A Winning Battle

by Carla Neggers

  “Dammit, woman, there are some things in life you just can’t plan!”

  She sighed, not the least perturbed by his outburst. “Are you really upset or just half pretending to be upset? You know, with you cynical types it’s not always easy to tell. You’re grouching about stuff so much of the time.”

  He groaned. “Now I’m supposed to be organized about how I get mad!”

  “Just clear,” she said, curiously calm.

  “Why the hell is it I don’t intimidate you?”

  He’d made his way back to the kitchen just as the coffee finished dripping and the doorbell rang. Page shrugged as she headed past him to the entry. “In my profession,” she said in a mock-cool tone, “one cannot be daunted by a disorderly mind.”

  If it hadn’t been for Mrs. Rosanna’s arrival, Page felt sure Chris never would have let that one pass. As it was, when they all had coffee together in the kitchen, he glowered at her in such a thrilling way she was reminded of the passion they’d shared during the night. Without any warning her pulse quickened and her hands began to tremble so badly that she had to put down her mug—and it had nothing to do with panic or terror. What was happening to her that she could be aroused by nothing more complicated than a look from him?

  She felt...out of control.

  Chris and Mrs. Rosanna were discussing the upcoming opening day at Fenway Park and the Red Sox chances for a pennant, but he seemed to sense Page’s sudden discomfort and shot her a worried look. She smiled unconvincingly—at least Chris didn’t look convinced. He pushed back his chair and rose. Already feeling out of breath, Page found herself taking in every inch of his hard male body, remembering the feel of the tanned skin under her fingers and hands... and tongue. She shivered with longing.

  “Guess I’d better get back. Thanks for the coffee, Page. Mrs. Rosanna, I’ll be watching for you at Fenway.”

  And he was gone. Page couldn’t even bring herself to see him to the door.

  * * *

  Something was wrong with Page B.

  As Chris walked along the meandering paths of the Public Garden, enjoying the smells of early spring and the quiet of an early Saturday morning, he suspected he knew what had gotten under Page’s lovely skin.

  One Christopher O. Battle.

  He wouldn’t fit into her scheme of things. He didn’t get up early on weekend mornings. He didn’t shave regularly. He didn’t have a cleaning woman. He didn’t clean. He didn’t plan when he was going to make love. He had come prepared for last night but hadn’t wanted to embarrass her or otherwise prolong the business by flipping open his wallet and showing her what was tucked inside. He wasn’t lazy and he wasn’t irresponsible. He just wasn’t... well, tidy.

  But he also wasn’t paranoid. He damn well knew that Page B. had had one hell of a time the night before. Even now at the blasted crack of dawn he could vividly remember how her body had shuddered with ecstasy under his, with his.

  He’d fitted into her scheme of things last night, all right!

  He understood that she was a little unnerved. So was he. He wasn’t at all sure how Page B. Harrington would fit into his life. But she would fit there. Somehow he’d make room; he’d make the right adjustments. He’d shave every morning and get up at eight on Saturdays if she wanted him to.

  Yet his pace had slowed, and he felt his shoulders sagging as he began to see the problem: he couldn’t become someone else for her sake. It wasn’t simply a question of his being unable to sacrifice his independence that way. It was also a question of who Page herself wanted him to be. As far as he could tell, it was him—with all his faults and quirks—that she had made love to last night.

  Poor woman. She’d fallen for her unsuitable man.

  * * *

  Page helped Mrs. Rosanna give the condominium a thorough cleaning and afterward felt much better. There were no more cookie crumbs on the rug, and the milk glasses Millie, William and Beth had used were washed up and so were the two brandy glasses. They’d even given the coffee maker its monthly vinegar-and-water cleaning. Everything was shipshape and spotless.

  And Page was bored.

  Boredom often resulted from a lack of organization and priorities, but that wasn’t her problem, at least not today. Mrs. Rosanna had left after lunch, and Page had the rest of the day to run errands, read her library books, write her letters home and play computer games. She had a nice neat list of Saturday priorities.

  She wondered what Chris would say if he knew she sometimes played computer games. She wondered if—

  It was useless. She couldn’t stop thinking about him.

