“I’m so glad you enjoyed I know I found it…er, how do I say it?…extremely interesting myself. We’ll have to do it again some time soon. Maybe we’ll learn more about each other,” he replied with pleasant words in an unpleasant way, and Carrie found the insinuation to sexuality as she remembered the kiss and her own eager response.
Her face burned furiously. She didn’t bother to reply to this, mainly because she knew she would have lost her temper if she had, so she opened the door and climbed into the sleek Porsche. Slamming the door shut on Gabriel’s presence, she put the key into the ignition and started the car. Gabe remained where he was, watching her leave.
Reversing the car quickly, Carrie carelessly slammed the gears into position and shot off down the road very fast. As the car gained speed, she mentally shrugged her shoulder and pushed the car into an even faster pace, getting a sense of satisfaction out of realising that Gabe was probably still watching. Let him watch, she grimly told herself. I hope he has a fit!
She reached home safely, for, even though she travelled too fast, she didn’t travel carelessly and took care to slow if anyone passed her on the road.
As she opened the front door and stepped into the house, Emma bustled swiftly down the hall, smiling uncertainly. “Why, hello, Carrie,” she greeted her carefully. “How was your evening?”
“Just fine,” Carrie lied easily. “Gabe is a perfect host. He loved my pictures, too. Everything turned out great.”
“Mr. Jackson called just a moment ago,” Emma told her. She searched Carrie’s face and found nothing. “He sounded a little odd.”
“Oh?” she affected casualness. “What did he want?”
“He left no message. He just said he’d call back soon.” Carrie turned away from Emma as the other woman spoke. Emma was watching her too closely.
“Well, we’ll find out what he wants when he calls, I guess.” And with that, she started up the stairs, but just then the phone rang. She turned back and forestalled Emma who had hurried to answer its shrill call.
“I’ll get it, Emma,” Carrie told her. “That’s probably Gabe now. Thanks anyway.”
Reaching the phone, she paused for a moment with her hand on the receiver. Then she picked it up and spoke carefully into the mouthpiece. “Hello?”
The reply was immediate. “Carrie, if you ever drive like that again and I see you do it, I don’t care where you are, I’ll come and beat you stupid!” Gabe’s voice as deep with anger as he snapped out the words in a quick staccato. “Of all the stupid things to do! It would have served you right if you’d broken your neck. You know better than that!”
She was almost dancing with rage, but somehow she found the strength to hold on to her tongue. When she had herself under control, she drawled sarcastically, “Well, next time I’ll just have to see if I can oblige, won’t I? It really shouldn’t be too hard, not with a fast car.”
“Idiot!” Gabe’s fury fairly crackled over the phone and she found herself flinching away instinctively from the receiver. “Anyone would think you were an irresponsible child, the way you’re acting now. My God, I’m surprised you’re allowed off on your own, for all your physical age!”
This touched a sensitive spot in her and she hissed as she sucked in her breath sharply. Then, very deliberately, she said with a false lightness, “Dear boy, what do you care, anyway?” Without waiting for a reply, she settled the receiver back on its resting place as carefully as she had picked it up, then turned to go upstairs. She found Emma hovering nearby with an attitude of innocence that was quite transparent, and she met Carrie’s eyes with her own blank stare as if to say, “I didn’t hear nuthin.’”
Carrie snapped, “Who are you looking at?”
Emma shrugged hastily. “Nobody, nobody at all. I was just passing through.”
She watched Emma head back towards the kitchen, then snorted with disbelief. Then she marched up the stairs with a very rigidly held back.
In her room, she sank down onto her bed, deeply troubled. She had overreacted, and badly, tonight She had acted like a child, and perhaps the justification of what Gabe had said over the phone had been what had goaded her into such a rude response. Perhaps. She had to convince herself of that.
But what had prompted her to act like a child in the first place?
