A Distant Summer

by Karen Toller Whittenburg

  The thoughts evolved into a slow question, and he ran a pensive fingertip over the hemmed edge of his napkin. “Kristina? How did you happen to be at the courthouse today?”

  Her gaze returned to him with a hint of smoky apprehension. She glanced down as if weighing her response and then met his eyes. “I saw your name in the morning paper and I decided to go. I didn’t intend to talk to you. I was just curious, I guess.”

  Her voice trailed into an unsettling hush, and Tucker felt a spiral of disappointment. Curiosity had brought her into that courtroom. She had wanted to see Dr. McCain on the legal hot seat. Nothing more. Certainly not Tucker McCain, victim of circumstantial publicity, a man in need of a friend. He couldn’t prevent himself from leaning back against his chair ... away from her.

  Kris recognized the defensive movement and knew that somehow she’d offended him. Even knowing she should not say more, she couldn’t seem to prevent herself. “When I read the article about your—about the litigation, I couldn’t believe it. I know how much, I mean, I remember that you told me, how much becoming a doctor meant to you. This lawsuit must be a nightmare.”

  “It hasn’t been pleasant,” he answered in cautious acknowledgment. “But then I don’t suppose malpractice suits ever are.”

  He had stressed the word, and Kris felt another tug at her sympathy. Malpractice. He must hate the very idea, and to have it associated with his career! Small wonder that he exuded such intensity. “Will the case be resolved soon? Out of court?”

  “My attorney seems to think so, but ...” He lifted his shoulders in a heavy shrug. “Frankly, I’m at the point where I don’t give a damn whether or not it’s ever resolved.”

  Oh, he gave a damn all right. Even a casual observer could see just how much he cared—or how much he hurt. Why hadn’t she simply skipped the newspaper that morning and gone ahead with her original plans? Then she wouldn’t be here now, caring because he cared, hurting because he hurt. “You worked very hard to become a doctor, a good doctor.”

  He tilted his head slightly at her confident tone. “Did I tell you that, too?”

  “There are things I don’t have to be told.”

  The corners of his mouth curved upward but didn’t quite become a smile. “It’s comforting to know I have a champion in the state of Arkansas.”

  “You must have a lot of supporters here in Denver.”

  His only answer was to glance, as if impatient, in the direction the waiter had taken. Restless fingers danced along his napkin before curling into a fleeting fist, and then he brought his gaze to her. “Tell me about Arkansas.”

  Kris accepted his change of subject gracefully. “The capital is Little Rock. The population is somewhere around—”

  He interrupted her. “I meant to say, tell me about you.”

  She’d been hoping he wouldn’t ask; she’d been wondering what she would say when he did. The napkin in her lap began to acquire nervous pleats. “I’m a newspaper editor. It’s strictly small-town news, but I’m very proud of it.”

  His dark brows lifted in acknowledgment, and Kris realized her defensiveness. She hated the unexpected feeling. After her first year at the Maple Ridge Gazette the guilty feeling that she should apologize for her career choice had vanished. Why should the old attitude reappear now? And why had she been so quick to classify herself by her work, as if the sum of her existence could be found in the equation of newsprint and ink?

  “And where is this small town?”

  “Arkansas.” Her tone was flippant, but it was threaded with a quiet panic. He smiled, and Kris saw an unavoidable and perfectly legitimate question rising in his eyes. As it parted his lips, the waiter arrived with the wine, and she thought it couldn’t have come at a better time. She didn’t want to tell Tucker anything more about her life. Maybe he wouldn’t ask.

  “You’ve never married.” Tucker offered the statement in the same careful way he extended a glass of wine, and just like that, he altered the mood and swept her into an ambiance of conflicting emotion.

  Accepting the glass, she pretended an interest in the transparency of the drink. “Why do you say that?”

  “Just a hunch.” He took a slow sip of wine and set the glass on the table. For a long moment he stared at it. He didn’t look at her, and she didn’t look at him, at least not directly. But the longing to do so was enclosing her, tightening across her lungs, increasing the beat of her heart. It was hard to breathe, and she knew release would come simply by lifting her eyes to his. But she must not.

