Can't Stop Loving You

by Peggy Webb

  All the things Brick had meant to say flew out of his mind. He moved his hands along the length of her back. How long had it been since he'd touched her naked back? How long since he'd felt her smooth, silken skin ripple beneath his fingertips?

  He caressed her once more, his hands molding the tiny, supple waist, the flared hips, then back up to her shoulders and down her arms. He was tempted to flatten his hands over hers, to lace their fingers together as they used to do when they were making love.

  Not yet. He wasn't quite ready to reveal himself. Selfishly he wanted to continue caressing her naked skin.

  "What's gotten into you, Matt?" She never lifted her head, but kept her face in her crossed arms. She sounded relaxed, almost sleepy.

  "Hmmm?"

  "Usually you're pummeling my back as if I were a punching bag."

  "Relax." Brick had done enough voice imitations in his career to be able to sound somewhat like Matt.

  "Not that I'm complaining." Helen arched her back and stretched like a kitten. "It feels wonderful… almost erotic." Her laughter was low and throaty. "Nothing personal, you understand."

  "Nothing personal."

  Ah, but it was. It was the most personal thing he'd felt in a long, long time. Caressing her was erotic, nostalgic.

  He realized how very much he had missed Helen. Their love was magical, special. What had happened to take it all away? How had they lost it?

  As he stood at the table massaging Helen, he realized how very fragile love was. They hadn't handled it with care. Sure, she had been the one to walk away, but part of the blame lay with him. Somehow he had failed her. Somehow he had not given her enough assurances that their love was permanent, that he wouldn't leave her at the first sign of trouble… or the second or the third. That, in fact, he would never leave her. He had been so absorbed in loving her that he had failed to know her, to understand her fears.

  His hands slid down the center of her back. She made soft murmuring sounds of pleasure.

  What if he failed her again?

  The thought was sobering. If he stayed in this quiet room to tell Helen the truth of his deception, then he must be prepared to take the next step, and the next, to woo her and win… and risk losing her all over again.

  Sweat popped out on his brow. There were no dress rehearsals for life, no repeat performances.

  "Helen…"

  She stiffened, then jerked her head around. Her skin flushed a deep rose.

  "How dare you…"

  "Helen, this is not what it looks like."

  "Get out."

  "I have to talk to you."

  She sat up, pulling the towel around her. "Leave. Now." She started getting off the table.

  "Helen, wait. Please."

  She hesitated, slowly pulled the turban off her head, and shook out her hair. As she often did when she was upset, she massaged her temples with her fingertips, then ran her fingers through her hair. It tumbled about her shoulders in enchanting disarray.

  Brick wanted to reach out, to touch her cheek, her hair. Instead, he waited. If he told the truth to an unwilling audience, all was lost.

  Crossing her legs, she sighed. He knew he had won the first battle.

  "All right," she said. "Say whatever it is that you came in here to say. But you must know this: I don't really care what you have to say, Brick. As far as I'm concerned, you're wasting your breath."

  "That's a chance I have to take."

  "Fine. Just so we understand each other."

  She tipped her head to one side, waiting, and suddenly he realized that he had no idea where to start.

  "This is not going to be as easy as I'd thought."

  "Nothing ever is, is it?"

  "No, Helen. Nothing is ever easy."

  Restless, he prowled to the other side of the room, turning his back on Helen so he wouldn't be distracted by the sight of her wearing nothing but a towel. She waited quietly.

  That had always been one of her good qualities, the ability to be still. She didn't have the nervous need of some women to fill every small silence with meaningless chatter.

  Coward. Tell her.

  He rammed his hands into his pockets and turned back to her. She hadn't moved.

  "I have no fiancée, Helen."

  "You've broken up with Barb?"

  "No. There never was anything to break up."

  "I'm leaving." Helen got to her feet. "I have no intention of sitting here in a towel, listening to your tales of romantic misfortune."

  He couldn't have made a bigger mess if he'd tried.

