Keast, Karen

by The Surprise of His Life

  Twenty minutes later, concerned despite the positive rhetoric he'd spouted for Lindsey's sake, Walker drove by the apartment Dean had rented after moving out of his house. Walker was on the verge of pulling into the driveway when the front door of the apartment opened. A redhead, a smiling, hair-tousled redhead, stepped— bounded—onto the small porch. Dean stepped onto the porch, as well. As though reluctant to part with her, he pulled her back into his arms. The only thing that Walker's brain would register was that he wished he hadn't promised Lindsey that her father was fine. Not that, in a technical sense, Dean wasn't fine. In fact, he was a little too fine.

  Even as Walker discreetly watched, Dean lowered his head and planted a kiss, a thorough kiss, to the woman's lips. The woman leaned into Dean, unabashedly pressing her svelte body to his. Dean slipped an arm about her waist and hauled her even closer. Walker felt sick—sick at heart. He, likewise, understood, and never more fully, the reputed blissfulness of ignorance. God, how he wished he hadn't seen what he just did! That acknowledged, he admitted that he couldn't say he was surprised. He'd had a nagging suspicion that he just couldn't shake. However much he longed to believe that his friend wasn't capable of such duplicity, the truth remained that an affair was an important component of a mid-life crisis.

  And there was no doubt about it, Dean Ellison was square in the middle of a mid-life crisis! He'd also unwittingly put his friend square in the middle of a moral dilemma. Walker owed allegiance to all three parties involved—Bunny, Dean and Lindsey. Lindsey. God, she'd be crushed if she knew that her father was seeing another woman!

  Pulling around the corner, Walker watched and waited, hating what he was seeing, yet captivated by it. In minutes, the woman walked to her car, got in and pulled from the drive. She turned at the corner, and Walker leaned forward as though retrieving something from the glove compartment. He looked up just as she was passing by... and got the shock of his life. Up close, the woman became nothing more than a child. She couldn't even be as old as Lindsey. Dean was having an affair with a woman, a child, younger than his daughter!

  Walker drove home with his thoughts alternately clouded by gray confusion and a red blaze of anger. What should he do? Should he tell Bunny, tell Lindsey? Should he confront Dean? The truth was that he felt like punching Dean out for putting him in this hotter-than-hot spot. Which, in and of itself, was upsetting. He could never remember wanting to punch out his best friend.

  Once home, Walker showered, went through the motions of eating, then called Lindsey. He had no idea what he was going to say until he heard himself saying it. Her father was fine, he told her. He'd had an errand to run just as he'd suspected. Hanging up the phone, Walker cursed at the out-and-out lie. He felt betrayed by Dean. Furthermore, even though he'd decided that there was no way he could tell Lindsey about her father's affair, he felt as though he were betraying her. He wasn't certain which was worse: being betrayed or being the betrayer.

  That night he slept restlessly and, when he did manage to drop off to sleep, he had wild and disturbing dreams. He dreamed that he and Dean were fighting it out, crude fisticuffs that bloodied noses and bruised knuckles. Interestingly, Dean's punches to him didn't elicit pain. It was only those he landed to Dean that caused him to writhe in physical agony. The blood was crimson and reminded Walker of flame-red hair... the flame-red hair of the woman coiled sensuously, serpentinely about Dean. Dean was kissing her and telling her that he'd wanted to play professional football.

  Another time—or perhaps this dream simply flowed into the other—Walker was comforting Lindsey. In the background, her father embraced the red-haired woman, while Lindsey cried. The tears, flowing from her silver-blue eyes, looked like diamonds—pale blue-tinted diamonds. Walker tried to capture them as they bled onto her cheek, but the softness of her cheek distracted him. It was softer than anything he'd ever felt, softer than fleece, softer than clouds, softer than silk and lace. Silk and lace. Like the hem of her slip. Like the hem of her sexy slip.

  And then he was embracing her, pulling her into him... comforting her... reassuring her... sighing at the softness of her... threading his fingers through the satin fullness of her hair... tilting her head back... brushing her lips with his....

  The next morning he awakened tired and restless. He had dreamed something—something about Dean, something about Lindsey. The something about Lindsey he couldn't remember. What couldn't he remember? He didn't pursue the question. Intuitively, he knew that he'd be happier without an answer.