  “I don’t want to stop,” she muttered, lunging for the telephone. She dialed his number and was relieved when he answered on the third ring. “Hi, it’s me.”

  “Hello, me.”

  He sounded groggy—and delighted to hear her voice. A surge of energy made her tingle with excitement. “Were you sleeping?”

  “Well... yes. You may be able to scrub floors after a night like we had, but we decrepit old journalists...”

  “Decrepit, my foot. I probably should take a nap, but I can’t. I’m too keyed up or something.”

  “Probably ‘or something.’”

  There was a sensual undertone to his words that didn’t escape Page. “You do have a fine opinion of yourself, don’t you? Well, I have an idea.”

  “Does it involve little colored circles that we have to stick on things?”

  “No, it does not. Nor does it involve plastering poor innocent people who are just trying to make a living doing something Christopher O. Battle might not approve of. It involves maple sugaring.”

  “Maple what?”

  “Sugaring. Actually, mostly maple syruping these days. I was thinking we could head out to western Massachusetts and check out a sugar shack, then spend the night at an inn and have blueberry pancakes with gobs of fresh syrup on them in the morning.” She took a breath. “I’m being spontaneous.”

  “You certainly are. You mean today!”

  “I guess. The sugar season doesn’t last long. It might already be over, in fact. It depends if the trees have budded in the western part of the state yet. I’m sure it’s still going on in northern Vermont, but that’s a little far, I think. I— Do you think I’m crazy?”

  “Yes. And I love it. I’ll be right over.”

  “Well, I’ll need a couple of hours to—”

  “Page, spontaneous means now!”

  “No, it doesn’t. It means resulting from a natural impulse, something not forced. I looked it up.”

  He was silent for a moment. Then he said, “So you don’t feel any pressure from me to do this. You’re being ‘spontaneous’ of your own accord.”

  “If it was of anyone else’s,” she said, “it wouldn’t be spontaneous.”

  He laughed. “There’s got to be a column in this somewhere. Okay, a couple of hours.”

  “No, no. Now’s fine.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Of course.” She laughed and added in her best haughty organizer’s tone, “The way I figure it, it’ll be at least an hour before you get yourself pulled together enough to get over here.”

  “You think so?”

  “Given the state of your apartment, I’d say so.”

  “That’s a professional opinion?”

  “Yes, but I won’t charge you.”

  “What about you?”

  She bit back a laugh. “If I need to, I can be ready in ten minutes.”

  * * *

  Chris had to hoof it, but he made it to Page’s doorstep in ten minutes flat. He felt a surge of excitement when he knocked. Maple sugaring didn’t intrigue him, but the prospect of spending the rest of the weekend with Page did. And it had been her idea. Spontaneous Page. He smiled and gave the door another tap with his knuckles.

  “It is you,” she said when she pulled open the door. “Will miracles never cease? Come on in.”

  He had a battered Lands End bag slung over one shoulder.
He couldn’t vouch for what was inside, but he was positive whatever it was would see him through the weekend. “Is that how you talk to clients?”

  She tossed him a grin over her shoulder as she headed down the hall to her bedroom. “I wouldn’t stay in business long if I did.”

  “Lucky I have a strong ego.”

  “Lucky we both do, sweets.”

  Wasn’t she chipper this afternoon? Chris thought with amusement. “Does scrubbing floors always make you sarcastic?”

  “It’s the smell of clean tiles and waxed furniture that does it.” From her tone he couldn’t tell how serious she was. “Gives me quite a heady feeling. It’s almost as good as sex.”

  That did it. He dropped his bag and was down the hall in a flash. She had her clothes for the weekend neatly folded on the edge of her bed and her back to him as she shook out a nightgown. A nightgown, he thought. What did she think she’d need that for?

  He pounced.

  Swinging one arm around her middle, he threw her off balance, and they fell onto the bed together. She groaned. “My clothes! Chris, dammit—”

  “Compare me to a bottle of ammonia...”

  “I wasn’t. I was just kidding!”

  “Too late.”

