Father of Two

by Judith Arnold

  She flinched. “What do you mean, what about me?”

  “You know my life story. Let’s hear yours.”

  “My life story?”

  “The abridged version, if you’d rather.”

  She set down her empty plate on the coffee table, cradled her beer in her hands, and mulled over her response. “The abridged version is, I grew up with Molly here in Arlington, I became a lawyer, and here I am.”

  He tossed back his head and laughed. “I guess I’m going to need the unabridged version.”

  “I’m afraid I haven’t lived a particularly interesting life,” she said almost apologetically. “I’m a very boring person.”

  “In all the time I’ve spent with you,” he said, sounding unnervingly earnest, “I have never been bored. Not for an instant.”

  She twisted on the couch to face him. He was studying her, a ghost of a smile playing across his mouth. She knew his gaze, knew the way he could look at her as if he was looking through her—but tonight it was different. Tonight she didn’t hate him, and she didn’t fear him, and when he stared at her she almost wanted him to see what was inside.

  So much for keeping up her guard.

  “What I meant,” she explained, her voice unexpectedly muted, “was that I haven’t lived a terribly exciting life.”

  “Would you like some excitement in your life?” he asked, the merest hint of mischief glinting in his eyes.

  She smiled and shook her head. “No. I think my life is just fine the way it is.”

  “Eighty hours of work a week and nothing on the side.” He considered, then nodded. “Yeah, that sounds about right.”

  It sounded wretchedly out of balance, but it also sounded like an accurate description of her life.

  “What about boyfriends?” he asked.

  “What about them?”

  “How many do you have?”

  “One hundred twenty-two,” she said dryly.

  “Hmm. I guess I’m lucky you were free tonight.”

  “That depends on your definition of lucky.”

  One of his eyebrows flickered up, a small motion that Gail might have missed if she weren’t gazing so intently at his face. She realized that her flip retort had revealed more about her than any of her other, more thoughtful statements. No man who got to spend an evening with her was lucky. She knew it, and God help her, if Murphy made any sort of overture, he’d learn it for himself.

  “I think,” he said quietly, placing his bottle on the table and edging toward her, “that tonight I’m the luckiest man alive.”

  Don’t kiss me, she prayed fervently, not because she didn’t want his kiss, not because in some long-forgotten region of her heart she craved his kiss, but because once he kissed her he would desire more from her, and more, until the fragile new closeness she felt toward him would be tested beyond what it could withstand. He would either let the kiss proceed to its logical conclusion—which, she knew from past experience would be a disaster, and would spoil any chance that she and Murphy would emerge from it as friends—or she would stop him, in which case he would resent her or hate her or think she was deranged. The moment Murphy kissed her, they would be boarding a train, and she would either have to throw the emergency brake or else let the train speed to its ultimate destination, a place that made her go cold with dread just thinking about it.

  He touched his mouth to hers, and she was in trouble. Big trouble. He grazed her lips again, and she yearned to wrap her arms around him and hold tight, and beg him to kiss her and hold her and ask for nothing more. A third whisper-light kiss and she heard the rumble of the engine, felt her feet slip as Murphy lifted her off the platform and onto the train as it chugged slowly away from the station.

  His fourth kiss was different—harder, hungrier. His fifth coaxed her lips apart, and after that she stopped counting. The train was moving too fast. Jumping off was out of the question.

  “What in God’s name would make you think you’re boring?” he whispered, then kissed her again, sliding his tongue into her mouth. It took him no effort to pull her onto his lap and plow his fingers through her hair until he was cupping the back of her head. Holding her still, he drew back. Through slightly blurred vision she viewed his face, his mouth, his angular jaw, his eyes so intense she could practically feel his gaze like a caress against her skin. “You are the least boring woman I’ve ever met,” he told her. “I get excited just thinking about your initials.”

  “My initials?” A breathless laugh escaped her.

