Wonder and Wild Desire

by Jeanne Stephens

  Carrie stammered, "I—I'd better change Mike's diaper."

  "I already did." Josh glanced up at her and laughed shortly. "Don't look so shocked. It's not all that difficult."

  She walked across the bedroom to sit in the velvet-padded dressing-table chair. "It's just that I can't picture you doing—that."

  His tawny brows rose sardonically. "No? I'm finding that I have a strong inclination toward fatherhood. Speaking of that, I talked to my attorney yesterday about the adoption. He's going to draw up the papers. He'll let us know when we can go down to the judge's office and sign them."

  "We? Why do I have to sign anything?"

  "He found no record that you had ever legally adopted Mike."

  Carrie was astonished. "Why, I didn't. I just assumed it wasn't necessary. Meg asked me to raise him."

  He shrugged. "In all likelihood, no problems would have arisen if I hadn't learned about Mike's parentage."

  "You needn't remind me of that!"

  "Now it seems wise," he went on levelly, as if she hadn't spoken, "for both of us, as husband and wife, to go through all the legal formalities of adoption. Then there won't be any unexpected problems later."

  "I see," Carrie responded, pressing her lips together. She didn't like being reminded that her problems had increased tremendously after Josh had learned about Mike. On the other hand, she did want to be Mike's legal mother, even if she had to accept Josh as his father into the bargain.

  She changed the subject. "Your mother wasn't very happy with you for being so late last night."

  He gave her a glacial look. "I'm sure I'll hear all about it when I stop by her apartment later. I don't care to be taken to task by my wife as well."

  Carrie stiffened. "Far be it from me to criticize how you spend your time! I couldn't care less, actually. I do hope, for your mother's sake, you will be here for the dinner party she is planning for Saturday evening."

  "Oh, no!" He reached out to retrieve Mike's stuffed bear, absentmindedly handing it back to the baby. "Must we be subjected to that so soon? Why didn't you veto the idea?"

  "I don't look forward to it any more than you do," Carrie said fervently, "but I'd no intention of hurting your mother's feelings. She wants to introduce me to your friends. How could I explain that I don't care to meet your friends—unless I tell her the truth about this so-called marriage?"

  Unwilling to meet his cynical gaze, she turned toward the dressing-table mirror and, picking up a brush, began giving her dark hair a second, unnecessary brushing. In the mirror, she saw Josh setting Mike down on the carpet with his bear. He strode across the room and stood behind her, meeting her look in the mirror.

  "You won't tell Mother anything about our relationship."

  Carrie laid the hairbrush down slowly. "I'm to play the loving wife Saturday night, is that it?"

  "Exactly," he sneered. "It is to be hoped that you can pull it off. The role is so contrary to your true attitude."

  "No more than your role as a considerate husband differs from the real Josh Revell," she retorted.

  The gold-flecked eyes widened slightly and stared at her in the mirror. Abruptly, his hand came to rest at the back of her neck, entangled in her hair. The heat from his fingers penetrated through the sensitive skin of her nape, and when he began a slow massaging motion, she stiffened, wanting to fling his hand away and run from the room. But that would gain her nothing, and she knew it. Mike would be frightened—and, besides, Josh would come after her and, she greatly feared, do something even worse.

  "I'd like you to look your best Saturday evening," he said quietly. "If you want to buy something new to wear, I have accounts at most of the stores in town. It isn't Boise, but there are a couple of good women's shops."

  "No, thank you," she said, her breath catching a little as his hand continued the sensuous caressing movements on her nape. "Your friends will have to take me as I am—or leave me."

  His honey-tipped lashes moved closer together as his eyes narrowed. "It's likely that the women will dress semiformally."

  Carrie bit her lip, stifling a mad impulse to moan and push back against the seductive fingers. "I—I have a long skirt that will go nicely with the blouse I wore with my wedding suit."

  "I am sure you will look lovely," he murmured.

