“I just had to get away for a minute,” Bette explained. “It’s even crazier today than it was yesterday. I saw Johnny Mehan with his entourage...isn’t that what they’re called? The people who hang around a person and tell him he’s wonderful? He is goodlooking! But heavens, he can’t make a move without three people showing him where to put his foot!”
She lifted Karen’s chin to examine her face. “How are you today, honey? Holding up? I saw that boyfriend of yours leave early this morning. That’s why I came over, really, to check on you.”
Karen smiled. “I’m fine.”
“He looks like the marryin’ type. Is that what he wanted?”
Karen nodded.
“And what did you say? No, never mind, I’m not really a relation of yours. I don’t have any business poking my nose in.”
“You’re as good as a relation. In my mind you are! You and John both.” She paused. “I turned him down.”
A pleased smile flickered across Bette’s lips at the elevation of status and at Karen’s response to Martin. “I thought that, too. I just had to be sure. So why are you looking glum?”
“It’s not easy to tell someone who loves you that you don’t love them back.”
“I can imagine. John was my first and only love. He still is. It’s the same for him, or so he says. And I think I believe him.”
“Do,” Karen urged.
Bette reached for the doorknob. “I guess I better get back. John might be needing me.” Still she paused. “You are coming to the premiere this afternoon, aren’t you?”
Karen shrugged. “I’m not sure.”
“The music hall looks great. I took a peek. The new curtain’s up, the chairs are arranged and they have this huge screen and speaker system set up by the pros. Too bad we won’t be able to keep it.”
“I’ll think about it,” Karen promised, “but I’m not really very interested in the movie.”
“I know. Me, neither. But it should be fun.” She paused again. “Something else... Did you know the ‘Western Rambles’ crew is leaving tomorrow? I didn’t either, or if I did I’d forgotten. They have to get back to San Francisco so they can rush through editing all the tape and put their special together. Lee’s promised to send us a copy as soon as it’s finished.”
“Tomorrow?” Karen echoed hollowly.
“Sometime after lunch,” Bette murmured. “Might want to keep your eye out to say goodbye.”
Then she left.
Karen didn’t move, struck still by what she’d learned.
“Tomorrow?” she repeated huskily. She hadn’t expected it to be so soon! She hadn’t thought... She needed more time!
More time to do what? a part of her whispered.
To apologize, to thank him, to tell him—what? I’m sorry for thinking so badly of you, Lee. Thanks for what you did Oh, and by the way, I love you.
She remembered the wish she’d left dangling earlier. She hadn’t known what to ask for then. Now she did, and closing her eyes, she wished for more time with Lee.
As FAR AS LEE COULD SEE they’d covered every base. They’d talked with the stars of the movie, talked with the director, with the producer, with the set and costume designers, with Raymond Armstrong. Everything was in the can. Manny was going to record some of the critics’ comments afterward, but that was it as far as coverage of the event would go on “Western Rambles.”
As he sat in the music hall along with everyone else, waiting for the vaunted movie to begin, Lee grew antsy. Maybe it was having had only one hour’s sleep last night. Maybe it was not having seen Karen all day, or the boyfriend.
What were they doing?
A frigging stupid question.
The music hall held an amazing mix of people—from the wholly natural Pete to the glittery and glossy Andrea Wright, who was draping herself across Johnny Mehan in a way that at one time might have gotten them arrested for public indecency.
The movie’s newly minted theme song started to swell. The lights went down. The chatter lessened.
And Lee couldn’t take it anymore. He had to leave. Right then. That second.
He stepped past Manny’s and Diane’s chairs, pausing to murmur, “Tell me how it is,” to address their puzzlement, and, “I’m going to pass for now,” so they wouldn’t continue to be concerned for him. They knew he was tired and had been existing on frayed nerves for most of the day.
They also knew what he’d done with the headstone. He’d told them earlier in private. They’d backed his decision one hundred percent, which should have done something to cheer him—but hadn’t.
He ambled over to the well, the dry heat quickly taking the chill from the music hall’s artificially cooled air, and breathed the sweetness of a West Texas afternoon. He was going to miss it when they left tomorrow. He was going to miss the town and its people. But most of all—
His gaze was drawn to the apartment above the antique shop. A jolt went through him when he saw Karen at the window, holding the curtain aside. She’d been watching him.
For a second he couldn’t move. Neither did she.
Where was the boyfriend? he wondered sullenly.
Then she was motioning to him, as if she wanted him to come closer.
It was everything Lee could do not to turn around, to check if she was signaling to someone else.
But it was to him, he was assured when she motioned again.
In order not to make a complete fool of himself, he continued to amble, this time across the street, There were only a few people about in town, mostly technicians, whose business wasn’t in the music hall viewing the film. The rest of the activity was taking place in the studio’s temporary village, where preparations for the after-the-show festivities were under way.
He stopped a little out from the sidewalk to look up at her. With her fall of curly hair and beautiful features, she almost took his breath away.
“Could I see you for a minute, Lee?” she called down.
“Won’t the boyfriend object?” he asked evenly.