  “G.S. Girl, Sexy. Go, Sweetheart. God-Send.” He kissed her chin, the tip of her nose and leaned back again. “Gail Saunders.” Then he took her mouth again, filled it with his tongue, stroked deep. She felt his kiss in her breasts, her hips, in her throat, her ankles, her ribs, in her heart. She brought her fingers to rest gently on his shoulders and he groaned, as if that timid touch was enough to ignite him.

  He kissed her again, then paused to catch his breath. “Let’s go,” he whispered, shifting her off his lap so he could stand.

  “Go where?” she asked stupidly. He laughed, clasped her hands in his and pulled her to her feet—and she realized where he wanted to go with this, with her. But the train was slowing slightly; this was her chance to stop it and climb off. “No, Murphy—I can’t.”

  “Can’t what?” He lifted his hands to the sides of her head and twined his fingers through her hair. The skin behind her ears tingled.

  “I’m just not...I’m not good at this,” she said. That was as much honesty as she dared. If she told him her true feelings about sex, he’d think she was in dire need of mental therapy. She’d already gone that route a few years ago, and it hadn’t helped.

  “I’m good enough for both of us,” he said, half a boast and half a dare. Then he kissed her again, and she very nearly believed him.

  He led her down the hall, past the bathroom where his daughter had once rinsed her mouth at Gail’s behest, and into a spacious room at the hall’s end. Like the living room, it was furnished in sleek modern pieces. A vast bed protruded from the far wall, which seemed to be all glass. A filmy drape was drawn across the windows, but through the translucent fabric Gail could see the lights of the city winking like stars.

  She returned her focus to the bed. Wide enough to hold four pillows across the headboard, it was made with dark sheets and a pale gray comforter. Teak night tables flanked it.

  It was so huge. As if nothing else mattered, nothing else existed. Just Murphy and his bed and the night outside.

  He swept her into his arms again. She closed her eyes, wanting to believe...she didn’t know what. That she could be good at this with him, that he could be good enough for both of them. That they wouldn’t despise each other when it was over.

  He opened his mouth over hers and ran his hands down her back to her waist. She felt him tug her shirt free of her slacks, felt him slide his hands beneath the cotton, felt his fingers against her skin. His fingertips were blunt and firm, following the line of her backbone upward until he reached her bra. With a flick he had the clasp undone.

  She recalled how dexterous he’d been repairing her windows. How handy he’d been, how capable when it came to fixing things. But when he brought his hands forward under her shirt, pushing the bra up and out of his way, she could no longer recall anything that had happened as recently as a nano-second ago. All she knew was now, the shocking heat of his hands covering her breasts, his fingers stroking, his palms arching around the flesh.

  She leaned into him, feeling dazed. Through her breasts he seemed to have affected her lungs, because she was no longer sure how to breathe. God, his touch felt good. Sweet and sensual. If only they could do this and not go further, if only this were the ultimate goal...

  He stopped kissing her, and she opened her eyes. His smile didn’t reassure her. Nor did his abandoning her breasts for the edge of her shirt, which he yanked up and off her head in one swift motion, taking her bra with it. She stood before him, bare from the wais
t up, feeling not so much modest as despairing that she could ever get the train to stop at this point, that she could prevent a devastating wreck.

  Hooking his thumb through a belt loop in her slacks, he backed up to sit on the edge of the bed, pulling her with him until she stood trapped between his knees. He kissed the soft, pale skin of her midriff, then held her with his legs while he removed his own shirt, which he hurled across the room.

  His chest was beautiful. Lean and supple. the skin gold-hued, his muscles taut. His shoulders were broad, knotted bone and sinew, and his arms were well muscled and dusted with hair a shade paler than the tawny mane framing his face. To her amazement, she wanted to touch his chest, to see if it felt as glorious as it looked.

  She let her fingers trace the horizontal lines of his shoulders and his breath caught. Surely she couldn’t be arousing him, not like this, not with such an aimless, tentative caress. Not when she was teetering so close to panic.

  Yet she skimmed her fingers along his shoulders again, and he gasped again, and then things suddenly started happening very fast. Within seconds, it seemed, he had her slacks open, and his own, her panties dispensed with, his boxers gone. Within seconds they were lying on his broad bed, side by side, completely naked.

