by Karen Young
“Well—”
“I thought not.” She laughed harshly. “Well, somebody asked me. Just today, as a matter of fact. And she’s probably the first of many.”
“Who? Who was it?”
“Would you believe Joan Gonzales? Your opponent’s wife, Jake. At the supermarket yet. In front of all of Tidewater.”
“I’m so sorry.” Pain shot through him and he raked a hand through his hair. “What happened?”
“We were—”
“We?”
“Michael and me.”
He closed his eyes, prepared for the worst.
“The woman’s curiosity is exceeded only by her gall,” Rachel muttered angrily.
“What did she do? Did she say anything to hurt Mike?” When she just looked at him, he saw that Rachel believed his concern had been only for Michael. The feeling that he was treading dangerous ground intensified. “Tell me,” he said bleakly.
“I managed to deal with her. And you can relax. Michael seemed to take it all in stride. She demanded an introduction, of course.”
“What did you do?”
“I introduced him, Jake. I told her the truth, as much as she needed to know.” She turned and began fussing again with the plant. “What did you expect?”
“I’m sorry, Rachel. I know how Joan is. She must have taken delight in finally getting to you.”
She glanced up at him. “What do you mean by that?”
“She’s always been jealous of you.”
“Whatever for?”
“Because you’re well liked and respected, you have countless friends and important family connections, you’re involved in a dozen things that she only wishes she could do and you’re gracious and lovely and very much a lady.”
She stared at him, speechless.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
She shook her head. “Aren’t you describing my sisters?”
“No! I’m describing my wife.”
“I…I don’t think of myself like that. And I never knew you did, either.”
“Then I’ve been a fool for not saying so. You’re all those things and more, Rachel.” He started to touch her, longed to, but pulled back at the look in her eyes. “I hate it that I’ve put you in a position to take heat from people like Joan. I hope you explained to Michael that she wasn’t worth losing any sleep over.” Rachel nodded.
“I know she’s a pain. She’ll probably blab this all over the county and enjoy doing it. J.B.’s been looking for something to use against me.”
“Well, he’s got it,” Rachel said bitterly. “What better weapon than an illegitimate child?”
He flinched inwardly, knowing her words to be true. “The best way to scotch the rumors is for us to show a united front, Rachel.” He did touch her then. He caught her arm to keep her from turning away from him. “When we’re alone together, you can punish me as much as you want, but by going to the rally and giving the appearance of having accepted Michael, you make it tough for J.B. to get much mileage out of this.” Unconsciously he stroked the soft skin inside her elbow with his thumb. “Won’t you at least think about it?”
She refused to look at him. “All those people…whispering, snickering, speculating.” She shuddered. “I hate it! You know I do.”
It’s me she hates. Jake ached with the pain of it but could see no alternative. That is, if he wanted to keep his position as sheriff. Rachel had never been entirely comfortable in the spotlight of a politician’s wife, but for his sake she’d accepted it. Only those closest to her realized how truly introverted she was. He let out a long breath. He wished he could tell her he wouldn’t run this time, but he couldn’t do that. In his job he had complete access to the system, and that was the surest way to locate a missing child. If he was an ordinary man in the street, those doors would be closed to him. He had to run again.
“I’ll make it up to you, Rachel,” he said quietly. “I don’t know how, but I will.”
“You can make it up to me by finding Scotty.”
He clenched his jaw. “Do you think I’m not trying my best?”
“I don’t know anymore.”
He tightened his hand on her arm so that she was forced to look at him. “What is that supposed to mean?”
She twisted loose. “You have Michael now. It’s not the same for you!”
For a second or two, he was so angry he couldn’t speak. “You think my loving Michael somehow diminishes the love I have for our son?”
“No…not exactly.” Rachel unconsciously rubbed the spot on her arm where Jake’s fingers had been, but she wouldn’t look at him. “I just think having Michael in your life has helped to fill the void for you. I sometimes wonder if you have the same incentive to search for Scotty now that Michael’s here.”