  "I don't believe it," Lindsey said later that morning. If her words had not betrayed her disbelief, her voice most assuredly would have.

  Walker glanced up. Lindsey stood staring out the window and into the parking lot. She wore a candy-pink skirt and a pink, blue and yellow summer sweater. Pink flats encased her feet, while her hair was pulled back into a ponytail with a pink ribbon. She looked like a girl; she looked like a woman. The combination, coupled with a restless night and troublesome dreams, had unnerved Walker all morning. So much so that he'd hidden behind a facade of professionalism.

  Lindsey had wondered at Walker's mood, which had bordered on, if not cool, then at least withdrawn, but now everything fled from her mind except the sports car strutting to a stop in the space reserved for her father.

  "What is it?" Walker asked.

  "I don't believe it," Lindsey repeated, watching her father spill from the car. "When did Daddy buy a sports car?"

  "Sports car?" Walker asked, rising and walking to stand just behind Lindsey. He'd been right. The top of her head came midway of his chin when she wore low-heeled shoes, which provided a good location for her perfume, a bedeviling scent of summer flowers, to subtly swirl about him. Glancing up and outward, Walker saw a sports car, a convertible whose color was red, as in flame red, as in redhead, sitting in the parking lot.

  "Don't tell me you didn't know about it," she said.

  "I didn't know about it."

  "Hi!" Dean called, bursting through the office door as though it were the most glorious morn that had ever dawned. He still wore his iridescent sunglasses, which entirely hid his eyes behind a deep purple tint. "Isn't she a beauty?" Before anyone could answer, he rushed on with, "I went by just to look. Next thing I knew, I'd bought it! I said, what the heck? You only live once." Again, before a comment could be forthcoming, he asked, "What do you think?"

  What Walker thought was that, if his friend were flying any higher, he'd bump into a cloud. He also sensed a tension in Lindsey. It was a tension that had not been there minutes before.

  Lindsey, on the other hand, thought her father had already run into something... and knocked what little sense he had clean out of his head. She felt her disbelief boil over into irritation. No, maybe it wasn't irritation at all. Maybe it was a clear-cut case of anger. Here she was worried sick about her mother, here she was trying to salvage their marriage and here her father was out buying a new flashy, splashy sports car, as though the only thing of importance was him zooming about like a playboy!

  "C'mon, let me show her to you," Dean said. "I'll even take you for a spin." As he spoke, he slid an arm about Lindsey's shoulder.

  Lindsey discreetly slid away. "You two go on. I'll stay and man the office."

  "Ah, c'mon," her father said. "The office'll be fine for five minutes."

  "No, really, ya'll go on," Lindsey insisted, stepping back behind the desk and starting to shuffle the papers. "I've got a couple of calls to make." Lindsey's gaze shifted to Walker, as though she was begging him to understand her feelings and run interference for her.

  "Call and see if you can get Ed Dowell," Walker said. "If not, just leave the message that I'd like to cancel the meeting for next week and reschedule."

  Lindsey gave a silent thank-you and reached for the phone.

  "I'll take you for a ride another time, sweetheart," Dean said, seemingly oblivious to his daughter's dark mood. "C'mon," Dean said enthusiastically to Walker. "Wait till you hear this engine, wait till yo
u feel this power."

  All the way to the parking lot, Walker listened to technical chatter: the car had a five-speed manual transmission and a 32-valve V8 engine, which allowed it to soar from zero to 60 mph in 6.2 seconds. Then there was the antilock brakes, air bags, the ten-way electrically adjustable seats and a fully automatic soft top, which could be raised or lowered at the touch of a button. Walker heard, but didn't hear, saw, but didn't see, felt, but didn't feel. In truth, all he heard was the drone of Dean's voice, all he saw was the redhead buried in Dean's arms, all he felt was the tension that had instantly coiled in Lindsey at the sight of the automobile.

  "Look at her," Dean said, drawing his hand across the side of the car, as though in a caress.

  The gesture reminded Walker of Dean's hand sliding around the waist of the young woman. He told himself that he had no right to judge Dean, but the truth was that he guessed he was. Dean was hurting two people whom he cared deeply about.

