Shared Secrets

by Pam Mantovani

  “Dad pays next to nothing.”

  “I don’t know,” Lucas defended. The threat of the trial still hung over them, but right now it was obvious his good mood revolved around Micah being home. “I bet I could afford to pay Stephanie more since she probably doesn’t eat as much as you.”

  “Yeah, she is pretty scrawny.”

  Micah’s amused grin slowly slid into a flat line when Stephanie sauntered his way. “Looks can be deceiving,” she murmured.

  “Yeah, well, right now the only look I’m interested in is the one I’ll be giving a plate at the dinner table.”

  “What’d I tell you?” Lucas sighed with exaggeration. “C’mon, let’s unload the truck for these ladies and show them where everything is, and then I’ll see what I can find to feed you.”

  As she expected, the rich color and warmth of wood was evident throughout Lucas’s home. The enclosed breezeway was a space obviously doing double duty as office and study, boasting a leather sofa along with an antique Queen Anne desk replica and an elaborate computer/printer set-up. The kitchen contained stainless steel appliances, a cheerful yellow and blue color scheme, and etched glass-fronted oak cabinets. Micah informed them that Lucas had designed and built the matching pedestal table and bow back chairs. A family room completed the downstairs. Upstairs she was surprised to learn there were four bedrooms. Lucas insisted she have the one with the private bath.

  “Micah and I’ll put your law books in the office,” Lucas told her. He stood in the doorway to the bedroom she’d use, almost as if afraid of coming inside.

  “Are you sure? I don’t want to take over your space.”

  He shrugged. “I do need to work up a bid, but I can do it at the drafting table out in the workshop.”

  “Fine. I’ll get my laptop out of my car while…” She trailed off when the phone in her pocket rang. This time when she studied the ID window, she knew she had to answer. She glanced up at Lucas. “It’s the senior partner at the firm. I should take this.”

  “No problem. I’ll be downstairs.”

  She found herself admiring the way Lucas moved as she answered the phone. Then her mind filled with defenses and explanations. Twenty tense minutes later, she closed the phone and ran a hand over the quilt covering the brass and white iron bed. As she’d found herself doing when noticing the other small touches throughout the house, she wondered who’d helped Lucas with his decorating. He’d said nothing about being involved with anyone, but she didn’t believe he would have any trouble attracting female interest. Or that he’d remained celibate during the years since his marriage ended.

  “Thought you might need more hangers.”

  Jumping at the unexpected statement, Taylor looked at Lucas leaning against the door frame, balanced by one strong shoulder. His feet, minus the boots he’d taken off upon entering the house, were casually crossed to add to the relaxed air of his posture.

  “Thank you.”

  Neither one of them moved, not she to reach for the hangers nor he to bring them closer. Attraction, in the form of remnants of the past and curiosity about the present, filled the empty space between them. Even from across the room she could feel his heat and solid strength, could breathe in the earthy wood smell he wore as seductively as aftershave. Her right hand curled up a fistful of quilt fabric, resisting the urge to skim them over his cheek.

  “As soon as I finish unpacking, I’ll be glad to help with dinner.”

  Lucas crossed the room and tossed the hangers onto the bed. Taylor caught herself before she eased back a little. “It’s not going to be much more than chicken on the grill, vegetables and a salad.”

  After a brief hesitation she stood, surprised at how unsteady her legs felt. Still, she didn’t want to convey any sense of unease. “I can at least set the table. Or Stephanie can, and I’ll do the dishes afterward. I know,” she hurried to add, “you said in court that we’re guests here.” Despite her efforts, she had to pause as her mind filled with images that were far removed from guest status. She cleared her throat. “And I realize you have a skewed image of my life, but both Stephanie and I are capable of doing our share while we’re here.”

  “No problem, but you’re gonna have to reverse your suggestion. Stephanie talked Micah into taking that bike ride after all.”

  That tight pull of sensuality and appraisal vanished. Cold replaced the heat, and apprehension took the place of attraction.