She frowned, seemingly confused, and he mentally kicked himself for having blundered. A beautiful woman, one you happen to be in love with, asks to see you...and what do you do? Throw up a roadblock.
“Around back?” he asked, hoping to make amends.
“Yes...please,” she said, then withdrew.
Lee no longer ambled. He hurried down the street and along an alley to the rear of the buildings, then trotted across the empty backyards. She wasn’t waiting with the door open, so he bounded up the stairs and knocked. As he waited for her answer, he reclaimed the protective mantle of nonchalance.
KAREN DREW A DEEP BREATH and opened the door. “You didn’t like the movie?” she asked, for something to say.
“It hadn’t started when I left.”
He looked so handsome standing there. Long and lithe, and coolly magnetic. She wordlessly invited him inside.
He came in and looked around, as if he expected to see something different. As if she might have changed everything around.
“Where’s he at?” Lee asked at last, his gaze coming back to her.
“Martin?” she asked.
“Hmm.”
“He went home. Back to Kerrville.”
His features were like granite. “You going to meet him there soon?”
“I might, but—but not—” She took another breath and braced for what she’d brought him here to tell him. “Lee, I know what you did. Pete told me. He saw what happened. I—”
“What do you mean, but not... ?”
“I want to thank you, Lee. What you did was wonderful. It—”
He stepped closer. “Are you going to meet him or aren’t you?” he demanded.
“No!” she cried, and tried to turn away, but he caught hold of her. Why did nothing ever turn out the way she planned? She’d been going to thank him, tell him how much she appreciated what he’d done, tell him how much it would mean to the people of the town if only they knew.... Then she pl
anned to tell him how she felt, if she could garner the nerve. But everything had become all confused. He seemed determined to take one course, while she took another. Obsessing about Martin—
Her protesting movements stopped. Obsessing about Martin! She looked up at him. In his face she read determination, anger, a haggard sadness and a confused kind of jealousy. Her heart gave a funny little jump.
“No,” she said again, only this time softer, more controlled. “I might meet him, but only as a friend.”
“How close a friend? He stayed here last night, didn’t he?”
“He didn’t have anyplace to go. Melanie had booked the hotel.”
“When did he leave?”
“This morning. Early. He left me a note.”
Something shifted in Lee’s demeanor. As if it were slowly becoming clear to him that the situation wasn’t as he’d thought.
“Do you love him?” he demanded.
She issued a challenge of her own. “Why should that matter to you?”
Lee’s eyes devoured her—her face, her body. He pulled her close. “It matters because I think I’ve been in love with you since I first saw you standing next to my brother and he introduced you as his fiancée. Since I had to come back inside that church two days later and deliver the news that he’d run away. You looked—I could barely handle the way you looked then. You were so vulnerable, so defenseless. I took you outside as quickly as I could, tried to comfort you, but it didn’t do any good. You blamed me. So did your parents. They dragged you away as if I’d been the one to hurt you.”
“That was you?” She relived the memory of being whisked out of church and held with her face pressed into a solid chest. She remembered how reassuring the embrace had felt in a world that had suddenly gone very wrong. “I didn’t blame you,” she said. “I was grateful.”
“You didn’t know it was me.”
“I—I wasn’t thinking. I was just...reacting. I barely knew what was happening. The embarrassment. Feeling stunned that Alex would—”
He placed a finger over her lips. “He’s my brother, but he’s done enough to come between us.”
“Lee, I love you! I didn’t want to, but—Like I told Martin, love isn’t something you can make happen or keep from happening. It just is. I don’t know why I love you, but I do! And I don’t want you to go away without—”
He groaned and kissed her. As if it couldn’t be held off any longer. As if the continuation of life itself hinged on the two of them finally coming together.
A wild kind of happiness sang through Karen’s veins. She had to have him, just as he had to have her. Only there was more to it this time. The demand of spirit as well as body. The blending of two souls. She kissed him back as hungrily as he did her, and she soon led him to her bedroom, where all the unicoms frolicked.
Their disrobing was both short and sweet, a time of discovery, yet also of driving need. Karen marveled at how beautiful his body was.
But she wasn’t allowed to marvel for long. His hands brought her to even greater heights, his kisses raining over her. Finally, when she didn’t think she could stand it any longer, she reached the fullest satisfaction, and her fingers curled into his back, holding him, helping him. Wanting to bring him with her to the same wondrous bliss.
Slowly, panting—perspiration dampening their bodies—they came down from the pinnacle to rest side by side in her narrow bed.
She’d never seen such an expression in his eyes before. Such satisfaction, such glowing happiness. She stroked his cheek, let her fingers play in his damp dark hair, smoothing it over his ear.
She loved his ear, she loved his hair, she loved his cheek, his eyes...his everything. She smoothed the muscles of his upper arm, ran her hand along his chest.
“Well—” he chuckled softly “—I’d say that was worth waiting for seven years.”
Her dimples deepened and he kissed them both.
“I’d say so, too,” she agreed just as warmly, just as softly.
His fingers threaded through her curls, trailed down her jawline to the pulsing hollow at the base of her throat, then on to the curves of her breasts. There, they trembled lightly.
