Lightning Storm

by Anne McAllister

  ‘Sounds great.’ She felt grimy, ripe for a shower. But there was rapture where her mind should have been.

  The back door creaked open and Addie appeared.

  ‘Though I heard you,’ she said with none of her usual smiles. Torey’s sunburnt nose wrinkled at the sight of her grandmother’s ramrod posture. ‘You have a visitor, Jake,’ she continued.

  ‘Huh?’

  A petite blonde woman appeared in the doorway behind Addie. Torey’s mouth dropped open in recognition. ‘You’re—’ she began.

  ‘Christy,’ Jake said heavily, his voice falling like lead into the silence left by Torey’s astonishment. ‘What the hell do you want now?’

  CHAPTER NINE

  ‘You look well, Jake,’ Christy said in a soft voice as she came around Addie to look down at him.

  Jake looked, Torey thought, sicker by the minute. The day’s sunburn seemed almost to drain out of his face leaving him in grim-faced pallor as he stared back at her. He glanced quickly at Scott who was just disappearing up the steps to their apartment. ‘What do you want?’ he repeated, scowling.

  ‘I came to see you. And Scott,’ Christy said. Torey heard her voice waver as if she were expecting just the sort of hostile reaction she was getting.

  ‘Why?’ That one word contained so much negative emotion that even Torey stepped back, startled.

  Christy shrugged slightly as she contemplated the apparent hopelessness of getting Jake to respond civilly. ‘To tell you I’m getting married again,’ she offered, as though it might help to make their peace. Torey sucked in her breath sharply.

  Jake looked stunned. Then he snarled, ‘Lucky you. Did you want my blessing? If so, you’ve got it. Better luck this time.’ Then he spun on his heel and stalked off towards his apartment, taking the stairs two at a time, never once looking back. The door slammed hard behind him.

  Christy was studying her sandalled feet in dismay. ‘I was afraid of that,’ she said. Pushing a wisp of white-blonde hair out of her eyes she sighed and turned to Addie. ‘Thank you for putting up with me while I waited, Mrs. Harrison,’ she said softly. ‘I don’t know if you should tell him or not, but I will be back.’ Torey saw a stubbornness in Christy’s chin that made her feel a respect for the young woman she didn’t want to feel.

  Christy looked over and caught Torey’s eye, considering her curiously as though wondering who her ex-husband was hanging around with now. But her gaze wasn’t hostile, only interested, and then, on longer inspection, a bit perplexed.

  ‘Haven’t we met?’ she asked Torey finally.

  ‘Yes, once or twice,’ Torey admitted. ‘When I was visiting my grandparents a number of years ago. You were dating someone else at the time.’ Christy had been. Mick. But Torey didn’t want to mention that, fearing the memories it would bring, recalling how Jake had reacted to her mention of his friend. Besides, she didn’t want Addie to know she had known Jake years ago, had dated him once. On a double date with Mick and the girl who was now Jake’s ex-wife!

  Christy’s eyes brightened momentarily, then clouded with sadness. ‘Yes,’ she said, a hoarseness in her voice that told Torey how harsh the memories were. ‘I remember now. You knew Mick?’ The question was gentle, tinged with a kind of wistfulness that made Torey think of how she had sometimes sounded when she met and talked with some of Paul’s old friends.

  ‘Not too well,’ she replied. ‘He seemed very nice.’

  ‘He was.’ Christy’s voice rose as though she would have continued, but then she seemed to think better of it for she shut her mouth, pressing it into a grim line. ‘If you talk to Jake tonight, Mrs. Harrison,’ she said abruptly, ‘tell him I’ll be around. Tell him I want to see Scott.’ She patted Addie’s arm and walked briskly down the steps, the smile on her face stiff and unyielding as she crossed the yard and shut the gate.

  ‘Oh my,’ Torey breathed, leaning against the railing watching her leave, watching the warmth of her day leave too. ‘When did she arrive?’

  ‘About two hours ago. When she didn’t find Jake home, she stopped to see me. We had tea and cookies and talked.’

  ‘She’s lucky she found you,’ Torey said. ‘I doubt she’d have got tea and cookies from Jake.’

