Heartache Falls (3 page)

The court clerk nodded. “It did, but Judge Harrison had a heart attack this morning on his way in. We heard fifteen minutes ago.”

“Oh, no. How’s he doing?”

“It’s serious. His son took my call and said he’s not out of the woods entirely, but they do expect him to survive.”

“That’s good news.”

“Yes, but the son also said the doctors are talking about retirement.”

Mac hated to hear it. Harrison was a brilliant jurist and an affable colleague. He’d be missed.

“The case has been reassigned to you, Judge Timberlake. You have a hearing that starts in twenty minutes.”

“Twenty minutes! What sort of hearing?”

“The U.S. attorney wants a search warrant executed today. We have FBI, DEA, and the Denver police headed in.” The clerk handed over a file. “It’s a good thing you had your vacation. This thing is liable to have you tied up for months.”

Mac stared down at the bulging file and sighed. He should call Ali and warn her that he might be late. He thought she might have dropped the word
special
when she’d referenced dinner tonight.

As he headed for his office to make the call, his secretary, Louise, stopped him with a problem. From that moment on, the Desai case consumed him, and he didn’t leave the courthouse until well after 10:00 p.m. It wasn’t until he walked into his dark house and smelled the faded aroma of his favorite, veal parmigiana,
that he remembered that he’d never made that phone call, and his stomach dipped.

Next he recalled the possible special plans reference, and his stomach dropped even more.

Sure enough, when he peeked into the dining room, he saw the table set for two with her mother’s china.
Oh, hell
.

Mac rubbed the back of his neck and inwardly groaned. He’d screwed up. Big time. He knew this was a difficult time for his wife, and he’d been trying to be extra sensitive to her wishes and desires. Luckily, she’d appeared to be happier since he returned from Alaska and she returned from Tennessee. He had hoped that Ali would find the anticipation of Caitlin’s departure for college more upsetting than dealing with the actual aftereffects of it, and so far, it appeared that would be the case.

But letting her down like this tonight sure didn’t help the situation. “Timberlake,” he murmured, “you’re an ass.”

He slipped off his jacket and loosened his tie as he climbed the stairs to their bedroom. The room was dark, the figure in the bed unmoving. Attempting to be as quiet as possible, Mac readied for bed, then slipped between the sheets.

He breathed in the familiar lavender scent of the lotion she habitually smoothed over her skin before bed and edged closer to her warmth, trying not to wake her as he put his arm around her, seeking, and finding, that sense of homecoming she offered him even after all these years.

“You’re home,” she said.

Mac closed his eyes.
Damn
. “Sorry I woke you. I’m sorry I’m so late. I know I should have called.”

“Where were you?”

She said it like a question, not an accusation, so he breathed a little easier. “I had a hearing. A new case. We ended up ordering in dinner.”

“Oh. Okay.”

She sounded tired—very tired—so he decided to wait until the morning to offer any further details. He kissed her shoulder and spooned her tight against him. “Goodnight, babe. Sleep well.”

“You too.”

Mac waited for her to continue their usual nighttime ritual, but her regular breathing told him she’d fallen back asleep. Disquieted, he drifted off plagued with a sense of foreboding.

When was the last time they’d gone to sleep together without exchanging the words
I love you
?

TWO

The following April

The pressure in her chest began the moment Ali awoke. She didn’t need to open her eyes and see the undisturbed covers on Mac’s side of the bed to know that he had never come upstairs. She was freezing. Cold clear to the bone. It was as if she’d lain exposed to the chilly early spring air throughout the long night.

Come to think of it, that aptly described what had happened. Mac radiated heat like a furnace, and for most of their marriage she’d slept comfortably snuggled up against him with only a thin cotton blanket on their bed. But his body heat didn’t do her a darn bit of good when he slept on the sofa downstairs, now did it? How many nights in a row was it now? Five? Six? Sporadically before that?

