Plain Jayne (24 page)

“I can still hear you,” I inform him while
continuing to wick away the tears.

He pauses and then says, “Of course, you can.
Because I’m not already humiliated enough.” He reappears in the doorway,
looking chagrined. “
Um… I don’t have any eye drops. I’m sorry. I can run
to the pharmacy for you. Yes. That’s what I’ll do.” He strides to his closet.
“I’ll get dressed and leave the house to get you some eye drops. And I’ll be
gone for a while. Or maybe I won’t come back.”

“Luke.”

“Hmmm?” he asks from the confines of his closet.

“Um, why don’t you come back over here and… kiss it better?”
I blush and hold my breath.

A few seconds pass, but then he emerges, looking shy. “Really?”

I nod. “Yeah. I don’t think it’s serious.” I sniff and
blink. “See? It still works. One kiss, and I bet it’ll be good as new.”

He sits next to me on the bed. “One kiss?”

I shrug. “Maybe more than one. Go ahead.”

He does. And I almost weep for real at how good it feels.

“Do your lips hurt?” he asks. At my nod, he briefly presses
his lips against mine. “Better?”

“They hurt real bad,” I murmur.

He smiles and kisses me harder, wrapping his arms around me
and then threading his hand up through my hair, which is still slightly
sleep-tangled and snags on his fingers.

“Gaaa, my hair! Never mind. It’s okay,” I frantically tell
him when he withdraws from me. “Just keep kissing me.”

No pain, no gain, right?

*****

Nothing else happened. My pain tolerance is too low for it
to have gone on much longer. Luke wasn’t kidding. He’s a bull in a china
bedroom. And if it wasn’t so painful, it would be sweet and cute and kind of a
turn-on. But it did hurt. A lot. It hurt when he tried to get his hand out of
my hair; it hurt when he elbowed me in the ribs; and it hurt when he trapped my
hand under his elbow on the bed. The pain was a blessing in disguise, though,
because if I didn’t have it to ground me, who knows how far I would have let
things go? In spite of everything, he’s a damn good kisser.

When I sat up, wiped my mouth and said, “We have to stop,”
he immediately agreed.

“You’re right. Tullah’s gonna kill me if you have bruises in
your author pic.”

I acted like that was my main motivation, too. It was easier
than repeating all the depressing things we already know.

I had another heart-stopping moment, though, when he said in
a jocular tone, “Hit the showers, Greer,” as I was headed toward his bedroom
door.

“W-what?” I asked, sniffing inside the collar of my t-shirt.
“Do I stink?!” Oh, it would just figure, although I didn’t know how it could be
possible, considering I’d showered the day before and spent much of the
afternoon in the pool.

He laughed in his bathroom doorway. “No! I was… Never mind.
You don’t smell bad. At all.”

“Oh. Okay. Good.”

Shaking his head and still chuckling, he turned and
disappeared from my view, closing the door behind him.

Now, hours later, it’s like I imagined what happened
earlier. I didn’t, though. It was real. Really real. I have the red eye to
prove it. But if all I had to go on was Luke’s behavior, I’d wonder. Not that I
expect him to act differently. Well, maybe I do. I don’t know. I don’t know
what I expect. I feel so different. And I don’t know how to act.

After alternately staring at my blinking cursor and studying
him in my peripheral vision for the better part of two hours, I close my laptop
and set it on the coffee table with a thunk. He looks sharply over at me as I
stand and stretch.

“I’m going for a walk,” I announce. When he moves to get up,
I add, “Alone.”

He looks surprised, but he doesn’t make a big deal about it.
Instead, he goes back to reading the manuscript in front of him. “Alright. See
you in a while, then.”
Scritch-scratch, scribble, scribble, scribble,
slaaaaaaash.

Okay, then. That was easy enough.

When I continue to simply stand in the middle of the room,
he glances up and half-smiles. “You okay?”

“Fine,” I toss, missing “breezy” by a long shot (as in, falling
somewhere closer to “leaden”).

I don’t want him to come with me, but I want him to want to.
Oh, shit. I’m losing my mind. I’m becoming one of those scary mind-game-playing
women who get all proprietary at the first kiss.

He starts to look up at me again, but before he can even ask
a question with his eyes, I bolt from the room. Must have fresh air.