  "Helen…" He caught her shoulders. "Please don't go yet. I'm telling the truth badly."

  "I hope you don't intend to keep me here by force." She looked pointedly at his hands on her shoulders.

  "No." Releasing her, he stepped back. "You're free to go, Helen." She hesitated. "Leave." He nodded toward the door.

  Still, she watched him.

  "All right," she finally said. "I can't go. My curiosity would kill me." She gave him a rueful smile. "You know me too well."

  "Or perhaps not well enough." He raked her from head to toe with his eyes, loving the way she flushed.

  "I'm going to put on my clothes. I feel at a clear disadvantage talking to you in a towel."

  "Feel free."

  "Turn your back."

  "Turn my back?"

  "Yes. Or close your eyes."

  "You have to be joking. As many times as I've seen you dress…"

  "You no longer have the right to watch me dress and undress. You forfeited those two years ago."

  "I forfeited them?"

  "Yes. That's what a divorce means. Forfeiture. No more rights. No more privileges."

  "I never wanted a divorce."

  "Well, I certainly d—" Uncertain, Helen paused. "Do as you please, then." She reached for her clothes.

  Brick turned his back on her and stood facing the door, alternately whistling and grinning.

  "Wipe that smile off your face," she said.

  "How do you know I'm smiling?"

  "Because I know you."

  "All right." He made a dramatic gesture with his hand across his mouth. "It's gone. Satisfied?"

  "Let me see."

  "Does that mean I can turn around?"

  "Yes."

  Barefoot, with no makeup, wearing black de-signer jeans and a blue silk blouse, Helen looked sixteen. And extremely vulnerable.

  Brick took both her hands.

  "Helen, I hired Barb Gladly to pose as my fiancée for this trip to New Hampshire because I was scared to death of you."

  "Afraid of me?"

  "Of being near you, of working side by side on the stage, of seeing you across the table at every meal, of knowing you'd be down the hall from me curled in bed with your hair spread across the pillow and your left hand tucked under your cheek." He lifted her hands, turned them over, and kissed both palms.

  "I had to protect myself," he added.

  "You thought I would come after you?"

  "No. I thought I would come after you."

  Helen pulled her hands out of his and laced them behind her so he wouldn't see how they shook. Passion. Joy. Hope. All the feelings she'd kept at bay for two years sprang to life.

  And yet, how could she dare to hope? Nothing had changed.

  "That's totally absurd," she said, then stood very still, waiting for him to contradict her, hoping he would contradict her.

  I never stopped loving you, he would say. I would never abandon you. Certainly not with a child.

  He shifted his feet, turning slightly so that he was looking out the windows beyond her right shoulder. What was he seeing that held his undivided attention? And why didn't he contradict her?

  "You're right," he said, still not looking at her. "The notion that I would come after you is utterly ridiculous."

  A bone-deep ache started in Helen's chest and spread throughout her body until she felt heavy with pain, smothered with it. She had to get out of this ro
om, out of Brick's sight.

  She swallowed the lump in her throat and untwisted her hands. It was time for a great exit.

  "Well, then… everything's settled." Her manner wouldn't have fooled a novice director. She tried for brisk, but what she got was forlorn.

  Oh, help. Brick would surely see through her.

  But he was still captivated by the sight beyond the window.

  An exit was no good if nobody noticed. Where was a good exit line when she needed one?

  "It's snowing," Brick said.

  "I guess that's to be expected."

  "Yes. New Hampshire in the winter."

  The door was on the other side of a long, hot desert, and she didn't know how to make the trek. She glanced longingly at the door, then back at Brick.

  His hair was longer than when they were married. She noticed how it grazed the top of his collar and curled under. He'd tucked his shirt in crooked, and it was damp across the chest and shoulders.

  He'd dressed in a hurry. What had been his hurry?

  "It's not as cold as I thought it would be," she said.

  "Me either."