  ‘I think you’re right about that.’ Addie turned and went back into the kitchen, leaving Torey to follow. ‘I’d no idea he was still so bitter.’

  Neither had Torey. It depressed her at the same time that it lent credence to her speculations that he still loved Christy. If he didn’t why would he care if she got married again? Imagine Christy being his ex-wife! All the while she undressed for her shower she marvelled at it. Had he been harbouring secret longings for her all the time she dated his best friend? Torey ducked her head under the cool spray, scrubbing the sand and salt from her hair, wondering if seven years ago Jake had been longing for Christy while she, Torey, was longing for Jake! And when he got her it hadn’t worked. There was a moral there somewhere, Torey thought dismally, whether she wanted to see it or not. Soapy water streamed down over her face and breasts, and she remembered Jake touching them and teasing them only a couple of hours before. Then they had tingled, aroused by her awareness of him. Now all her awareness was in the pit of her stomach which knotted as she wondered if, knowing that Christy was about to remarry, Jake would try to win her back.

  It didn’t seem likely, Torey had to admit, when he arrived freshly shaved and scrubbed an hour later. He made every effort to be genial and charming, teasing Addie about her first date out since her hospitalisation, giving Scott a ride on his shoulders from the parking lot to the restaurant, and calling Torey ‘my favourite dragon’ until she threatened to incinerate him with one breath if he said it again. But though Jake smiled and teased, there was a hollowness in his voice she hadn’t heard before. His smile was forced, the teasing a bit too strong. He nearly shredded his napkin while they waited for dinner, and Torey longed to reach out and touch him, take his hand in hers, comforting him and promising him that everything would be all right.

  But of course that was patently impossible. She didn’t know for sure what, in his eyes, ‘all right’ meant. Jealously she didn’t want to believe that it might mean that Christy would come back to him, and realistically she wasn’t willing to tell him that ‘all right’ meant that she cared about him, would always be there for him, loving him and making his life complete. So instead she sat on her hands, trying to say with her eyes what she felt in her heart and wishing that Jake had good memories like she had of Paul, and that his memories, like hers, would recede into the past, letting them get on with life now. Jake, unfortunately, wasn’t looking.

  It was until they had taken Addie home and Jake was about to take Scott up to bed that he said to Torey, ‘Want to come up and see my etchings?’ He wasn’t smiling, his face was dead serious, but she knew it wasn’t etchings he was offering tonight. Nor sex either. It was simply that some nights, confronted by memories, it was better not to be alone.

  ‘All right.’

  He showed her where the coffee was, handed her a stack of picture books he had illustrated, saying, ‘Behold the etchings,’ and nodded towards the sofa. ‘Make yourself comfortable. I won’t be long.’

  Torey made coffee, then curled into the corner of the sofa, adjusting a navy blue enamelled desk lamp over her shoulder for the best light. She was just beginning to look through his second book when Jake appeared in the doorway to Scott’s room, looking sheepish, a dull red flush on his cheekbones.

  ‘Do you tell bedtime stories?’ he asked uncomfortably.

  ‘One or two.’

  ‘Could you?’ An eyebrow lifted in entreaty. ‘Scott wants you, not me.’ It didn’t seem to be an admission he liked making.

  ‘Tell me a mother dragon story,’ Scott demanded from his narrow bed.

  Jake looked embarrassed, but moved out of her way as she sat on the edge of Scott’s bed. ‘A short one,’ she agreed. ‘The coffee’s ready,’ she told Jake. ‘Go pour it. I’ll be out in a
few minutes.’ He wasn’t the only one feeling uncomfortable. She didn’t need to feel any more like a member of the family tonight, not when she knew how much Scott longed for a mother and that his real one had just appeared today.

  Obviously Jake hadn’t told him or there would have been a million questions on his lips. She wondered why Christy hadn’t insisted on going up to Jake’s after he had left. But then, recalling the look on Jake’s face, perhaps it wasn’t so odd. She wasn’t sure she’d have dared knock either. Not if, in time, she could come to terms with him another way.

  She told Scott a story about a mother dragon looking for a child to love. She hadn’t planned it, it just came out that way. And while she felt almost tearful at the end, Scott sighed and smiled contentedly, letting her shut out the light and. rejoin Jake in the living room without protest.

