Because of Joe

by Because Of Joe [Contemporary Rom. ] (lit)

  Rags. Tell's arms flexed involuntarily when he thought of her, and he wanted to hold her again. He wanted to breathe in her sweet, warm scent and go to the wild place with her. That place where there was no pain or sorrow or recriminations. That place where, whether they said it or not, they still loved each other.

  He needed, Tell admitted to himself on this night of his father's funeral, to give and receive love. Not just in word or thought and not just in the shared devotion with his children. He needed to make love with the only person he'd ever truly made love with.

  He needed Rags.

  She stood on the beach beyond the deck, silhouetted against the silver-black sky. She was wearing the shorts and tee shirt she'd thrown on the minute the last guest left that afternoon, and the clothes looked as weary as she did, hanging listlessly on her body.

  As he watched, she put her hands on her lower back and pushed inward, making her body into a smooth curve broken only by the thrust of her breasts against her shirt.

  Tell's physical response was immediate, but no more so than his emotional one. The knowledge was as intense and certain as it had been that day he walked across the churchyard to the girl trying to get out of the hammock and announced his intentions of marrying her. He'd gone instantly from being a jock business major on the make to being a young man in love.

  He wasn't young any more, and his only claim to jockdom was a decent handicap on the golf course. The business major that had helped him succeed in Maguire Industries wouldn't mean diddly in whatever his new life turned out to be.

  On the beach, Rags let her hands drop from her back and stood still again, her face lifted to the dark sky.

  One of Joe's cameras lay on the table behind Tell, and he picked it up. It was an old Nikon, one he'd given Joe for high school graduation six years ago.

  It fit Tell's hands as comfortably as the ancient one he'd consigned to the Salvation Army box and Joe had dragged out. He looked it over, checked and changed its settings, and held it up to his eye. God, it was like seeing his dreams come back to life. He'd wanted, before he married the girl in the hammock, to be the photojournalist his son had become. But he'd known the life Rags wanted didn't include the building of a career that might or might not be successful.

  He'd gone to work at Maguire Industries without a whimper, putting away his camera the way he had his letter jacket and the trophies he'd earned in sports.

  Opening the French doors, he stepped onto the deck, silent in his bare feet, and lifted the Nikon.

  Once he started, he didn't stop. Even when Rags lifted her head at the sound of the clicking shutter, he kept moving and snapping pictures.

  "No," he said once, "not like that. Reach up and muss your hair. Let's see sexy at forty-two."

  When she laughed, he took pictures of that, too.

  "Walk away from me," he ordered.

  "No."

  "Aw, come on, old lady. What kind of model are you?" He grinned at her, but she wasn't smiling.

  "I walked away once, and will do it again when this" -she raised her arms to include the house and all that happened within, and he clicked the shutter again- "is over. But not right now."

  The words "not right now" sang in his ears. He grinned again. "Okay," he said. "Walk toward me."

  She did, her gaze direct and slumberous at the same time, what his mother would have termed "come hither." Tell took the last picture on the roll and lowered the camera.

  And went hither.

  ~*~

  "I do believe," Joe drawled, "that we could whip the pants off Mama and Dad at Trivial Pursuit, as long as it's not the Baby Boomer one."

  "Joey," said Micah patiently, "how many times do you have to be told not to talk dirty around Ben?"

  Ben, walking past his younger brother, set down the glass he was carrying and caught Micah in a headlock. "How long has it been since we've beaten you into submission? We could still do it, you know." He scrubbed his knuckles over the top of Micah's head.

  "Excuse me, children." Ellis Ann's soft voice stopped them, as it always had. "I know it's been a very long few days," she said on a quiet sigh, "but since some of you are leaving tomorrow, I wanted you to know the contents of your grandfather's will. You can stay, Abby, my dear. Sit down, Joseph."

  When Rags stood and Sam and Joyce started for the door, Ellis Ann stopped them with a frown. And so they all sat, obediently quiet, as she read from the papers in her hand.