  The absolute stillness in the room tore at her nerve endings. Her heart pounded so hard, she could almost hear it.

  "Even Marsha is not complaining."

  "She always hated cold weather."

  They were talking about the weather as if it were of paramount importance in their lives. Helen had never felt so helpless… nor so uncertain.

  He turned back to her so suddenly, she was caught off balance. His eyes. They looked shattered, too bright. Surely it was not tears.

  She couldn't bear it if Brick cried, couldn't bear to think what it might mean. To him. To her. To them.

  "Thanks for telling me the truth about Barb."

  She held out her hand. He took it. Polite strangers.

  "You're welcome, Helen."

  He held on. Or was it her imagination? Wishful thinking?

  Her palm still tingled as she started for the door. Don't look back.

  The room was so still. Was Brick watching her leave? She thought not. Hoped not.

  At the door she almost turned and went back. But what was there left to say?

  She closed the door firmly behind her, then leaned her head against it. Her hand was still on the doorknob. All she had to do was turn it.

  Brick was just beyond the door. She closed her eyes, picturing how he looked with his hair curling over his collar and his shirt tucked carelessly into his jeans.

  She wanted to smooth back his hair, tuck his shirt in straight. She was losing it.

  From inside the room came the sound of footsteps. Brick was coming.

  Helen raced down the hall. It wouldn't do for her ex-husband to find her mooning outside the door.

  Thank goodness there were no afternoon rehearsals. That meant she didn't have to see him until dinner.

  No. She'd go out somewhere for dinner, take Marsha and Matt. It would do them all good to get out of Farnsworth Manor for a while.

  She wouldn't think about Brick tonight; she'd sleep on the problem. And then, when morning came…

  Oh help.

  When morning came there would still be Brick.

  NINE

  There was no reason for him to still be standing at the window. It was dark outside. Nobody stood looking out windows into the darkness except a fool.

  Or a coward.

  Brick didn't like to think of himself as a coward, but that's exactly what he had been. He'd told the truth about Barb, but then he'd chickened out. In the face of Helen's resistance, he'd pretended that he never had any intention toward her except clearing the air.

  Outside his window he could see nothing except the glare of snow—pure white shining through the darkness as far as the eye could see, each unique flake frozen and compressed with the other flakes until they all blended into one continuous blanket. Why didn't he have that ability to blend in? To be a part of the whole?

  No. Not him. Not Brick Sullivan.

  He had to be the strong, independent type. So strong, he couldn't even tell his ex-wife he still loved her.

  He turned his back on the snow. Across the room his bed was the most lonesome place he could imagine being. So much room for one man. Too much.

  His feet padded on the carpet, and his door creaked shut behind him.

  Farnsworth Manor was a big place. There had to be a friendly couch by the fire somewhere.

  Helen tossed and turned until she was so twisted in the covers, it was going to take a rescue squad to get her out. Sensing her discomfort, the Abominables took turns padding to the bed to nudge her with their big wet muzzles.

  "Go to sleep, girls," she said. "It's all right."

  But it wasn't all right. Even Gwenella knew it. The big cat prowled around the room, every now and then pouncing onto the bed and sniffing around as if she were trying to ferret out the trouble.

  Helen kicked her covers back and padded in bare feet to the window. Snow everywhere. Shivering, she curled her toes into the rug. In Georgia it was perfectly all right not to wear shoes in the house during winter, but in New Hampshire it was foolish not to wear them. Already she could feel the cold creeping up through the soles of her feet.

  Gwenella rubbed against her legs, purring. She leaned down to pet the cat and to retrieve her shoes.

  Brick had been barefoot.

  The image of him standing in his bare feet hit her with such impact that she sat on the floor. This afternoon she'd taken note of his damp shirt and the crooked way he'd tucked it into his jeans. But not the bare feet.

  He'd been in such haste to get to her that he'd come without his shoes. In New Hampshire. In the dead of winter. With snow on the ground.

