Hot Shot

by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

  "It probably was."

  Susannah turned on her. "It couldn't have been or he would have stayed faithful."

  "Grow up, Susannah. Some people don't feel alive unless they're having sex with half the world." Paige's face took on a closed, hard expression.

  "But he loves me," she said fiercely. "Despite everything he says and everything he's done, he loves me."

  "What about you?"

  "Of course I love him!" she cried, furious with Paige for asking the question. "I gave up everything for him. I have to love him!" She sucked in her breath as her words hit her. What was she saying? Did she truly love Sam or was she still caught up in an old, worn-out obsession?

  "I'm definitely not an expert on love," Paige said slowly. "But I think there are lots of different kinds. Some are good and some are bad."

  "How do you tell the difference?"

  "The good love makes you better, I guess. Bad love doesn't."

  "Then what Sam and I had was definitely good love, because he made me better."

  "Did he? Or did you do it yourself?"

  "You don't understand. Daddy wanted me to be his perfect daughter. Sam told me I should be strong and free. I listened to Sam, Paige. I listened to him and I believed him."

  "And what happened?"

  "A miracle happened. I discovered that Sam's vision was right for me. It was a perfect fit."

  "That should have made him happy." Cynicism edged Paige's words.

  Susannah blinked against the sting of tears. "But it didn't. A big part of Sam liked the old Susannah Faulconer. Deep inside, I don't think he wanted me to change at all."

  "I like the new Susannah."

  The unusual softness in Paige's voice pierced through Susannah's misery, and she looked at her sister as if she were seeing her for the first time. Against the sunlight, Paige's profile was as soft and blurred as an angel's. "Did I treat you so terribly when we were growing up?"

  Paige plucked at a blade of grass. "You treated me wonderfully. I hated you for it. I wanted you to be awful to me so I could justify how awful I was to you."

  Something warm opened inside Susannah like a loaf of her sister's bread. The awful chill that wouldn't go away thawed a little.

  "I thought if you were out of the way, Daddy would love me," Paige said. "But he never did. Not really. You were everything to him. Even after you left, he let me know I couldn't compete. The irony of it was that I did so many things better than you-the meals were more imaginative, the house prettier. But he never saw that. He only saw the things I didn't do well."

  Paige's unhappiness touched a chord inside Susannah. "After the way you've taken care of me, I can't imagine you not doing anything well."

  Paige shrugged off the compliment. "Look at my checking account some time. And I'm completely disorganized. I hate everything connected with FBT business. Daddy should never have left the company to me. I don't know what I would have done without Cal."

  Susannah looked away.

  "He's been a good friend to me, Susannah," Paige said earnestly. "You really humiliated him."

  "I know that. And the selfish part of me doesn't care. Isn't that awful? I'm so glad to have escaped marrying him that I'm willing to feel guilty about what I did to him for the rest of my life."

  "Even though escaping Cal meant that you married Sam?"

  Susannah stared at the dappled shadows on the ground. Nothing had changed, but some of the turmoil inside her seemed to have eased. "I could never regret having had Sam in my life. In a funny way, he created me, just like he created the Blaze. In the end I guess his vision of me wasn't right for him. But it was right for me."

  "Are you going back to him?"

  The pain that was never far away spread through her again. She was a fighter, and she didn't take her marriage vows lightly. In the deep quiet of the olive grove, the vow she had made on her wedding day came back to her as clearly as if she had just spoken it. I promise to give you my best, Sam, whatever that may be. As the words echoed in her mind, she knew that she had done exactly that, and she finally understood the time had come to begin fighting for herself.

  "No," she murmured. "No, I'm not going back."

  "That's good," Paige said softly.

  For dinner that night, Paige fixed a cheese pie with fresh marjoram and tossed a handful of pine nuts into a dish of green beans. As Susannah ate her sister's wonderful food, she began to feel at peace with herself. Something important had happened in the olive grove. Maybe she had finally completed the task she had begun when she'd run away from home. Maybe she had found herself.