  Tell felt his chest tighten with dread. Was this where the old man tied his grandchildren to Maguire Industries with unwanted board positions? Where he forced Tell back into the company with the carefully worded threat that the livelihood of over five hundred employees depended on him? Where even after death he treated Joe as an unwanted bastard?

  "This isn't the actual document," Ellis Ann began. "That's so long and involved I can't begin to understand it, with all those 'heretos' and 'therefores,' so Harlan dictated this letter."

  Tell exchanged wry grins with Rags. They both knew Ellis Ann understood every last word of any complicated document.

  But this one wasn't complicated. The bulk of Harlan's private estate went to Ellis Ann, with numerous bequests to charities and servants. The children, including Joe, were left trust funds equal in size, with no stipulations concerning their use.

  Sam received the paid-off mortgage to the house he and Joyce shared, along with the testy suggestion he attend medical school and enough money to do so.

  To Rags went the deed to the beachfront property next door to Tell's house. She could build there, said Harlan's letter, or set up a tent, or just sit on it like some beachcomber. However, he didn't think she should put up one of those used clothing stores.

  But it was to his son that Harlan left the best gift of all.

  Tell received the controlling interest in Maguire Industries with the stipulation that the company be sold.

  "'You have given over twenty years of your life to the company,'" Ellis Ann read. "'It has, in all likelihood, cost you your marriage and threatened your health. While your mother and I appreciate your sacrifices, I have come to understand that their price is greater than their worth. I don't want you to end up with your children feeling about you the way you do about me.'"

  It seemed as though the words washed over Tell, dribbling into his consciousness one-by-one until he finally understood.

  He was free. For the first time in his life, no one expected anything of him. He could sit on the beach if he chose, or buy a motor home and travel around the country taking pictures, or get a job sacking groceries down at the Winn-Dixie.

  From her seat beside Ellis Ann, Rags was watching him. He felt her gaze on his skin even though he didn't raise his eyes to meet hers. He knew if he looked at her, he wouldn't feel free any more.

  Rags saw him leave her as certainly as if he'd walked out of the room. She almost lifted a hand in silent entreaty. We've just found each other. But only her heart said the words. Her lips formed themselves into a smile. It was her professional smile, the one she wore when she was being the boss at Glad Rags or a committee chair at chamber of commerce meetings. She'd practiced it in front of the mirror until she had it right.

  "Real good and cold," Linda had said. "And no one can see behind it."

  That had been the idea, and it had worked. But it wasn't working now. She could feel the corners of her mouth beginning to tremble, her lower lip threatening to rise into a pout. Any second now, she would sniffle and make a complete fool of herself.

  "Rags, would you give me an arm up the stairs?"

  Ellis Ann's request came just in time.

  After kissing the older woman's papery cheek, Rags went to bed, too, propping herself against the pillows to read.

  An hour later, when the house was silent and dark around her, she acknowledged ruefully that two nights in bed with Tell Maguire had ruined her for sleeping alone. She would have to learn, as she had eleven years earlier, just how to place the spare pillow at her back so tha
t the other half of the bed didn't seem so large and lonely.

  She knew what Harlan's legacy to his only son meant. The old man's letter had sprung the final trap. Now Tell was as free of Maguire Industries as she was of Glad Rags. The last leash that held him to his old life had been untied.

  Even though it made her ache and miss him all over again, she was glad for Tell, happy he would be able to pursue whatever dream called him. If the aching part of her regretted that he considered her part of his old life...well, she'd just have to get used to it.

  Chapter Eight

  Exactly what did one do when one didn't have any responsibilities?

  As she waxed a kitchen floor that didn't need waxing, Rags wondered what Tell was doing with his freedom. She doubted if he was volunteering at the library and blood bank the way she was. And he probably wasn't playing cards at the senior center with retired people who cheated outrageously and taught him to do the same. She didn't think he was cleaning house, either, especially not a house that was already disgustingly clean.

  He was, without doubt, obsessing about Joe's health to the same extent she was. That certainty made the fear that was her constant companion seem less overwhelming.

