Face to Face

by CJ Lyons

  He looked down on her face. It no longer was Pamela. It was Hart.

  Drake bolted from the realm of dreams. His breath came in gasps. His body shivered despite the sweat pouring from him. Damn, damn, damn. He hadn't dreamed of Pamela in months—not since Hart entered his life.

  Now, somehow his screwed up mind mixed up Hart and Pamela. As if both women were doomed to die.

  He couldn't save the one. Was his subconscious trying to tell him to give up any hope of protecting the other as well?

  The air in the small room was heavy, too thick to breathe. He pushed his morbid thoughts aside. Hart was safe—as long as he kept his distance, kept her out of the sights of his stalker. As long as he was out of her life, like King had suggested? No, no way. He couldn't accept that. This was only temporary. A few days and he'd find the creep who was doing this and it would all be over.

  He hoped.

  He pulled on a pair of shorts, crept downstairs and walked out to the dock. The moon was hidden behind a haze, casting a faint glow over the lake. He sat on the edge of the dock and dangled his legs over the side.

  The tide was in high enough the cold water swelled around his ankles. He used to do this when he visited Nellie and Jacob as a child. Sneak out of the house at night and no one would know.

  His aunt's voice startled him. "I guess old habits are hard to break."

  She eased herself down beside him. Drake noticed she was still fully dressed.

  "I thought no one knew I came out here," he said.

  "Of course we knew. Couldn't let you go falling into the lake, could we? What would your mom and dad say?" She settled against one of the railings. "So what was the fight about?"

  "What makes you think there was a fight?"

  "You've never once talked about bringing someone home for the family to meet. Now you've been with the same woman for almost six months and you come home without her?"

  "Still a reporter after all these years, Nellie?"

  "Like I said, old habits. What really happened?"

  "I don't know. Sometimes she's just so stubborn. She never sees my side of things."

  "Drake, you're a grown man who to my knowledge has never been shy of speaking his mind. But sometimes you have a habit of making your arguments in such a forceful manner that it puts people on the defensive."

  "You make me sound like Captain Ahab. I listen to Hart, but she didn't see how important this was to me."

  "And what was it that was more important to her?" Nellie asked softly.

  Drake was silent, ashamed to tell her. What could he say? He'd never given Hart the chance to tell him? "That's beside the point. Sometimes I just feel smothered."

  "Oh, I see. Cassie is the clingy, dependent kind?"

  "Of course not. She's independent, resourceful." He rubbed his eyes. He was confused; he didn't know what to think.

  "Is it Cassie smothering you, or yourself?"

  Drake took a deep breath. Sometimes his aunt was too smart for his own good. "I think it's the whole idea of staying with one person. It's an obligation. It's frightening. I wake up in the morning and I see her there and I think what would happen if I ever lost her…and I panic. Then I start thinking maybe it would be better not to let things get that far. Just to end it quickly, cleanly. But I can't."

  Nellie laughed. She patted his thigh and gave him a quick hug. "For someone who prides himself on seeing everything, sometimes you have the biggest blind spot." She hauled herself up and turned toward the house. "And don't stay out here all night. You need your rest."

  <><><>

  Drake woke to Muriel and Nellie's voices floating through the open window as they worked in the garden below.

  "Not as many tomatoes as last year," Nellie said.

  "Why do you really think he didn't bring Cassie?" came his mother's voice. "Think it has anything to do with that other one from last year?"

  Drake tensed. He hadn't told his mother about Pamela's HIV. He wanted to protect her from worrying. He moved closer to the window, but a creaking floorboard betrayed him.

  "Come on down and enjoy the morning," Nellie called out. Her hearing was still as good as always. He never could get anything past her.

  "Be right down," he yelled out the window. He pulled on a pair of khaki shorts and a T-shirt.

  "What do you want for breakfast, Remy?" his mother asked. She never could understand his aversion to eating first thing in the morning.