  The next morning after breakfast, Paige once again dragged her down to the beach. As she stripped off her clothes, she said, "This time you're going in the water. No more excuses."

  Susannah began to protest, but she stopped herself. How much longer was she going to wallow in self-pity? Reaching for the tie at the back of her neck, she unfastened her halter top, then pulled off her clothes until she was as naked as her sister.

  "I've got bigger boobs than you," Paige called out in a deliberately taunting voice as Susannah waded into the surf.

  "I've got longer legs," Susannah retaliated.

  "Giraffe legs."

  "Better than duck legs."

  The water was sun-warmed and wonderful, the surf gentle. Susannah bent her knees and settled down so that the water covered her shoulders. The sea was gentle and soothing. For a while, anyway, it made her feel well again.

  "You can't stay out too long," Paige said, flipping over onto her back. "You're a real paleface. Not to mention other parts of you." A wave passed in a swirl of foam beneath her. "What should we have for dinner tonight?"

  Susannah turned on her back to float. "We just finished breakfast."

  "I like to plan ahead. Lamb, I think. And a tomato and cucumber salad with feta crumbled on the top. Stuffed eggplant-You're starting to drift out. Come back in."

  Susannah obediently did as she was told.

  That evening they worked together in the kitchen. Paige opened a bottle of Skeponi, a local wine, and poured two glasses for them to sip while they worked. "Slice that cucumber thinner, Susannah. Those things look like hockey pucks."

  "I'm not enjoying this," Susannah grumbled after she produced another slice that was too thick to meet her sister's approval. "Why don't you cook while I straighten out your checkbook?"

  "You're on," Paige said, laughing.

  Five minutes later, both sisters were happily occupied-Paige with a hollowed-out eggplant and a mixture of pine nuts, herbs, and currants; Susannah with her pocket calculator and what she quickly labeled "the checkbook from hell."

  Just as they were getting ready to eat, Susannah heard the sound of a moped approaching the cottage. Paige stiffened. The moped stopped, and several seconds later someone knocked. As Paige opened the door, Susannah glimpsed a handsome young Greek with thick curly hair. Paige immediately stepped outside, but Susannah could hear bits of conversation through the open window.

  "… in village today. Why you not come to me?"

  "I have company, Aristo. You shouldn't have come here."

  The conversation went on for several minutes. When Paige reentered the cottage, the old hard look had settled over her face. "One of my legion of lovers," she said tightly, picking up the last of the serving dishes and carrying them to the old kitchen table.

  Susannah brought over the wine bottle and poured them each a second glass. "You want to talk about it?" she asked cautiously.

  Paige's tone immediately grew caustic. "What's there to say? Unlike you, I've never been Miss Pure and Innocent."

  It was Paige's first attack. Susannah set down her wineglass. "What are the new ground rules between us, Paige?"

  "I don't know what you mean."

  "If it weren't for you, I'd probably be curled up in a ball someplace. You've taken care of me in a way no one else ever has. But does that mean we can only get along if I need you? Not if you need me?"

  Pai
ge toyed with one of the wrinkled oily olives in her salad. "I like taking care of people. I just never get the chance."

  "You're getting the chance now, and I'm not ready to give it up." Her voice broke a little. "I feel battered, Paige. You've given me sanctuary. I'm not used to needing people, and it scares me to think about how much I need you right now."

  Paige's eyes filled in response. "I always wanted to be just like you."

  Susannah tried to smile, but couldn't quite manage it. "And I wanted to be like you-a rebel giving the world the finger."

  "Some rebel," Paige scoffed. "I don't want my life to be this way. I'm tired of running all over the world and having sex with men I can't stand."

  "Then why do you do it?"

  "I don't know. Sex lets me connect, you know. Except I don't connect at all, and that makes me hate myself."

  And then she told Susannah about the boy who had raped her when she was sixteen. She spoke of Aristo and Luigi and Fabio and the string of lovers who existed like spoiled meat everywhere she went. She talked about the filmmaker she had imagined she was in love with and the abortion she couldn't quite forget.