  She told herself to assemble every self-protective instinct she had, to prepare to fake it if necessary. She told herself that this was Murphy, that he wasn’t any other man, that for this one evening she had decided to trust him. She told herself that his back felt so good, his kisses were so lovely, his sighs so eloquent that she would be able to get through the rest of it with a minimum of horror. She told herself, with every movement of his hands on her skin, every caress of his mouth, every shift of his legs against hers, that she would be okay.

  “Touch me,” he whispered.

  She was touching him. She was touching his neck, the thick ridges of his collarbones, the curves of his pectorals. She was touching his upper arms, his bony elbows, the flat expanse of his abdomen, his supple back. She was groping through his hair, nibbling his lower lip, arching against him so her breasts could press his chest. Everywhere she touched him seemed to please him. His breath was uneven, his kisses wilder, more demanding as her hands glided over his torso.

  He snagged one as it journeyed along his side and guided it forward, lower, into the denser, curlier hair. “Touch me,” he pleaded, pressing her hand to his aroused flesh, closing her fingers around him. He was big, hard, hot. Alive, as if that one organ had an existence all its own.

  Her windpipe slammed shut. Her hand jerked away. Every drugging kiss, every lulling caress evaporated in a sharp, blindingly bright memory. She couldn’t push the thought away, couldn’t get past it. It surrounded her, screamed at her, hurled her out of the present and back, back to a time, an experience she could not forget.

  “No,” she whimpered, unable to look at Murphy. “No, I’m sorry, I’m sorry—” Her voice was weak and frantic. “I can’t—I’m sorry, I just—I can’t...” She wrenched free of his embrace and rolled away, curling herself in a ball with her back to him.

  She was mortified beyond words. Shivers wracked her. She wanted to run away, but she doubted her legs would function well enough to flee.

  Behind her she heard a low, shaky breath. Then a groan. Then a curse.

  “I’m sorry,” she mumbled. Her lips were quivering too much to utter anything beyond that.

  He said nothing. A long minute passed in silence. She lay in fetal position, her eyes squeezed shut and her body trembling as if she’d just fallen through the ice into the black water of a winter pond.

  When at last he brought his hand to her shoulder she stiffened. She was so cold, the heat in his palm seemed to singe her. She expected to see blisters where his fingers had been.

  He sketched a line with his thumb. His vast, broad bed seemed too small now. She couldn’t crawl away from him. Then again, she probably lacked the strength to crawl.

  “What’s going on?” he asked.

  “Nothing.” As if he’d believe that.

  “Gail.”

  “I’m sorry, I really am.” She hated how feeble she sounded, how frightened. How many times had she vowed never to be this frightened again, never to let the old fears rise up and conquer her? How many times had she sworn that nothing and no one would ever intimidate her?

  He slid his hand forward enough to be able to push her shoulder down, forcing her onto her back so he could look at her. She saw fire in his eyes, anger, frustration. His lips shaped a grim line. His hair was disheveled. Had she done that to him? Mussed his hair like that?

  He was waiting for an explanation. She didn’t blame him. But he looked so...bewildered. So bitter. “I’m sorry,” she said yet again, her voice a tremulous whisper. “I warned you I wasn’t any good at this.”

  “Gail.” He brushed a strand of hair away from her cheek, and only then did she feel the dampness. She was crying—and she hadn’t even realized it. “Tell me what’s going on.”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “I do.”

  “No. Look, I’m sorry, okay?” If she could find the energy to get out of his bed, if she could stagger across the room to retrieve her clothes...dear God, if she could get away from him before she began sobbing, before he decided she was worthless and horrible and—

  “I’m here, Gail. It’s me. You won’t scare me off. Just tell me.”

  “I can’t.” Her voice was scarcely a whisper of breath.

  “Someone hurt you,” he guessed.

  Either she was too easy to read, or he was too perceptive. Probably the latter. None of the few other men she’d gone to bed with had ever asked.