  "I'm fine, Mom. Besides, I need to head back to the city." He winced at the look of confusion that crossed her face. She and Nellie exchanged a glance.

  "Help your mother. I'm going in to start some laundry." Nellie left them.

  Drake knelt down beside his mother and began pulling weeds from the extensive vegetable garden. His mother sat back on her heels and watched him.

  "You okay, Mom?"

  "I'm fine. When did you learn the difference between a weed and a plant?

  Drake smiled. "I guess Hart taught me." An image of her flashed through his mind. "I really do need to get going. Now."

  She ignored his last statement, her hand resting over top of his, holding him in place. "I thought it probably wasn't the other one, the one who killed herself with your gun. You weren't in love with her, were you?"

  An uncomfortable pause stretched out between them.

  Muriel sighed. "You've never been easy to talk to—you take after your father. Laughing on the outside and bottling up everything else inside of you."

  Drake stared at her. He thought of his mother as someone who would always depend on others. Deep down, he had been afraid that after his father died, she would cling to him. The idea had terrified him. Now for the first time, he realized she had an inner strength of her own.

  "Why did she do that to you? This Pamela Reynolds. Was she in love with you?"

  Drake took his time answering. "At the time I thought she did it because she was afraid to face me, to tell me the truth—" He paused and took his mother's hands in his and helped her to her feet. They began to walk toward the dock. "Mom, Pamela had AIDS. I didn't know until after she died."

  Muriel opened then closed her mouth. The muscles in her face went slack. For the first time in his life, his mother looked her age.

  "Are you all right?" she whispered.

  "So far, I'm fine. I took their drug cocktail, and I've tested negative. My last test was last week. Then it'll just be the yearly screening the PD does."

  "Oh my God." She clasped his hands. "I wish you had told me sooner."

  "I didn't want to worry you."

  She paused by the lawn chairs at the edge of the grass beside the dock and sat down. Drake joined her. "I don't think she loved you, Remy."

  Drake nodded. When had his mother become so smart? He lied to himself for almost a year, telling himself Pamela did what she did because of some misguided idea of love. "I'm starting to believe that myself."

  "Why do you think she did it?" Muriel asked.

  "I think if she couldn't have me, she didn't want me to be able to get close to another woman. It was her only weapon." It was the first time he'd ever voiced his suspicions about Pamela, but as soon as the words were out, he knew they were true.

  "She was obsessed. How is Cassie taking all this?"

  Drake looked away. That was his mother—straight to the heart of the matter. "Every time we get close I find myself thinking of Pamela, thinking of the consequences, thinking of my own death even—" He broke off.

  "Let me tell you," he continued, his voice stronger, "it's a real mood breaker." He laughed harshly. "Spontaneity is definitely out of the question." He took a deep breath and looked down at his mother.

  "She's haunting you, Remy," she said softly.

  "That's a good word for it. It's slowly driving me crazy. I look at Hart and all I want to do is touch her, hold her, make love to her—but then I have to stop, make sure that we have protection, think about what we're doing. And every time I do, it's Pamela I see in front of me. It's
not fair to Hart. Sometimes I think I should just break it off with her…"

  They were both silent for a minute, then Muriel took his hand. "Your father and I were married for thirty years before he died. There were plenty of bad times, but having him there helped me get through them. The worst pain I ever felt was when I lost him. I thought I was all alone, that I'd never make it without him there to help me. It was like I was half the person I had been. Nothing you do can ever replace that part of you."

  Drake looked over at her. He couldn't believe his mother was talking to him this way.

  "But then I came to realize that Mickey was still here. He was inside of me, with me always." She patted Drake's hand. "I talk to him almost every night. The point is, even knowing that pain and how awful it is, I wouldn't trade having Mickey Drake in my life for anything. I can't stand to see you passing up what has to be the most wonderful experience life has to offer."

  Drake hung his hands between his knees and looked past her, his gaze sinking into the cerulean blue of the water. "You're such a romantic. Hart and I have a good thing going, I just don't want her to get hurt."