For a moment Jake simply looked at her. When he finally spoke, his voice vibrated. “I’m going to overlook what you just said, Rachel. I know your grief has been almost unbearable. I know Scotty means more to you than anybody in the world.” The thought had been with him a long time although he’d never said it. “But if you ever—I repeat, Rachel—if you ever dare insinuate that I wouldn’t give my life to have Scotty back, that I’m not making every conceivable effort to try to find my boy, then you won’t have to put up with me another day, because I’ll walk out myself. This marriage, our relationship, everything we’ve ever shared will be history, Rachel.”
She stared at him rebelliously, both of them caught in the taut pain of the moment. Faint sounds came from the pool. Nearby a car door closed. The neighbor’s big dog woofed softly. They stood still, oblivious to everything. Then, with a choked sound, Rachel brushed past Jake and ran.
Left alone, Jake released the breath he’d been holding and felt his rage fade with it. He’d probably screwed up beyond redemption. Closing his eyes, he pressed his fingers deep into his eye sockets. A sound escaped him, like a fatally wounded animal.
From the very beginning of their relationship, Rachel had evoked his most protective instincts. There was something about her that was so sensitive, so vulnerable, that it touched the best and deepest part of him. For eighteen years he had taken intense, masculine pleasure in caring for her, in running interference for her. To the best of his ability, he had always tried to see that life’s harshest realities didn’t touch his Rachel. A knife through his heart couldn’t hurt him any more than Rachel’s belief that he would shortchange their son.
He looked at a sky devoid of stars and whispered her name in a tortured voice. “What are we doing to each other?”
“OKAY, WHAT’S THE party line?” Suzanne demanded, leaning forward to take a tall glass of iced tea from Rachel. “I’ve been fending off the most intrusive questions, sweetie, but sooner or later we’re going to have to give. So, what’s it to be?”
Liz, Rachel’s oldest sister, took her glass from the tray Rachel held. “Suzy’s right, Rachel. All this speculation is terrible for Jake’s image. Better to hammer out a story right up front, seize the initiative before J.B.’s people can do too much damage.”
Rachel smothered a sigh and sat down. “You sound like a lawyer, Liz.”
“I am a lawyer, Rachel, and I’m also Jake’s campaign manager. It’s my job to get down and dirty, but better me than some stranger at the five-and-dime.”
“She’s right, Rach,” Suzanne said. “In my job, I have my finger on the pulse of this town, too. Jake’s name is up. Things could get really awkward.”
Rachel picked up her sunglasses and put them on. Dark lenses were a frail barrier to the kind of grilling she was going to get from her sisters, but it was the only protection she had. They both knew her so well. Which was the reason she’d been avoiding them. She’d known they’d want details as soon as they heard about Michael. With their considerable political savvy, they had quickly realized the potential for disaster Michael’s sudden appearance represented to Jake’s campaign. They were sure to be full of advice for Rachel on managing the crisis.
As the youngest, she had grown up trying to fend off her sisters’ well-meaning attempts to manage her life. Besides running smooth households, they each managed high-powered jobs with ease. Neither had ever been satisfied watching Rachel devote herself to a life devoid of any real career. Rachel was so different from them that she sometimes wondered if she had been born with a missing gene. They meant well, but she was struggling to run her own life now.
Suzanne cleared her throat. “Rachel?”
“Why is everybody so concerned about the effect of this on Jake’s campaign?” she asked, looking from one to the other. She knew what she was going to say would shock them. “Why are both of you tiptoeing around the obvious fact of Jake’s infidelity? He had an affair! What about the effect on me? What about the effect on my marriage?”
For once, neither of her sisters had a ready comeback. They stared at her, their faces mirroring their distress. Seeing their discomfiture gave Rachel an odd feeling. It wasn’t often she found the grit to withstand their combined strength.
“Oh, Rachel,” Suzanne murmured.
“You’re going to have to let it go,” Liz said.