I jog through the yard, scramble up the dunes, and scamper
down the other side. I’m not a runner, but for the first time in years, I
decide to try it. Barefoot, I pound down the beach on the packed sand,
mesmerized by the prints I make that almost immediately disappear again.

When I get into a rhythm and no longer have to think about
things as basic as breathing, I’m forced to confront other, more disturbing thoughts.
As in, what’s the goal here, Jayne? Miss High and Mighty from last night seems
to be nowhere around today. No, one careless cuddle session and a slightly
less-accidental kissing clinic later, and the moral dilemmas have suddenly
escaped me. He has a wife? Big whoop. She could be pregnant with his baby? No
prob. He’s my editor? So what? I’m horny. Oh, in that case… the rules don’t
matter. Do whatever feels good and deal with the consequences later. That’s the
way of the world, isn’t it? I’ve always wanted to be worldlier. This is good
practice.

No. I don’t like this. I mean, I
do
like it. Too
much. But I don’t like where it’s going, ultimately. The pit-stops along the
way are fun, but the final destination sucks.

Now that the train’s left the station, though, how do I stop
it? I don’t know if I can. I don’t know if I want to.

*****

I still don’t know what I’m going to do, but I can tell I’m
going to have shin splints from my
Baywatch
audition, so I turn around
and return to the house, hoping I’ll magically figure something out when I hit
the back door. That doesn’t happen, oddly enough. Maybe some lunch will get my
brain working.

As much as I’m trying to avoid talking to him until I figure
out what I’m going to say regarding more serious matters, it would be impolite
not to ask Luke if he’d like me to fix him something while I’m making my own
ooey, gooey peanut butter and jelly sandwich. When I get to his study doors,
though, I nearly injure myself when I try to open them and find them locked.

“Aggh!” I cry, gripping my shoulder.

On the other side of the door, I hear Luke say, “Hang on a
second, Arthur.”

The lock clicks, the door opens, and he winces at me through
the narrow opening. “Hey. Uh… sorry about that. I’m on a call.”

“I see that,” I reply, rolling my shoulder. “I was coming to
ask if you wanted lunch.”

He suddenly becomes stiff and formal. “No, thank you. I’m
busy.”

Taking my cues from him, I say, “Okay. Sorry to bother you,”
but it’s barely off my lips before he’s closing the door in my face. And
throwing the lock home again.

I stare at the wood grain for a second, wondering what that
was about. Then I remember that the owner of the publishing company is named
Arthur, and it hits me that we probably broke a rule or two earlier this
morning regarding publishing staff and their authors, so he’s trying to sound
ultra-professional so as not to arouse any suspicions.

I’ve satisfied myself with that explanation, but as I’m
about to walk back to the kitchen, I hear him say, “I’m back. Sorry for that….
Yes. I know…. It
has
been a few weeks, yes…. No, everything’s fine, but
she’s making the edits a bit more slowly than I expected…. I know…. Yes, I
know…. But—”

He’s quiet for a long time. Then he says with typical
temper, “You think I don’t know that, Arthur? What is this, my first author...?
No…! Not at all…. Trust me; she’s a lot further along than she would be if left
to her own devices. This place is good for her…. No, she’s not sunning herself
on the beach and making me rub suntan oil on her! She’s working….

Again, he doesn’t say anything for a couple of minutes,
until, “I’m well aware of that deadline, yes…. No, she doesn’t know about it; I
didn’t want her to freeze up under the pressure. With all due respect, sir,
when have I ever let the company down? Never. Would you let me do what I do and
stop worrying about it…? I
know
what we’re sitting on, yes. I’d assumed
that’s why I was assigned this…. I had heard those rumors, too, but she hasn’t
said anything to lead me to believe they’re true, and anyway, that’s R&D’s
bread and butter, not mine. I fine-tune the copy….” He sighs. “I have Ms. Greer
under control. Can we move on to the next writer, please? Ridgeworthy’s latest
round of edits is nearly finished…”

I move away from the door, taking care not to even breathe
too heavily for fear that he’ll know I was listening in on his conversation.
About me. To the head of the company. What are they “sitting on?” What
“deadline” is looming? What rumors are they hearing?