  For a long moment their mirrored gazes locked, and his fingers stilled. Then, almost as if he had just become aware of what he was doing, he snatched his hand away. "Incidentally, your new car should arrive today. I picked it out yesterday morning."

  Yesterday morning? But he had said he was buried in work all day yesterday. How odd that he had taken the time to find a car for her.

  "There weren't a great many to choose from in town," he continued, "but I thought you'd prefer having a car right away to waiting months for a special order. If you don't approve of my choice, of course, we will return it."

  "No," she stammered. "I'm sure it will be fine."

  "Good." He tore his gaze from hers and walked toward his own suite, leaving Carrie feeling strangely as weak as if she'd just finished a stint of strenuous physical exercise.

  The car, a red Corvette, arrived just after she had put Mike down for his afternoon nap. Its sleek lines were pleasing to the eye, and Carrie had to admit that she couldn't have chosen anything better suited to her tastes herself. What a maddeningly surprising man Joshua Revell was!

  She experienced a feeling of excitement as she looked the car over, and she wanted to take it for a spin immediately. After telling Ethel that she was going to drive into town and getting Betty's promise to look in on Mike, she got into the car. After a few moments spent discovering what all the knobs controlled, she drove slowly down the curving drive and through the estate gates, picking up speed as she approached the small lumber town.

  As she descended the slope of the mountain the town was spread out below her, lying along the eastern boundary of the Snake River, the state of Washington on the opposite bank. The area had an interesting history. It was the ancestral home of the Nez Perce Indians and later the location of a large gold strike in the 1860s. In former times, the only visitors to the vast wilderness area had been the legendary mountain men. Probably because the new car was making her feel fanciful, Carrie told herself the mountain men's major characteristics of independence, strength, and a belief in self-rule had been passed down through the families who had lived in the area since that earlier time. This tradition was manifested in men like Joshua Revell.

  Mountains rose to the east of the town, with some high prairie areas to the north and south. Carrie drove slowly through the periphery of the residential area until she found the business district. Turning into one of the main streets, she parked near a block of shops and got out, pulling the wool coat up closely under her chin against the brisk wind. As she wandered through several of the shops she couldn't help noticing that workers and shoppers alike eyed her curiously. The town was obviously small enough so that she was identified as a stranger. When the man behind the counter at the drugstore where she had a cup of coffee asked if she was a tourist, she satisfied his curiosity by introducing herself. It was clear, from his reaction, that her husband was greatly admired in the town. That was understandable, since the Revell Corporation was the community's largest employer.

  A few minutes later she received a friendly welcome from the owner of a small craft shop, a blond woman in her early thirties named Julia Freemont.

  "I've been dying to meet you, Carrie," exclaimed Julia as she pumped Carrie's hand vigorously. "We all have, ever since word got around that Josh was married again. He's well thought of around here, as you've probably already discovered."

  Carrie smiled, enjoying the woman's open warmth.

  After a few other preliminaries, Julia said baldly, "I want to be the first to capture you for the holiday bazaar. Ethel's probably mentioned it to you."

  "As a matter of fact, she has," Carrie admitted.

  "I'm in charge of a bakery booth, and I'm still
in the process of lining up volunteer help. May I put you down for, an afternoon or two? Say, the Friday or Saturday before Thanksgiving? It's expected of a Revell, you know."

  Julia Freemont seemed to take it for granted that, as Josh's wife, Carrie would want to help. She found that she couldn't say no to this cheerful, gregarious woman, and before she had left the shop she had promised not only to work in the bakery booth but also to contribute some of her own baked goods for sale.

  More than an hour later, as she drove back toward the Revell estate, Carrie reflected with some surprise upon the way she had been accepted by the townspeople she had met. They, like Ethel, seemed to feel a wife was just what Josh had been needing to make his life complete. And, of course, since she was young and attractive, no one doubted that the marriage was a love match.

  However, Carrie thought wryly as she turned the car between the stone pillars again, it remained to be seen if that opinion held after the dinner party on Saturday.