  “You let them go off unsupervised?” she asked.

  “Why wouldn’t I? I trust Micah. Don’t you trust Stephanie?”

  Taylor wouldn’t answer; couldn’t because she didn’t want to admit the truth. She started to walk around him only to have him block her way.

  “I’m not going to treat Micah any differently now than I did before this nightmare began,” Lucas said. “And I’m not going to let what happened between us in the past distort your opinion of my son.”

  “This has nothing to do with the past.”

  But of course, it did. In fact, as much as she wanted to ignore the past, she should cling to it. To avoid the temptation of the present. Or any lure of the future.

  “I won’t apologize,” Lucas continued. “Not for marrying Micah’s mother, not for keeping him after I…after the marriage failed.”

  Something hot and dangerous flared in his eyes as he shifted toward her, something Taylor found impossible to turn away from.

  “And I’ll be damned if I’ll apologize for wanting you. Then or now.”

  “Lucas,” she began, her voice low and thick from the dryness in her throat. “What we’re experiencing, these are just unresolved feelings from all those years ago.”

  “Think so?”

  His calm question should have warned her. Before she could guess his intention, he had her pressed against him.

  “You might be right,” he claimed, his voice whisper soft in contrast to the hard length of him. “We fit together the same as we always did. We look at each other with the same hunger we felt from that first look. This morning you tasted as sweet and hot as you always did.”

  His voice dropped even lower, his hand moved to the small of her back and nudged her body closer. His mouth came within a breath of sweeping over hers.

  “Tell me, Taylor,” he said. “Tell me that what you’re feeling now is left over from what you felt every hour of every day and night that we spent with each other. Tell me what you’re feeling now is based on memory and imagination. Tell me,” he demanded, his voice growing coarser even as his hands continued their gentle stroking along her back, “that you don’t want to know how different, how much better, it could be between us now.”

  “I can’t,” she cried softly.

  The feelings came faster, stronger, more potent than any memory could. Because what she felt had nothing to do with the past, and everything to do with the present. And the man that Lucas was today.

  In her marriage she’d known pleasure and moments of simple joy. But nothing, absolutely nothing had incited the frantic rush of need the way one touch from Lucas could bring. It was a need that surpassed the purely physical. It went deep into the marrow of her bones, into the very fiber of her being. It had been there the entire time she’d been away from him, trying to forget him. Throughout time and distance, over and above each of their pride and hurt, they’d somehow remained connected.

  “Does it make you happy to know I look at you and think about what we lost? Do you want to hear that of course I wonder what it would have been like if we’d stayed together?” She shoved his chest, succeeded in putting distance between them, and began pacing the room. “Is that the real reason you announced Stephanie and I would stay here?” She stopped, whirled on her heel and jabbed a finger in the air. “Are you hoping to make me forget that you’re the one who betrayed what we had?”

  “You left me.”

  “I had no choice.” She swiped at her bangs and then pressed the heel of both hands to her eyes. “If I had stayed, I would have given you everyt
hing. God, Lucas, I loved you so much. My whole life I’d been nothing but someone else’s cast off.” Her hands flew out, palms forward, in an instinctive reaction to him stepping closer. “For the first time I had a chance to make something of myself, to be someone I could be proud of instead of always believing I was less than everyone else. And I would have thrown it all away if you’d asked.”

  The color on his face faded a little. “I would never have asked you to give up your dream.”

  “You kept talking about us getting married.”

  “Well, yeah. I loved you. Of course, I wanted to marry you.” He shook his head as if clearing out some errant thought. “But that didn’t mean I wanted to keep you pregnant and barefoot. I knew how important it was for you to get your degree.”

  Her heart drummed in her chest at the mention of her being pregnant. For once she didn’t back down from the memories, she confronted them, and admitted her own role in what happened to change both of their lives.