  He grabbed her sides and tickled her unmercifully, but Page B. Harrington wasn’t one to acquiesce. She wasn’t a scrawny bit of fluff, either. With great determination and no small amount of strength she went for his sides, and soon they were rolling all over her queen-size bed, laughing and tickling and making a general mess of her clothes, including those she had on. Her blouse had come untucked and was twisted... and it was just too tempting. Chris shoved one hand up it and felt her warm, smooth skin. His palm moved upward.

  “Don’t tickle there,” she warned.

  “I don’t intend to.”

  He moved his hand over the soft swell of her breast and easily unhooked the front clasp of her bra. She murmured as his mouth covered hers. Under his palm he felt her nipple harden, and he rubbed it gently with his thumb as his tongue probed the inside of her mouth with the same rhythm. He felt himself hardening.

  “I think we’re going to get a late start,” he said, coming up for air.

  She grinned at him. “You’re wrecking my spontaneity.”

  “I’d say this is ‘resulting from a natural impulse,’ wouldn’t you?”

  “Very natural... Chris!”

  It wasn’t a cry of anguish or warning, but of sheer delight—and he knew it. He’d trailed his hand down her side and slipped it inside her pants and down her bottom. He could feel her warmth and how much she wanted him. In seconds their clothes joined those she’d so neatly arranged, and he lay back on a heap of them and she climbed on top of him, straddling him and drawing him into her at once. She set the pace for their lovemaking, and it was a wild one. He held back and focused on her and her pleasure, watching her bite down on her lower lip and thrust herself down onto him, again and again. Only when he could hardly see from want did he stop watching her and shut his eyes as wave after wave of fulfillment washed over him.

  Afterward he helped her refold her clothes and noticed that she’d lapsed into silence. “Are you okay?” he asked gently.

  She nodded, putting things into her overnight bag in an organized manner that seemed so automatic to her. Unless he just shoved things into a bag, he had to concentrate on what went where so this wouldn’t get wrinkled and that wouldn’t get dirty and that wouldn’t spill onto that. But she tackled packing with the same speed he did, just more efficiently. It was a trick, he decided, he’d have to learn. But he’d tell her that later.

  “Page, do I scare you?”

  “No!” She seemed startled by his question. “No, I guess I scare myself. But it’s nothing to worry about. Shall we take my car?”

  “Allow me, won’t you? Believe me, I have the perfect vehicle for maple sugaring.”

  * * *

  IT WAS A BIG GMC truck of indeterminable vintage— and color. Something between gold and brown, Page decided. It was the sort of color only available for beat-up old trucks. It was parked on the street, and she had to laugh when she saw the prestigious Beacon Hill resident sticker.

  “And you a famous columnist,” she said. “I was expecting a Mercedes.”

  “The hell you were.”

  “All right, all right. I was expecting...” Sighing, she eyed the truck once more. “I guess I was expecting this.”

  “It gets me where I’m going. It’s never been stolen or stripped and isn’t likely to be. Other vehicles give way to it in a traffic jam—and you know how rotten Boston drivers are under the best of circumstances, so that’s saying something, indeed.”

  “But what about your image? What if you need to impress someone?”

  “First, I don’t give a damn about my ‘image.’ Second, I’ve never needed to impress anyone...or wanted to. Third, if I did, this baby’s impressive as hell. How many trucks do you know that have been on the road for twenty years?”

  “Mercifully, none.”

  She was glad he realized she was only half serious and laughed as he unlocked the passenger door. “Correction,” he said. “Now you know one.”

  He pulled the door open, and with a mock-chivalrous bow, helped her up onto the seat. With less ceremony he tossed the two bags onto the somewhat dubious-looking floor at her feet. The dashboard was dusty and the upholstery frayed, but when Chris climbed into the driver’s seat beside her, he informed her that the engine ran like a top—at least for a twenty-year old truck. On the third try it started with a roar.

  Chris grinned at her. “Love that sound. What do you drive?”

  “A Pontiac sedan.”

  “There you go. Keep America working.”

  She didn’t point out that the America he’d kept working was probably near retirement age. Nor when they began coughing down Beacon Hill did she point out that the gas gauge read empty. She herself never parked her car on an empty tank. But she kept quiet and relaxed as they bumped along to Route 2 West... without stopping for gas.