  She didn’t want to talk about it, but he’d figured it out on his own. And she owed him. It’s me, he’d said, I’m here. He was there, and if she couldn’t give him what he wanted, she could at least give him the truth.

  “Yes,” she admitted, dying a little inside as another tear rolled across her cheek and soaked into her hair. “Someone hurt me.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  HE CURSED AGAIN, not at her but at the world in general. Yet the anger faded from his eyes, and the bitterness. He sank into the pillows next to her and gathered her to himself, cushioning her head with his shoulder.

  She tried not to cry, but he was too strong, too inviting. With his arms so comforting, so sheltering, she couldn’t help herself.

  “I’m sorry,” she said, sniffling and swatting the tears from her face with her fingers.

  “If you say that one more time, I’m going to wind up punching the wall and breaking my hand.”

  “Okay,” she conceded. “I’m not sorry.”

  “Good.” He bowed and kissed her forehead. His kiss was a benediction, a prayer to keep her safe. “Who hurt you, Gail?” he asked. “I’d like to go and beat the crap out of him.”

  To her surprise, a faint, watery laugh slipped past her lips. “Oh, Popeye,” she murmured. “My hero. You’re so tough when you eat your spinach.”

  He kissed her again, lightly yet purposefully. “Tell me what happened.”

  “It’s stupid,” she began, her voice sounding measurably stronger, her tears spent. “I’m embarrassed, because it happened so long ago, and I—I should have gotten over it by now.”

  “Well, shame on you,” he teased. “Two demerits for not getting over it.” He kissed her once more, soft, soothing. “What did he do to you?”

  “He...” She sighed. “He stopped me for having a broken tail light.”

  “A cop?” This time she felt Murphy stiffen. His voice bristled with revived rage. “A cop did this?”

  She nodded, her hair brushing his shoulder. “I was in college at the time, a junior. I was such a twit, Murphy—I’m sure it was partly my fault, but—”

  “No. I don’t like that part of your story, where you keep blaming yourself. That doesn’t work for me. Get rid of it. No more apologies. Okay?”

  “Okay.” His skin was warm and
smooth. His arms felt like a life preserver around her. Within his embrace she was safe. She could lie like this with him for the rest of her life and know no one would ever hurt her again. “I was driving back to the campus from Hartford one evening. I’d been up there interviewing for a summer job as an intern at the State House. It was dark, and one of my tail lights was out. So this...this officer pulled me off the road. He told me to get out of the car. He said he wanted to show me the broken tail light. So I got out.”

  “And it turned out he wasn’t a cop?”

  “Oh, he was a cop, all right. He was in a cruiser, and he was wearing a uniform, and he had a badge and a gun. He had a gun, Dennis.” She swallowed, afraid her voice was going to splinter.

  He massaged her shoulder with his hand. Perhaps he could feel that she was starting to shake again. The warmth of his touch didn’t burn this time, though. It felt soothing, seeping into her and tamping down the tremors.

  “He made me walk off the road with him, down this long, grassy slope. Maybe if he’d just—if he’d just raped me the usual way, that would have been it. I mean, I’m not the first woman who’s ever been assaulted. There’s no reason I should be like this about it now—”

  “Uh-uh,” Murphy cut her off. “Sounds like you’re about to apologize again. I won’t have it, Gail. I’m not kidding. Cut it out.”

  “Okay.” Despite her anguish, she smiled. Murphy was making this easier for her than she would have imagined. In all her life, she’d told only two people about what the policeman had done to her by the side of the road: the therapist she’d seen for a few months, and Molly. She’d never told a man before.

  But Murphy made her feel as if he really, truly wanted to know. She took a deep breath and continued. “He made me...he made me touch him like the way you...the way you asked.” She had to fight the tension in her throat. She was nearly choking on it. If she didn’t force out the words, she would choke. “He kept saying, ‘Touch me, touch me,’ until he was hard,” she said. As long as Murphy held her, she wouldn’t choke. She swore to herself she wouldn’t. “He made me take him in my mouth.” She was shaking again, shaking badly. “He had a gun. I thought I was going to gag, but he just—he just...”