  She worked herself into a corner and gave a dismayed look at the shining expanse of tile between her and any avenue of escape. What had she been thinking?

  Well, she knew the answer to that. She'd been thinking about Tell just as though she were once again a wide-eyed VISTA volunteer in love for the first time.

  At least, she could reach the coffeepot and the telephone. She did both, touching the memory dial buttons that would connect her with her three younger children, none of whom answered their phones.

  Fatalistically, she tried Joe's number, receiving the expected message: "Hey, I'm not here and don't know when I'll be back. You can leave a message if you like, but no guarantees on when I'll return your call. Have a good one."

  She really wished at least some of them would get cell phones.

  Ellis Ann was home, but on her way out the door to play bridge. Linda was in Europe. David Miles was a part of the past. Rags had other friends, but most of them had jobs and husbands or significant others to fill their time. A few were still doing the bleachers thing with their teenage children. She pushed back a stab of longing for those days in her own life, when the house was never empty, never silent, never too clean.

  She laid the cordless receiver in her lap and reached for her cup. Maybe it wouldn't hurt to phone Tell. It wasn't as though their parting six weeks ago had been angry. Regretful, maybe, but not angry. Their farewell kiss at the airport had drawn whistles from onlookers.

  That was when she realized she didn't know his phone number.

  The thought gave her pause. How could she have even considered having a relationship with a man who hadn't taken the trouble to give her his unlisted number?

  The floor was dry in patches and she was twenty minutes into feeling good and sorry for herself when the knock came at the back door. Startled, she dribbled coffee down the front of her sweatshirt and stared at the door for a moment before yelling, "You can open the door, but don't come in." It was probably the UPS man with the things she'd ordered for Marley's Christmas. She'd tell him to leave them on the porch.

  But no brown uniform filled her expectant gaze.

  "You shouldn't tell people to come in when you don't know who they are," said Tell.

  "I didn't tell you to come in. I said you could open the door." Oh, Lord, he looked even more wonderful than he had that first night at the airport in Pensacola. Freedom must be better for him than it was for her. "What are you doing here?"

  "You didn't leave me your phone number and Mama wouldn't give it to me."

  Oh. He wasn't the only one with an unlisted number.

  "You could have asked the kids," she said.

  "No, I couldn't. We've never done that, never made them pass messages. I didn't see any reason to start now. Besides, they never answer their phones."

  She lifted the receiver from her lap. "I know," she said ruefully. "Have you heard from Joe?"

  "A couple of times. He's doing better, he says. May I come in?"

  "No. The floor's not dry yet." She met his eyes and felt her own begin to burn. "I got the results of the compatibility tests. I don't match at all. Neither do the twins."

  Oh, the relief of getting those words out to the one person who understood how much they hurt. She'd been so hopeful her kidneys would match Joe's.

  "Ben or Abby, either," he said, his voice curiously without expression. He leaned against the doorframe, his arms crossed over his chest.

  Defeat settled into her soul, too deep even for tears. "So we have to wait for someone to die who matches him."

  "No."

  The meaning of his answer was immediately obvious. "Tell, you can't. What about your heart?" She heard the panic in her voice and didn't care.

  She came to her feet as she spoke, the receiver dropping to the floor, and moved toward Tell at a run. Her bare feet hit one of the still-wet spots and she skidded. When he grabbed for her, they both went down.

  He gained purchase with the heels of his tennis shoes and scooted to where he could lean his back against the wall, hauling her with him. "You should know by now," he drawled, settling in with her held firmly in his arms, "that there are easier ways than this to sweep me off my feet."

  "Tell, you can't," she repeated, rubbing her hip where it had hit the floor.

  He pushed her hand aside to massage the sore place. "Yes, I can. The match was nearly perfect."