Chapter Five
Carrie undressed that night in quick, jerky movements. She was still so furious with Gabe that she couldn’t find enough serenity to relax when she crawled into bed. She turned over, first this way and then that, staring off into space and occasionally looking out of the window. Finally she left the bed altogether and padded over to her dressing table to start pulling out clothes she planned to put on. She stopped in the middle of an action as the thought of the water in the swimming pool, warm from the day’s heat, washed over her mind. She began to search for a swimsuit.
The dive into the pool was as cool and refreshing as she had imagined it would be. She surfaced, shaking her head to one side to get the water out of her eye, and then set off for the other side, beginning a quick-paced breast stroke that she knew would tire her out. As she swam steadily, a voice sounded by the edge of the water, causing her to start up in surprise, treading water as she looked about her.
“Always carrying on a love affair with the pool,” Steven teased as he lowered himself into a sitting position near the edge. Carrie responded by splashing him with a wave of water and he howled in protest.
“It’s only what you deserve,” she told him unsympathetically as he sputtered.
His grin was grey in the dusky semi-darkness. The only light source was the light that streamed out from the house nearby. She swam easily to the side and hung on to the edge, lazily kicking her legs.
“Some night, isn’t it?” Steven looked about him with satisfaction. Carrie could only agree, wryly smiling as she thought of how true Steven’s words really were if he but knew it. Steven continued speaking. “Dad got this pool built for you, you know,” he said casually. “As soon as he found out how much you loved the water, he called up and ordered this pool built. I can remember Mom protesting that you weren’t old enough—you were about two, I think. Dad just said that you’d learn soon enough, and when you got a little older, he hired a tutor to teach you to swim.”
Carrie was astounded. She’d known about the tutor, but had assumed that he had been for all three of the children. She said, hushed, “Dad did that for me? Just because I like the water?”
“Uh-huh,” Steven grunted. “Only don’t tell him I told you. I wasn’t supposed to know myself.”
“Good Lord! Of course I won’t say anything. I just can’t believe it.” She stared off into the darkness.
“Why not?” he asked. “He’s always loved you best.” It was said totally without rancor; it was the truth, as Steven saw it. “I think because you’re so different from the rest of us. He always treated you the harshest because he wanted you to be the best of us. And I suppose, in a way, you are.”
Carrie protested at this. “Oh, no, I’m not really,” she replied with vehemence. She thought back over the evening and the way she had acted towards Gabe, feeling embarrassed. “I act so stupidly sometimes.”
“Don’t we all?” Steven asked mildly, toying with one end of his shoelace. “Are you happy, Carrie?” The question was unexpected.
She said slowly, “I don’t know. I think I could be very easily. I think that I’m working towards my happiness right now, and I’m on the right track again. That’s sort of being happy, I guess.”
“Sometimes I think it’s funny that of all of us, you’re the one who left home and started a life outside the ranch. You were always so little and timid as a kid.”
“I’m the restless one,” she reminded him.
“Yes. Ralf and I, we’re born ranchers. Once in a while, I get to thinking about moving away from home and starting my own ranch, but I never do.” Steven sighed. “I love this one too much, I guess, to ever be happy with anything else. I
t would just be second best, compared with home.”
“Steven, if you’re happy here, then that’s how it should be,” Carrie reassured him. “After all, some day this house is going to be yours. Dad has always said that he’d divide the ranch in his will so that you got this house and Ralf would get the land near the foothills, since he loves that area so much.”
“I know. But sometimes I look at you and I wonder if I should be trying to make a life for myself, like you are.” It was the first time Carrie had ever heard Steven be anything but his usual calm, unflappable self.
She said firmly, “Steven, you should only be what makes you happy. If staying here makes you content, then that’s fine. If leaving makes you happy, then leave, and God go with you. But don’t do one or the other because you think you should. Do it because you want to.”
Steven was quiet. Then he stirred, standing up ponderously, bulky and steady once more, like a firm rock. He grinned. “I’m gonna get my swimsuit on and be right back.” He disappeared. Carrie floated on her back as she waited. When Steven got back, they had an uproarious race, thirty laps long, loser fixing winner breakfast in the morning. They never found out who really won, for it was too dark and they lost count of laps, anyway.