  “I didn’t know that at the time. At least, I didn’t stop to think about it. All I knew is that when I woke the next morning and thought about the night before—how you’d loved me like I’d never before been loved, I panicked. I thought I had to get away before you could ask me to stay.”

  With her eyes burning she looked at him. “But while I was gone, I realized I was nothing without you.” Everything they’d shared and meant to one another sprang into his gaze. It would be easy to take that and forget the rest. Only they needed to air this out—so they could hopefully put it behind them.

  “So, I came back.” Her breath hitched. “Only to learn I was nothing to you.”

  “How could you think that?”

  “How could I not?”

  “I slept with Peggy, yes,” he admitted. Taylor heard a mix of regret and fatigue that went deeper than for this one physical act. A chill ran down her spine. “But not until the night after you left without a word. I didn’t know where you were, or if you would ever come back. For all I knew, you’d gotten a taste of experience to take with you.” Taylor winced at the brutal honesty in his comment. Even so, she knew it was no less than she deserved.

  “I went out to Bull Shoals Lake and drowned my sorrows with a couple of six packs. That’s how Peggy found me.”

  Stunned, Taylor lowered to the bed. The chill down her spine spread throughout her body. “You never drank.” The result of dealing with too many of his father’s drunken episodes.

  “Yeah, well, I’d never had my heart ripped out of my chest before either.”

  “Oh God, Lucas. What have we done?”

  Slowly he walked over and eased down beside her. “It looks like we’re both guilty of jumping to conclusions.”

  She laughed short and just shy of hysterical. How much would be different if they’d both trusted each other. If, she corrected with a measure of the same brutal honesty, she’d trusted Lucas and his understanding of her dreams and what she hoped to achieve. She thought of Stephanie and immediately decided she couldn’t dwell on lost opportunities or love. Too much danger lay along that path, better to divert the root of the discussion.

  “Not exactly a ringing endorsement of my attorney talents.”

  “I don’t want our past to cloud your defense of Micah.”

  She had to swallow twice before the words would come. This was where being an attorney skirted the line between honesty and justification. Sometimes what you didn’t say meant as much as what you did reveal.

  “I promise, Lucas, that I’ll do everything within my power to make sure your son doesn’t go to prison.”

  He shifted to stare at her, almost as if he heard the unspoken message in her statement. “What about us?”

  His question brought a stab to her heart. If she’d learned nothing else the past years, however, it was how to bury her feelings and present the front expected of her.

  “I don’t know about you.” She stood. “But I’ve got boxes of books to unpack.”

  “That’s it?” he asked. “Push aside what we’ve just said to one another and go on as if nothing happened?”

  “What choice do we have, Lucas? We can’t change what happened. We can only go on.” She sighed. “I promised to help Micah, but I also came here to repair my relationship with my daughter. That has to be my first priority.”

  He rose and faced her. The look in his eyes wasn’t as dark or hot as before, but it was every bit as dangerous.

  “What about us?” he repeated.

  “Which us?” she demanded in return, feeling tired and more indecisive than she’d felt in a long time. “The us we were so many years ago, or the us we are now? And honestly,” she pressed before he could answer. “I don’t want to go back to the person I was then. I want, I need, to leave that past behind me.”

  Lucas stared at her for a long moment. Finally, he extended a hand.

  “Will you give me a chance to know the person you’ve become?”

  Her heart pounded with fear at this huge risk he asked of her. She slipped her hand in his, wanting to forge a new beginning for them.

  “I’d like that.”

  Chapter 6

  “I don’t believe you,” Taylor said.

  “Hey, if I’m lying, I’m dying,” Lucas swore. “Besides, everyone in town knows it’s been going on for years.”

  When they first came downstairs the uncertainty of what to expect created an awkwardness they’d never before known. Gradually, however, they picked up the rhythm of their old comfortable ease. With the last box of law books unpacked, Lucas ignored the comfortable looking leather sofa and stretched out on the floor, head propped on his left hand. As near as Taylor could recall, she’d never known Stephen to be casual enough to sit on the floor.