  “I’m not married,” he said in an offhand manner. “There’s never been time. Or maybe there’s just never been a good reason. I don’t know.” His pause was contemplative; his soft sigh, weary. “That doesn’t surprise you, does it?”

  “No,” She wasn’t surprised at the information— she knew he would be the type of doctor whose commitment to medicine superseded any other commitment—but she was surprised that he’d mentioned the subject at all. The fact that he had was a measure of his uncertainty at the moment. It provided a glimpse of the vulnerable man beneath his cloak of confidence.

  Silence came again, but this time she welcomed its comfort, and she sensed that Tucker did, too. Kristina continued to stare at her wineglass, remembering, oddly, that the last time—the one time—she’d been with this man, they had allowed not a second of silence. There had been a constant flow of words ... looks ... touches.

  Luncheon arrived, and she banished memory to the safe past. Suddenly she was hungry and eager to lighten the mood and the pensive line of Tucker’s smile. “Do you have a private surgical practice?” She picked up a fork and poised it above her salad.

  “Yes.” Tucker focused first on the fork and then slowly raised his gaze to her face. Her gray eyes met his, and for an instant he thought her sudden cheerfulness faltered, but she recovered quickly with a general comment. And although he answered in the same vein, he did not recover as quickly. There had been something in that momentary exchange, something muted and almost fearful—but real. Very real.

  Tucker tried to define that intangible reality during the course of the meal, but he never came close to solving the enigma. If there were shadows in her gray eyes, Krishna never allowed him another clear glimpse of them. She was quietly animated, talking around many topics of conversation yet drawing out his opinions and his attitudes with skilled subtlety.

  He realized what she was doing without being truly aware of how she did it. He knew only that he was talking, voicing thoughts that seemed to form without conscious effort. What he said seemed unimportant. It was the type of conversation he might have had with any new acquaintance, but he had an odd sensation that she was learning more about him than he would have willingly told anyone else.

  Each time he tried to turn the tables, to discover the person behind her beautifully delicate face, she gave answers that left him dissatisfied and hungry to know much more than she revealed. By the time he paid the check Tucker was certain that he wanted to see Kristina again.

  “Have dinner with me tonight,” he said, impulsively reaching across the table to touch her hand. Her fingers were cold, and he thought they trembled slightly beneath his. “We can make it late, if you prefer, and light.”

  She met his gaze and slowly withdrew her hand to her lap. “No. Thank you, Tucker ... but no.”

  His palm lingered against the crispness of the tablecloth as he sought again to penetrate the elusive veil of reserve that sheltered her. “Tomorrow, then. I’ll phone your hotel room,”

  “I might not be there.”

  “I’ll leave a message.”

  “That isn’t necessary. Really.”

  “It is necessary, Kristina. I want to see you again. I intend to see you again.” He couldn’t understand her reluctance, couldn’t explain his own persistence, but he knew he had never meant anything more sincerely.

  She looked as if she might make another protest, but then a polite smile erased the impression. “I think I should be ge
tting back to the hotel now. Thank you for lunch. It was very nice.”

  He rose just in time to grasp the back of her chair as she stood and tucked her purse under her arm. His hand went automatically to her waist, and, although she permitted the faint brush of his fingertips, he felt her become instantaneously alert. As they left the dining room and descended the stairs, nothing else was said, no smiles were exchanged. There were no glances that held a small treasure of meanings, and Tucker was lost in the puzzle.

  When he followed her into the afternoon brightness, she turned to him. “Again, thank you. It was good to see you, Tucker.”

  A knot of frustration pulled taut inside him. She was going to walk out of his life as inexplicably as she’d walked in. He couldn’t allow that, but what could he do to stop her? Without actually considering a course of action, he bent his head and whispered a zephyr-soft kiss to her lips. It was a mere touch, yet it told him more than he had learned during the entire afternoon.

