Never Too Late (8 page)

She tried to wiggle free, but he held her waist. “I can't,” she said weakly. “I'm not ready.”

“You'll never get ready this way,” he said. He opened the door and that new-car smell of polish and leather wafted out. “Take your time, but get in. Let's just do it. It'll be fine.”

“It's been so long.”

“I know. I don't think you should make it any longer.”

“Really…” she attempted, pleadingly.

“Just around the block then,” he said. “But it's time. You need a car and you have to drive.”

Reluctantly, she slid in. Her dad had tried something like this a few weeks ago, but he'd let her off easy. Maggie had talked about it, her driving again, but talk she could handle. She swore to Maggie she wasn't phobic about it—she just wanted to pick out a nice car when her insurance settlement from the accident came in, and that would be that. But the truth was that Clare didn't need to wait to buy a car. She had plenty of money—both savings from her life with Roger along with the stipends he sent, not to mention her future salary from the
teaching position. She could qualify for a car loan, no problem.

She sat behind the wheel while Sam got in the other side. She placed her hands on the steering wheel, massaging the leather cover. He waited a moment, then when she didn't move he reached across her and fastened her seat belt. “How's it feel?”

“It's very nice,” she said. “I'd like to just sit here for a while.”

He gave that about ten seconds, then he turned the key and started the engine. “Very uncomplicated car, Clare. Just put it in reverse, back out and take her around the block. You can do it. Simple.”

“I can do that,” she said. And in her head she said,
I can do it, I can do it, I can do it. I'd just rather not.

One thing she knew for sure—this was going to have to happen sometime, and for whatever reason she was glad it was happening with Sam and not George or Maggie or even, God forbid, Roger. So she put the car in reverse and with her foot on the brake, adjusted the rearview mirror. She went slowly down the drive, changed gears and headed down the street. She signaled at the corner, made a right turn, signaled at the next corner for another right, and repeated the process a third time. She licked her lips, swallowed several times and gripped the wheel hard, so that it wouldn't fly away.

“How's that feel?” he asked.

“I don't know. Are you supposed to sweat this much?”

“Well, I do. But I think it has something to do with the payments.” He chuckled.

She stole a quick glance at him and then got her eyes back on the road. He was smiling at her. Joking around with her.

Her house came into view. “Go around again,” he commanded.

“Really, once is—”

“Clare! You have to get it up to fifteen miles an hour before we quit! Now drive!”

She eased down on the accelerator with caution and brought the speed up. “Jeez. All you have to do is ask.”

After four trips around the block, her pulse began to slow. She wiped her hands on her jeans several times and then, miraculously, didn't have to anymore. Then Sam told her to take a left and another and that put them out on a nonresidential street and while she felt a little nervous, it wasn't too bad. “You have to do the speed limit if there are no traffic restrictions,” he told her, sounding like such a cop. She sped up and navigated the road. She stopped at a light and when it turned green she looked both ways before proceeding. She drove as he directed and it began to come back to her, how she'd zipped around this little town with such confidence before. Not just the town but the country roads that wound around the luscious green farms and cattle ranches. But that was nothing—she'd been up the winding mountain roads and passes in the dead of winter to ski at Tahoe, and at night to have dinner at a wonderful small restaurant at eighty-five hundred feet at the top of Lander's Pass. And over the mountains and down the other side, all the way across the Bay Bridge to San Francisco.

Sam had stopped directing her and she was on her own. He popped in a CD and music wafted through the car on its wonderful sound system. She opened the window and felt the wind blowing her hair. She went through town, past her father's store and out into the country. She got on the highway and headed south right
along with all the Tahoe tourists. Then she got off the highway and took the country roads back toward Breckenridge.

“Pull over at that field,” he told her. “Please.”

It never occurred to her to ask why; she did as she was told.

“Turn off the engine,” he said, unsnapping his seat belt and getting out.

She was slow to respond, wondering just what he had in mind. He probably had to pee, she thought. Men—the world is their bathroom. There was nothing out here but a couple of big, old trees, a falling-apart structure that was once a barn, field upon field of what looked to be soybeans, and cattle grazing in the distance. Not terribly far away a tractor trundled along.

Sam just stood under the tree and looked westward toward the mountains. A breeze flapped at his shirt and he pushed his hands into his pockets.

She got out and joined him. “What are we doing?” she asked.

He nodded toward the Sierras. “There's going to be snow up there in a couple of months. You going to be able to ski this year?”

You don't ask someone from Breckenridge or anywhere around Reno and Tahoe
if
they skied, because almost anyone who lived right beneath this gorgeous mountain range was born on skis. Her entire family had skied together, though George didn't go anymore. And Jason was a snowboarding pig who fancied himself an extreme snowboarder—something that challenged her sanity. “God, I hope so,” she answered. “We grew up on skis. That's one of the things our family loves doing together.”

“I do some part-time ski patrol,” he said, not breaking his gaze from the mountains. “Molly is
very
grateful,” he added with a laugh. “Free lift tickets.” Finally he looked at her. He smiled that bright dimpled smile and said, “Nice driving.”

One muscle in her stomach that had been tight since the accident finally relaxed. She had done it—the crazed fear was behind her. Oh, she might experience a tingling nerve or two, but it no longer seemed like something she couldn't push through. So she said, “Thank you, Sam. Whew. I might've put that off forever.”