And yet maybe she was wrong. Maybe she could blame it on hormones. Maybe her body’s thermostat was all screwed up. She was forty-three, after all. Instead of hot flashes, could a woman suffer cold spells? Frigid spells? Was that the problem?

That was probably what Mac would say. She’d
seen the accusation in his eyes, though he’d never said that
F
-word out loud.

Holding her breath and hoping, Ali sought warmth by slowly stretching a leg across the wide expanse of their king-sized bed. Inch by inch she searched. She encountered nothing but cold, crisp Egyptian cotton.

The pressure in her chest intensified. Despair oozed through her like a cold, dark cloud. She yanked her leg back and curled into herself. Burying her head beneath her pillow, she willed away the tears that threatened. She was tired of being cold. In her bed. In her home. In her marriage. So cold that it hurt. It was as if the Colorado winter had moved inside and surrounded her.

She lay shivering and miserable, looking within herself for the will to meet the day, until finally the lure of a hot shower enticed her from her bed. A glance at the bedside clock revealed red numerals glowing 6:03 a.m., a good hour before her customary time to rise. In the master bathroom, she glimpsed her reflection in the mirror and winced. The dark circles beneath her eyes complemented the Medusa thing she had going on with her hair. Black mascara streaks on her cheeks accentuated the look.

“I wouldn’t want to sleep with you, either,” she said to her image before turning away and stepping into the shower. The fact that she’d neglected her makeup removal routine last night bothered her. As did the reality that she was overdue for a haircut, and she’d been MIA at her standing manicure appointment for weeks now. Okay, months. The last time she’d had a pedicure was the mother-daughter spa
day she’d indulged in with Caitlin the week before they left for Tennessee.

As the hot water warmed her, Ali’s spirit rebounded. It wasn’t like she’d let herself go, because she hadn’t. So what if she weighed eight whole pounds more than she had on the day they’d married? She’d given birth to three of his babies. That was only 2.67 pounds per child, and frankly, they didn’t look bad on her. And if her breasts weren’t as perky as they used to be, well, she’d nursed those three babies, too. What did he expect?

Sure, she had a few lines on her face, but her skin wasn’t leathery from a lifetime of worshiping the sun. Maybe she’d noticed a few gray hairs creeping in. So what? Since she was blond, they weren’t all that noticeable. And she still had a darn fine butt. She wasn’t going to allow Mac Timberlake’s lack of attention make her doubt her femininity.

If she said it often enough, maybe she’d eventually believe it.

Nevertheless, her little pep talk had helped. At ten minutes to seven, wearing the armor of fresh makeup, styled hair, her favorite slacks, and a cashmere sweater, she made her way downstairs to the kitchen and the coffeepot, which Mac always programed to start brewing at 6:30 a.m. As she grabbed a mug from the cabinet, she glanced out the kitchen window into the backyard where the Honorable Mackenzie S. Timberlake was swimming his morning laps in the heated pool.

At the sight of her husband, Ali’s melancholy came rolling back in. It was hard to be married to Mr. Perfect.

That was an apt description of the man. His dedication to his exercise regimen offered a good example. How many Monday mornings had she declared a new beginning to an exercise routine of one sort or another? Too many to count. She would do fine for a week or two, sometimes even a month, but then something would happen—one of the kids would get sick or their schedules would change—and she’d miss one day, then two, and her good intentions would go right down the drain.

Mac, on the other hand, never let illness or schedules stop him. In all the years they’d been married, he’d missed his daily workout no more than a dozen times. Even that stupid Desai case that had consumed his life from September to February hadn’t stopped him from getting his exercise. He’d get up an hour early, cut his lunch short, or even hold a meeting at the health club to fit it in. A part of Ali admired that tremendously. Another part of her thought it was a bit … well, she wouldn’t use the word
anal
because the term offended him, as she’d learned one time when she’d called him that to his face. The term she’d adopted to describe her husband was
über-disciplined
, and it fit Mac Timberlake to a T.