  "Wait till you see how she handles," Dean said, tossing the keys to Walker.

  With lightning speed, Walker caught them, then sailed them back to Dean. "You drive. I'm not used to anything that goes from zero to sixty in 6.2 seconds."

  Dean laughed. "Believe me, you can get use to this baby's performance. Not that I've opened her up on the streets, but the power's there. You can feel it."

  Walker thought his friend sounded orgasmic.

  Opening the car door, Dean bustled inside. Walker, less enthusiastic, followed suit, feeling the warmth of the sun-heated leather penetrate the fabric of his slacks. In seconds, the car hummed. Dean's hand on the gearshift, the convertible, its nose pointed in the direction of the street, roared from the parking lot. In a gusty surge, the wind tunneled through Walker's hair, teasing it like sensuous fingers. Dean's hair flew wild, too, ironically playing up the receding hairline that Dean fought so valiantly to disguise.

  Dean looked over at his friend, grinned, then shifted into another gear that sent the car barreling down the street. Not dangerously so, but enough to challenge the speed limit. Several turns here, several there, and Dean maneuvered the vehicle onto an asphalt road that ran just at the edge of town. The road was deserted, except for an occasional car. Without warning, Dean floored the gas pedal. The car, like a bullet, shot forward, causing the wind to whip violently at hair and clothes and senses.

  "Great, huh?" Dean shouted above the howl.

  Walker said nothing. He simply rested his arm across the back of the seat in a negligible pose that said he was out for nothing more than a snail-paced Sunday drive.

  Slowing the car, which had indeed lived up to its fast claim, Dean pulled the vehicle to the shoulder of the road, made an illegal U-turn and started back into town at a more reasonable pace.

  Looking over at Walker, he asked, "Well, what do you think?"

  What he thought was that he was about to do something he'd probably regret. "Who is she?"

  On the surface, Dean's expression went absolutely blank. Below the surface, however, Walker thought he saw a streak of panic flash behind the purple-lensed sunglasses. The flash was so quick that it made the sports car's speed seem drop-dead slow.

  "Who's who?" Dean asked calmly—too calmly.

  "The young girl I saw you with?"

  "What girl—"

  "For God's sake, Dean, don't insult my intelligence or our friendship!"

  Dean said nothing. Neither did he look in Walker's direction. It was as though the road had become the sole focus of his attention.

  Obviously realizing he'd have to make a comment at some point, he said finally, "How'd you find out?"

  "I saw you."

  "Where?"

  "On the porch of your apartment," Walker said, adding angrily, "Didn't discretion ever cross your mind?"

  "I was discreet!" Dean bellowed back.

  "On the porch of your apartment? For God's sake, Lindsey could have been the one to find you!"

  Dean jerked his head in Walker's direction. "She doesn't know, does she? She and... Bunny don't know?"

  "Not that I'm aware of."

  "You're, uh... you're not going to tell them, are you?"

  Walker had been looking at his friend. He now turned his eyes back to the road. "No," he said, flatly, but emphatically. Just as he'd known in a split second that he couldn't tell Lindsey, so, too, in just such a split second did he discover he couldn't betray his friend. Being caught in the middle was an unbearable position, one he hoped to never be caught in again. Assuming he ever got out of the viselike jaws of this unbearable middle.

  At his answer, Walker could feel Dean's relief. He could hear the soft sigh that whispered at his lips. It crossed Walker's mind that maybe Dean was offering up a prayer of thanks.

  Neither spoke for a while, then, blocks from the office, Dean said, "I, uh, I met her at a diner. She's a nice kid."

  Kid. Walker thought the word more than appropriate. He was relieved, though, that at least Dean wasn't denying the woman's youthfulness.

  "I mean, she's not underage or anything—she's nineteen—but that's..." He sighed. "That's still a kid, huh?" He laughed mirthlessly. "I've got a daughter older than my girlfriend."

  Walker said nothing. He wondered what Dean would think if someone his age was seeing Lindsey. He didn't pursue the thought, because, quite frankly, he himself didn't much like the idea of an older man with Lindsey. Something in him said maybe he wouldn't like seeing Lindsey with any man, regardless of his age. He told the something to get lost, that the subject was something he didn't want to consider too closely.