Oh, gosh. I feel like I’m going to throw up. Why do I feel
like I’m going to throw up? There’s nothing to worry about. Right? Luke was (sort
of) standing up for me. And I trust him. Don’t I? I think I do. I don’t have
much of a choice. I can’t very well ask him anything without letting him know
that I’m an eavesdropper. Maybe I don’t care if he knows, though. Maybe I have
a right to hear what he’s saying about me to his colleagues and his boss.

Maybe I’m going to go hyperventilate out in the gazebo for a
while.

Chapter Twenty

A brisk breeze is preventing the afternoon heat from
becoming too oppressive, so I sprawl on my back on the padded bench to take
advantage of the cross ventilation. I stare up at the wooden beams and let the
endless string of confused thoughts run in a loop in my brain. I don’t worry
much about trying to answer the questions I have or making any decisions. I merely…
exist.

Plus, what’s the point in wasting my energy? Seems to me
like any sense of control I have over anything is an illusion, anyway. I’m not
saying this is in a spiritual sense, either (God and I have a bit of a tense
relationship since He killed off my whole family and everything). I mean that
Luke is driving this… this spaceship. And I’m the alien he’s captured to bring
to his leaders for tests and observation.

This thought naturally leads me to dream about aliens and
space travel when I inevitably fall asleep to the soft whispers from the ocean
and the gentle caresses of the wind in my hair. When I wake up, the light
around me is a deep goldenrod color, and the warmth around my ankle radiates
from a hand that’s attached to an arm that belongs to a very serious-looking
man sitting on the bench and gazing down at me.

“Creepy staring is always a sure way to wake someone up,” I
murmur at him. I bring down my arms, which have been flung over my head for the
majority of my stay out here, and rest my hands on my midriff. My shoulder
screams. “Owwww,” I intone.

“We need to talk,” he utters the worst words ever to be
arranged together into a sentence.

“Do we have to?” I half-joke. “We
can
sit out here
and not say a word. As a matter of fact, I’d prefer—”

“Jayne.”

I scowl at him. “Luke.”

“I’m serious. I…” Now he looks away from me, out toward the
water. “We need to get your manuscript in shape for final editing.”

Nervously, I ramble, “We are. You even said it’s almost
done. All we need is the ‘money sentence.’ Oh, we have to blend and cut and…
oh! I experimented with turning the fire into a tornado, but… I think it’s
better as a fire…” I trail off when he squeezes my ankle more firmly.

“The fire’s fine,” he says with uncharacteristic
indifference.

“Oh. Okay. But you—”

“Yeah. I know.” He blinks and focuses on my face. “The thing
is… some of the other team members are getting anxious to see a final draft.
I’m afraid maybe my suggestions were a bit too… ambitious.”

“They’re doable, though. I didn’t think so at first, but—”

Again he interrupts me. “Well, we don’t have time to do them
all. I’ll need you to email me what you have—in whatever form—by the end of the
day tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?!” I sit up and wrap my arms around my knees.
“What’s the big rush?”

Flatly, he replies, “We’d like to start getting a return on
our investment, I guess. We’ve paid you for this book—and two others—and
haven’t made a dime.”

Having been put in my place and reminded where I fit into
this equation, I gulp. “Right. I get it. I guess.”

He stands. “Don’t take it personally.”

“I’m not.”

“And I don’t want you to feel like it’s your fault, either.
I’ve permitted your slow pace with this rewrite because… Well, anyway, it
doesn’t matter why. It was selfish of me. I should have been more like I would
have been with any other author.” Now he looks incredibly sad when he says,
“There’s something about you that makes me feel…”

Yes…? Yes…? What do I make you feel? Do you want me to go
first? I can tell you about all kinds of things you make me feel.

“…protective. And indulgent.”

Oh. Hmmm. Not really what I was going for. Those are very
fatherly words.

When I say nothing, he continues, “But that has to end. We
have to be more disciplined. And not only with your writing.”

“I see.”

“No, you don’t. You think I’m saying this because I’ve
suddenly come to my senses. But I’m just as insensible as—if not more than—I
was this morning. This is
not
something I want to have to say.”

I should be relieved. I should be glad that he’s taken the
decision away from me. I don’t have to tell him how much it bothers my Midwestern
sensibilities to be in love with a married man. I don’t have to confess to
anything as strong as love, even. As far as he knows, I kissed him a couple of
times so I could say I did. Fodder for future fiction.