  ‘I think he’s obsessed,’ Jake said irritably when she emerged. ‘He’s got dragons on the brain.’

  ‘Mothers actually,’ Torey corrected gently, going to sit at the opposite end of the couch, needing the space if she were going to be the least bit objective tonight.

  Jake sighed heavily. ‘Yes, damn it.’ His eyes closed and she saw his jaw tighten. Then he muttered, ‘What the hell did she have to show up for?’ He shook his head wearily. ‘Well, if I know Christy, she’d be gone again tomorrow.’

  Torey thought she detected a hopeful note in his voice which pleased her because it made her think he didn’t care about Christy after all. But she knew she had to disabuse him of the notion that he was rid of her whether it pleased either of them or not. ‘She said she would be back,’ she told him.

  The blue eyes flew open, steely and cold, and Jake stared at her. ‘She said that?’

  ‘Yes.’ Torey wished she had kept her mouth shut. She picked up her cup from the rattan and glass coffee table and blew on it gently.

  ‘Damn.’ Jake jumped to his feet and paced across the room, staring out the kitchen window into the sunset beyond the pier. But Torey didn’t think he was paying the least attention to the picture postcard setting. His shoulders were thrown back, his hand stuffed into the back pockets of pale blue corduroy jeans. His posture spoke more of tension than of anything else, and Torey contemplated the wisdom of getting up and going to him, trying to massage the tautness from those muscles and ease the tension in his shoulders and back. It was what she would have done for Paul. It had never occurred to her to do it for anyone else. But she desperately wanted to do it for Jake now. She set down her cup and got slowly to her feet, padding across the thick carpet until she stood noiselessly behind his right shoulder. In the reflection of the glass she saw the tension in his face.

  Jake took one hand out of his pocket and rubbed it around the collar of his navy and green striped polo shirt, easing it away from his neck in a gesture she had come to recognise as indicating his discomfort and anxiety. Then his hand drifted forward to rub absently at the scar over his eye. ‘Sorry,’ he mumbled. ‘I guess I’m not exactly in the right frame of mind to show you my etchings now.’ His self-mocking grin barely reached the corners of his mouth, but Torey felt it tug at her heart.

  ‘Is there anything I can do?’ Her hands went up behind him, beginning to knead his shoulders and neck. Her thumbs rubbed up and down on the cords of his neck, and he dropped his head forward, bracing himself against the window with his hands, encouraging her fingers to tangle in the thick hair at the nape of his neck.

  ‘Shoot Christy?’ he suggested with a hollow laugh. ‘No. Just do what you’re doing. God, that feels wonderful.’ He sighed softly as Torey worked magic with her fingers across his shoulders, on his neck, and slowly down the ridged column of his spine. She wished she could ease his mind the same way. ‘God, Torey, where’d you learn this?’ He was shivering under her gentle ministrations, and Torey stopped the massage long enough to take him by the hand and lead him to the couch.

  ‘I’m a physiotherapist, remember?’ she reminded him, smiling. ‘It’s all part of the job. Lie down.’

  He lay, obedient, on his stomach, his face turned to watch as she knelt next to him, his black hair drifting across his forehead shading the arctic blue of his eyes. She began to massage again, kneading the muscles near his shoulder blades, then sliding upward to work again on his neck before edging slowly and deliberately down the length of his spine. Jake stretched and arched his back, small almost primitive sounds catching in his throat as she moved her fingers along his spine. Reaching the waistband of his jeans, she began a languorous upward trek again, pleased to feel his tension easing. His eyelids flickered shut, then open again.

  ‘You’re a miracle worker,’ he muttered, his voice sleepy.

  Good, Torey thought. Maybe I can put you to sleep. She was grateful for his somnolent inclinations. They would be easier to deal with than his desire tonight. Together they had come a long way today. Far enough, she thought. It wasn’t that many days since he had been a villain in her eyes. In the last week she had dared to give him a chance, dared to accept her attraction to him. But too much too soon would be as bad for them both as never knowing or trusting him at all. If she tried, she might even find it in her heart to be grateful to Christy for happening on the scene just now. But she wasn’t quite that magnanimous. Not yet. Christy might still be a threat. Things between Torey and Jake were too tenuous, too new.