  “Miss Mamie and Mr. Halperson,” she mused from where she’d remained sitting behind the desk.

  Miss Mamie, a dignified and long respected resident known for her beautiful gardens, earned her living making drapes and slipcovers “for the public.” Mr. Halperson owned a tavern in each of the three surrounding counties. The two, according to the gossip Lucas just shared, had been seeing one another, supposedly on the sly, for the past twenty years.

  “I just can’t picture them together.”

  “I try not to,” he answered with a dry tone of voice that contrasted the slight grin curving his lips. “Although, one morning just last week when I drove by her house before six, his truck was there.”

  “Surely you don’t mean…Lucas, they have to be in their sixties now.”

  “So? I say good for them.”

  What would it be like she wondered, at that advancing age to know someone still wanted you with the same need and desire as when you’d been younger, firmer, and full of raging hormones? Lovely, she thought with a sigh, it would be warm and wonderful. Would she and Stephen have had that? No. How could they when they hadn’t had it from the beginning? What they’d had was good in many respects—it just wasn’t that kind of thrilling fire.

  She rose suddenly and began roaming the room, touching a fingertip to a book or knick-knack on a shelf or tracing the oak trim molding. She felt Lucas’s gaze on her, following as she moved around the room.

  “I’m going to arrange an interview with Rebecca in the next day or so.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  Taylor looked up from her blurred study of an odd-shaped block of quartz. Lucas moved to stand beside her. “Nothing.”

  He lifted a hand and ran a fingertip over the surprising tear running down her cheek. “This says otherwise.”

  “I’m just tired.”

  “You never cry. Or you never did.”

  With his hand still gently on her cheek, he leaned forward and kissed her. It was a soft brush of lips, one that didn’t make demands of passion. Oh, but she felt the desire.

  More than the hot, explosive kiss this morning, more than the long, tempting glances they couldn’t seem to stop exchanging, more so even than the firm feel of his body shifting against hers,
this kiss frightened her. Here in the privacy of his study, with his mouth lingering, with comfort found in his home and his arms, the thought of everything she’d given up enticed her.

  Her mind tried to tell her she glorified the past, remembered only the good. She might have claimed to want to leave the past behind, but it had a habit of creeping between them. “Lucas.”

  “It’s all right,” he assured her with a whisper. And another kiss. Exactly as he had with their first kiss all those years ago. “We’re only going to do this.”

  But of course, it was only the beginning. Ignoring every warning screaming through her mind, Taylor’s body molded itself against Lucas. Her breasts absorbed the hard planes of his chest, her thighs parted slightly to accommodate his hips, her arms slid around his waist and her hands pressed against the small of his back an instant before they lowered and filled with his firm, jean-clad butt. Not even the salt of her lingering tears could sour the sweetness of being held and kissed by Lucas.

  Taylor wasn’t sure what she else she might have done, what decision she might have been forced to make, had the sudden roar of a motorcycle coming up the gravel drive not stopped her. That sound, and what it represented, propelled her to jerk away from Lucas. He tried to hold her close, but she managed to put distance between them. She scrubbed hands over her eyes and cheeks.

  Her heart hammered, her breath froze in her lungs, as guilt and chastisement took root. How could she have forgotten her daughter was off, unsupervised, with Micah? Lucas’s son.

  With approaching footsteps, she turned. Panic surged within her at the first sight of her daughter.

  “Oh, God.”

  She ran across the room. Her hands framed Stephanie’s face, holding tight when she tried to pull away. Taylor took in the swollen lip, the dried blood, and felt her heart drop to her stomach. “What happened?”

  “It was my fault,” Micah said.

  “No, it—” Stephanie began.

  “Yours.” Taylor released Stephanie and turned on Micah. “What did you do to her? Tell me.” Her fist pounded against the hard wall of his chest. And would have again had Lucas not caught her wrist.