  "Don't lie to me, Remy," she replied in a stern voice. "I don't know how Cassie puts up with you, but if you ask me and if she'll have you, I think you ought to marry her."

  "You want me to marry her? You hardly even know her."

  Muriel shook her head and laughed. "You younger generation, always trying to reinvent the wheel. You love her. Sounds like she loves you. Marriage is what two responsible adults," she emphasized the last word, "do when they care for each other. You're thirty-four years old. Time to grow up. You should feel lucky you've found someone to grow old with. I just wish your father and I could have had longer together. Not a day goes by I don't thank God for the time we did have."

  Drake looked at her. It was the longest speech he'd ever heard her make. Muriel stood up and brushed her hands on her slacks.

  "I'm going in to help Nellie. You think about what I said."

  He stared out over the lake. Marriage? It was a foreign concept to him. He might love Hart now, but a lifetime commitment?

  Most of his friends had been married at one time or another. The vast majority now happily divorced. But a few of them, like Jimmy and Denise, had remained devoted to one another.

  If he did this, it would be for a lifetime, he promised himself. He'd had plenty of time to play the field. If he was going to commit to one person, it would be forever.

  That thought made him shiver. He stood and walked out to the end of the dock, catching the breeze from the lake. Never make love to another woman? Monica Burns' face raced through his mind, but the spark of desire that tormented him yesterday was gone.

  What if he asked Hart and she said no? After her past experience with unholy matrimony, she just might.

  Even more terrifying–what if she said yes?

  CHAPTER 16

  The next morning after she sent Tony on his way, Cassie searched through the clothing she'd left at Drake's house to find something to wear to the deposition. All she found were work clothes in need of washing, and a simple sleeveless ankle-length voile dress. It was pale green with tiny violets and at least three-dozen buttons down the front.

  Cassie smiled as she remembered the last time she'd worn this dress. A week ago Sunday. She'd come to Drake's after taking Gram Rosa's friend Tessa to Mass. She'd been hot and sweaty and feeling more than a little naughty. She hated going to Church–had mainly done it for so many years out of habit and a sense of debt to Rosa and Tessa. But Father Shuster's sermon on the ways of wickedness and corruption seemed directed solely at her. Which, of course, left her in a most rebellious mood.

  Drake had been out for a run and despite the open windows, his apartment was hot and steamy. Cassie had made a pitcher of fresh squeezed lemonade, brimming with ice and lemon quarters, then slid out of all her clothes except the button front dress, covered with its tiny violets done in purple and indigo, and waited for Drake to return.

  The first thing he saw when he entered was sunlight streaming through the thin cotton of her dress, silhouetting her body. The second was the tall glass of lemonade she ran over her cheek, beads of condensation streaming over the glass.

  "Is that for me?" he asked hopefully, kicking his shoes and socks off and dropping his sweat soaked shirt on the couch. "Looks wonderful."

  She smiled a wicked smile and took a small taste. "Oh it is," she assured him. Her fingers snagged an ice cube and ran it above the bodice of her dress.

  "Just one problem, sugar," she mimicked a southern accent as he approached. "There appears to be only one glass."

  Drake arched an eyebrow, backing her up until she was against the table. "What are we going to do about that?" He licked the condensation the ice cube left in its wake.

  Cassie carefully set the glass on the table out of reach. "First one to beg loses," she said, teasing him with the ice cube against his lips.

  He grinned, nipping at her fingers as he sucked on the frozen water. "Deal." He moved his mouth to her top button, his tongue flicking her sweaty skin. She in turn reached around and rubbed the ice cube down his spine, her fingers slipping below his waistband to the sensitive spot at the small of his back.

  "Only one rule," she whispered as his teeth clamped down on the small button, ready to yank it from her dress. He glanced up at that; they both knew rules weren't her forte. "You tear any buttons, you sew them back on."

  Drake straightened, his hands sliding down to her hips. "No fair. There must be a hundred of them," he protested, his palms heating her skin through the thin fabric of the dress.