  Jake’s breathing grew deep and even, the sound of an exhausted man who needed his sleep. Torey smoothed down the shirt on his back, loving to touch him, rejoicing in the privilege of doing so. She settled back on her heels, regarding him with a smile, her eyes feasting on the thick dark hair, the craggy face vulnerable now in sleep, the hard body so neatly outlined by the knit shirt and cord jeans. She reached down and slipped off the pair of deck shoes he wore, setting them beside the couch. Then, with a reluctance she battled against and won, she rose to her feet, dumped the cold coffee into the sink and turned off the light. In the silvery blue glow of the street lamp, she bent over him, touching her lips to his hair, loving the softness, the hint of lime shampoo and seabreeze there.

  ‘Good night, Jake,’ she whispered. ‘Sleep well.’ She let herself out, catching the nightlatch on the door as she left, her mind still remaining in the apartment, her heart fast becoming a possession of the man who lived upstairs.

  ‘Is he back yet?’ It was getting to be a ritual, Christy’s voice at the door or on the ‘phone as she tried unsuccessfully to track down Jake.

  ‘Not yet,’ Torey sighed, embarrassed almost by the ritual quality of her answer. For three days now she had been saying the same thing. It was as if Scott—and his father—had disappeared.

  They were gone in the camper when Torey got up in the morning, and rarely did she see a light in their apartment when she went to bed at night. After three days even she couldn’t tell Christy that Jake’s absence was mere coincidence anymore.

  ‘He has no right to do this,’ Christy complained that afternoon when she and her fiancé, a ruggedly handsome blond, had arrived for the third time. ‘I do have visitation rights.’ She swept a hand through her casual hairstyle and stared helplessly at her fiancé. ‘Do you want to give up, Doug?’ she asked wearily, and Torey couldn’t help feeling sorry for her. If Scott had meant little to her years ago, obviously that had changed now.

  Doug shook his head. ‘No. Not unless you do. We don’t have to be back in San Francisco immediately. I’m willing to stay.’ He drained the glass of iced tea that Torey had given him. ‘Come on, Chris. Let’s walk on the beach.’

  Christy, who looked like she needed a distraction just then, obligingly followed him to the gate. Then, turning back to Torey, she said, ‘I’m not leaving. I have a right to see my son. You tell him that, will you?’

  ‘I will,’ Torey promised. ‘If I see him,’ she added to herself. She hadn’t since the night she had left him asleep on the sofa. He was avoiding her too.

  ‘I don’t understand him,’ she complained to Addie. ‘I mean, I know he’s angry at Chr
isty. I know he’s bitter. But he’s acting like a child. This running away is irrational, hysterical. What’s going on in his head?’

  Addie shrugged, apparently as mystified as Torey was.

  It was as if he had dropped out of her life altogether. Ironic, she thought, how a month ago she would have given her eye teeth for him to do this same vanishing act. But now, when she wanted to see him, he wasn’t there. ‘Do you think he still loves Christy?’ She asked the dreaded question, not really wanting to hear the answer. But Addie surprised her by shaking her head and saying,

  ‘No. Though of course I’m not certain. Still, I wouldn’t think so.’ She cocked her head and smiled at Torey. ‘Not the way he looks at you.’

  Torey flushed under Addie’s knowing smile, but the singing in her heart was tempered by the knowledge that Jake’s passion for her had surfaced before Christy had reappeared in his life. Maybe she had merely been an adequate replacement for Christy as long as she wasn’t around. But once she had come back, had Jake’s old longings and memories been reawakened? She wished she knew.

  By Friday she was fed up with giving Christy the same two-word response and annoyed at Jake for what she could only describe as totally irresponsible and immature behaviour. One way or another, she decided, he had to come to terms with Christy. For Torey’s sake if not his own! She needed to know if he still cared for his ex-wife. She couldn’t eat, she couldn’t sleep. She couldn’t live in this limbo he was creating by his absence. Thursday she waited until she saw a light on in his apartment and went up to knock on his door. He didn’t answer it though he was obviously home.

  If that’s the way you want to play the game, so be it, she thought. And the following night she camped on his doorstep. He would be hard pressed to ignore her if he had to step over her to get in.