  "But you could-" She stopped, unable to finish the thought. She tried to concentrate on the warmth of his hand on her hip, on the way his other hand rested lazily between her breasts, but couldn't. All she could think was-

  "I could die," he said quietly. "Anybody can die having surgery. They even tell you that when you're having a hangnail removed, but chances are real good that I won't. Joyce gave me a clean bill of health, then sent me to my cardiologist so he could do the same thing."

  "You're sure?"

  "Cross my heart and hope to die." He grinned down into her face.

  "That's a real comforting way of putting it." But she smiled back, cheered in spite of herself.

  "But that's not why I'm here," he said briskly. "He's still refusing the surgery, so we haven't won that battle yet anyway."

  "So why are you here?" she asked.

  "To take pictures. Joe has an assignment on the colors of autumn. He's in New England, and since he can't be two places at once and Micah can't take time away from school right now, he asked me to shoot the Midwest." Still holding her, he leaned over to pick up the manila envelope he'd dropped when he lunged to catch her. "He developed these."

  She pulled the pictures out of the envelope. The top one was an image of herself on the beach with her arms in the air. "Oh." She started to push them back in. "I don't like looking at myself."

  "Then don't." He stopped the movement of her hands. "Pretend they're someone else and tell me what you think."

  "All right, but let's get up first. I've spent entirely too much time on this floor today."

  While she sat at the table and looked at pictures, he roamed the kitchen, opening and closing cupboard doors and drawers, peering into the side-by-side refrigerator, and leaning over the sink to stare out at the sycamore and cottonwood and willow trees in the side yard. He stopped mid-circuit to look with consternation at the philodendron that completely covered a tabletop and hung over the sides in jungle-like profusion.

  "If you're hungry," she said absently, looking through the pictures for the second time, "there's some vegetable soup."

  "Okay."

  She was still looking when a bowl of soup and a glass of sweet tea appeared before her. She looked up, meeting the blue gaze across from her. For a moment, she was tempted to tease, to shrug off the photographs as nothing, but the expectancy in his eyes stopped her. She didn't know why, but this was important.
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  "They're wonderful," she said. "Pictures of me are always flat and one-dimensional-you know that-but you've made me look the way I wish I really did. No one but Joe's ever done that."

  "When he came back from developing them, he damn near threw them at me. He was that pissed." Tell's gaze had gone far away, but pleasure laced his voice. "'Why didn't I ever know you could do this?' he said. 'How could you have wasted it all these years?'"

  "What did you tell him?" She laid down her spoon and sat erect.

  "That there were choices to be made and I wasn't unhappy with what I'd chosen. I could have done far worse things with my life than help raise four smart-ass kids."

  "But you didn't choose it," she said. "Your father expected you to run the business and I did, too. Even though I hated what I thought it did to us, I'd have gone into cardiac arrest or something if you'd suggested you do something else for a living. How could we possibly have a perfect family otherwise? After all, if you'd done what you really wanted, we might not have been able to live where we lived." She gave a self-mocking shudder. "Good heavens, I might have had to drive my minivan three years instead of two. Those were my choices, Tell, not yours." She sipped her tea, but the sweet liquid tasted bitter on her tongue. "Maybe if I hadn't been so insistent, you'd have spent the last twenty-some years as a-"

  He interrupted her with a raised hand and a softly spoken word. "Whoa."

  "But-"

  "Old lady."

  She subsided. "What?"

  "Rags, believe it or not, I'm responsible for my own choices, just like we spent twenty years telling the kids they were. I didn't hate Maguire Industries, even if I did hate what we allowed it to do to our lives as much as you did. You didn't force me into working there. Even my father didn't, though it seemed like it. I was a grownup, for God's sake."

  "All right," she agreed grudgingly, somewhat resentful that he was shooting holes into her self-imposed martyrdom. "But I still say-Tell, why are you here?"

  "To take you to dinner."

  He grinned at her, and she felt her heart do a slow, complete flip in her chest. God, how could he make her feel the same way as he had when she was too young to know better? It wasn't fair. It was as though the eleven years she'd spent not loving Tell had gone right out the window and gotten lost in the floppy willow limbs.