Another Summer (7 page)

Kelly had no doubt Ray eventually would grow out of his desire to be the center of attention. He needed time, and she needed patience. She just had to keep reminding herself that Ray’s good qualities more than balanced his bad and that if she held out for a perfect relationship, she would live her life alone. She wasn’t like her mother or Maggie, but neither were millions of other women. Real soul mates were about as easy to come by as fifty-carat diamonds.

Wide-awake, she turned on the television and clicked through a dozen channels before giving up and turning it off again. She glanced around the room and thought about the women who’d lived here. She wondered if Julia had chosen the furniture and curtains and colors out of preference or if there had been a nod to Maggie’s influence. They weren’t anything she would have picked, but they seemed to suit her in a way she never would have anticipated.

To celebrate passing the bar, she’d redecorated her apartment in an expensive retro fifties style that had seemed wonderfully clever and funky at the time, but now seemed dated. If Ray weren’t so adamant about liking the look, or if she had some real idea what she wanted in its place, she would sell everything and start over.

The fact that she felt more a sense of home here than she did in her apartment might be the prod that she needed. She liked being somewhere she could kick off her shoes and curl up on the sofa and not worry what it was doing to the symmetry of the cushions. The drapes could be opened and closed without adjusting pleats, and nothing was finished to a high gloss that showcased dust.

She loved that someone had thought to put binoculars in every room that faced the ocean and that the bookshelves in the living room held everything from a rock collection to children’s literature to popular fiction. There were restaurant menus from Aptos, Capitola, Soquel, Watsonville, Santa Cruz, Monterey, Pacific Grove, and Carmel in a kitchen drawer. All had handwritten reviews that ranged from a simple “yum” to “heartburn likely, but worth it if you’re adventuresome” to “not to be missed” to “try the grocery-store deli first.” There were ordinary shells in a basket on the coffee table and expensive hand-loomed rugs in the bedrooms.

The only photograph in the house was in an ornate pewter frame on the mantel over the stone fireplace. She’d picked it up a half dozen times to stare at the couple standing outside in the garden under the rose arbor. The condition of the photograph, the clothes the people were wearing, and the car parked in the driveway led her to believe it had been taken sometime in the late forties or early fifties.

The man had looked directly at the camera, making a connection she could feel through the years that separated them. He had his arm around the woman, and his smile was a beacon of happiness he plainly wanted the world to see. The woman had her arm around the man’s waist. She was gazing up at him, her joy so complete and intimate that being a witness almost seemed an invasion of her privacy.

Kelly had planned to ask Andrew about the couple when she saw him again–who they were, why theirs was the only picture in the house, and what had happened to them. Now she knew. They were Joe and Maggie.

Settling deeper into the sofa, she picked up Landry’s book and turned to the first chapter. She’d barely made it through the opening paragraph when the phone rang. Happier than she wanted to be that Ray had given in and called her, she reached for the phone. “I was worried about you,” she said in lieu of hello.

“Why?” Donna asked. And then, “Oh, I get it. You thought I was Ray.”

She could deny the assumption, and Donna would let her get away with it, but they would both know it was a lie. “I missed his call earlier and left a message for him to call back.” Donna hesitated long enough that Kelly could almost hear the wheels turning.

“Oh? And what were you doing that made you forget he was supposed to call?”

“Did I say I forgot?”

“Same difference,” she said.

“If you must know, I was out on the deck having a cup of coffee.”

“Your deck or Andrew’s?”

Kelly didn’t stand a chance. Donna was too good. “Andrew’s. We were talking about Matt Landry and his girlfriend.”

“Matt’s girlfriend or Andrew’s?”

“Andrew’s.”

“Damn.” Half a heartbeat later, “Did he happen to say whether Landry was seeing anyone?”

Kelly laughed. “This can’t be why you called. You should be in bed by now.”

“I need some legal advice.”

Kelly groaned. “Please tell me you’re not in trouble again.”

“It’s not for me, you nitwit, it’s a friend. He just found out his ex never put through the papers to take his name off the condo they owned together, and the bank is coming after him, threatening to turn him over to a collection agency unless he makes up the back payments. He doesn’t have the money, and he’s scared to death his credit is going to be ruined.” She paused. “And what do you mean
again?
I’ve never been in trouble. Or at least not lawyer kind of trouble.”

Kelly ignored the last part. “Where is this friend?”

“Right now?”

“No, you nitwit,” she countered. “Where does he live?”

“San Diego.”

“John Murdock’s the man he wants to see. He’s tenacious and loves this kind of thing. I’ll contact him first thing in the morning and tell him to expect your friend’s call. I assume he’s in San Francisco with you now but will be back in San Diego by the end of the week?”