  There was a bond between his heart and hers. He didn’t know if it had been forged in a long-forgotten moment or if it had bloomed into being within the past hour, but he didn’t doubt its existence, and he didn’t doubt that Kristina was aware of it, too.

  “I’ll phone you.”

  The husky tone of his voice sent a sweet unrest rippling through her composure. She didn’t protest. She simply turned from the dusky determination in his eyes and stepped inside a waiting taxi.

  Tucker came forward to close the door, leaning down to offer one last promise. “Tomorrow.”

  The cab pulled from the curb into the flow of traffic, and Kris knew he watched until her taxi rounded the corner.

  Only then did she let her head drop back against the cushioned seat.

  Only then did she rub the tension from her forehead.

  Only then did her shoulders slump and the quiet panic swirl helplessly inside her.

  She had broken the cardinal rule, the one absolute in her life: “Don’t look back.” Today, for reasons she didn’t completely understand, she had. And the consequences stretched before her like a deserted highway on a misty night. She couldn’t see him again; she couldn’t not see him again.

  A trembling finger relived the brief caress of his kiss.

  Tomorrow. He would call tomorrow.

  What was she going to do?

  Chapter Two

  There were no messages waiting for Kris when she returned to the hotel the next afternoon. She had left early and spent the day out. By three o’clock she had walked past the courthouse twice, fighting a private battle of her own. At last, she’d decided not to complicate one mistake by making another. If Tucker phoned, she’d tell him she wasn’t interested in furthering their acquaintance.

  But Tucker hadn’t phoned. The room clerk checked and said there were no messages. Standing at the front desk, Kris breathed a sigh of relief. But as she stepped inside the elevator, she admitted a definite splinter of disappointment.

  She loosened the tension of her braided chignon with a restless fingertip and glanced around the confining cubicle. She was alone. The thought slipped through her mind; the feeling settled inside her. She was often alone. By choice, for the most part, but still alone. Perhaps it was a deeply ingrained defense left over from a childhood smothered in abundance but deficient in meaning.

  The elevator doors opened, and she stepped out, determined to leave her sudden attack of self-pity behind. What was wrong with her? No messages, her heart answered. Maybe it was time to think about going home.

  Home. Even in silence it sounded good, soothing and geared to forgetfulness. She had sometimes thought she would have drowned in the impersonal atmosphere of the world outside the Maple Ridge city limits. She had gone there in search of a hiding place and found a home and friends and, in many ways, a family.

  Kris inserted her key and opened the door of her hotel room. It looked nice, neat, but it offered only a token welcome. What was she doing in a lonely hotel room in Denver, Colorado? Her friend Ruth insisted a yearly vacation was necessary for sanity, and usually Kris returned from a trip in total agreement. But not this time.

  After tossing her purse on the bed, she slipped off her shoes and curled wearily into a chair. If she canceled her plans and went home a couple of days early, was there any possibility of avoiding Ruth’s probing questions? No. Kris knew her tongue would run like a river the moment she heard Ruth’s perceptive “You met someone, didn’t you?”

  She hadn’t met someone, though. She’d met Tucker, and that was the reason for her longing to run home, to seek a hiding place. Kris sighed and reached for the entertainment guide on the dressing table.

  When the knock came, her heart jumped in startled surprise and the booklet slid from her hands to the floor. Who could—Tucker?

  No.

  But it might be—

  No. Disordered thoughts scrambled for recognition; a confusion of emotions accompanied her to the door. She touched the lock. Paused. The knock came again.

  “Who is it?”

  “Tucker.”

  Her fingers trembled. The lock was stubborn; her powers of reason were even more so. Finally, she opened the door to the dark-haired, blue-eyed reality of her past and faced again the private war of wanting things she couldn’t hope to have.

