Gayle laughed and said that the pizza man was due any second; hearing that a pizza was on the way, the boys happily raced down the stairs to watch for it at the window. Gayle and Phil followed them, and Lee and Bryn were left alone.
“I think after lunch—if you’re up to it—we should get over to your town house and start on the pictures.”
Bryn hesitated a moment, then shook her head. She looked at him, smiling hesitantly. “If the boys are leaving with your sister and her husband in the morning, I’d like to spend the day with them. One day won’t make that much difference, will it?”
Lee stared back at her for a long time, smiling slowly. “No, one day won’t make that much difference.” He slipped his arm around her waist and led her out of the studio. “You do like pizza, don’t you?”
She wrinkled her nose. “With absolutely everything but anchovies.”
“No anchovies, huh? I’ll learn to live without them.”
Bryn laughed, then quickly sobered. “Lee, I’m just afraid of how the boys are going to take this.”
“They’ll take it fine! Don’t worry. All little boys like Indians.”
“I’m not so sure,” Bryn said dubiously. “These days, little boys like Star Wars toys. And Gremlins. And Pac-Man. And—”
“And quit worrying, Bryn. Things will work out; I promise you. Come on now, let’s have a pleasant afternoon!”
The afternoon did pass pleasantly, so pleasantly that Bryn didn’t want it to end. At five-thirty Andrew and Barbara arrived, with Mick and Perry in tow. Mick wound up at the piano, playing fifties tunes. Somehow two of the guitars made it downstairs, and Bryn wasn’t sure if she was surprised or not when she watched Lee accept one from Andrew, who then slid onto the piano bench beside Mick.
“Don’t tell me you play that, too?” Bryn asked him.
He shrugged, and Bryn sat back in the modular sofa with Adam ensconced in her lap. He could play it. She watched the agility of his fingers with amazement as they seemed to move instinctively over the strings.
Mick made a quick change to Beatles tunes, and when he teased Brian, Brian told him with great indignity that, yes, of course he knew who the Beatles were. He proved it by singing every word of “Yellow Submarine.”
Dinner was a light makeshift meal of sandwiches, but Gayle tossed a huge salad and put out a platter piled high with fresh fruit, so Bryn’s health-conscious-for-the-children’s-sake mind was pleased. The more she saw of Gayle and Phil, the more she liked them, and the more reassured she felt. It was just going to be difficult to tell the boys.
After they had all eaten, Bryn accompanied the boys upstairs. Gayle and Barbara had handled everything well; in the strange house they had put all three in one room, bringing in a cot to slide next to the double bed. The children’s pajamas were all under their pillows, and their toothbrushes were neatly lined up in the bathroom. Bryn started to help them change, then decided it was time to talk.
“How would you guys like to really play Indians?” she asked enthusiastically.
Too much had happened recently. Three pairs of suspicious eyes turned her way. “What do you mean?” Brian asked, his voice quavering.
Bryn smiled, although the tightness of her face told her how plastic it must look. “Gayle is Lee’s sister, you know. She and her husband are going to go up and stay with Lee’s grandfather. And he’s a real Indian.”
“Isn’t Lee a real Indian?” Keith asked.
Bad terminology on her part, Bryn decided. Kids learned too fast in the schools these days, she thought ruefully. “Of course he’s real. Or half real. Oh, never mind! You’re purposely not understanding me! Lee’s grandfather lives on a hill by a stream, and he lives just as they did a hundred years ago!” They were still staring at her blankly. “He lives in a teepee,” she tried. “A real teepee.”
Adam’s lip started quivering. Great big tears splashed to his cheeks.
But it was Brian who spoke again. “You’re trying to send us away, aren’t you?”
“No!” Bryn protested. “I just wanted to let you have a little vacation, that’s all. Adam!”
Balling his little hands into fists, Adam ran past her and into the hall. Bryn took off after him, only to pause in the doorway when she saw that Lee was coming—with the squalling Adam raised high in his arms.
“What’s all this about?” he queried. Adam kept squalling. Brian faced Lee defiantly. “Us going away!”