“I could let him go as early as Wednesday, if necessary.”

“Call me when you get a break tomorrow, and I’ll let you know what John’s schedule is like. Your friend can take it from there.”

“I knew there would come a time when I was glad I pulled you out of Lake Morgan.”

“You pulled me out because you knew you wouldn’t sit down for a week when Dad found out you’d pushed me in.”

Donna laughed. “Oh, yeah. I forgot that part.”

“I miss having you here.”

“We’ll do it again–next summer. I promise. And if we can’t get Alexis to go with us, we’ll find a way to make her come to the beach house.”

It was a dream they would talk about through the winter and, if nothing else, have the pleasure of planning.

“I’ve got to get to bed before it’s too late to bother,” Donna said. “But first promise me something.”

“What.”

“You won’t stay up all night waiting for Ray to call.”

She wasn’t expecting something this easy. “I promise.”

“And, I want you to promise–”

“One is all you get.”

“Can’t blame a girl for trying.”

“Go to bed, Donna.”

“I love you.”

“Love you, too.” Kelly’s hand lingered on the receiver when she returned it to the cradle. In a way she was glad Ray hadn’t called. She’d had a wonderful day, too wonderful to end with a fight.

The thought brought her up short. How had she let this happen to her? When had she become captive to Ray’s moods? Why had she made excuses for him when Donna told her about his wandering eye?

What if the situation had been reversed, and she was the one who had made the call and Ray hadn’t answered? She simply would have called later, no questions, no pouting, no problem. The answer was like a flash of light in a dark room forcing her to see something she hadn’t wanted to see. Rather than work though the revelation and face something she didn’t want to face, she went to bed.

  K
ELLY WOKE THE NEXT MORNING TO THE
sounds of a bird singing outside her bedroom window. She listened, fascinated by the series of warbles that ended in a high
zeee
repeated over and over again. She went to the window and studied the eucalyptus tree beside the deck, but couldn’t spot the bird.

Stretching, she considered crawling back into bed but decided tea on the deck with the bird held more appeal. She slipped into the red silk bathrobe Alexis had given her for her twenty-fifth birthday and went into the kitchen, automatically glancing at the clock and then the telephone as she passed. Six-thirty, Ray should be leaving his apartment about now. Obviously he’d decided to call her on his cell phone rather than risk leaving late.

She made her tea in an enormous earthenware mug and took it outside with her, careful to leave the sliding door open far enough to be able to hear the phone when it rang.

When Ray still hadn’t called by eight, Kelly decided she’d waited long enough and picked up the phone to call him. She tried his cell phone first and then his office.

“Hi, Phyllis,” she said to his assistant. “Is Ray available?”

Phyllis only paused a fraction of a second longer than usual before answering, but it was enough to let Kelly know that what was coming next wasn’t the truth. “He hasn’t come in yet, Ms. Anderson. Would you like to leave a message?”

She hated being lied to, but hated even more that Ray had Phyllis doing the lying. It was embarrassing–for both of them. “No, there’s no message.” She started to hang up, then changed her mind. “Wait–” Phyllis was still on the line. “Tell him I’m not going to be available for several days and not to bother trying to reach me.”

“Are you sure there’s no number?” She seemed astounded, as if it were impossible for anyone to go anywhere they would be out of touch.

“Tell Ray I’ll call when I get back.”

“Can you hold for a moment?”

“Certainly.”

A canned message came on the line reminding her that quarterly taxes were due on the fifteenth and that it wasn’t too early to start planning tax strategies for the end of the year.

“Kelly–,” Ray said, stopping as if to catch his breath, “I was afraid I might have missed you.”

When added to her personal revelation of the night before, she realized she was overwhelmingly weary of the pretense that went on between them. Nothing was happening that hadn’t happened before or wouldn’t happen again. And that was the problem. She simply didn’t have the energy or desire any longer to trade her pride when all she received in exchange was the comfort of knowing she always had a convenient companion.

“You have,” she told him, feeling an unexpected, heady rush.

“I don’t understand.”

Quickly, before she could change her mind, she said, “I’m done, Ray.” Shouldn’t she be feeling a sense of sorrow? What was this feeling of freedom? “It’s over. We’re over. It was fun for a while, but it isn’t fun anymore.”

“You’re dumping me?”

Had he not been taken by surprise, he would have never used a demeaning term like “dumping.” Five minutes after they hung up he would become the one who’d broken it off.

“Just like that?” he added.

“Just like that,” she repeated.

“What about–”

“Yes?”

“I thought we had something going, something that was eventually supposed to lead us somewhere.”