But Rachel wasn’t ready to let it go. “What if I don’t feel particularly concerned about Jake’s campaign and what people will say? What if I don’t want to hammer out a party line? What if right now I don’t give a fig about Jake McAdam?”
There was a moment of shocked silence. Then Suzanne reached over and laid a hand on Rachel’s knee. “You don’t mean that, honey.”
“I do mean it.”
Liz spoke. “You’re ticked off, naturally. That’s understandable. But it—”
“Ticked off?” Rachel stood up abruptly. “Ticked off is how you feel when somebody cuts in the line ahead of you, Liz. Ticked off is when you get the wrong stuff on the pizza you ordered. The way I see it, when your husband has an affair that results in a real, live child, ticked off isn’t quite strong enough. Do you think you’d feel ticked off if Cliff’s fourteen-year-old son suddenly showed up on your doorstep?”
Cliff was Liz’s husband of twenty years. “I’m sorry, Rachel. It was stupid of me—”
“It was stupid of both of us,” Suzanne broke in quickly. “We shouldn’t have mentioned this at all until you brought it up yourself, Rach, if and when you decided to. You’re right, of course. If Liz or I discovered that Cliff or Alan had been unfaithful, no matter what the circumstances, we’d both be out for blood.”
Rachel bent her head and pressed on the bridge of her sunglasses with her forefinger. “I know the whole town is buzzing over this. I know Jake’s campaign is jeopardized because of it. I know I ought to be thinking about what to say in public, but frankly, as things stand now, what the public thinks is pretty low on my list. My life has been turned upside down. The voters of Tidewater will just have to wait to hear the sordid details!”
If she’d suddenly stripped in a public place, her sisters wouldn’t have been more surprised at her outburst, she realized. Liz, with the most at stake as Jake’s campaign manager, frowned then busied herself pouring more iced tea. Suzanne anxiously patted the chair Rachel had just vacated.
“Come and sit down again, Rach. Forget the wagging tongues of Tidewater…and I’m including Liz and me in that number. Besides, we’ll think of something if we’re put on the spot, right, Liz? In the meantime,” she said in a more sympathetic tone, “tell us about Michael. You can do that, can’t you?”
“He’s like Jake,” Rachel said, sitting down. Her eyes clouded. “Actually, he’s more like Jake than…than Scotty is. His eyes are the same gray, his hair’s the same, he has an identical birthmark…”
She took a drink, forcing the cold liquid past the knot in her throat.
Suzanne studied her over the rim of her glass. “Then there’s no doubt about his paternity?”
Liz was the one who answered. “Although Jake believed him from the beginning, naturally he had me run a check.”
Rachel set her glass down. “He’s had a hard life,” she said, feeling compelled to defend Michael. “Striking out on his own in search of his natural father was a big step for a fourteen-year-old, but he did it. He must have had a few bad moments, but he managed. He’s tough. I guess he’s had to be.” She paused a minute before adding, “Actually, he’s a nice kid.”
“Where has he been all these years?” Suzanne asked.
“In Iowa, with his grandmother.”
“What about his mother?”
“Dead.”
For a time, their palpable curiosity hung in the air. Rachel knew they wanted to know about the affair, but she simply wasn’t ready to talk about it, even to her sisters. Other people were going to be watching her, too, speculating, gauging her reaction. She knew very well that her reaction could mean the difference between public acceptance or condemnation—Jake’s fall from grace. During his years as a public figure, he had been remarkably free of scandal. He was known by his constituents, his friends and his family as rock steady and dependable, a man of integrity and honesty. Surely his reputation was strong enough to weather worse than this, she told herself.
Because until she managed to work through her own tangled emotions, Rachel honestly didn’t think she would be much help to him.