Bryn stared at Lee reproachfully. Things would work out fine, huh? her eyes asked him.
“Are you going to marry my aunt? Is that why you’re trying to get rid of us?”
“What?” Lee demanded sharply. But then he laughed, setting Adam down on the cot beside him and reaching out a hand to Brian. “Come here, Brian,” he said quietly. “We need to talk.”
Bryn, wishing she could sink into the floor, watched as Brian stared at Lee’s hand for a long while. But then he took it and walked over to stand before Lee.
“Brian, you know that some strange things have been happening lately, don’t you?”
“Yes, sir,” Brian murmured.
“I swear to you, Brian, I just want you to be safe. Can you understand that?”
Brian shuffled his feet and stared down at them. Keith suddenly walked over to the pair and asserted himself, placing his hand on Lee’s shoulder. “I understand,” he said with remarkable maturity.
Brian grudgingly looked up. “How long?” he asked miserably.
“Not long at all!” Lee said, tousling his hair. “Your aunt and I will be up to meet you in…say…two weeks, tops.”
“Does your grandfather really live in a teepee?” Brian asked, a note of excitement in his voice.
“Sure does. He can show you all kinds of neat things. How to build a sweat lodge. Carve figures. I’ll bet he’ll even make you a jacket out of skins if you ask him.”
“Wow,” Keith murmured.
Lee glanced at Bryn triumphantly. She could see the taunt in his eyes and knew exactly what he was thinking: “Star Wars, huh?”
But just as she started to assume that things were going well, Adam started howling again. Bryn scooped him into her arms. “Adam! You’ll just be away for two weeks without me, Adam. I swear it, Adam…I promise…”
I can’t do this, Bryn thought. I can’t make him go away.
But could she take a risk with him—or with Brian or Keith—again? He had been taken from her once, now she had him back. But would she get him back a second time.
“Adam!” Bryn soothed. She walked over to the bed with him, set him down and lay beside him. Lee followed her, sitting on Adam’s other side. The tears continued to slide down the little boy’s cheeks, and Bryn thought her heart would surely break.
“Adam! Don’t you know how much I love you? I would never, never in a thousand years let you stay away long. I promise, Adam, I’ll be there for you, all of my life!”
His tears subsided to soft sobs; she wiped them from his cheeks. He drew a long, shaky breath as she smoothed back his hair.
“I’ll always love you, Adam,” she repeated softly. “I’ll always be there for you.”
As usual, when he was upset, his r slurred. “Pwomise?”
“I promise, Adam!”
“Pwomise?” he repeated, and Bryn realized that he was staring at Lee.
Lee solemnly returned his stare. “I promise, Adam.”
Keith decided to cut in on the action. He came plunging onto the bed, right in front of Adam.
“We’re going to stay with real Indians, Adam!” Keith turned to Lee. “Can we paint our faces and wear feathers?”
Lee grimaced, then shrugged. “Why not? But you’d better get some sleep, because you’ll have to take a plane out early in the morning.”
“A jet?” Keith asked.
“Umm.”
“My father was a pilot,” Keith said proudly.
“Was he now? That’s wonderful. One day you’re going to have to tell me all about him. But for
now…well…Indians do rise at dawn, you know.”
Lee stood up, allowing Keith to crawl into the double bed. Brian rose and padded over to the cot. Lee walked to the door and placed his finger over the light switch, then paused with a frown as he realized Bryn was still lying next to Adam.
“I…I’m going to stay in here with them for a while,” she said. She was, in a way, lying. She was going to stay there all night. She knew it, and Lee knew it.
Don’t hate me! Bryn pleaded. Please don’t hate me because I need to be with them tonight instead of you.
She couldn’t tell what he was thinking. His golden gaze was unfathomable. “Good night,” he told her softly.
He switched the light off, but Bryn noticed that, just as at home, the bathroom light had been left on.
She hugged Adam closer to her, then stretched her arm out to touch Keith’s shoulder.