  Chapter Five

  Carrie studied herself in the mirror. She wore a floor-length chocolate velveteen skirt with the new ivory silk blouse. She'd left the first few buttons of the blouse undone to reveal a single strand of tiny pearls, her only piece of real jewelry except for her wedding ring, and she'd pinned an ivory velvet rose trailing long velvet ribbons to the skirt's wide waistband. Her dark brown hair was brushed back from a center part in loose waves, falling to her shoulders in a casual cascade of upcurling strands. She'd applied mascara, eye shadow, blusher, and a wet-look lip gloss, more makeup than she ordinarily used. Despite that, she looked curiously young and vulnerable.

  There was a sharp knock. Calling, "Come in," she turned as Gracie Helmstrom thrust her head around the door.

  "Mr. Josh wants you to come down now. The guests have arrived."

  Carrie smiled at the freckle-faced girl. "Do I look all right?"

  Gracie ran her eyes over Carrie and said earnestly, "You look beautiful!"

  "Thank you, Gracie." Carrie laughed. "It's nice to know that at least one person in the house approves of my appearance."

  "Oh, it isn't only me," said Gracie frankly. "I've seen the way Mr. Josh looks at you, as if he'd like to grab you and kiss you in front of everybody."

  Or shake me, thought Carrie, biting her lip. She picked up an atomizer from her dressing table and sprayed a mist of perfume on her wrists. She wondered how much the servants suspected about her true relationship with Josh. They had to know they didn't share the same bed. She had even found herself remarking to Betty once that Mike was often restless at night and she didn't want Josh to be disturbed, and she had hated herself for feeling called upon to offer any sort of explanation.

  "Is Mike behaving himself?" she asked the girl.

  "He's being a little doll," Gracie assured her. "Aunt Betty's already fed him and put him in his playpen in the kitchen. Uncle Adam's playing with him now." The way the Carneys had taken to the baby, Carrie knew she needn't worry about him.

  She turned away from the dressing table and, leaving the bedroom, went slowly along the carpeted hallway and down the wide stairs, lifting her skirt slightly as she descended.

  Josh, wearing a dove-gray casual suit with an open-collared black silk shirt, was standing at the foot of the stairs, gazing up into the shadows, a glass in his hand. He stared at her as she reached the foyer.

  "Come, I want to introduce you to our guests," he said abruptly, his eyes going over her coolly, and she could not guess what he thought of her appearance.

  He took her arm and led her into the formal living room, where all talk ceased at their entrance. Carrie fixed a smile on her face and went forward to meet the Revells' friends.

  Loren McCloy was middle-aged, a little above medium height, with light brown hair and eyes. In his well-tailored heather-green suit he looked the part of a successful businessman, and he spoke quietly. His wife, Christine, could not have been more of a contrast to her husband. Short, plump, with tightly curling auburn hair, she spoke quickly, almost breathlessly. Within two minutes of being introduced to her Carrie knew the names and ages of her three children and how they were doing in school.

  The more elderly couple, Dr. Robert Marlow and his wife, Jane, could almost have been twins. The doctor was portly and swarthy-skinned and had an impressive head of thick white hair. Jane, his wife, was a large woman with white hair that had been treated with blue rinse the same shade as her floor-length polyester skirt and jacket. She had a remarkably unlined face for a woman in her sixties. Both the Marlows had bright blue eyes and long noses. It soon became clear that Jane was the retiring sort, allowing her husband to do most of the talking for both of them.

  The person Carrie had most dreaded seeing, of course, was Jessica Thorpe. Her first sight of Jessica, wearing a tight black crepe gown split to the knee in front and astonishing large diamond earrings in her well-shaped ears, did nothing to bolster Carrie's confidence. Jessica's black hair was pulled back smoothly in an intricate French roll fastened with several small diamond clips. She was standing at one end of the living room, champagne glass in hand, talking to a tall, extremely slender man in his early thirties. The man had dark hair and eyes and well-shaped features that, taken together, still managed somehow to be rather ordinary looking. He had a warm smile, however, that made Carrie feel a little more at ease as Josh introduced the man as Kevin Hamilton.

