The Black Sheep

by Patricia Ryan

  “Have you eaten? I can make you some—”

  “Don’t bother,” said Liz. “We stopped on the way.” She looked around, too. They were looking for Tucker.

  “Ice tea?” offered Harley. “Or lemonade. I have some fresh lemons, I can make you some—”

  Liz touched her arm. “We’re fine, my dear. Tell me, where’s Tucker?”

  They both looked at her. Summoning a steady tone, she said, “Tucker’s gone.” The exact same words R.H. had used when she had asked him about Tucker, shortly after he hired her. Tucker’s gone. A statement both accurate and vague.

  Liz hesitated. “Gone. Do you mean he just stepped out for a moment, or—”

  Gravel crunched at the end of the driveway, and all three heads turned to watch the vehicle that pulled up and parked behind Liz’s blue Volvo.

  It was Tucker’s black Jag.

  Harley stared, wide-eyed, as Tucker emerged, his own gaze riveted on his father.

  “Here he is!” Liz crowed, descending the porch steps to kiss his cheeks. “Look at you! You look wonderful! Where have you been? I began to worry you’d gotten cold feet.”

  Tucker’s eyes met Harley’s for a fleeting second. “I had an errand to run. I had to go to the bank in the village.”

  His words extinguished the tiny flicker of hope that had sparked within her breast at his reappearance. He had gone to the bank, obviously to empty out his safe-deposit box. He would be leaving, after all, although apparently he had taken her advice and decided to see R.H. first.

  R.H. studied his son from the porch. “Tucker.”

  “Sir.”

  No one spoke for a moment, and Harley swore she could hear the electric crackle of tension in the air.

  Finally, nodding toward Tucker’s car, R.H. said, “Is that the new F-Type SVR?” Slowly he walked down the steps and over to the car.

  Tucker met him there. “That’s right.”

  R.H. ran a reverential hand over the front fender. “What’s she got inside?”

  “Supercharged five-liter V-8.”

  “Horsepower?”

  “Five seventy-five. Speed tops out at a hundred ninety-five.”

  R.H. scowled. “Car and Driver said two-hundred.”

  “Not the convertible.”

  R.H. nodded thoughtfully. “Still. One ninety-five...”

  “Yeah.”

  “Pop the hood.” Both men spent a minute admiring the gleaming new engine. Their resemblance was enhanced by their identical attire: dark jeans and light blue button-up shirts. “How does she ride?”

  Tucker took the keys out of his pocket and handed them to the older man. With R.H. behind the wheel and Tucker in the passenger seat, the Jag screamed out of the driveway and disappeared.

  Rejoining Harley on the porch, Liz said, “Men have this absolutely amazing capacity for superficial communication in even the most emotion-charged circumstances.” She used the same measured tone with which she used to deliver her statistics, lectures. “They do it because they’re frightened, poor things, and they generally use sports or toys as props to facilitate the process. With R.H. and Tucker, vehicles are the toys of choice. Let’s have a drink.”

  “Iced tea or—”

  “Have you got any single-malt Scotch?”

  The liquor cabinet was in the study, so that’s where Harley led Liz, then excused herself to shower and change into a sundress before joining her. For an hour or so they made preoccupied conversation while they waited for the men to return. Liz nursed two single-malts straight up; Harley, two iced teas. They spoke briefly about R.H.’s aborted trip. Liz told of R.H.’s anguish at feeling compelled to put the Anjelica up for sale, since the strain of sailing her appeared to be more than his heart could stand.

  When they finally heard the Jag slowly pull up, they each took a window, shamelessly peeking through the closed curtains. R.H. turned the engine off and sat quietly for a moment, listening to his son talk. Nodding thoughtfully, he responded. This went on for some time, none of it audible to the two women.

  For the most part their conversation seemed eerily restrained, but from time to time one or the other of them would betray his emotion with a forceful gesture or intense expression. Anger occasionally surfaced, but was quickly extinguished with calming words.

  R.H. rubbed at his eyes. Tucker put a hand on his shoulder and said something; his father nodded in response. When R.H. spoke, Tucker nodded.