These days, she found it so annoying.

Outside, he finished his laps and stood in the shallow end, his arms resting on the side of the pool. He gave his head a shake and sent water droplets flying, then levered himself up and out of the water. Watching him as he reached for a towel, his swim trunks hanging low on his hips, Ali couldn’t deny that his exercise regimen paid off. At six foot four and 220
pounds, the man could have made his living as a model had he not chosen law. He had thick, mahogany-colored hair, gray eyes, and a square jaw. His broad shoulders tapered to a slim waist, and his belly remained almost as flat as it had been the day she’d met him. After more than twenty-two years of marriage, he still made her mouth water when she saw him naked.

Not that she’d seen him naked lately. Not for weeks. Okay, a month. Months.

As he toweled off in the cold morning air, Ali indulged in a little fantasy where she exited the house, crossed the yard, and pushed him back into the pool. She’d done that very thing a few years ago when the kids were up in the mountains on a church youth group camping trip. She’d caught Mac by surprise and he’d teetered at the edge of the pool, his arms windmilling as he fought for balance. He’d fallen backward with a huge splash, and she’d been laughing when he’d surfaced, sputtering. His eyes had flashed. He’d scrambled from the pool and she’d started running.

Of course he’d caught her. They’d both been laughing when he’d tossed her fully dressed into the pool, then jumped in after her. Before they were done, they’d made love once in the pool and again in the hot tub.

Ali knew that if she pushed him into the pool today, she wouldn’t be playing, wouldn’t be laughing when he surfaced. It would be an act of meanness, plain and simple.

“What happened to us, Mac?” she murmured.

Tears stung her eyes and she tried to blink them away, but she had little success. Nothing new there. Lately she cried at just about everything—sappy commercials, country songs on the radio, and the color yellow. The yellow thing was a bit weird, she would admit, but yellow was just so … happy.

Maybe, though, she should go for some yellow. Try to make some happiness happen.

As he started toward the house, she stepped away from the window and decided to make an effort this morning. They could share a cup of coffee, a conversation, maybe even a meal. When was the last time they’d sat down for a meal together that didn’t involve either his work or one of her philanthropic interests? She honestly couldn’t remember.

Ali grabbed a second mug from the cabinet—a yellow mug—and filled both cups with coffee. She added a teaspoon of sugar to Mac’s, then stood near the door just as he walked inside, a damp royal blue beach towel draped over one shoulder. Seeing her, he stopped abruptly. “Oh.” She heard surprise in the word. “Hi.”

“Good morning.” She handed him a mug with a smile that, despite a sincere effort, probably didn’t reach her eyes.

“Thanks.” He glanced at the clock as he sipped his coffee. “You’re up early.”

She hesitated. She wanted to tell him that the cold woke her up, but she wasn’t ready to toss the issue out into the open like a bad piece of fish. One couldn’t ignore bad fish, and Ali wasn’t prepared to face the stink. Not here and now, anyway. It wouldn’t be … yellow.

She cleared her throat. “I have a busy day ahead of me.”

“Oh? What’s on your docket?”

She didn’t miss the surprise in his voice, and for some reason it raised her hackles. The words
Nothing you’d respect
hovered on her tongue.

This morning she had a meeting planned with her friend Celeste Blessing to discuss window drapes. Celeste had decided to redecorate her private suite of rooms at Cavanaugh House, the mansion once owned by Ali’s silver-baron ancestor and now the centerpiece of the Angel’s Rest Healing Center and Spa property in Eternity Springs. Recalling that Ali recently had chosen new draperies for her father’s Victorian home, Celeste had asked to see them next time she visited Denver. That was today, so draperies were on Ali’s docket.

Unlike Mac, Ali didn’t spend her days deciding the fate of criminals or corporations. Justice might be blind, but in Mac’s case it was also arrogant. He considered drapery design little more than fluff.