Donna’s words came back to her. “We did have something going, Ray. You had a woman willing to cater to your needs, and I had a man willing to let me. I don’t want to do that anymore. The game stopped being fun a long time ago. I just didn’t want to admit it. Now, I’m packing up my toys and going home.”

“But–”

“Yes?”

“You can’t call it off just like that,” he sputtered.

“Why not?”

“I’m not ready.”

“What are you trying to say, Ray? That you love me too much to let me go, that you’ll miss me when I’m gone, or that your life won’t be the same without me?”

“All I’m saying is that I’m not ready for it to be over.”

“Give it a couple of hours, you’ll be fine.”

“You can be a real bitch, Kelly.”

“I suppose it’s too much to think we could still be friends?”

He hung up on her.

She waited. She should have felt bad, maybe even a little sad. Anger would have been appropriate. But all she felt was relief. How long had she subconsciously known that they were in a dead-end relationship? A better question was how had she talked herself into tolerating the situation as long as she had?

She’d listened to women who’d spent years swimming in the murky waters of the dating pool claim a bad relationship was better than no relationship. She wasn’t there yet. She might have come close with Ray, but as her grandfather used to say, close only counted in horseshoes. Whatever that meant.

K
ELLY CELEBRATED HER NEWLY WON INDE
pendence by going to Monterey and joining a walking tour of the downtown historical district. Eleven Spanish adobe-and-stucco buildings and one blister later, she wandered into a bakery and ordered a slice of carrot cake that turned out to be three layers tall with a half inch of cream cheese frosting. She told herself she would only eat half and save the rest for the next day. Ten minutes later, the only thing left on her plate was the fork.

Satisfaction overrode guilt, but not to the point she gave in to the temptation to buy a second piece to take with her. Back in her car, she considered her options. Time was a rare commodity in her ordered life, something she rarely had in excess, and never for indulgence.

She tried to imagine what Donna would do in her place and decided she really didn’t want another man in her life, even a temporary one. Instead she found a spa with an opening for a facial and massage.

On the way home she stopped at a roadside stand that proclaimed Castroville the artichoke capital of the world and bought a bag of the glorified thistles. That night’s dinner consisted of artichokes dipped in melted butter and a half bottle of Merlot, a combination so good she put it on her list of all-time favorite meals.

After the dishes were done, she halfheartedly picked up Matt Landry’s book and settled down to go to work. Three hours later she winced as she untucked and stretched her legs, stunned that she’d been so caught up in what she’d thought would be a series of dry statistics that she had barely moved.

She took a mental step back and thought about what she’d read. Employing fiction techniques, Landry had made the nonfiction work read like a novel, telling with relentless unfolding the catastrophic effects of man’s disregard for his home. He’d ended the first section with the race to find cures for viruses that turned human organs into unfunctioning, gelatinous incubators ready to infect the next unprotected and unwary passerby, viruses unleashed by man’s disregard for the balance of nature.

The man could write. She would give him that. And she was beginning to understand why and how his arguments worked with a jury. The key to winning a case where he was called to testify would be in the jury selection.
And in her ability to find reason in her opposing argument,
something that grew more difficult the more she read.

She went outside to walk around and work out the kinks while thinking about and absorbing the ideas Landry had presented. The waves carried a gentle breeze, heavy with moisture and smelling of brine. At the top of the stairs, with her hands at the small of her back, she leaned to one side and then the other, her gaze sweeping the moonlit beach. Joe and Maggie’s house, her house for the month, sat in the exact middle of the cove, with twelve houses on each side. Most were cottages, some had small additions, and a couple bordered on ostentatious, filling their lots like size eight pants on a size twelve body. The pine and eucalyptus trees growing on, behind, and around the lots gave shelter to perching birds and squirrels and the occasional chipmunk.

The residents accommodated the wildlife, studiously obeying the posted twenty-five-mile speed limit, even stopping traffic to scoot fledgling birds or a slow-moving raccoon out of the way.

The community wasn’t gated, but dead-end streets discouraged all but the most intrepidly curious, giving a sense of security she knew better than to accept but still enjoyed. At home she would not venture out alone at night the way she was now. Just walking on the beach by herself would have friends questioning her sanity. If small-town America survived, it was in places like this, where neighbors knew and looked out for each other. Kelly had yet to see half the residents on her floor at her high-rise apartment building, let alone know them by name.

She was back at the house, sitting on the deck, when a rustling noise beside the house startled her. She waited, not moving, barely breathing, hoping it was the cat and not wanting to frighten it.