  They got out of the car. Tucker offered his hand, and R.H. took it in both of his. Each gripped the other’s shoulder, and when they spoke, there was conviction and sincerity in their eyes.

  Harley’s throat closed up. When she sniffed back the tears that threatened, Liz snapped, “Don’t you dare cry. If you do, then I shall, and I refuse to allow it.

  AS DINNERTIME APPROACHED, Harley scanned the cupboards, wondering what she could dream up to feed four people, when she had only shopped for two. Improvising with what was at hand, she picked some of the basil that had been planted among the lavender, tossed it together with hot fettuccine, olive oil, and sun-dried tomatoes, and served it on the patio. R.H. ate with gusto and several times mentioned how pleased he was that she would be staying on until September. Not wanting to put a damper on things, Harley smiled and pretended that her heart was not filled with anguish at Tucker’s imminent departure.

  The only awkward moment occurred when, halfway through the meal, she carelessly pushed her hair behind her ears, freezing when she noticed R.H. staring at her fixedly. The earrings! She was wearing his dead wife’s five-hundred-year-old earrings! What would he think? What should she say?

  To her amazement, his expression softened into something almost like a smile. With a brief glance in his son’s direction, he said, “Those earrings are most becoming on you, my dear. I wonder if I might have another serving of that fettuccine?”

  When the sun had sunk low in the sky, R.H. suggested coffee and liqueurs in the study.

  “Can we meet you there in a little while?” Tucker asked. “I was hoping I could talk Harley into a walk on the beach before night falls.”

  YOU’RE NOT SO DUMB, EITHER,” Tucker said, breaking the silence in which they walked.

  The waves alternately slapped Harley’s ankles and sucked the sand from beneath her feet. Up ahead she saw the giant boulders that defined the secluded little spot where she and Tucker had spent the night in each other’s arms. The sight should conjure up happy memories, she thought, not sadness. Everything had gone wrong. Most of it was her fault, and now he was trying to tell her she wasn’t so dumb?

  Stealing his line, she said, “Oh, I don’t know about that.”

  “I’m talking about the things you said when we were sitting in the car earlier today, before you went for your run.”

  “About you and your father?”

  “About everything. You can be pretty persuasive when you put your mind to it.”

  All Harley could take credit for persuading him to do was talk to his father. “I take it you explained things to him?”

  “We each explained things. A lot of explaining went on. And a lot of promises to make things right. I must say he wins the prize for the most impressive gesture of good faith. He gave me the Anjelica.”

  “Wow!”

  “That’s my line. Don’t make me tell you again.”

  Despite everything that had happened, she was unreservedly thrilled for him. The Anjelica! “Where is it now?”

  “She. She’s dry-docked in Fort Lauderdale.”

  “How are you going to get it—her—up to Alaska?”

  He said, “I’m not. I’m gonna fly down to Lauderdale and get her out of dry dock and sail her.”

  “In the Caribbean?”

  “To start with, but I’ve always been kind of curious about the South Pacific, too. And the Indian Ocean. I think I’ll just leave it open-ended. Start sailing and not worry too much about where I go or how long it takes. It could be two months or two years.”

  Tw
o months or two years. She missed him already. Not that she could ever expect to see him again if he went back to Alaska, but at least then, she would know where he was. In her mind, he would have a distinct location. Sailing off to nowhere like this was like falling off the edge of the earth. But that was just like Tucker. No itinerary, no expectations. Still, even he had obligations. “What about your business?”

  “I’m going to make Molly happy and sell it to her.”

  “Then what? After your sailing trip is over, I mean.”

  “I don’t know. I figure I’ll have plenty of time to decide that during the trip. That’s one thing about long sailing trips, you’ve got plenty of time to think.”

  They approached the semicircle of boulders and Tucker led her to a low one with a flattened top. They sat side by side, facing the water, still holding hands. In the distance, silhouetted against a sky the color of apricots, a single large schooner sat motionless.

  Harley said, “The Anjelica’s a forty-footer, isn’t she? Can you handle that much boat alone?”