“Carrie!”
“What?” Carrie yelled without moving from her comfortable position on the lush and tenderly cultivated grass near the swimming pool. It had been a mistake to eat anything for breakfast. She always felt listless whenever she filled her stomach in the mornings, and so she avoided eating, but Steven fixed such good pancakes that she couldn’t resist, and she succumbed to temptation. She’d eaten like a pig, and now regretted it.
“Got company!” Janet’s shout floated back across the lawn in reply. Carrie groaned as she pushed herself reluctantly to her feet and started to the house. Of course company would come so early in the morning, when she had on her oldest, most faded and tattered pair of shorts, and a thin cotton top about three years old. She might have known!
As she reached the house, she glanced at the door to the back stairs that led up to the second storey from the kitchen. Maybe she could sneak up and change quickly before she went to see who her company was. But it wasn’t meant to be, for as she started towards the back staircase, a deep voice sounded from the doorway and she turned resignedly. Of course—she should have known that Gabe would be by this morning. After all, she had forgotten her copies of the pictures she had wanted to keep, and things had been rather—unresolved, to say the least.
Running a hand through her hair and tousling it wildly, she surveyed the dark man in front of her with wariness. It was impossible to read his face. His features were in an expressionless mask and the real Gabe was nowhere to be found. Dark eyes appeared to glitter strangely and Carrie stared into them, fascinated. A small, twisted smile flitted by and then was gone, leaving him as serious as before.
“Running off?” It was impossible to judge anything by his tone; that too was expressionless. Nevertheless, her face flamed furiously, although she answered calmly enough.
“Of course not,” she replied. “I was merely hoping to reach the second floor so I could change into more suitable clothes before I came to see who my company was.” She looked ruefully down at herself. “This outfit, you must admit, is pretty bad.”
This time a smile of genuine amusement appeared on his tough features. “I wouldn’t say that,” he murmured, eyeing her slender form appreciatively. She took in his meaning, even before his next words, and coloured again. “Things seem to look rather nice from my perspective.”
“Er—would you like some coffee?” she asked quickly, making his eyes dance.
But he didn’t attempt to tease her anymore and he answered simply, “Yes, please.”
She busied herself with the coffee maker, glad of the excuse to be doing something. Gabe seated himself at the kitchen table as she worked at the counter. Emma, drat her, was nowhere to be found, she saw as she looked about her.
He started to talk as she worked. He watched her small form move around the kitchen, like a little bird darting from one place to the next. “I came to bring the prints over that you forgot last night.” She nodded, unsurprised. “Also,” he continued, “I wanted to apologise for losing my temper with you like I did. I said some things I shouldn’t have, things I had no right to say.”
Carrie’s hands stilled as she heard the quiet words. Remembering what she was supposed to be doing, she quickly started to move again, but her attention was not on what she did. She spooned too many teaspoons of sugar into her coffee and handed it to Gabe by mistake. She sat down opposite him at the table and sipped her coffee. Ugh! It was as bitter as sin, and she couldn’t take bitter coffee. She watched him lift his cup to his lips and said sharply, “Don’t drink it!”
He stared at her. She said sheepishly, “You like your coffee black, no sugar, right?” He nodded, looking mystified. She finished lamely, “I think I gave my coffee to you by mistake.” He shoved the cup over to her and she tasted it tentatively. Ugh, again! Her expression of disgust was wholly spontaneous, and Gabe got quite a kick from it, by the look on his face. He watched her pour out the cup after shoving the other his way. She stared at his laughing face sourly over the rim of a fresh cup. “Finished laughing at me?”
He was totally unrepentant. “I can’t promise that unless you stop doing things that I find funny,” he retorted, chuckling. “Now, where was I?”
“Apologising,” Carrie answered happily. “And quite nicely, too. But you spoiled everything the next minute, you know. You’ll have to start again.”
“No way,” he told her. Kicking out his legs in a long stretch that reached all the way to her legs, tucked neatly as they were under her chair, he continued, “I only apologise once for something. And I only mean it once.”