  She wasn't swayed by his argument. Instead her grin widened. "Maybe even a hundred and one."

  "So we'll leave the clothes on," he told her, sliding the ice cube from her fingers before it could wreck his resolve. "I remember a certain lap dance you gave me once," he murmured as he slid the ice cube down her cleavage, his lips close behind. She shivered beneath his touch. "I've been wanting to pay you back for that."

  His fingers moved the ice cube over one of her breasts, holding it there as her nipple swelled. Then he clamped his mouth over both the ice and her flesh, teasing her through the fabric of her dress, his tongue directing the ice in its movement.

  She writhed beneath him, her fingers clamping around his biceps with a bruising grip. Relentless, he slid the ice cube down her body until it rested just beneath her belly button. His hand held it there, her dress staining with the melting water, as he nudged her hips up onto the table. He spread her knees apart and leaned forward until his pelvis and hers rubbed together, separated only by several thin layers of fabric.

  Then he moved his hand down even lower.

  In the end it was Cassie who had ripped the dress open, buttons showering them from every direction.

  Drake took his victory drink and tortured her with it. He squeezed drops of lemon over her lips and chin, his tongue dancing over her skin, tasting the refreshing tartness. He sipped lemonade from the notch above her sternum, slurped it from her belly button, sucked it from her breasts, all the while using his fingers to bring her to climax after climax.

  Afterwards, Cassie remembered sitting naked, sewing buttons back on her dress, all thirty-six minus two lost forever, while he sketched her. The perfect summer day.

  Now Cassie bounded down the steps from Drake's apartment, the memory of that lazy Sunday warming her. She lowered her head and sniffed at the fabric of her dress, disappointed to smell only laundry detergent. No hint of lemons or heat or passion. But still, every time the cloth caressed her skin, she felt Drake's hands. As if he was there with her, protecting her, helping her get through this ordeal.

  Even if he wasn't.

  Reality hit her as she punched the alarm code into the new system. That was the nice thing about fantasies. They wouldn't let you down like real people so often did.

  It wasn't Drake's fault. He didn't even know she had the deposition today. Or what was going on with
Mary's case.

  Because he hadn't given her the chance to tell him. If he really did love her like he said he did, he'd be here when she needed him. Good thing she didn't need him, Cassie told herself as she stepped into the parking lot. Good thing she wasn't in love with him.

  Just a bad case of hormones run amuck. That's all her and Drake were. And hormones she could handle.

  <><><>

  Drake hauled his bag out to the Mustang, still confused by his discussion with his mother. Could he ask Hart? It was the worst time possible.

  Yet images of her face laughing, beaming, hell, even crying tears of joy in answer to his proposal filled his mind. Irresistible future gems of emotion he yearned to experience in real life.

  He was so engrossed in fantasy he didn't hear Muriel call his name until she stood right beside him. "Remy."

  "Sorry, Mom. What did you say?"

  "I said be careful." She hugged him tight, so tight he lost his breath, surprised such a small person could squeeze so hard. Then she broke away, wiping her eyes with her knuckles.

  "And take this." She thrust a tiny black velvet box at him. One side was worn down to gray cardboard. "Your father used to rub it like a good luck charm. Took him three months of carrying it around before he worked up the courage to ask."

  He opened the lid. Her sapphire engagement ring sparked in the morning sun.

  She laid her hand on his and squeezed the lid shut again. "Don't you make Hart wait that long. She's not one to wait, Remy. You ask her."

  "When? How?" Surely not while he was being stalked by some psycho-nut who wanted him dead.

  "You'll know when the time is right." He must have looked worried because she reached her fingers to his brow, soothing it just like when he was a little boy. Only now she had to stand on tiptoe to do it. "You'll know." She kissed his cheek and returned to the house.

  Drake slid the tiny box into his pocket. It felt warm, solid. Just like Hart. He drove away, his mind buzzing with possibilities, Hart at the center of them all.