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Waking Up

Page 14

by Carpenter, Amanda


  Then a frown began to wrinkle her forehead, and she rolled to her side to curl up as though protectively shielding herself from something. The actual realization dawned on her. She was having an affair. The word instantly brought images of others whom she knew indulged in affairs, and Casey from the restaurant immediately came to mind. Robbie winced and shied away from the comparison. It wasn’t the same thing at all. She was making love to Jason, a lifelong friend. Theirs was a relationship of…of…well, at the moment, she wasn’t sure what their relationship was. But it had certainly endured a lot, and it wasn’t as if she were promiscuous.

  She resolved to dismiss the whole thing from her mind for the time being, and she rose to go to the bathroom down the hall and shower quickly. It felt rather odd to be showering in a strange bathroom just next door to her house and the shower she had used now for twelve years. That thought began to bother her, too, niggling at the back of her mind as she wondered what Jason’s parents were doing that day. Most likely they were basking in the Greek Isles and thinking of home. How would they feel if they knew about her and Jason? More unsettling, how would her father feel?

  The first seeds of doubt had been well sown.

  Wrapped in a towel, she hurried back to Jason’s room and dressed. Then she used his hairbrush to pull back her brown length into another ponytail. When she went searching for Jason, she found him in the back garden, whistling cheerfully as he hung several pairs of jeans and shorts out to dry. She looked out of the back window for some time, absently admiring the play of rippling muscles across his naked back. A quick flush tinged her cheeks as she thought of how she had so urgently gripped that broad male back just a few hours ago.

  She glanced back, saw her roses again, still in their box on the kitchen table, and she had to smile again at the fragrant scent that reached her even from that distance. With a quick stride, she gathered them up and slipped out of the back door, heading for her lawn as she called out, “Coming over for supper tonight?”

  He threw her a warm smile over his shoulder and removed two clothes pegs from his mouth to reply, “I’m not sure. Sometime this afternoon I’d meant to run over to my apartment and check up on things, but time got away from me.” That with a wicked, white grin. “Maybe I’d better not, but I promise to pop by later on, if you’d like.”

  “Sure.” She flashed him a responding smile and turned to go, but he ran over to her and tilted her head up for a long, slow, lazy kiss. Then, after staring laughingly down into her flustered expression, he let her go and went back to his work.

  Robbie went inside and rummaged in the kitchen cupboards for something in which to put her flowers. She had to use three vases, one of which she put in her bedroom, the other two she put downstairs. She didn’t know how she was going to explain them to her father. She pondered that logistical problem as she began making supper.

  The phone rang, and she hurried to answer it. With an inordinate amount of surprise, she greeted Ian. He sounded peculiarly short and grim as he asked her out for a drink that evening.

  “No, I can’t make it,” she replied slowly, unwilling to see him. “I’m busy. Look, is anything wrong? You sound upset.”

  He was immediately, painfully hearty. “Good grief, no! I’ve just had a lousy day at work and wanted some company. Well if not tonight, maybe we can get together this weekend, how’s that?”

  “Why don’t you give me a call in a few days?” she prevaricated, finding herself unable to give him a second rejection in a row in light of his obviously low mood. “We can talk about it later when I have more idea of what my schedule will be like.”

  They rang off and Robbie went back to her cooking in a thoughtful frame of mind. It was strange how her dating days with Ian seemed like another era when they had literally been a matter of days. She felt as though she had changed that much. She wasn’t sure how she had changed, for the depth of her new range of emotions was so vast she had only just begun to explore them, but she was sure that she would never be the same again.

  After tucking a roast chicken into the oven and putting potatoes on the stove to boil, she wandered into the living room and threw herself onto the couch. Her father would be home at any minute now and she still had to think of something semi-plausible to tell him about her lovely roses.

  A car pulled into the off-shooting pavement that was their small cul-de-sac, and she glanced out of the window idly. It wasn’t her father’s car, nor was it Jason’s or their other neighbors’, and her interest quickened slightly as she watched to see whose driveway it would pull into.