  "I didn't leave Bunny for her," Dean said. "Our relationship isn't that serious. I mean, I did start seeing her before I left Bunny. God knows, I hadn't intended to, it just happened. I stopped at the diner one day for lunch, and she got to kidding around and then... well, one thing led to another, but we're not serious. She's going off to college this fall. She's sweet and everything, but our relationship's just not that serious."

  "Then why are you seeing her?" The question was blunt. Determinedly so. At its core was Walker's need to understand. His desperate need.

  Dean looked over at his friend. His unvarnished answer rang with painful honesty. "Because she makes me feel young. I said that I didn't leave Bunny for Michele, and I didn't. I left her for the way Michele makes me feel. She makes me feel young. She makes me feel alive."

  Somewhere during the discussion, Dean had driven the car back into the parking lot of Gal-Tex. He hadn't killed the motor, though, and Walker was aware of the engine's powerful thrumming vibration. Understanding equally rumbled through him. He could identify with wanting to feel alive. Growing older didn't necessarily bother him, but the emptiness he felt did. He was tired of feeling that he was standing on the sidelines watching everyone else live life.

  "I know it's not an excuse, and I'm not trying to pretend it is," Dean said, "but Bunny's the only woman I'd ever been with. Hell, I used to talk big about scoring with the girls—we all did!—but the truth was I never did. I met Bunny the summer I graduated from high school, and we went together until we got married. She's the only woman I'd ever been with."

  Walker grinned despite the seriousness of the discussion. "Yeah, I guess we all exaggerated a little."

  Dean grinned, too. "What about Sissie Pennywell? We all thought that you and she... I mean, you never said anything, but then again you didn't deny anything, either."

  Walker's grin grew. "Let's just put it this way, I wouldn't have ruined her chances of getting into a nunnery."

  For a moment, both men sat smiling at high school memories. For a moment, both were bound in the close camaraderie they'd shared for most of their lives.

  Dean's smile slowly disappeared. "Like I said before, I don't expect you to approve or to understand." His voice had deepened when he added, "I just don't want you to hate me."

  There was no doubt in Walker's mind that Dean Ellison had just bared his soul. Nor was there any doubt in Walker's heart that it had taken courage to
do so. But then, his friend had never lacked for courage. Not on the football field. Not flying helicopters through the war-torn skies of Vietnam. Not hustling back and forth across a sometimes stormy gulf. No, Dean may have his faults, but lacking courage wasn't one of them. Any more than it had ever been, or ever would be, in doubt how Walker felt about this man, this man who was closer than a brother.

  "I could never hate you," Walker said. "I don't always like what you do, but I could never hate you."

  Dean said nothing. The two men simply stared at each other. Finally, his voice noticeably blank, Dean said, "To tell you the truth, I don't always like what I do, either... and I'm not always as kind as you. Sometimes I despise myself."

  The heartfelt words slammed into Walker's heart, bringing with them a new realization, a realization that Walker's narrowed thinking had not taken into account. While it was true that Dean was hurting innocent people—Bunny and Lindsey and even his best friend—it was also true that he was hurting himself. In fact, perhaps it was he who was hurting most of all.

  Chapter Five

  "I'm sorry."

  Walker, who was sitting at his desk, glanced up from the drilling chart he was perusing. It was all Lindsey could do not to reach out and brush back a swath of hair that slanted across his forehead. Ever since he'd returned from the sports car outing several hours before, his hair had been attractively mussed, as though the wind had played a game of tag through the silver-tinted black strands. But Walker had been too pensive to even take heed of his hair's tousled condition. Lindsey couldn't help but notice, however. Just the way she couldn't help but wonder what had transpired between the two men.

  "For what?" Walker now asked, removing the reading glasses he'd been forced to put on in order to make out the detail chart figures.

  "For the surly mood I've been in," Lindsey said with a sheepish smile. "It isn't your fault Dad bought a sports car. It isn't your fault that he's acting like a jerk."

  Walker wanted to tell Lindsey how badly Dean was hurting, but he knew that Lindsey herself was in pain. It was hard to see another's pain through your own. Instead, he laid the glasses on the desk and, pushing back his chair, he stood. "You haven't been in a surly mood."