LED ASTRAY

by Sandra Brown

  * * *

  Jenny had learned not to fight the swaying motion of the bus, but to let her body rock with it. It had become almost lulling. The sheer monotony of it was soothing, and it kept her mind off her future.

  What future?

  She had none.

  The Hendrens had made their feelings plain. She was a Jez­ebel who had tempted their sainted son, who had tried to lure him away from his life's calling by getting herself pregnant by him.

  Stinging tears filled her eyes, but she wouldn't submit to them. She closed her eyes and laid her head on the seat cush­ion behind her, wishing she could sleep. But that was impos­sible. Her mind was in turmoil and the passengers around her were becoming increasingly restless and vocal.

  "Would you look at that."

  "A maniac."

  "Does our driver see him?"

  "What does he think this is, the Indy Five Hundred?"

  Curious as to what had captured their attention, Jenny peered through the window. She saw nothing but her own reflection in the glass and a stygian blackness beyond it. Then she saw the sports car skid alongside the bus, coming danger­ously close to the oversized wheels.

  "A madman for sure," Jenny heard someone mutter just as her eyes went wide and her mouth went slack with recognition.

  "Oh, no," she breathed.

  Suddenly the bus gave a lurch as the driver applied the brakes and steered it to the shoulder of the highway. "Ladies and gentlemen," he said into the microphone mounted near the steering wheel, "I'm sorry for this delay, but I'm making an unscheduled stop. This is obviously a drunk driver who's intent on running us off the road. I'll try to reason with him before he kills us all. Stay calm. We'll be on our way again shortly."

  Several passengers leaned forward in their seats to see bet­ter. Jenny scrunched down in hers, her heart pounding. The driver pushed open the automatic door of the bus and made to leave his chair. Before he could, however, the "madman" bounded inside.

  "Please, mister," the driver pleaded, obviously concerned for the safety of his passengers. He patted the air in front of him with raised hands. "We're just innocent folks and—"

  "Relax. I'm not a robber. I'm not going to hurt anybody. I'm just going to relieve you of one of your passengers."

  Cage's eyes were busily scanning the passengers. Jenny sat quiet and still in her seat. He began making his way down the aisle. "Sorry for this inconvenience," he said in friendly fash­ion to the passengers, who eyed him warily. "This will only take a minute, I promise." When he spotted his quarry, he stopped in the aisle and sighed with relief. "Get your things, Jenny. You're coming back with me."

  "No, I'm not, Cage. I explained it all to you in a letter. I mailed it just before I left. You shouldn't have come after me."

  "Well, I did, and I didn't make the trip for nothing. Now come on."

  "No."

  They had everyone's attention.

  Aggravated with her the way a parent is with a lost child when he's found, he put his hands on his hips. "All right. If you want to air the dirty laundry in front of all these nice people, it's fine with me, but you'd better think about it before we get down to the juicy details."

  Jenny's eyes skittered around the other passengers, who were looking at her with open curiosity. "What'd she do, mama?" a little girl piped up. "Was it bad?"

  "What's it going to be, Jenny?"

  "You don't have to go anywhere with him, miss," the driver said gallantly from behind Cage. It wasn't going to be said that he had let a wife-beater haul his hapless victim off his bus.

  Jenny looked at Cage. His jaw was set. His eyes were glow­ing like yellow flame. He seemed as immovable as the Rock of Gibraltar. He wouldn't relent, and she didn't want to be held responsible for a brawl aboard a Greyhound bus.

  "Oh, all right. I'll go." She edged into the aisle after re­trieving her small suitcase. "I have another bag in the luggage compartment," she told the driver softly, aware that every eye in the bus was focused on her.

  The three of them stepped outside and the driver opened the luggage compartment beneath the bus. As he handed over her suitcase, he asked, "You're sure you want to go with him? He's not going to hurt you, is he?"

  She smiled at him reassuringly. "No, no. It's nothing like that. He's not going to hurt me."

  After shooting Cage a fulminating look and mumbling something about maniacal speedsters, he climbed back aboard his bus. A moment later it lumbered onto the highway, its passengers craning their necks in the windows to see the two people left behind.