It wasn’t the cat, it was Andrew. “I thought I saw you out here.” He came down the abandoned path that ran in front of the deck. “Beautiful night, huh?”

“Breathtaking. I keep expecting the dreaded fog that everyone warned me about, but every day has been prettier than the last.”

“Well, you’ve done it now. The fog’s sure to roll in tomorrow.” He stopped but didn’t open the gate to the waist-high railing that surrounded the deck. “If you want people to think you’re a native, never talk about the fog unless it’s all around you.”

She smiled. “Thanks for the tip. I’ll be more careful about what I say from now on.” She went to the gate to open it for him. “Would you like to come in for a drink? I found a local Merlot that’s wonderful.”

“I wish I could, but the security company that makes rounds at the nursery just called. There’s a broken pipe in one of the greenhouses. I’m hoping it’s something simple, but if it isn’t, I’m liable to be out there all night. In which case, I was wondering if you could do me a favor?”

“Sure.”

“Matt Landry’s coming over in the morning to borrow my surfboard. If I’m not here, would you mind letting him in the garage?”

Her brief fling with feeling special ended with the realization he’d asked her because she was the only one around in the morning. “Of course.”

He dug a key out of his pocket and handed it to her. “I’ll leave a note on the door telling Matt to come here.”

“What time should I expect him?”

“Somewhere around six–a little before or after. He likes to hit the waves early.” He turned to leave.

“I hope everything is okay at the nursery,” she called after him.

“Thanks–me too.”

Kelly went inside and put the key on the table by the front door. She wasn’t crazy about the thought of seeing Matt again, but it was probably better to get past the initial awkwardness sooner rather than later. Somehow, somewhere she would get back at Donna for her clumsy attempts to hook her up with Andrew and Matt.

The phone rang. For a fraction of a second her heart soared with the thought it could be Ray. Acutely disappointed at her reaction, she answered with an impatient, “Hello.”

“Bad time?” her father asked.

“No, it’s a good time. I was just thinking about something that put me in a bad mood.”

“You want to tell me about it?”

“Not particularly.”

“Okay, then I’ll get to why I called. I have a feeling they could be connected. Ray seems to think there’s something wrong up there.”

She was speechless. Never, not if it had been written in stone and passed down from on high, would she have believed Ray would call her father to intercede for him.

“Is he right?”

“No, he’s not right. I’m fine. Better than fine, I’m terrific. I’m having a wonderful time. The house is beautiful, the beach is beautiful, I’ve made a new friend.”

“Male or female?”

“Male.”

“So that’s it. I assume you told Ray?”

“What I told Ray was that I was through waiting for him to grow up.” She wished she could see the look on her father’s face. She had a feeling he was smiling.

“Meaning he’d better grow up fast or that it didn’t make any difference whether he did or not, you were through?” he asked carefully.

“Meaning it’s over–regardless.”

“Good for you.” His voice was a verbal high five. After several seconds, he added, “Of course, if you should change your mind, I don’t want you to think I’m passing judgment on Ray. It’s just that–”

“Don’t worry. It’s not going to happen. The only thing that could make me change my mind would be if I were stuck on a desert island with him.”

“I’ll do what I can to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

Kelly laughed. “Take care, Dad.”

“You too. And let me know what you think of this Matt Landry guy when you meet him.”

“I’ve already met him. He’s everything we’ve heard. We better hope we don’t have to come up against him too often.”

“You can handle him.”

While it was wonderful having someone believe in her the way her father did, at times it was a burden. “Right now I’m basing everything on first impressions and what I’ve read in his book. Maybe I’ll find a weakness or two when I get into the class.”

“Everyone is vulnerable.”

“So you’ve always told me.”

“You just have to look hard enough.”

“Yes, Dad.”

“Okay, so you’ve heard it all before. That doesn’t make it any less true. Keep me posted.”

It was her father’s way of saying good-bye. “I’ll do that–as soon as I have something worth reporting.”

“It’s all right if you just want to call to check in,” he added unexpectedly.

The warmth in his voice brought a smile. “I’m doing fine. Stop worrying about me.”

“It goes with the territory. I worry about all three of you girls.”

Telling him it was long past the time when worry would do any good wasn’t what he wanted to hear. “One more thing,” she said instead. “I recommended John Murdock to a friend of Donna’s in case he mentions something to you.”

“He did, and it’s being taken care of.”

“Thanks. Now go to bed, Dad. It’s late.”

“As soon as I finish going over this brief.”

He worked harder and with more dedication than anyone else she knew. Someday she hoped to feel some of whatever it was that drove him. Right now it was everything she could do to impress the other partners with her skill and ambition and still have a little time left over for a life outside the office.