  The introductions made, Josh asked abruptly, "Would you like a drink?"

  "A sherry, please," she said as she turned to answer Kevin Hamilton's question about her nephew.

  Josh fetched her the sherry and she sipped it gratefully, clasping hands that had suddenly become damp around the coolness of the crystal glass. She was conscious of a feeling of disappointment and in that same instant realized that she had been childishly hoping Josh would comment favorably on her appearance. Now, standing near the elegantly turned-out Jessica, she was sure she was dressed too simply.

  The living room was a vast expanse of off-white carpeting and walls broken by several excellent original oil landscapes. The furnishings were in muted shades of blue and green, lit by a magnificent crystal chandelier and several lamps. In the dining room, a large table was spread with white linen and set with a low centerpiece of deep rust and amber carnations. China, silver, and crystal gleamed under the flickering light.

  Josh had caught the direction of her look and was gazing at her with a questioning lift of his brows. "The table looks lovely," she murmured.

  "Mother is a renowned hostess." His smile was slightly twisted. "You must learn from her, for you will be taking over those duties soon."

  She wanted to reply sarcastically, "My role keeps expanding." Instead, she heard herself saying in an uncharacteristically prim voice, "There's so much I don't know."

  "True." The gold-flecked eyes were mockingly alight, as if it amused him that she was purposely avoiding controversy with him. "But you are young, and there is plenty of time."

  Noticing that Jessica had drifted across the room to speak with Ethel, she turned away from her husband to the tall, dark-haired man. "Kevin," she said brightly, "I understand you manage the plywood plant. I'm afraid I know very little about the lumber business, but I would like to learn. Perhaps you would show me the plant sometime."

  "Certainly." He darted a look at Josh. "But I'm sure Josh would be happy to educate you in the family business."

  Josh sipped his drink, his only response a slight tilt of his head. Carrie said, "I don't think my husband has the time or the inclination to play tour guide."

  "Kevin doesn't while away his days in idleness either, my dear," said Josh quietly.

  "I can always take time for the boss's wife," Kevin responded gallantly.

  Josh abruptly detached himself from them and moved to set his empty glass on a convenient side table. Carrie sensed a kind of simmering anger in his withdrawal, but she had no idea what could have inspired it. Perhaps he resented her showing an interest in the family business, more proof that
his interest in her, if it existed at all, was purely physical. He merely wanted a warm body on nights when Jessica was otherwise occupied. Once he realized he could not seduce her, she wondered, how long would it be before he decided a divorce was in order? At the moment she was little more than an irritation because she was thwarting his will. But he wasn't a patient man, and she couldn't believe he would accept the status quo indefinitely.

  She continued to chat with Kevin and was glad when Ethel announced it was time to go in to dinner. Kevin followed her to the table and took the chair to her right, with the McCloys on her left. Ethel sat at the head of the table, with Josh and Jessica to her right and the Marlows across from the McCloys.

  Betty served the first course, vichyssoise, flushing as Josh complimented her on its flavor. She had every right to feel gratified, Carrie thought, as she spooned up some of the thick cold liquid redolent of herbs. It was delicious and she felt it calming her tense nerves.

  Across from her, Josh bent his head to hear something Jessica murmured. For no reason, Carrie found herself remembering that recent morning when he had stood behind her at her dressing table, his fingers moving at her nape.

  Whenever Josh spoke, the others at the table leaned toward him to listen respectfully, as if they were drawn to the power that emanated from him. Was she any different from the others? Carrie wondered. More than once she had been drawn, too. But the magnetic attraction for her was something instinctive and primitive, something she did not understand and, moreover, feared.

  Abstractedly, she heard Ethel's voice asking her kindly if she had finished her vichyssoise and realized, her face flushing, that Betty was standing beside her waiting to take her half-empty soup cup.