The Black Sheep

by Patricia Ryan

  “Take it outside, Phil,” he said, just soberly enough so that his friend knew he meant it.

  Shaking his head, Phil rose and tossed him the washcloth. “I’ll go out and sit in the driver’s seat of that nice new Jag while I smoke this. Hope it doesn’t slip out of my fingers.” He paused in the doorway and smiled. “Nothing takes burn marks out of leather.”

  After Phil left, Tucker sat on the edge of the tub and dabbed the washcloth on Harley’s face, throat, and shoulders. It struck him as an intimate thing to be doing—she was naked, after all, and he was bathing her—yet he felt only tenderness, not lust. This surprised him, since he had an active libido, and had never been good at reining it in. Witness the way he had tried to rush her into bed last night, when, as she’d pointed out, they had known each other less than twenty-four hours. His common sense should have told him that a woman as conventional and tightly wound as Harley, virgin or not, would never go for that. He had wanted her, though—badly—and desire had won out over common sense.

  In spite of their differences, he found her ridiculously sexy. Her face was compelling, if not conventionally pretty, and he liked her sleek, strong little body. But it went beyond looks. It was her aura of health and purity that drew him to her, he decided. Opposites attract.

  He dipped the washcloth and patted her dry lips with it, then touched them with his fingertips. Perhaps he sought in her what he had once enjoyed in such abundance but had lost—youth, strength, a clear vision of the world. Is that what attracted him to her? Something did; something more, or at least different, from what had attracted him to women in the past.

  This might not be a good thing. This felt complicated. Maybe the best thing he could do would be to pack up his duffel, toss it in the trunk of his new car, and head back to Alaska in the morning. No, he had to wait until Harley had recovered from her heatstroke. He would leave in a day or two.

  He shook his head, bemused. Responsibility had never kept him from bolting before. It had also never made him into a member of the fucking Hale’s Point antismoking vice squad before. He stroked Harley’s cheek, ran a thumb over a closed eyelid. He had been wrong, thinking of her as powerless just because she was unconscious. She was more in control than ever.

  Phil’s voice jolted him out of his reverie. “What’s with the dealer plates on that Jag?” He had his black bag in his hand, and now he set it down on the floor next to the tub and withdrew the thermometer.

  “I only bought it this morning.” Tucker stood, and Phil took his place on the edge of the tub, slipping the thermometer into Harley’s ear. “I got up before dawn, thinking I might head home. Then I remembered I hadn’t seen Liz Wycliff yet—you remember Liz?”

  “Sure.” The thermometer beeped. Phil checked the readout and shot a fist. “Yes!”

  “Yes?” Tucker hovered anxiously, trying to see the numbers.

  “It’s down to 103.2.”

  Tucker closed his eyes and leaned back against the wall. “Yes.”

  Phil lifted Harley’s right arm out of the water and took a pulse. “Got a towel?” He dried off the arm, draped it over the side of the tub, and wrapped the blood-pressure cuff around it. The results made him smile. “Looking good.” He picked up the washcloth and went back to wiping Harley down with it. Tucker observed that his touch was coolly impersonal, and he found this reassuring. “So you wanted to see Liz.”

  Tucker took his seat on the toilet lid again. “Yeah. She was like a surrogate mom to me. I couldn’t leave without seeing her. So instead of hitching to JFK, I hitched to the train station—”

  “Hitched?”

  “And took the train into New York. She’s got this co-op on Central Park West—the San Remo. The doorman wouldn’t let me up.”

  Phil gave him a sideways sneer, his eyes scanning Tucker from head to toe. “Can’t imagine why.”

  “I know I need a haircut.”

  Phil expelled a gust of laughter. “It’d be quicker to list the things you don’t need than what you do. You don’t need... God, I don’t know. Elevator shoes! There. You don’t need elevator shoes. You could live without them. What you do need, as soon as possible, is a decent haircut, some decent clothes, a decent pair of shoes—”

  Tucker chuckled. “Where have I heard that before?” He frowned, pretending to search his memory. “Those words, they’re so familiar. ‘Get a haircut, get some decent clothes, what are you, an animal in the zoo?’” He smacked his head as if the light bulb had just gone off. “Oh, I remember! It was your father, that’s right! Standing on the front porch screaming at you with all the neighbors listening, and you giving him the finger and slamming the car door.”