“I know, I was only teasing. Really, I have to apologise too. I acted pretty badly, if my memory serves me right,” she sighed. She had always found it quite impossible to hold a grudge against anybody. It wasn’t part of her personality. She pulled at a curl on her forehead and succeeded in making it stick straight out. Trying ineffectually to smooth it down, she glanced at Gabe and found him looking, very hard, right into her eyes. She said suddenly, prompted by something she read there, “I guess I was a little piqued at how you seemed to rebound so quickly and easily from—what I’d thought we’d shared out in the beautiful, starry night. It really was my fault, I think. I said things in a way that I shouldn’t have. I didn’t handle things in a mature manner.”
Her eyes fell away from Gabe’s, and she searched for something to say in the little silence that followed her speech. After a moment, she ventured a glance in Gabe’s direction. She regretted her confession now. The words spoken out loud, in daylight, sounded melodramatic.
Gabe was looking down pensively at his coffee cup. The overhead light in the kitchen threw shadows across his face and outlined the high line of his cheekbones and the strong curve of his jaw. The firm mouth was held crookedly, the well-shaped lips pulled awry. His hands toyed with his cup, twirling it absentmindedly around, the long fingers lean and graceful.
“More coffee?” she asked, noticing his cup was empty. Gabe, startled out of his reverie, looked up quickly, shaking his head. Carrie helped herself to another cup. She turned from the counter and leaned against it, glad of an excuse to put distance between Gabe and herself.
“There must have been a misunderstanding all around,” he spoke at last, turning his head towards her.
She set her cup down too sharply, and feigned a nonchalance that she was nowhere near feeling, for the talk had become uncomfortable. She searched for a way to end an awkward situation.
“Let’s forget the whole thing, shall we?” she offered carefully. She examined her fingernails. One edge of the middle fingernail on her left hand was jagged and she began to worry at it. “Surely it would be better if we put the whole unpleasantness behind us and tried to go on from there?”
A
hand closed over Carrie’s two fidgeting ones, covering them both. She watched it with interest, stubbornly refusing to look up.
“Is that what you want?” he asked, giving her hands a little shake. “That’s not what I want. I don’t want to try and forget any part of that night, not even the unpleasant part.” The hand holding her hands moved to her chin and gently forced her to look up. “Don’t you see? We must have felt pretty strongly about something, to react as strongly as we did. It was an important night, and just why it was, I’d like to find out.” He pushed the hair off of her forehead and his hand trailed down the side of her face. It felt like a caress.
“Have dinner with me tonight.” She shook her head, an automatic gesture, and instinctive. The hand on her face stilled. “Why not?” he asked.
She opened her mouth, but no words came out. She couldn’t think of any reason why she couldn’t tell him, and suddenly she felt a great impatience with herself, an anger at her own slowness. “I…just no,” she said flatly.
“Surely there’s a reason?” His dark eyes probed her face, watching the expression flit across it.
At these words, her eyes fell and she remained silent. She was afraid of his anger, afraid of another unpleasant scene, but for the life of her, she couldn’t articulate a thing.
“Afraid?” His guess was much too accurate. His eyes saw too damn much.
She twisted her chin out of his hold and averted her face. Gabe’s stare never wavered, his stare relentless. “Er—” She sighed shakily and gave in. “Yes.”
“Why?”
Carrie looked down at her hands as she twisted them together. There was a vulnerable curve to the side of her cheek, the part of her face that Gabe could see. She pressed her hands tightly. “Once upon a time, there was a very foolish girl,” she started quietly, not looking up. “She…got hurt pretty badly. It wasn’t that long ago, and it destroyed all the trust that she felt for—someone, and all her respect.” A hand came up to her face again and cupped her cheek gently. It gave her courage to look up, and she smiled at the concern that she saw in those dark eyes. “It hurt her pride, too. Gabe, don’t ask me anymore, I don’t want to talk about it. I’m over that hurt, it’s just that I’m wary, that’s all.”
Damaged Trust Page 9