“When did you know?” she asked.
His pale eyes, rimmed with dark lashes, met hers. “Not until I came here. I couldn’t get you out of my mind, but I didn’t know why.”
“I blamed you most of all.”
“Because I bothered you? Like a pesky fly?” he teased.
“Not exactly like a fly,” she said, grinning.
“Zzz!” He moved a finger in a jerky zigzag simulation of flight that ended on the tip of her nose, which he then promptly kissed.
Karen said, “I’m realizing now that I must have fallen in love with you a long time ago, too, and didn’t know it. I couldn’t make you disappear like I wanted. And believe me, I tried. I was so angry and I buried it to survive.”
“You probably put my face on a wanted poster and shot the hell out of it every time you had the chance.”
“Public enemy number one!”
“I knew you were here when we agreed to cover the goings-on in Twilight. If I hadn’t seen your name we might never have committed. We don’t usually go to shoots on such short notice. And Manny and Diane were on vacation in Hawaii.”
“Where did you see my name?” she asked, curious.
“John’s letter. He wrote about your aunt Augusta, then said that she’d died. Did I ever tell you I was sorry about that? He said you’d be arriving soon. He wrote about other people, too, but I couldn’t get past you.”
His hand dropped to massage her hip, but she caught it. “I’d really like to know why you moved the headstone.”
“It was the only visible evidence that could give away the story.”
“Why?” she persisted. “I was thrilled when I heard about it. That’s why I was in the saloon yesterday morning, looking for you. I wanted to tell you.”
He smiled slightly. She could sense him withdrawing emotionally.
She placed a hand on his cheek. “What is it? What’s happened?”
He still seemed hesitant, then he admitted, “I didn’t do it for you. I couldn’t, not and live with myself. That was the hardest part. It would have been so easy to just coast along, let things go on as they were, make you happy. Make Diane happy. But I had to do what I thought was right. In the end I listened to my gut feeling. To instinct.”
“Do you believe now that what you did was right?” she asked. Her respect for this man’s honesty and integrity was growing with every word he uttered.
“Yes. Byron’s the only person who might care, and I doubt he’d be too upset.”
She sat up suddenly, drawing his look of concern.
“What is it?” he asked.
“I’ve just thought of the other Parkers! What would they make of this if they knew?” She indicated the two of them together, in bed.
“Not a thing, I’d say.”
“What about your mother? What about my mother? Oh my heavens!”
He grinned. “Maybe we shouldn’t tell them...at least, not until after the first grandchild.”
“Grandchild!” Karen exclaimed.
“Why not? If I’d married you in place of Alex, we could already have had five or six kids!”
“I wanted to slap you when you said that! I knew why you were doing it, but still—”
“I wanted to kiss you.”
Which he promptly did, because this time there was nothing to stop him, not even Karen, who fell against him in total complicity.
AN HOUR LATER, with the street still relatively quiet because the movie had yet to end, Karen and Lee sat down for a dinner of scrambled eggs and toast—in honor of the morning when she’d come to Bette’s and they’d shared a first meal. Lee cooked the eggs again and she made the coffee and buttered the toasted bread. He was in the dark dress slacks he’d worn to the premiere and she was in her robe. Both were ravenous as well as completely happy.
; They ate quietly for a few minutes before Lee said, “The Cruzes and I are leaving tomorrow. We still have to take a few shots of ‘afters’ here, then we go to San Francisco to put it all together. It’ll be tough finishing in time, but to take advantage of all the publicity around the main premiere, we have to. I can’t put it off.”
“I know.”
He reached across to take her hand. “If I had a choice, I wouldn’t leave. You know that. But a few people have pulled some big strings to be sure the special airs close to the movie’s general release date.” He frowned. “After all this, I sure hope the damned thing’s good!”
She laughed. “How can you say that when you walked out on it?”
He smiled crookedly. “I never gave it a chance. The music started and that was that. I wanted to see you. But I thought the boyfriend—”
“Martin is a very nice person. You’d like him.”
“I didn’t like him yesterday,” he growled. “Or today.”
“I’m going to miss you.”
“You’ll be so busy finishing up with your aunt’s things you won’t even know I’m gone.”
“Yes, I will,” she said huskily.
From that point the meal was ignored, as was the commotion that occurred sometime later when the movie let out. From the celebratory sounds that did manage to filter through. Justice at Sundown had been very well received. But Lee and Karen no longer cared.
THEY MADE NO SECRET of their togetherness the next day. When it was time for Lee to join the Cruzes at the saloon, Karen accompanied him.
“Is this what I think it is?” Diane asked, grinning as she threw a meaningful glance at Manny.
“It” was hard to mistake. Lee had his arm around Karen’s waist, her body was tucked close to his.
“Another one bites the dust,” Manny said softly.
“Manny!” Diane scolded.
“Well?” Manny said, defending himself. “It’s a married man’s hobby to watch his buddies fall, one by one.”
“You’re embarrassing Karen!” Diane maintained.
But Karen was smiling so broadly there was no question of embarrassment. As was Lee. They couldn’t seem to stop.
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