  Tucker was unprepared for the uncertainty he saw in her expression. Wispy strands of silvery gold feathered her face and neck. Her brightly patterned skirt looked somewhat crumpled; her blouse was unbuttoned to the shadowy cleft of her breast, as if she’d absently loosened it to a more comfortable level. Her feet were bare, her legs a creamy tan. He noticed the details of her appearance in that first moment, but her questioning gaze allowed him to do no more than notice.

  The shadows were there, yet he thought there was a shy gladness, a definite welcome in the soft gray eyes. The mystery of her intrigued him, her casually disheveled beauty captured him, and all he could do was smile. “Hello,” he said. “It’s tomorrow.”

  “Yes.”

  Why did he feel so awkward with her? “May I come in?” he asked. She hesitated, and he held his breath. He’d had a suspicion she would ignore his messages, so he’d come in person and waited in the lobby for her to return. When finally he’d seen her at the front desk, an unexpected attack of nerves had kept him in his seat until she’d entered the elevator and disappeared from view. He’d followed slowly, knowing he wanted to see her but unsure if she would want to see him. And now it seemed as if she might close the door in his face.

  “Yes, of course. Please, come in.” She stepped back, and he walked into the hotel room, not overly encouraged by her polite tone.

  As she closed the door and moved toward the window, an aura of intimacy drifted into the air he breathed. He had never before been so aware of the fragility of a moment or of the many different levels of communication possible in a movement, a look, a silence. It was suddenly vital that he convince her to spend the evening with him.

  “What happened today?” Kris turned her back to the curtained window and offered a tentative smile to conceal her disquiet. “At the courthouse.”

  “The insurance company settled with Abernathy yesterday afternoon.”

  “What? Just like that? But what about the trial?”

  The rueful shrug of broad shoulders beneath a somber frown expressed a tightly controlled frustration. “Jury selection was just beginning. The trial hadn’t actually begun, but my attorney thought it would be best to settle and avoid accruing any further expense.”

  “But the legal fees would have been taken care of in a judgment, wouldn’t they? And you would have won the case. I’m sure of it.”

  A touch of gratitude lightened the sapphire of his eyes. “The insurance company isn’t blessed with your foresight or your faith, Kristina. They played it safe. So as of this morning, the suit’s been dropped, and for all practical purposes it’s over.”

  “You don’t sound as if you believe that.”

  His brows fo
rmed an arch of disillusionment. “Just because something has ended doesn’t necessarily mean it’s over.”

  Kris dropped her gaze, feeling the truth of his words in a dozen memories. She knew firsthand that some things were never over. “Despite the fact that the whole thing seems grossly unfair to you, I’m glad it’s settled. I know you must be relieved.”

  “I’ll feel better about it if you’ll agree to celebrate with me tonight.”

  How could she refuse? Kris licked dry lips. “I’d love to, Tucker, but I can’t. You see, I planned to— to—” What? She couldn’t think beyond the moment and the tension clenching along his jawline.

  “Is it the lawsuit? Does it bother you that I was accused of malpractice? Is that the reason you’re so reluctant?” His voice was edged with impatience as he shoved a hand into a trouser pocket in frustration. For a heart-hammering instant he held her gaze, and then control straightened his shoulders. “I’m sorry. That wasn’t fair. It’s just that I want very much to share this evening with you.”

  Her breath hung precariously at the base of her throat, and the thought that this wasn’t really happening spiraled aimlessly inside her. Oh, God. She’d never dreamed she would see him again. She’d thought it was over long, long ago. If she’d had any idea of the sheer physical attraction that would scintillate between them.... If she’d even suspected the emotional pull he could evoke in her....

  Even had she realized the danger, Kris admitted, it wouldn’t have changed this moment of self-knowledge. Elemental longings drew her to Tucker now, just as they had drawn her to him years before. She’d been naive, innocent, then. But she’d been only slightly less so in thinking she could see him again without igniting embers that should long since have grown cold. And now she was helpless before the tiny flicker of warmth inside her.

  She pressed her lips together before drawing a low breath of courage. “I’m flattered by your interest, but the truth is....” And there the impending lie faltered with the cautiously self-protective angle of his chin.