  Afterward, they were silent. Susannah thought of the roles they had been assigned from the time they were small children. Paige played the rebel daughter while she took the part of the obedient conventional one. But all along it should have been the other way around. They were like two sisters who had gotten their parts mixed up at some cosmic version of Central Casting.

  Paige abruptly shattered the silence. "I'm starved."

  Their dinner had long grown cold, but they fell on it anyway, both of them suddenly lighthearted from the connection they had made with each other.

  "You know what I really want?" Paige said, stuffing a gooey chunk of eggplant into her mouth with her fingers. "I want to mother the whole world. Sort of like a slutty version of Mother Teresa."

  Susannah, who hadn't imagined she would even be able to smile again, burst out in laughter. They drank more wine and Paige told terrible jokes and they cleaned up the dishes together. Afterward, Paige moved a small lamp into the center of the kitchen table. She gave Susannah her old mulish look. "I bought something for us in the village. If you start laughing again, I won't speak to you for the rest of my life."

  "All right. I won't laugh."

  "Promise?"

  "I promise."

  Paige reached into one of the cupboards and pulled out a cheap coloring book along with a brand new package of Crayola crayons.

  Susannah hooted with laughter. "You want us to color?"

  Paige gave her a snotty look. "Do you have a problem with that?"

  "Oh, no. I think it's a wonderful idea." Without thinking about what she was doing, she swept her sister into her arms and hugged her so tightly that Paige let out a yelp.

  They settled down at the table, chairs butted up next to each other as the two Faulconer sisters bent their heads over the coloring book. Susannah worked on the left page, her sister on the right. Paige fancifully shaded her cartoon cow in pinks and roses, then added a comically oversized hat. Her artistic eye held no regard for the thick black outlines of the drawing, even as her homey soul craved strong, respectable borders.

  Susannah neatly outlined all the separate parts of her lady pig before she dutifully filled in the blocks of color. Constriction was fine in coloring books, she discovered, but it wouldn't do at all in real life.

  "Not fair, Susannah. You wore the point down on the blue crayon. I can't stand it when the points aren't sharp."

  And because Susannah cared more about pushing life to its limits than she did about crayons, she gave Paige the sharp ones and used the dull, blunt nubs herself.

  It was an arrangement that made them both blissfully happy.

  Chapter 24

  Mitch stood at the edge of the patio and gazed down at the secluded beach from behind a pair of silver-rimmed aviator's sunglasses. A sweat stain had dared to form a patch on the back of his pale blue knit shirt, and his gray slacks were rumpled from the long plane trip. But fresh clothes were the furthest thing from his mind as he watched the two women playing in the surf below.

  Paige's body, with its full centerfold breasts, was the more voluptuous, but it was Susannah's lean, thoroughbred form that held his attention. Water glittered like crystals on her shoulders, her breasts, and the flat plane of her belly. It slithered down the small of her back and glossed her small, sweet ass as she waded at the edge of the waves.

  He knew he shouldn't watch, but the sight of her held him in a grip that was so powerfully erotic, he couldn't turn his head away. Thou shalt not covet thy partner's wife, a voice whispered. But he had been coveting his partner's wife for a very long time.

  He didn't know exactly when in the past few years friendship had turned to love or affection had become desire. There was no specific moment he could point to and say-now! Right now I know that Susannah Faulconer is the woman I've been looking for my entire life. He certainly hadn't wanted to fall in love with her. It was messy. Inconvenient. It absolutely violated his moral code. But just the sight of her filled him with a piercing sweetness that transcended anything he had ever felt for a woman.

  Except now that her farce of a marriage was finally over, that sweetness had been distorted by anger. For years he had kept his emotions firmly leashed when he was around her. He had never slipped, not once. But when he had heard what had happened, something inside him snapped. He wanted to shake her for her stupidity, for all those wasted years she had held on. He wanted to shake her until he rattled loose whatever it was inside her that had made her an emotional slave to Sam Gamble.