  The car purred into the Morrows’ driveway, and curiously she watched the driver step out. The late-afternoon sun caught a gleaming, raven-dark head, and Robbie felt an odd, sluggish shock as she watched Jason’s friend Linda, looking stunningly beautiful, straighten to look around her.

  Jason must have also heard the car approach, for he came out of the front door and approached the brunette, who turned and walked straight into his arms. That shook her. That really shook her, for Jason’s golden-brown head came down to rest atop Linda’s for a brief moment, before he gently urged her into the house and shut the door behind them.

  It didn’t necessarily mean anything. There could have been a thousand different reasons for her to visit him, and for him to receive her in such a tenderly caring way. Robbie told herself that fiercely over and over again, while desperately trying to dampen down the sick feeling of hot jealousy that choked her throat.

  Herb walked through the front door a few minutes later and Robbie put on her normal, cheerful expression. When he saw the flowers, he naturally asked where she had got them from. She was so preoccupied with her jealousy and harsh effort to appear normal that she told him the plain truth. That sent his eyebrows shooting up in surprise, but she didn’t even notice.

  Supper tasted like sawdust, though her father complimented her several times. Television couldn’t hold her attention. Later on, Jason phoned briefly to tell them that he wouldn’t be over that evening, and Herb took the call.

  Chapter Ten

  When the travel agent had suggested the Virgin Islands for a vacation, courtesy of a late reservation cancellation, Robbie had leaped at the idea. She had only wanted to get away to think, to put Cincinnati and home far away in a desperate bid to get her life into perspective. Anywhere would have been fine.

  For the first of the two weeks, she had thrown herself into a feverish schedule of sightseeing on the island St Croix. She swam hard in the afternoons and was still going strong in the evenings when she watched the nightclub entertainment. She thoroughly explored Fredericksted, the city where she was staying, and she joined any available tours. She grew even darker after lying whole afternoons in the hot southern sun and struck up several vacation friendships.

  A surprising number of men, both young and old, had made advances that ranged from the utterly suave to the rather unsettling, and the downright pathetic. She went out once or twice, but they always seemed to have the same goal in mind and were frantic to get her into bed before the end of their holidays. After a while, she thought she should carry a stopwatch around with her to time each carefully executed maneuver.

  To each and every one, she gave a firm and emphatic refusal. Somehow the thought of getting physically intimate with a man after the special experience she had shared with Jason was completely repelling to her. That was a scary realization.

  But then everything about Jason scared the sin out of her. Every single thing about him. She had become obsessed with him. She dreamed and thought about him, she yearned, she mooned, she sighed. But somehow she would have to get over her infatuation for him and settle down to leading her life again. He was messing up her mind so that she couldn’t think properly. She had to keep reminding herself of their differences. She should never have made love with him, never, never.

  The second week, her nervous energy was spent, and she drooped, either on the beach, in the hotel lounge, or in her room. Her ankle had swelled
a few times when she had been excessive in her walking about the city, and so she pampered it. She slept late as was her usual custom and sometimes took naps. The two-week leave of absence she had taken from work simply wasn’t going to be enough.

  She was going home tomorrow and she still hadn’t resolved a thing. She was no closer to working out her feelings and fears than she had been when she came, and she didn’t know what she was going to do or say when she saw Jason again.

  She hadn’t told him when she was leaving, and that was part of the complication. She didn’t know what he would do or how he had reacted when Herb had informed him that she had left. She didn’t know whether she should expect rage or cheerful indifference, and she found that she was equally afraid of both. The day after he had spent the evening with Linda, she had simply gone downtown to make travel arrangements, fallen into an extraordinary piece of luck with the cancelled reservation, and had left that very evening.