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE NIGHT of the chamber rally came all too soon for Rachel. She went with Jake, of course, and played the role expected of her. If her smile seemed a little fixed, no one noticed. Jake’s expression was almost equally strained, but she was probably one of the few people who knew him well enough to see it. As a man who was often in the limelight, he was practiced in masking his feelings. She watched from the door of the ladies’ lounge as he chatted with Tidewater’s mayor and Jerry Lowe, the president of the chamber, who’d organized the rally. As though sensing her gaze, Jake looked at her over the mayor’s balding head. Their eyes met for a second or two before his attention was reclaimed by Jerry.
She made her way through the crowd searching for a friendly—genuinely friendly—face, excluding blood relatives. It was no accident that every member of her family was in attendance. Every one of them was aware that this event would be difficult for her, and they’d been especially attentive, as though she were a child. What was it about her that made people want to run interference for her? she wondered irritably.
A crush of couples headed for the dance floor as the lead singer of the band, a local country-and-western group, launched into “I’m Proud to Be an American.” Someone backed blindly into Rachel, then laughingly apologized. One of Jake’s deputies asked her to dance. She flashed a bright smile and refused, glancing at her watch to see how soon they could decently leave. Until then, the next best thing was a breath of fresh air and a moment or two of peace and quiet.
She changed direction abruptly, making a beeline for the patio doors. A few others had the same idea, but for the most part the crowd was content to stay inside where the bar was open, the talk friendly and the music loud. “Rachel!”
Someone caught her just before she managed to slip through the door. She glanced up at Ron Campbell’s ready smile and relaxed slightly. “Oh, hi, Ron. I didn’t see you earlier. Were you held up at the hospital?”
He gave her arm an intimate squeeze. “I’ve been right here. It’s tough trying to get a word with you, lady. Every time I got close, Jake whisked you away.” He grinned engagingly. “When I saw you heading in this direction, I grabbed my chance. Come on, let’s get out of this madhouse.”
Rachel hesitated briefly, then allowed herself to be drawn outside and across the patio. She did dislike this kind of event, but she hadn’t been aware that it showed. As the sounds inside the hall faded, she drew a relieved breath. “At last, peace and quiet.”
Ron laughed. “I’m telling you! Another decibel and the chamber’ll have to spring for earplugs for that crowd.”
“I know what you mean. I always thought of country-and-western music as mellow, laid-back stuff. But tonight it’s like a f
eeding frenzy at the zoo. I was more than ready for a break.”
He slid his hand down her arm to her hand and squeezed it. “Then I’m glad I happened along to enjoy it with you.”
In the sudden quiet, his tone had an intimate sound. Rachel gently withdrew her fingers. Glancing around, she found that he’d led them to a particularly secluded area of the grounds. With a soft sigh, she sank onto the garden bench, and Ron sat down beside her. For a moment, she hesitated. It had been a long time since she had been alone with a man like this. Probably not since she’d been married. Certainly not since Jake had been sheriff. People were quick to judge, so she was always extremely careful to avoid even the appearance of impropriety. Tonight she felt oddly indifferent to what people might think.
Ron watched her, a small smile playing at his mouth. “You must be used to this kind of thing, being a veteran campaigner.”
She plucked a leaf from a gardenia growing close to the bench. “I don’t think I’ll ever be used to crowds and noise and nosy people.” Even as she spoke the words, she couldn’t believe she’d said them. As a politician’s wife, discretion was as necessary as smiling. What was happening to her?
“Sort of like living in a goldfish bowl, hmm?”
“Sort of. Fortunately the noise and crowds subside somewhat after the election.”
“But you’re still in the goldfish bowl.”
“Unfortunately.”
He shifted slightly, lifting his arm and bringing it down to rest on the back of the bench. The maneuver was casual, but Rachel was acutely aware of it. If someone should see them…
“We’ve been friends a long time, Rachel,” he said softly. “If you ever need anybody, you know you can talk to me.”
“If she needs anybody, she has me.”
Jake’s voice was like cold steel slicing into the conversation. Startled, Rachel almost jumped to her feet, but caught herself just in time. She wasn’t guilty of anything! Ron, however, did rise. As he looked into Jake’s face, his expression was wary.