  Stiffly Jenny turned to face Cage. She dropped her suitcases with an emphatic plop. "Well, that was quite a stunt, Mr. Hendren. Just what did you expect to gain by it?"

  "Just what I did. To get you off that bus and stop you from running away like a scared rabbit."

  "Well, maybe that's what I am," she cried, giving vent to the tears that had been welling up since the scene in the par­sonage.

  "What did you have in mind, Jenny? Running to Dallas and having an abortion?"

  Her hands knotted into fists. "That's a despicable thing to even suggest."

  "What then? What was your intention? Were you going to have the baby and give it away?"

  "No!"

  "Hide it?" He stepped forward. How she answered the next question was of utmost importance to him. "Don't you want the baby, Jenny? Are you ashamed of it?"

  "No, no," she groaned, covering her stomach with both hands. "Of course I want it. I love it already."

  Cage's shoulders slumped with relief, but his voice still had an angry edge to it. "Then why were you running scared?"

  "I didn't know what else to do. Your parents made it ob­vious they didn't want me around any longer."

  "So?"

  "So?" She jerked her arm in the direction the bus had just taken. "Not everyone is brave enough or crazy enough to come chasing after a Greyhound bus. Or drive ninety miles an hour down the highway on a motorcycle. I can't be like you, Cage. You don't give a damn what people think about you. You please yourself." She splayed her hands wide over her chest. "I'm not like that. I do care what people think. And I am scared."

  "Of what?" he asked, thrusting his chin out belligerently. "Of a town full of petty minds? How can they hurt you? What's the worst they can do to you? Gossip about you? Scorn you? So what? You're better off without the people who would do that.

  "Are you afraid of besmirching Hal's name? I hate it that some righteous hypocrites will think badly of him. But Hal is dead. He'll never know. And the work he instigated will con­tinue. You've seen to that yourself by setting up that fund-raising network. For godsake, Jenny, don't be so hard on your­self. You are your own worst enemy."

  "What are you suggesting I do? Go back and work in your office?"

  "Yes."

  "Flaunt my condition?"

  "Be proud of it."

  "Have my baby knowing he'll be labeled with a dirty name all his life?"

  Cage pointed a steely finger toward her middle. "Anyone who labels that kid anything but wonderful is risking his life."

  She could almost laugh at his ferocity. "But you won't always be around to protect him. It won't be easy for this child in a small town where everyone knows his origin."

  "It won't be easy for him to grow up in a big city where his mother doesn't know anyone either. Who would you call on for help, Jenny? At least any hostile faces you encounter in La Bota will be familiar ones."

  She hated to admit how the thought of moving to another city without much money, without a job or a place to live, without friends or relatives, had terrified her.

  "Isn't it time you showed some backbone, Jenny?"

  Her head snapped up. "What do you mean by that?" she asked tightly.

  "You've been letting other people make your decisions for you since you were fourteen."

  "We had this same argument a few months ago. I tried to direct my own destiny. Look what a mess I made of it."

  He looked offended. "I thoug
ht you said the lovemaking was beautiful. You're going to have a baby as a result of it. Do you really consider that a mess?"

  She hung her head and pressed her hands to her stomach. "No. It's wonderful. I'm awed by the thought of the child. Awed and humbled by the miracle of it."

  "Then hold that thought. Come back to La Bota with me. Have that beautiful baby and thumb your nose at everybody who doesn't like it."

  "Even your parents?"

  "Their reaction tonight was a knee-jerk reflex. When they think about it, they'll come around."

  Meditatively she stared at nothing. "I suppose you're right. I can't find a future for me and the baby. I have to make one. Right?"

  He grinned and gave her the thumbs-up sign. "I couldn't have put it better myself."

  "Oh, Cage," she sighed, her arms dangling uselessly at her sides. She was suddenly sapped of energy. "Thank you once again."

  He moved toward her, his boots crunching on the gravel. Cupping her face between his hands, he whisked his thumbs over her cheekbones. "You could make this a lot easier on yourself if you'd just marry me. The baby would have a daddy and everything would be neat and nice and legal."

  "I can't, Cage."

  "Sure?"

  "Sure."

  "That's not the last time I'll ask."