Sometime during the night, Brian had left the cot and climbed in beside her. She dimly remembered waking and hugging him, too. It was crowded in the bed, but it was crowded with love.
* * *
Bryn didn’t go to the airport with the boys; Lee thought it would be better if she weren’t seen driving away and then returning. Lee and the group owned a private Lear, and their pilot would do the flying.
It still hurt to see them go, but Bryn kept an enthusiastic smile plastered on her lips as she kissed and hugged them all goodbye. Gayle hugged her in the entryway, swearing that she would look after her charges with the diligence of a mother hen.
“And you do me a favor too, will you?” Gayle whispered, lightly inclining her head to where Lee and Phil were exchanging a few last words.
“A favor?” Bryn inquired, whispering as Gayle had. “I’d love to, but what could I possibly do for you?”
“Look after my brother. Oh, Bryn! You’re the first woman he’s cared for—I mean really cared for—since Victoria. And all that was such a tragedy! I know that he can be as hard as rock and as cold as ice, but bear with him, huh?”
“Of course,” Bryn murmured automatically. What are you talking about, she wanted to shout. But Phil was giving her a friendly hug next, and saying he would see her soon. She only had time for one more quick kiss for each boy, and then they were on their way out. Bryn thought that Adam might shatter her cheerful composure by bursting into last-minute tears, but it seemed that Phil, as well as Gayle, knew something about kids. He carried Adam and talked to him. “Did Lee tell you he had another sister, too? She lives near where we’ll be staying, and she has five kids. And they have a stack of toys like nothing you’ve ever seen….”
Bryn waved until Phil’s rented car was long gone. She closed the door and turned around to find Lee staring at her very strangely. As soon as he caught her eyes on him, though, the enigmatic assessment was masked with a smile.
“You okay?” he asked.
Bryn nodded. “So what next, Sherlock?”
He chuckled softly. What next, he thought with bemusement. I’d like to scream like a bloody conquerer, whip you into my arms and race up the steps to the bedroom. I don’t think I’m really a savage of any kind; it’s just that once man hath tasted the fruit…
She was still walking a fine line between courage and tears. It wasn’t the right time to play Clark Gable in his stairway scene.
“Next,” he said, “is that we join Barbara and Andrew and the rest over at the Fulton place. We work just like normal. You won’t have to do anything but watch and supervise—everyone knew you were in an accident—but I think we should both be there. Then we’ll have dinner and head for your house. What do you say, Dr. Watson?”
“I’m sure I could work, Lee.”
“No way. You’re too valuable to risk.”
“You’re the boss,” Byrn said lightly.
“Hmmm. Why don’t I believe it when you say that?” Lee chuckled.
Bryn smiled. As they walked out the door, she came up with another thought. “Lee, I’m going to need all sorts of things. Chemicals, paper. Almost everything I had was destroyed. But I’m afraid if I run into a camera store and start buying everything in sight, someone could get suspicious.”
“Good thinking, Watson,” Lee teased, “Give me a list and your door key. Mick or Perry can pick up the things and take them to the town house in grocery bags with bread sticking out of the top.”
“Sherlock,” Bryn replied in kind, “you’re half genius.”
“Umm, and what’s the other half?”
Bryn stared into his eyes and answered, “I’m really not sure yet.”
* * *
Rehearsal went smoothly. Bryn was touched by the concern of her fellow dancers, and of Tony Asp and Gary Wright. She remembered how much she had dreaded the work she had needed so badly. Taken aside from everything, this was one of the nicest jobs she had ever had.
The rehearsal broke early for the day. Bryn and Barbara and the group went to a Mexican restaurant for dinner, where they kept the conversation so casual that Bryn began to wish again that she could just forget everything. Surely, if she made no false moves, she couldn’t be in any more danger….
When she and Lee were alone in his car and heading back to her town house, she broached the subject again. “Don’t you think it might still be best just to drop everything?”
“Do you really think that, Bryn?”
She thought about the things that happened to her. Her darkroom destroyed. Adam kidnapped. The crash that had sent her to the hospital for the night. She still felt fear, but also a ripple of that fire-hot fury. She had been pushed against a wall, and when you reached that wall, there was no place to go. Except forward again, fighting back.