  “Not a chance,” he answered lightly. “I was hoping you’d come along and give me a hand.”

  She regarded him in stunned silence.

  He said, “You love to sail, and you’re damn good at it. A trip like this is just what you need to shake out all that chaff your life is so filled with.”

  Struck dumb, she just sat there.

  He lifted her hand to his lips and kissed it. In a quiet voice he said, “Please say yes. I won’t want to go without you.”

  He wanted her with him! But... “What about all those things you said about us being too different, and—”

  “And what about all those things you said about weathering a crisis? I compared the things you said to the things I said, and you won. You’re right, it’s fear that drives me to bolt. That and the fact that I’ve never done anything else. But I don’t want to bolt this time. This time I’m in it for the long haul.”

  “The long haul means the long haul, Tucker. Are you saying you’re not going to panic two weeks from now and—”

  “Not two weeks or two months or two years. I know what the long haul means. It means a commitment. I never wanted one before, and I can’t believe I want one now, but I do, with you. More than anything. I can appreciate your skepticism, though. I anticipated it.” He reached into the front pocket of his rolled-up jeans and handed her another little black velvet bag. “My Dad’s not the only one who knows how to make a gesture of good faith. This is mine, to you.”

  “Tucker, no. I really can’t keep taking—”

  “Open it.”

  “Tucker—”

  Impatiently he took the little bag from her, opened it, and shook it into his palm. Something rolled out: a gold ring set with a cabochon emerald held in place by two tiny hands.

  “Tucker! That’s your mother’s—”

  “Engagement ring,” he finished. “Now I’d like it to be yours.”

  She was breathless. Hers? He couldn’t mean... “This is why you went to the bank? To get this? For me?”

  “Of course.”

  “I thought... I thought...” What did this mean? Did this mean... “Why are you giving this to me?”

  He sighed, but he was smiling. ‘‘Honey, I’ll get down on one knee if I have to, but you know that kind of thing still hurts like a son of a bitch.”

  “But I just don’t under—”

  “All right, here goes.” He got up and awkwardly knelt in the sand at her feet, his weight on the good leg.

  She could tell the position was painful for him. “Tucker, get up.”

  “Not until you agree to marry me.”

  Her mouth worked, but no sound came out.

  “I want you to marry me.” Taking her left hand in his, he slid the ring onto her finger. It fit perfectly. “I’ve thought it all out. R.H. has invited me to stay as long as I like, but I think twenty-four hours is all the state requires between the license and the wedding. My father’s minister can do the honors, or we can use a justice of the peace, whichever you prefer. Then, we can fly to Lauderdale and sail the Anjelica into the Caribbean.”

  “But—”

  “But who’ll take care of my father? Somehow I suspect Liz’ll be more than happy for the opportunity to prove how loving and nurturing she really is under all that frost.”

  “Yeah, but—”

  “But what about your M.B.A.? Take a leave of absence. I’m sure Liz will be happy to arrange it for you. Then, when we come back, you can complete it.”

  Harley couldn’t think. She could barely breathe. “But, Tucker, you don’t believe in marriage. You said it was for... for people who couldn’t think straight.”

  “It is. I’m a case in point. I’m way too crazy about you to think straight. All I can think about is spending the rest of my life with you. You’re all I want anymore, You’re the only thing that’s really important to me. Please say yes.”

  Harley looked down at her hands, enveloped in both of his. She looked into his eyes, deep and translucent.

  “Come on, Harley. Say yes.”

  He was all she wanted anymore, too. More than anything. Suddenly all her careful plans and well-thought-out schedules and inviolable rules seemed petty and unimportant. The only important thing in the world was Tucker—her life with Tucker.

  “Say yes, Harley. Please. My leg’s killing me.”

  She took a deep breath. “Yes.”

  “Yes!” Seizing her around the waist, he pulled her down onto the sand, rolled on top of her, and covered her mouth with his. With no reservations she gave herself over to the pleasure of the kiss, to the feel of his body pressing her into the sand, his hands stroking her face, caressing her breasts....