  And now he would have to comfort her. He would have to be good old Mitch, patting her back and pretending to be sad right along with her. He would have to be her compassionate and understanding friend when he didn't want to be a friend at all, when he wanted to kick up his heels and shout, "Good riddance."

  That's what he wanted her to do, too. He wanted her to look up into his eyes and say, "Thank God that's over. Now you and I have a chance."

  But Susannah wasn't frivolous with her emotions, and he knew that wouldn't happen-not for a very long time, if ever.

  The recent turn of events at SysVal made everything more complicated. As he remembered the crisis that had arisen so abruptly, he wondered what he would do if she weren't ready to go back with him.

  Paige looked up at the cottage, interrupting his thoughts. He could tell by the way her body grew still that she had spotted him, but he didn't back away. Susannah continued to play in the waves, so he knew that her sister hadn't shared the news that they had an observer. If Paige wasn't going to tell, neither would he. He continued to watch.

  Susannah was astonished to see the back of a man's head and shoulders rising above one of the patio chairs as she came up from the beach. He turned and smiled at her, the sun glinting off the metal rims of his aviator glasses as he stood.

  "Well, if it isn't SysVal's lost lady."

  "Mitch! What are you doing here?"

  "I was in the neighborhood."

  She rushed toward him and then remembered that she was naked beneath her beach towel. Clutching it more tightly in her fist, she leaned forward and kissed a jaw that bore an uncharacteristically rakish stubble.

  His hand pressed flat against the small of her back for a moment and then he released her. "I've been worried about you. It's been three weeks."

  Had it been so long? September had slid into October and she had barely noticed. "You came this far just because you were worried?"

  To her surprise, the corners of his mouth tightened in the subtle sign that indicated he was upset. "You could have telephoned, Susannah. You must have known-" He broke off as something just behind her caught his attention.

  Susannah turned her head to investigate, and to her dismay saw Paige standing on the edge of the patio, the beach towel wrapped low on her hips, her breasts as brown and bare as one of Gauguin's Tahitian women.

&n
bsp; "Well, well, well," Paige said. "If it isn't Mister-Black, is it?"

  "Blaine," he said. He gazed at her for a moment, and then dropped his head so that it was obvious he was deliberately staring at her breasts through his sunglasses. "You're looking well, Paige."

  Susannah was embarrassed. And then she wondered why she should be uncomfortable. These two were both pros. Mitch certainly knew what he was doing, and Paige had to work out her devils in her own way.

  Paige looked over at Susannah, obviously expecting her to intercede in some way. Susannah lifted an eyebrow. You got yourself into this, sister mine. Now you can get yourself out.

  She could see Paige begin to grow flustered. Mitch stubbornly refused to redirect his gaze. Paige made an elaborate show of yawning as if all this were too, too boring for words. "I'm thirsty," she said. "I guess I'll go get us something to drink."

  Susannah had to suppress the urge to applaud her sister's feistiness. Paige knew she had lost the battle, but she was going down fighting.

  Paige, however, had one final salvo to deliver. "You really should have come swimming with us, Mr. Blaine, instead of standing up here spying. It would have been so much cooler." With a smug glance at her sister, she disappeared inside the cottage.

  Susannah rounded on Mitch. "You were spying on us?"

  He slowly pulled off his sunglasses and folded in the stems. "Not spying exactly."

  "Then what, exactly?"

  "Just sort of watching."

  "I don't believe this! Mitch, how could you do something so slimy?"

  "Aw, come on, Susannah. Ease up, will you?" He stuffed his glasses in his shirt pocket. "What would you have done if you were a healthy heterosexual male who just happened to stumble on the sight of two beautiful naked women cavorting in the water?"

  She saw his point, but she didn't have too much fondness for any member of the male sex at the moment, and she refused to give in. "I'm not beautiful, and I'm not a woman. I'm your business partner."

  "Ri-i-ght. And for a business partner, you've got a terrific-"