  Never mind that he had been in the house. The drafty old house was cold. Period. Especially the floors.

  The Abominables crowded next to her on the floor and put their big heads on her lap. Gwenella arched her back and huffed off, preferring to sit in regal splendor on the windowsill rather than share the limelight with mere dogs.

  Helen hugged the Danes.

  "He didn't even take the time to put on his shoes."

  They licked her hands and the moisture on her face. Tears of wonder.

  "Nobody has ever been that anxious to see me," she said. "And I turned my back on him."

  The tears turned to remorse.

  "What am I going to do?"

  The Danes thumped their tails on the floor and lapped at her face with their long pink tongues.

  "I have to go to him… but what will I say?"

  The same restlessness she always got before a performance overtook her. It might be the performance of her life. She couldn't possibly do it without rehearsal.

  Helen slipped her feet in high-heeled mules, grabbed her robe, and hurried from her bedroom, trailing ostrich plumes as she made her way down the darkened staircase. A shaft of moonlight slanted through the tall windows to light her way.

  Here she was, skulking about the house at midnight once more. She covered her mouth with her hand to hold back the giggles. She felt as if she were in the middle of a made-for-television murder mystery, the kind that was always set in some creaky old mansion in an out-of-the-way place.

  She could see the marquee Murder in the Manor, starring Brick and Helen Sullivan.

  Brick and Helen Sullivan.

  From the moment they'd met they had been a team. Her heart hurt thinking about their early days together—the late-night rehearsals, the greasy burgers eaten backstage at midnight, the flubbed lines, the laughter, the dreams.

  She caught the banister at the bottom of the staircase and closed her eyes, remembering…

  "We'll be America's sweethearts," she'd said, kicking off her shoes among the plastic flowers and propping her feet on a plastic rock, all part of the set for The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe.

  She was the White Witch and Brick was the Lion. Always perfectionists, they'd stayed after the rest of the cast and cr
ew left to rehearse the White Witch's death scene.

  "The first couple of the theater." Brick discarded his mane and grabbed a top hat out of the costume closet. Setting it at a jaunty angle, he took a cane and did a quick soft shoe around the stage.

  "Care for this dance, sweetheart?" He swept off his hat and gave her a deep bow.

  She donned a red feather boa and a broad-brimmed hat trimmed with ostrich plumes.

  "Enchanted, my love."

  Together they did a waltz around the stage, with Brick humming "Shall We Dance?" from the The King and I.

  "They might call us the dynamic dancing duo," she said.

  "Sophisticated Sullivan and his scintillating bride."

  "Who, moi?"

  She unslung her boa and tickled his face, then his neck.

  "Want to play rough, do you?" He caught the boa and wrapped it around her, dragging her close.

  "Yes," she said. He pulled her closer, and closer still. "Yes… yes . . . yes," she murmured as he lowered her to the stage… .

  Heavy with memories, Helen made her way across the hallway and headed to the library. The cozy book-lined room was exactly the refuge she needed.

  The doors creaked when she entered. She stood a moment to allow her eyes to adjust to the dark. The light switch was on the wall near the door, but she preferred the comfort of darkness.

  The heavy draperies over the French doors leading to an enclosed courtyard were drawn shut. A small sliver of light made a path from the doorway to the bookshelves. Following the path, Helen made her way to the bar, her backless slippers making soft slapping sounds on the wooden floor.

  Someone was tapping at his door. Brick opened first one eye, then the other. Where were the sheets? And what was that hard lump in the middle of his back?

  The soft tapping sounded once more. Then he remembered. He didn't have covers, he was not in his bed, he was not even in his room. He was in the library on the couch. And a darned uncomfortable contraption it had turned out to be.

  He rubbed his eyes and started to sit up.

  "What will I possibly tell him?"

  Helen's voice. Brick froze.

  In the faint light coming from the narrow opening in the draperies he could see her long, lean body sheathed in a shimmery silk that reflected the moonlight.