  Finally she couldn’t stand it anymore. “Urn, do you plan to stop for gas on Route 2?”

  He looked over at her. “I was wondering how long you’d sit on it. You notice everything, don’t you?”

  “Well, no, I don’t think so. I just don’t want to run out of gas.”

  “Trust me.”

  “I do. How far can you get when the gauge reads empty?”

  “Miles and miles.”

  “That’s rather vague.”

  “I know.” He reached over and patted her knee. “Relax, darlin’. The damn gauge doesn’t work.”

  Chapter Nine

  About two hours later Page gave Chris directions to a farm just north of monstrous Quabbin Reservoir, a Depression-era public works project that had drowned five towns to provide water for metropolitan Boston. As the truck clattered up the road, Page said, “It’s hard to imagine now what this area would be like if those five towns had continued to exist. Quabbin’s become quite a wildlife preserve—bald eagles have returned. But it must have been difficult for people to give up their homes, move their dead... I don’t think anyone’d get away with a project like that these days.”

  Chris gave her a suspicious look. “How do you know all this?”

  “Oh. I grew up around here.”

  “I see.”

  She was quite sure he didn’t, simply because she’d neglected to tell him a few salient facts—such as the sugar shack they were headed to was on Harrington property. But she didn’t think he needed to know that just yet. She asked, instead, “Where did you grow up?”

  “Suburban Boston.”

  “That covers dozens of towns. Did you move around a lot?”

  “No. We always lived in the same house.”

  There was something about his tone that made her turn, but his expression was unreadable, and she couldn’t tell what had caught her attention. “Does your family still live there?”

&nbs
p; “Mmm.”

  “In what town?”

  “Concord.”

  Concord was an expensive suburb west of Boston known for its beautiful colonial homes. She enjoyed shopping in Concord and strolling along its picturesque streets, where she didn’t recall ever having seen a beat-up old truck parked. But perhaps Chris was from one of Concord’s slightly less prestigious neighborhoods. She couldn’t, however, think of a polite way to ask.

  “Concord. Really? It’s a beautiful town. No wonder you weren’t worried about sending your mother a birthday card on time. You can just visit.”

  “Not in March,” he said. “She and my father stay in Florida most of the winter. They have a place on Amelia Island.”

  “Oh.”

  She spoke absently, thinking fast about changing their route, but she knew it was too late. The familiar hill was coming up fast. She told Chris to take the next left, a back road that wound into the hills. They passed a small white clapboard house: Mr. Sadowski was out putting up his mailbox, which had obviously been knocked down by a snowplow. It happened every year. Page waved and noticed his look of surprise as the truck clattered through a series of potholes. The last time he’d seen her, she’d been in her dark blue sedan. Beat-up trucks hadn’t been her style in years.

  “Do you always wave at old men?” Chris asked.

  “That’s Mr. Sadowski.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  He obviously didn’t understand, but why should he? Page coughed and added, “He was my closest neighbor growing up.”

  “Page...”

  “Take the next right.”

  “The driveway with the dog sleeping in the middle of it?”

  She nodded. “That’s Gladiola.”

  Since there was no other traffic on the narrow road, Chris didn’t bother to signal. He just glanced at Page as he made the turn. “Gladiola,” he repeated.

  She smiled at him and, her heart pounding, said, “My family’s dog.”

  * * *

  The driveway was unpaved, and for an anxious moment Chris thought they were going to get stuck in the mud. The truck, however, pulled through. Page gave him directions to a giant shallow puddle that served as a parking area in front of a shed painted barn red. About twenty yards to their left was the side entrance to a gray clapboard house that needed painting; none of its black shutters seemed to hang quite straight. The place was tucked on a hillside in the generally colder west-central part of the state, where spring didn’t come as early. There were still patches of snow in the woods behind the house and on the other side of the road; everywhere else it was muddy. A few chickens were scratching in the wet, pounded-down grass. Buckets and plastic milk jugs hung from every maple tree in the vicinity, catching the clear, sticky sap.