  Tucker’s legs felt too long for the little bathroom; they kept bumping into things made out of porcelain. He lifted the bad one with both hands and crossed it over the good one, then leaned back and tried to get comfortable, but it was a lost cause.

  “Did I really give him the finger?” Phil laughed disbelievingly, although Tucker suspected his friend remembered the incident just as clearly as he did. “What a punk I was! Insolent little douchebag. I’m the one that should have been sent to military school.” He opened one of Harley’s eyelids, then closed it. “So the doorman, exercising superb judgment, wouldn’t let you up.”

  “Yeah, but he buzzed her and she came down.” He smiled, remembering. “She’s... Well, she’s older. I hadn’t really expected that. But still beautiful. She’s so great, you know? She’s just great. As soon as I saw her, I realized how much I had missed her. When she saw me, she said, ‘Good morning, Tucker. How nice that you’re not dead. You may take me to breakfast.’”

  “I’m all choked up. You realize this is supposed to be leading up to the Jag, which is the only part I really care about.”

  “So at breakfast I told her I wanted to buy a car to drive back to Alaska, and she said what kind, and I flashed on this hood ornament up in my room and said Jaguar, and she drove me to a dealer, and he had a black F-Type convertible SVR right on the lot, and I bought it,” he said, all in one breath.

  Phil frowned as he patted Harley’s forehead with the washcloth. “Now, when you say you just bought it... People don’t just buy cars on impulse like that, especially not expensive cars. You’ve got to arrange for financing, there’s paperwork—”

  “I don’t finance things.” Tucker explained. “I don’t owe money. I wrote him a check, and he’ll take care of the paperwork and plates and stuff by tomorrow, he said.” He shrugged. “It’s a done deal.”

  Phil stared at him. “You wrote him a check. You’ve got, like, a couple hundred thousand bucks sitting around in a checking account just in case you suddenly get the urge to buy a—”

  “It wasn’t quite that much.”

  “So, like, what? One fifty? One twenty-five? It’s a lot of fucking money! And you wrote a fucking check?”

  “I did have to make a phone call to transfer the funds. This is very bad form of you, you know. We never discuss money in Hale’s Point.”

  “We did it all the time in Brentwood.”

  “You live in Hale’s Point now, buddy. You’re coming up in the world.”

  “And you, you who are lecturing me on decorum, live in... Elk something?”

  “Moose Pass. Near Moose Pass.”

  “In a two-room cabin in the woods. That you built yourself from trees.”

  “The logs came from trees, yes. But it’s really one room and a kind of a lean-to on the side, there.”

  “Is there enough room in the lean-to for the Jag?”

  “No, I’ve got to keep the Jeep in there to keep the snow off it.”

  Incredulous outrage flared in Phil’s eyes. “Is it me? Am I nuts? Because, you’ll have to excuse me, but I’m having a really hard time picturing that exquisite, magnificent piece of British engineering covered in snow out in front of some two-room—strike that, one-room-plus-a-lean-to-for-the-Jeep hovel that you made yourself out of trees! In the middle of the fucking woods! In Elk, exc
use me, near Elk Pass, Alaska, for God’s sake—”

  “Moose. Moose Pass.”

  “Moose, elk...” He shrugged wearily. “The point is, I am very serious about this trade, and I want you to give it every—”

  “What trade?”

  “My house for your Jag. Remember?” He turned back to Harley, and Tucker could no longer see his expression.

  “Right.” Phil’s oddball sense of humor was one thing about him that hadn’t changed over the years. It had always amused him to propose some ludicrous idea, hammer away at it until everyone believed he was serious, and then laugh at their gullibility. Tucker rose and put on his sunglasses. “My turn for a break now.”

