce,” Donna said tentatively. She’d kicked off her shoes earlier, and when she stood close to him she had to arch her neck to meet his eyes. “We’ll work everything out, you’ll see. I know this is all a bit of a shock, but you’ll get used to it.”
He rested his chin on his chest and his hair fell forward, catching light from the last shafts of sun coming through the tall windows.
She put a palm on his chest.
“No!” Bruce drew back. “I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but it stops here.”
But she’d felt the thud of his heart, the slight trembling in the solid muscle beneath her fingers. Bruce Fenton wasn’t immune to her. “Could we do what you said, take this one step at a time? I’m sorry I pulled the stunt with Raymond Tsung.” She meant it, truly meant it. “I don’t know what made me do that, except that I was desperate for a way to be with you.”
He laughed bitterly, and turned away to rest his head on his arms atop the fireplace. “And it worked. Jeez, I can’t take this in. What happened, did you and some of your little friends dream up a summer’s entertainment? Let’s make a fool of Bruce Fenton this summer? Something to laugh about in years to come? Hey, Carla, remember when we came up with that number to pull on Bruce?” He rolled his forehead on the backs of his hands. “Well, kiddo, you’ve gone too far.”
Donna sucked her lower lip between her teeth. He still saw her as a kid, one of the group of kids he’d met on his visits to her family in Vancouver.
“This wasn’t anybody’s plot but mine, Bruce. I’m the one who’s been in love with you forever.”
He straightened as if she’d shot him, and stared at her, stricken, in the mirror over the fireplace. “Don’t…don’t say that again. You’re just a child, only nineteen. You don’t know what love is.”
“I’m not a child, and I do know about love,” she responded deliberately. “Fight it, if you like, but you’ll give in in the end.”
“Oh, my God,” Bruce whispered. “This is awful. What the hell would Evan say if he could hear this…and Sara?” He swung around and grabbed her shoulders. “Laura already knows. Does Mark? Donna, so help me, if Mark knows we’ll never hear the end of it. You’ll come to your senses eventually, but Mark will never let any of us forget it.”
Sickness gathered in the pit of her stomach. In her worst nightmares, she’d never imagined Bruce reacting so strongly, so negatively. “Mark doesn’t know. Laura hasn’t told him.”
Bruce seemed to digest this information. Then he brushed past her and strode about the room, pushing back his hair, shoving his hands into his pockets. He dragged his tie all the way off and threw it on top of his jacket.
“All you have to do is forget Raymond Tsung and give yourself time to get used to the idea of having me around all the time,” Donna said, her wavering confidence making her voice crack. “Honestly, Bruce, that’s all—”
“It’s not all,” he snapped. “It’s out of the question. Now, listen to me. Get over here.” He took her elbow and hustled her back to the couch. “Sit there.” She thumped onto the seat. “And listen. Don’t interrupt. Don’t say a word.” His eyes narrowed warningly.
Donna folded her hands in her lap and sat rigidly upright. She regarded him steadily.
He faltered, lifted his hands, then resumed pacing. “I can’t forget Raymond Tsung. It isn’t possible.”
What had Laura said? That he was like a dog with a bone when he was onto something? Donna sighed. “I didn’t expect you to actually find Raymond Tsung,” she said quietly. “My mother and father both tried and failed. I didn’t think anyone would ever find him.”
Bruce turned the full force of a glare on her. “You mean Evan and Sara tried to find Tsung? That’s another little point you failed to mention. Why would you do this to me?”
She studied her hands. “Because I love you.”
“No.” He shook his head. “No, no, no. This is crazy, it isn’t right. You don’t know what you’re talking about. You’ve done what a lot of us do, translated one kind of…of…affection into another. We are still just friends, very special friends, and we always will be, if you don’t insist on pushing for something that can never be.”
“Why can’t it? You’re a mature man. I’m a mature woman. We liked each other the minute we met, and we’ve never stopped liking each other. Now we love each other. Or at least I love you, and you’ll learn to love me. The best love affairs come from friendships. Bruce…” She let the rest of the sentence trail away. He was watching her with deepening concentration, and in his eyes Donna thought she saw a mixture of fascination and…fear? Bruce couldn’t be afraid of her.
“You hit it,” he said slowly. “In all you said, somewhere, you hit it. You said you were mature.”
“I am.”
“Yes. Well, Donna. In that case you’re ready to face up to what you’ve done and accept the consequences, aren’t you?”
Her scalp prickled. “Absolutely.”
“Good.” Bruce sat beside her and turned sideways, so that he could look closely into her face. “Listen carefully. I’ve already contacted Raymond Tsung in Hong Kong—”
“But—”
“Listen. I have an appointment to see him when he returns to San Francisco. I contacted his secretary and made an appointment.”
Donna rubbed her moist palms together. “Cancel. You didn’t say what you wanted to see him about. Just call and cancel.”
“I can’t.” He lifted her wrist, then dropped it as if it burned him. “Raymond Tsung is an important man. You don’t just call up his office and say you want to come in for a chat. You have to make it sound imperative that you see him—life and death, understand? I gave Fenton and Hunt’s name. I made it sound
like this was the most important meeting the man was likely to have—ever. I really rubbed it in, Donna. For you, dammit. And now you’re going to hold up your end.”
“I can’t,” she whispered, sagging. “I absolutely can’t, Bruce. I don’t want to see him, even if he does want to see me. I’ve really done it, haven’t I?” She ran a finger over her mouth.
Bruce turned his head away. Donna lifted her hand letting it hover inches from his shoulder, and her resolve crumbled. She just wanted to be with him. She leaned against him, pressing her cheek into his chest.
He was suddenly very still. “Please sit up, Donna. I’ve got a few things to say, and I want to make sure that you’re listening.”
She didn’t move. He couldn’t be this hard, he couldn’t.
Bruce gently gripped her upper arms and pushed her away. He brushed her hair back from her face, and for an instant she thought she saw a softening in his eyes, but he patted her cheek awkwardly and leaned forward, resting his forearms on his knees.
“You say you’re mature, Donna. Now you’re going to have to prove it. The first step is for you to face up to how stupid this little game of yours is.”
“Bruce—”
“Stupid, Donna. It is stupid. I’m twelve years older than you and divorced, and not looking for any kind of commitment. And if I were, I wouldn’t be with the daughter—the nineteen-year-old daughter—of some very old and dear friends.”
“You don’t like me?”
He shook his head. “Of course I like you. Don’t interrupt. And don’t listen selectively. Right now, we’re going to deal with the immediate mess you’ve gotten us into and try to forget the ridiculous suggestions you’ve made.”
Donna felt the first stirrings of anger.
“You asked me to find Raymond Tsung and I did,” Bruce continued. “I’ve made arrangements to see him, and I’ll keep my appointment when the time comes. And if he says he’d like to see you, you’ll see him, Donna. Got it?”
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