  Her desire for him was sudden, overwhelming, almost painful. Senseless with need, she clutched him to her, instinctively parting her legs. He moved against her, and she could feel his need, equal to her own. When he lifted her skirt and fondled her through her thin cotton panties, she pressed her hand over his and moaned his name. He knelt over her and swiftly unzipped his jeans. Sitting up, she reached in to torment him as he had tormented her.

  He yanked her panties off and tossed them aside. She grabbed his wallet out of his back pocket, ripped open the little packet with frantic haste, and expertly sheathed him, all in a matter of seconds.

  Too impatient to undress further, Tucker threw her on her back and rose over her, lifting her hips and driving himself into her. They coupled with unthinking urgency, moving together in a primal rhythm, like a single, struggling creature.

  On the verge of climax, she froze at a sound from beyond the boulders. Tucker heard it, too, and turned his head to listen. A jangling... panting... a man saying, “Catch, Rusty!”

  With a mumbled curse, Tucker quickly rolled them onto their sides and adjusted her skirt—to give the impression, she realized, that they were merely locked in an innocent embrace.

  “Good evening,” the man said as he passed the semicircle of boulders.

  “Good evening,” Harley and Tucker said in unison, not too breathlessly.

  The man walked on a few yards, until he was out of sight but not out of earshot, and proceeded to toss whatever it was he was tossing to his dog.

  They still lay side by side, intimately joined, both of them trying not to laugh. “Shh,” Tucker whispered, as he closed his big hands around her hips and rocked them slowly.

  “Oh my God,” she breathed. She locked her legs with his and slid her hands beneath his shirt to grip his back. “I’m so close.”

  “Me, too.” He was trembling.

  Harley thought she was going to explode, to fly apart in a million shivering pieces. She felt Tucker’s body go rigid and flex as his fingers dug into her hips. A strangled sound escaped his throat, and the skin on his back erupted in goose bumps. The convulsive throbbing within her sent her over the edge, into a heart-stopping orgasm of excruciating intensity. The struggle not to cry out only magnified its force. He held
her tight as it ran its course, and for some time afterward.

  Eventually they drew apart and set about adjusting their clothes. Rezipping his pants, Tucker peered over the boulders. “That guy is gone. It’s about time.”

  Harley slipped her panties back on and smoothed down her dress. “I don’t know. I thought it was kind of exciting having him there, kind of dangerous.”

  “Exciting? Dangerous?” He sank down next to her and took her in his arms. “I’ve created a monster.”

  “An insatiable monster,” she said. “Come to my room tonight.”

  She could see his eyes light with anticipation, but after a moment’s thought he said, “Not here, not in R.H.’s house with him down the hall. We’d have to sneak around like teenagers. And not out here anymore, for the amusement of the neighbors. Let’s wait until we’re aboard the Anjelica.”

  “You want to wait until our wedding night?”

  He chuckled. “It does seem out of character, I know. But yes, I want to wait. The next time we make love, it’s going to be on the deck of the Anjelica, under the stars. I want to feel the ocean swell beneath me while I’m inside you. I want to make you insane with pleasure. I want us to lose ourselves in each other, in the middle of nowhere, where no one can hear us or see us.”

  “Yes.” she whispered, gripping his head to pull it down until their mouths met in a deep, lingering kiss.

  Tucker broke the kiss and pointed to the sky. “Check it out.”

  Harley sat up and looked. Against a sunset of fiery brilliance, tiny spheres floated up and drifted out over the sound. “Phil’s balloons,” she said. “Phil’s and Kat’s.”

  “Ours, too,” he said. “They were my idea, after all. And now that they’ve been set free, I think we have as much of a claim to them as anybody.”

  Tucker put his arms around her and held her in a silent embrace as the balloons rose higher and higher, floating wherever the breezes took them. First there were dozens, then hundreds, in every hue of the rainbow, scattering across the sky, filling it with color.

  They watched, transfixed, until the last balloon rose into the darkening heavens and disappeared, a fleeting testament to lasting love.

  ~ THE END ~