“No,” she said quietly.
He cast her a crooked grin. “Do you want to hear an old Indian saying?”
“Sure, why not?” She smiled back.
“When the cougar stalks by night, the hunted must become the hunter.”
Bryn grimaced. “Nice saying.”
“Oh, we’re full of nice sayings. When you get to meet my father you’ll probably hear them all.”
Mick and Perry had already been at the town house. Bryn almost laughed when she saw the neat line of grocery bags set along her counter, a long loaf of French bread protruding from each. But beneath the bread she found everything that she had put on her list.
“Well,” she said briskly, “I guess I’d better get started.”
“Can I help?”
“Can you hang paper?”
“Sure.”
“Then you can help!”
Time meant nothing as they worked. The darkroom was strung with so many lines that they had to duck every time they moved. But by 1:00 A.M. Bryn had finished with the basics. They had enlarged one hundred eighty five-by-sevens to eight-by-elevens that had to be weeded through.
“These are still going to be too small to get much out of,” Bryn said wearily as she grasped her stack and bypassed the file cabinet to reenter the house. “But at least we can dispense with the impossible shots before enlarging the rest.”
Lee grunted his agreement, following close behind. Bryn started to sink down to her sofa, but he stopped her with a soft chuckle. “Don’t get too comfortable. We’re not staying here.”
“We could—”
“No, because I just had an elaborate security system installed at my house.”
“Yes,” Bryn murmured. “I guess that makes sense.”
They locked up her place and drove to his house. Bryn remembered yawning and resting her head against his shoulder. The next thing she knew, she felt movement…and warmth.
Lee was carrying her up his stairway. She opened her eyes and smiled at him with heavy-lidded eyes.
“Did I ever tell you I’m crazy about red-skinned tom-tom players?”
He chuckled softly, huskily. “No. But I’m glad you are.”
She was still half asleep when he laid her on his bed, but she didn’t stay that way long. She discovered that he had a very sensual talent
for convincing her that she wasn’t tired at all….
CHAPTER 13
Bryn was lingering in a pleasant stage of comfort between wakefulness and sleep when the phone began to ring. Immediately she stiffened; a week had passed since the night of Hammarfield’s dinner, a quiet week in which there had been a lot of work and a lot of learning to live together. Nothing in the least frightening had happened in all that time, yet still the sound of a ringing phone sent instant shivers racing along her spine.
The sheets rustled, and she knew Lee was rolling over to answer the phone. He glanced her way and saw her anxious features, then smiled reassuringly after his quick “Hello?” Covering the mouthpiece with his hand, he said, “It’s Gayle.”
“Oh!” Bryn exclaimed anxiously.
“Nothing’s wrong, she’s just checking in.”
Bryn waited while Lee exchanged a few words with his sister, promising that they’d be there by the end of the next week.
“One more day and the video will be finished up. At least at this end. Then the editor will take over.” Lee laughed at something Gayle said. “I don’t like to sound immodest, but, yeah, I think it’s great.” His eyes fell with wicked amusement on Bryn. “I had a stunning ‘Lorena.’”
Bryn smiled, and he handed the phone to her. “She’s got three little urchins tugging at her. They want to talk to you.”
They did talk to her, all three of them, grabbing the phone from one another. They were full of enthusiasm. Brian—she thought it was Brian—told her all about his new bow and arrows. Keith was all excited about sleeping in the teepee. “It’s made out of animal skins! Real animal skins, Aunt Bryn.” She didn’t have the slightest idea of what Adam was saying. When he got excited his speech still got garbled into a language that only another four-year-old could possibly understand.
She sent them all kisses over the phone, warned them to be good and promised that she’d be there in no time. Then Gayle was back on the phone with her.
“I just wanted to set your mind at ease,” Gayle said cheerfully. “They really are having a great time.”
“They sound like it. I admit I was worried about the psychological effect all this might have on them.”
Night Moves (60th Anniversary) Page 23