  Robbie stretched and yawned as she lay sprawled on her beach towel. The sand was hard under her stomach, and she had to pound out a few bumps that dug into her hipbone. The sun was a fierce, relentless glow. She hadn’t thought it possible, but the day after she had first spent the afternoon in the tropical sun, her skin had been tender to the touch and she had just finished a light peeling, though no red had shown through the deep brown of her tan.

  “Hello,” said a strange, male voice from directly above her, and a shadow fell across her head and shoulders. With a deep sigh, she hid her face in her crossed arms for a moment before coolly replying to the greeting. “Mind if I join you?” he asked.

  She lifted her brown, sun-streaked head and saw a black shadow surrounded by blinding white sun rays, and she said briefly, “Help yourself, if you’re not a chatterer and you’re not trying to pick me up. I’ve had my fill of that, and I’m in no mood to tolerate any nonsense.”

  It was remarkable, she mused sleepily, what a put-off brisk annoyance really could be. The fellow looked around him with a great show of nonchalance, muttered something to her which she didn’t catch, and set off for easier prey.

  That evening, as she had for the last two weeks, she dined excellently and savored every bite. The holiday had made a huge dent in her savings account, but it was something she’d always promised herself. She wished she could have appreciated it more than she had. After the meal, she strayed into the bar for a drink and to listen to the music, but after she had been forced to give a few sharp rebuffs to a man who was distinctly unsteady on his feet, she went to her room and locked the door behind her with the feeling of having escaped from a jungle. Any other time she would have felt flattered at the attention, but she was simply too preoccupied for that sort of thing.

  She called her father to let him know what time her flight would be in the next day. After a wait, her phone call went through, and Herb sounded delighted through the slight crackle of the overseas connection. “Hello, honey! This is an unexpected pleasure. Is everything all right? Are you having a good time?”

  “Yes, everything’s fine, and I’ve had a wonderful time,” she assured him cheerfully, if not very truthfully. “If you can believe it, I got sunburn on my first day at the beach. How’s everything there?”

  “Just fine. I’ve had Marjorie over several times, and the house is a mess,” he chuckled. “Not that the two have anything to do with each other. Are you sure you can afford this phone call?”

  “Don’t worry about the money,” she dismissed lightly. “I just wanted to call and let you know that my flight will be arriving tomorrow evening at six thirty, and I was wondering if you could pick me up at the airport.”

  “Sure, no problem. Which airline are you flying on?” She told him, and then she started to make appropriate closing noises when he interrupted quickly with, “Listen, Jason’s sitting right here, would you like to talk to him before you hang up?”

  Foolishly, her heart leaped with the unexpected shock of hearing Jason’s name. Talking to her father and discussing Jason was bringing them both as close as though they were in the next room, and the whole purpose of her holiday was shattered into indiscernible fragments. She replied, too fast, “No, we’d better hang up before I really do end up in debt over this call. Just tell him I’ll talk to him when I get back.”

  “All right, honey. See you soon.” And with that, the conversation was ended.

  The next day, after packing and having a leisurely brunch, she arrived at the airport in plenty of time to sit and stew for a good half an hour before her flight. She was the kind of person who found just the philosophy of travel tiring, even when she was simply sitting and doing nothing but reading a magazine and looking around. Flying was nothing new to her, and so she daydreamed for most of the trip, except for a long and hilarious conversation she had with a pale, old man who sat next to her and trembled with palsy. He said the most outrageous things and had her whooping for a good half an hour, which left her feeling like a limp noodle. When the plane landed in Cincinnati, they walked out together to find their respective families.

  His was the first they spotted, and they parted with the cheerful, affectionate indifference which is so unique to travelling companions, before she continued to search for some sign of Herb. She’d had it fixed so firmly in her mind that her father was picking her up that she looked at Jason twice before realizing that he was watching her with a quiet, twisted smile. Her face reflected her deep surprise, and then he was coming towards her in long, graceful, eye-catching strides.