She noticed, not for the first time, that he had the bluest eyes she'd ever seen. And they bored into hers with heat and power. The smile was still there on his lips but without that flash of bright white teeth. He took one hand out of his pocket and reached toward her, threading his hand around the back of her neck under her hair. She was very still, not quite sure what he was going to do. Maybe just hold her there? But she couldn't deny that his large hand felt good, and for Clare, feelings like this were long ago and far away.

Then he pulled her to him and those eyes gently closed as he pressed his mouth against hers. But her eyes flew open and she held her breath. It was a soft kiss but demanded a little something, like a response. She was in shock. But why should she be when she'd suspected for a long time that his ultimate interest in her was romantic? Suspected? Hell, she'd
known!
She just couldn't figure out
why.

He began to move against her mouth, giving her an idea that a deeper kiss was entirely possible, but certainly not more meaningful. Then he let go and looked into her
wide startled eyes and said, “For God's sake, close your eyes, breathe and kiss me. It wouldn't kill you.”

She had always been very good at doing just as she was told. She closed her eyes, leaned into his lips and gently breathed. Ah, that was what she remembered. It was very, very nice. In her head she was already pressed against that rock-hard chest, wrapped around him like her grandmother's shawl, but he didn't embrace her. So she embraced him, though somewhat clumsily. It must be hard for him to imagine that this almost-forty-year-old woman who'd been married for sixteen years was pretty inexperienced in this…this kissing men she barely knew.

But she did know him. She knew him well. They'd become friends during those phone chats. It was just that she'd been focused on keeping him at a respectable and platonic distance because there were two things that were glaringly obvious to her. One, she could fall into him and devour him like a hot fudge sundae, and two, she was a little too vulnerable to be in that kind of relationship right now. It held the potential for people to get hurt.

He pulled back. “That's more like it. You appear to be a little rusty.”

“You don't,” she said a bit breathlessly.

“I've been thinking about it a long time,” he said with a shrug.

“Sam…”

“Me first. Are you dodging me, Clare?”

“No,” she said. “No, really. I've been…Well, you know.”

“No, I don't. Level with me.”

She took a calming breath and said, “You're sweet,
Sam, and I like you. Who could help but like you? I appreciate that you've stayed in touch since the accident. And what you did today—well, much as I resisted, it was wonderful of you.”

“But…?”

“But any kind of relationship, with anyone, is way down on my ‘to do' list. I have monumental things to accomplish, not the least of which is a divorce. I don't want to get hurt, and I don't want to hurt anyone. I'm not ready.”

He pursed his lips and gave a sharp nod, as though he understood. “Fair enough, Clare. It's been a rugged few months for you.”

“Thanks for understanding, Sam.”

“No problem. I'm not here to mess with your head. That first night I met you, the one thing I could see was that you were a woman who could think straight even under stress.” And finally he removed that hand, but not his eyes. And, she instantly missed the hand.

“Hah!” she laughed. “Me? I was speeding, remember? And a basket case at that!”

Unruffled he just chuckled under his breath and said, “Do you know how many people actually shoot each other in situations like you found yourself in? Believe me, a few tears, ten miles over the limit—it was downright stoic.”

“There was this ice bucket,” she said. “At the foot of the bed? I doused them both,” she admitted.

“Well good for you,” he said. “I like you, you know.”

“I like you, too,” she said. “But I'm not ready for more than that.”

“Okay then,” he said, taking her hand and leading her back to the car. “Take me home—I have things to get done today. Since I'm not having sex.”

“Yes, sir!” she said with a big laugh.

They didn't talk during the ride home. She enjoyed the driving and he, apparently, enjoyed the scenery and his sound system, though he did reach over and put his hand on her thigh. Common sense told her she should tell him to remove it, but she happened to like it there. What the hell, she thought. I should have something to look forward to. A fling with a drop-dead gorgeous younger man wasn't entirely out of the question. Was it?

Once they were back in her drive she left the car running as she unbuckled and got out. He crossed to the driver's side and she thanked him again. As he was backing out he lowered the window and said, “Clare? Get to work on that ‘to do' list, okay? I'll be in touch.”

 

Right after that drive, Clare rented a car. She had always hated the whole process of shopping for and buying cars and she just wasn't up to it. But one of the items in her “to do” list had to be taken care of right away, before the start of school. She had to see Pete, the football coach.

Jason didn't play football; he liked to save himself for snowboarding and varsity football players weren't allowed to ski during the season because of the risk of injury putting them off the team. Football practice started in early August, a month before the start of school. The team practiced all morning, every morning, and school would start in a few days. With nerves taut and heart hammering, she went to the field and watched what she judged to be nearly the end of their session.

Pete stood on the sidelines, his broad back moving with the force of his shouts, his raised hand and emphatic gestures. Every time she saw him over the years,
she had quickly averted her eyes lest he see her, approach her, engage her. She hadn't allowed herself the luxury of watching and remembering him. She never let herself think about how handsome he was. Once they had been so close, such good friends, bonded by her relationship to his older brother. Then once they had been too close.

He shouted at the boys and dismissed the team. He turned toward the bleachers to walk off the field and spotted her almost immediately. He glanced, then stared, then tentatively raised a hand in her direction. She returned the brief wave. Well, she wouldn't have to chase him down or even find him in the parking lot as he prepared to leave. But she hadn't thought it would be this easy.

While the team ran off the field and the managers were busy stuffing supplies into big canvas bags, he walked toward her. She didn't think her heart could pound any harder, but it did. He leaned on the railing in front of the first row and said, “Hey. I've been wondering about you.”