  His breath was hot and sweet on her lips before they actu­ally made contact with his. He eased her face upward to his descending mouth and kissed her with gentle possessiveness.

  As before, his lips were open and moist. But unlike the other time, his tongue touched hers. Just the tip. Just enough to make her breath catch in her throat and her heart beat erratically. Just enough to make her breasts flare in instantaneous re­sponse.

  He slid the end of his tongue back and forth over hers in a lazy movement. Then he withdrew and left her wanting. When he stepped away from her and took her arm to guide her to the car, she felt chilled with the absence of his body heat.

  He stored her suitcases behind the seats of the Corvette as best he could. "The first thing on the agenda is finding you a place to live," he remarked when they were under way.

  Somehow her hand had come to rest on his thigh. "Have any ideas?" she asked vaguely.

  "You could move in with me."

  Their eyes locked across the console. His were inquiring and mischievous; hers were chastising. "Next suggestion."

  He chuckled good-naturedly. "I think I can fix something up with Roxy."

  * * *

  Chapter 8

  «^»

  "Roxy Clemmons?" Jenny asked, snatching her hand away from his thigh.

  "Yeah. Do you know her?"

  Only by reputation, Jenny thought snidely. Only by repu­tation as one of Cage's regulars. "I've heard of her." She turned her head away to gaze out the car window. Despair and disappointment tasted acrid in her mouth.

  He had kissed her with such sweet intimacy. His embrace had been warming and security-lending. She was coming to like it when he touched her, liking it even more when be kissed her. But he wasn't doing to her what he hadn't done to hun­dreds of others. His kisses might set off fireworks in her head, but that kind of passion wasn't a new experience for him. His kissing technique could have been perfected only by hours of practice.

  Was she destined to become one of Cage Hendren's "women"? Did he plan on lumping her into that sorority, actually ensconcing her under a roof where she would always be convenient to visit?

  "You don't sound very enthusiastic about the idea," he commented.

  "I don't have much choice, do I?"

  "I offered you an alternative. You rejected it."

  She sat in stony silence. She was angry and couldn't quite pinpoint why. Why should she be feeling mad and insulted? She certainly had nothing in common with that Clemmons woman. There was one major distinction between them.

  Jenny Fletcher wasn't one of Cage's women … yet.

  Had she been subconsciously harboring the thought that they would become lovers? Why? Because he had kissed her a few times? Because of the night in Monterico? Or because she had always felt an inexorable gravitation toward him? It had frightened her and she had resisted it. Until recently.

  Well, if he thought she was going to join the ranks of his other women, he had another think coming. Roxy Clemmons and so many other women were strung like beads on a thread of sexual encounters that wound through several counties. Maybe because of her fall from grace with Hal, Cage now considered her fair game. He couldn't be more mistaken.

  They didn't speak for the reminder of the trip back. The streets of town were deserted by the time they reached La Bota. Cage pulled his car into the parking lot of an apartment complex and cut the engine. "What's this?" Jenny asked.

  "Your new address, I hope. Come on." He led her up to the apartment with a discreet sign reading Manager stuck in the front yard.

  He rang the bell. Through the walls, they could hear Johnny Carson amusing his audience. When the door opened, Jenny came face to face with Roxy Clemmons. The woman looked at her with polite curiosity, then spotted Cage in the shadows. "Hiya, Cage." The smile she flashed him caused Jenny to whither inside. "What's going on?"

  "May we come in?"

  "Sure." Without reservation Roxy stood aside and held the door open for them. After she closed it, she went to the television set and turned the sound all the way down.

  "I'm sorry to bother you so late, Roxy," Cage began.

  "Hell, you know you're welcome anytime."

  Jenny's heart twisted and her gaze dropped to the floor.

  "Roxy, this is Jenny Fletcher."

  "Yeah, I know. Hi, Jenny. It's nice to meet you."

  Her open friendliness surprised Jenny and she raised her head. "Nice to meet you too, Ms. Clemmons."

  Roxy laughed. "Call me Roxy. Y'all want something to drink? I've got a cold beer, Cage."

  "Sounds good."

  "Jenny?"

  "Uh, nothing, thank you."