  He was dressed in nothing special. Faded jeans hugged his lean hips and thighs, and a light blue shirt was open at his neck and rolled up at his elbows, bringing out the gold highlights in his hair and skin and making his eyes seem more vividly brilliant than ever. There was nothing especially outstanding about his appearance, and yet heads turned to watch him go by. Robbie didn’t even see the appreciative glances other women threw at him. All she saw was Jason.

  “Hello. I suppose we have to get your luggage, hmm?” he said, as ordinary as he’d ever been with her, and her spirits plummeted. So it was to be a cheerful indifference from him, and she was left completely alone as she struggled to cope with her deep, surging feelings for him.

  “Yes,” she said too brightly, and she whirled to find the conveyor belt upon which the luggage from their flight was unceremoniously dumped. “What happened to Dad?”

  Jason’s light eyes were on the moving luggage, his lean face preoccupied, and her spirits sank even lower. “Hmm? Oh, he was going out this evening with Marjorie, so I said I’d pick you up to save him time.” With a quickly flicked, smiling glance, he remarked, “I didn’t think it was possible, but you’re darker than ever. Herb told me you got sunburned.”

  “Yes, the weather was fabulous.” She hardly knew what she said, and her large suitcase almost went by before she saw it and made a darting grab. “I think it must have been the swimming that did it. I was in the water for several hours that first day, and isn’t water supposed to reflect sunlight?”

  “I believe so. Is that it, then? We might as well go. Here, let me take that for you.” His lean fingers brushed hers as he took the suitcase handle, and she nearly dropped the luggage before he had a grip on it.

  The drive back was full of pleasant, nondescript, empty conversation. Jason informed her that he was back at work, to which she replied that it was a shame he hadn’t had more time off. She stared out the window and felt deadened inside while he traced the long-familiar route back home. He pulled into their cul-de-sac, parked in the Morrows’ driveway, and carried her suitcase again as he walked her back to her house.

  For some reason, walking into the empty house with Jason silent and somehow distant right behind her made her start to shake. She entered breezily and walked right through the entire downstairs as though she were inspecting the place, but in reality, she was running away. The rooms were scrupulously clean, and in the kitchen she turned to laugh at Jason who had set down her suitcase and followed her. He leaned
against the archway to the hall, regarding her steadily.

  “Dad said the house was a wreck, but I think it looks terrific! He must have stayed up late last night cleaning!” she exclaimed, and then she whirled to the kitchen counter. “Want a cup of coffee? I think I’ll make a pot.”

  “Why did you leave like that?” he asked softly, and a terrible apprehension seized her. She turned to stare at him and found that she’d been wrong, horribly wrong, for under his pleasant cheerfulness had burned a hot anger the entire time. It was a hard shock, for she’d never realized how adept he was at concealing his emotions.

  “I needed a vacation,” she said, her voice strained. She couldn’t bear to look into his hard expression and angry eyes, and so she turned back to the coffeepot and took it in her hands. All intention of making coffee had fled, and she just stared down blankly at the empty pot.

  “You were already having a vacation. Why did you leave like that?” His quiet, soft voice, that frightening control, that relentlessness, sent her into a panic.

  “I needed to get away.” Her words throbbed.

  “You didn’t say a word to me, not a word. You were gone, and I didn’t find out until I came over that evening and Herb told me. You just left. I understood that you might have needed to get away, but how the hell could you have just picked up and left like that?” Though he tried, the burning heat came through the fabric of his words until his last question was savage with it.

  “I couldn’t face you,” she whispered, and she didn’t think he could hear.

  “My God,” he said deeply, and he began to swear. She whirled, feeling a little like a spinning top, and she stared at him, shocked by his molten eyes, his clenched hands, his taut, darkened expression. When he finally fell silent, they stared at each other across the distance of the room. She was weak with weariness at her intense emotions, and she bent her head to cover her eyes with one hand. Then Jason asked, his voice raw, “What did I do to send you away?”

 

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