  Tucker retrieved his cigarettes from the glove box of the Jag and smoked two while he sat on the stone wall staring out at the Sound. That kid from next door, Jamie Tilton, was walking along the water’s edge with the au pair and his little sister. He turned and saw Tucker, then shielded his eyes and peered first toward the west, then toward the jetty to the east. Probably looking for Harley; she would be due for her afternoon run about now. He looked again toward Tucker, frowning as if trying to make up his mind about something. Whether to come up and ask him where Harley was? Or maybe sneak into the garage and check out the deep freeze for body parts? Tucker made his mind up for him by stubbing out his cigarette and going back in the house.

  He walked into the bathroom as Phil withdrew the thermometer from Harley’s ear. He looked up at Tucker and smiled. “Chicken’s done. What’ll we have with it?”

  “Man, you are one twisted son of a—”

  “It’s 102.2 and dropping,” Phil announced triumphantly.

  “All right!”

  Harley moaned and her head rolled to the side.

  Phil said, “Let’s get her back into bed.”

  Tucker moved the fan into the bedroom and went to the linen closet to fetch a bath sheet. When he returned to the bathroom, Phil had Harley out of the tub and on her feet, although she was still insensible. His arms supported her against him and her head rested on his chest, as if they were dancing. Now that she was vertical, her nakedness seemed more... naked, more sexual, especially in contrast with the fully clothed Phil. She still inspired Tucker’s protective instinct, but now another, more fundamental instinct, as well. Tucker wished it were his arms embracing that warm, wet skin; his shoulder on which her head reclined. He felt a painful stab of jealousy toward his friend, but swallowed it down, composing his features into a neutral mask.

  “You want to dry her off a little?” Phil said.

  Tucker scrubbed the bath sheet over her back and legs in a cursory way. He would have loved to linger over the task, particularly as regards that small, firm bottom, but without the good Dr. Zelin in attendance, and with Harley’s full knowledge and approval. He wrapped the bath sheet around her, and Phil carried her into the bedroom, laid her on her side on the bed, unwrapped her, and pulled the sheet up.

  As he was doing this, Tucker happened to notice Harley’s clothes in a jumble on the floor where Phil had tossed them, and he did a double take. On top of the pile, the last item removed, was a pair of black-and-white zebra-print minuscule bikini panties. He smiled. Little zebra-print panties. Who woulda thunk it?

  Phil said, “Are you listening to me?”

  “Yes, Doctor.”

  “I said, keep sponging her off until she’s down to about a hundred degrees. I’ll leave you this thermometer. Take her temperature every half hour and call me if it goes up even a little.” He went back to the bathroom for his bag and snapped it closed.

  “You’re leaving?”

  “You don’t need me here anymore. She’s out of the woods. As soon as she can sit up and drink, start forcing fluids on her. She cooled off fast, so I think it’s unlikely there’s any kind of irreparable damage to the body tissues.” Tucker sighed with relief. “Unlikely, but not impossible. Brain tissue is particularly susceptible to those high temperatures. When she can get out of bed, watch for signs of ataxia.”

  “Ataxia.”

  “Vertigo, disorientation. Call me if she can’t stand by herself or walk. After she’s been awake for a while, that is. At first, of course, she’ll be disoriented. I’ll stop by tomorrow to check on her.” He slapped Tucker on the arm and headed out of the room. “I’ll find my way out. You stay with her.”

  “You’re a good friend, Phil. I don’t know how to thank you.”

  From the doorway, Phil said, “You can thank me by getting a haircut. And would it kill you to get on fucking Facebook?”

  Grinning, Tucker extended his right arm, the middle finger raised.

  Turning away, Phil said, “He should have sent you to military school. Would have served you right, you punk.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  HARLEY OPENED HER EYES. It was night. A dim lamp shone in the corner where Tucker sat reading a book. She was in his bed. She couldn’t remember why, but she knew there was a good reason. It was very quiet, the only sound the soft whirring of the fan.

  Even with the breeze from the fan, it was warm in the room. Tucker wore a pair of baggy olive-drab shorts and nothing else. His legs were crossed, the bad one over the good. There was a small movement, a rustle, as he turned the page. She could see the concentration in his face, the little frown lines between his eyebrows.