  "A Coke?"

  She didn't want to appear impolite, so she answered with a weak smile. "Yes, all right, a Coke."

  "Sit down and make yourselves at home."

  Roxy turned toward the swinging barroom doom, which led to the kitchen. Her hips showed full and shapely in a pair of tight jeans. Voluptuous breasts swung free beneath her sweat­shirt. She was barefoot. Her coppery hair was tousled, but attractively so. She looked either like she had just gotten out of bed or was on her way. She was the kind of woman a man could curl up and relax with, custom made to be a mistress. Friendly, hospitable, warm, and willing. The thought brought a scalding rush of nausea to Jenny's throat.

  Cage had settled down on the sofa and was leafing through an issue of Cosmopolitan that Roxy had left there. "Sit down, Jenny," he said, noting that she was standing awkwardly in the middle of the room.

  Uneasily, as though she might dirty her skirt if she wasn't careful, she lowered herself onto a straight chair. Cage looked amused. That irritated her.

  Roxy came back with their drinks, and after Cage had taken a long swallow from the can of beer, he said, "Do you have any vacancies? We need an apartment."

  Roxy cast a dumbfounded glance at Jenny, then her eyes swung back to Cage. "Gee, that's great, congratulations. But what's wrong with your house?"

  He laughed. "Nothing that I know of. I think you misun­derstood. Jenny will be living in the apartment alone."

  Jenny could have killed Cage for making it sound like they would be living together. Her cheeks were flaming scarlet. Now that he had clarified the situation, she watched Roxy for signs of relief. Surely Roxy would be glad that he wasn't going to move in another mistress right under her nose. But all Jenny saw on Roxy's face was chagrin at her mistake.

  "Oh!" She looked at Jenny and smiled. "You're in luck. I have a one-bedroom apartment vacant."

  Jenny opened her mouth to speak, but Cage cut in before her. "How large is the bedroom? Jenny's going to have a baby. Is there enough room for a crib?"

  Roxy's
reaction to that piece of news was shock. Her mouth hung slack for several moments as she stared at Cage. When she turned back to Jenny, her eyes moved unerringly down to Jenny's still-trim middle.

  "You don't have any restrictions on tenants with babies, do you?" Cage asked.

  "No. Hell, no." Visibly Roxy collected herself and put things in their proper perspective. She bent down to slip her bare feet into a pair of sandals. "Let's go see the apartment and you can decide if it's what you're looking for."

  "It's in a good location," she said over her shoulder a few minutes later as they followed her down the sidewalk between the buildings. She had gotten the key to the vacant apartment from the spare bedroom in her unit, which served as an office. "Private and quiet, but not so isolated that you'll be afraid to live here alone, Jenny." She prattled on about the complex's amenities, pointing out the laundry facilities and the pool area.

  Jenny wasn't listening. She was casting murderous glances at Cage for blurting out her condition to this … this woman. By morning everybody in town would know she was pregnant.

  "Here we are." Roxy unlocked the apartment and led them inside. She switched on the light. "Whew! It's a little close. I haven't opened it since the cleaning crews and painters were here."

  The apartment did smell of disinfectant and new paint, but Jenny didn't mind that. It was spotlessly clean as a result.

  "This is the living room, of course. You have a kitchen in here." Roxy led Jenny through a louvered half door like the one in her own apartment. The built-ins were all clean and shiny. Jenny opened the refrigerator. It was clean, too.

  They finished touring the apartment, which didn't take long. There was only a bathroom and bedroom beyond the living room. "How much is the rent?" Jenny asked.

  "Four hundred a month plus utilities."

  "Four hundred?" Jenny squeaked. "I'm afraid—"

  "Unfurnished?" Cage asked, butting in.

  "Oh, Jeez," Roxy said, swatting her forehead. "I mis­quoted. Unfurnished one bedrooms are two-fifty."

  "That's more like it," Cage said.

  Jenny calculated her income and expenditures. She might be able to afford it if she were frugal. Besides, this was one of the nicer apartment complexes in town, and her choices were limited. She was lucky there was an apartment available. Trying to forget that she would be living doors away from one of Cage's lovers, she said, "Do I need to sign a lease?"