  She wanted to ask him what he was reading. “Tucker,” she said, but her mouth was dry, and it came out as a parched whisper.

  He looked toward her, his eyes lighting when he saw that she was awake. He put down the book and uncrossed his legs by lifting one off the other with both hands. She could see his chest clearly now, the muscles hard and smooth on one side, torn by savage wounds on the other. The magnitude of his injuries suddenly struck her; the burden of living with them day after day.

  She closed her eyes and began to drift, but his touch woke her up again. He sat on the bed next to her, pulled the sheet up, and tucked it around her shoulders.

  “Not yet,” he said softly. “You can sleep in a minute, I promise.” His voice sounded raspier than ever. He was tired.

  He lifted her into a sitting position, one long arm curled around her while the other poured water from a pitcher into a glass. She liked the feel of his arm against her bare back, his skin cool against hers. She could feel his muscles tense to support her weight.

  He brought the glass to her lips and she drank, then he eased her back down again. She tried to remember what it was she had wanted to ask him when she had said his name.... His name... it had always struck her as odd....

  She said, “Tucker—that’s a funny name.”

  He leaned over her, his arms flanking her on either side. For a few seconds he just looked at her, faint amusement in his eyes, then he smoothed some stray hairs off her face and pressed a wet cloth to her forehead and cheeks. “It’s an old family name on my father’s side. Saxon. It means a tailor—a tucker of cloth.”

  He picked something up off the night table, fiddled with it, and inserted it in her ear, saying, “Harley’s kind of a funny name, too.” There came a beep. He withdrew the thermometer and said, “Down to 101 on the nose. Were you named after a relative?”

  Harley tried to shake her head no, but it made everything start to reel. “A motorcycle,” was all she managed to say before oblivion reclaimed her.

  WHAT HAPPENED TO MY CLOTHES?”

  Tucker opened his eyes. The room was yellow with sunlight. Harley was sitting up in bed, holding the sheet to her chest. Her color seemed normal, her hair was in delicious golden disarray, and she looked angry.

  He wanted to laugh, but he knew that would probably be a mistake. He pried himself out of the chair in which he had fallen asleep, every bone in his sorry body complaining. The book he had been reading—Kerouac’s On the Road—tumbled off his lap onto the floor.

  “I said, what happened to my clothes?”

  He pointed to the pile in the corner, zebra panties et al. “They’re right there.”

  She
glanced at the pile and then glared at him. She looked like a scruffy, mean little cat. “Who took off my clothes?” she asked more pointedly.

  Tucker came to stand over her. She noted his state of undress—he still wore shorts and nothing else—and pulled her sheet up higher. He said, “Dr. Philip Zelin, M.D., of the Stony Brook University Medical Center Department of Internal Medicine, took off your clothes.”

  She squinted, as if trying to remember. “You weren’t here?”

  He poured her a glass of water. “Little hair of the dog?”

  “You aren’t answering me.”

  “That’s a bad habit of mine. You’ve called me on it before.”

  “That’s still not an answer.”

  “Here, drink this.”

  Her lower lip jutted and her eyes glittered ferociously. “Why aren’t you answering me?”

  He sat on the bed and she squirmed away from him. “Because you are so very, very beautiful when you’re angry. Drink.”

  “What is that?”

  “Straight vodka. I’ve been pouring it down your throat for days.”

  She swatted at him. “Get away from me!”

  “First drink this. It’s water.” Holding the glass near her mouth, he said, “Open up the hangar, here comes the airplane.”

  “That never worked with me.”

  “No? And I had such hopes for that one.”

  She took the glass with the hand that wasn’t holding up the sheet, but it shook, so Tucker steadied it.

  “Excellent.” he purred demonically. “My plan is working perfectly.” He took the glass from her, slid the thermometer into her ear—beep—and popped it out. “Congratulations, Miss... What’s your last name, anyway?”

  “Sayers. Ms. Sayers.”

  “Ms. Sayers, you are, at long last, normal. Except, of course, for being named after a motorcycle.”