Sapphire and Shadow (A Woman's Life) (13 page)

She didn’t know whether he was aware of it, but his gaze made her feel like a woman. “Then we’re agreed.”

He withdrew his hand from his wallet. “If that’s what you want.”

She laughed and took a sip of the black coffee. It was hot and the whiskey in it was hotter, but it did a lot to burn away the chill she was feeling. In one fiery moment, it blurred the room and made her oblivious to her wet clothing. “Why are you here?” she asked suddenly.

“Because a lovely lady needed to take the chill out of her bones.” He laughed at her.

“No.” She shook her head and found that the room tipped a little. They certainly didn’t believe in watering down their liquor. “I mean why aren’t you with Harry and the others in Italy. Don’t they need sets there?” She took another healthy sip. The heat was getting easier and easier to withstand.

Tommy toyed with his mug, watching her. “They might, but that’s for the prop carpenters to build.”

Johanna blinked, confused. “Oh, did I make a mistake? I thought you were—“

“I was.”

Then she didn’t understand. Was the whiskey clouding her brain? “But?”

He took a long drink. “Your husband had me fired, I’m afraid, right after you left the set.”

She stared at him, appalled. But that sounded just like something Harry would do. Johanna felt both ashamed and angry. “That bastard.”

“Aye, that was a word I played with in my mind.” Although he sounded as if it hadn’t bothered him at all. He struck her as the type that rolled with the punches. Or maybe he hadn’t learned yet that they hurt at times.

She was ashamed of her husband, ashamed that Tommy had lost his job because he had helped her. “I’m so sorry.” The words sounded hopelessly inadequate.

He hadn’t meant for her to feel guilty. “You needn’t be. I went back to working with my father. I’m happier that way, actually. Working on the set was a lark, because my friend Jamie thought it might be fun. But I like working for myself better.”

Someone cheered and she looked at the game at the dart board. One of the men had won and the loser was challenging him to another game. Johanna looked back at Tommy. His eyes were on her and she felt herself fighting a blush. “What is it you do?”

“I build things.”

“Like a contractor?”

“More specifically, like a carpenter. I’m working on a chest of drawers right now.”

“Oh, for whom?”

He finished the rest of his coffee and set the mug down. “An old couple I know in Gloucestershire.”

“Does it pay well?” She knew she shouldn’t be asking, but questions seemed to come so easily with him. The Irish coffee didn’t hurt either.

“Not that particular one, but I’m not doing it for the money.”

“What do you do for money?” Too late, she realized that the question might be misconstrued.

He grinned a moment, rocking on two legs of the chair. He liked the blush that colored her face. It made him think of delicate pink roses painted on a fine piece of china.

Pulling his lips into a serious expression, he addressed her question. “I’m helping to remodel this old house that some Americans’ve bought recently and now want renovated. But for myself, for my gratification, I’m working on this chest. There’s a certain satisfaction to working with your hands, creating something unique.”

She looked at his hands. They were strong hands. Hands a woman could feel safe in, not the artistic hands she had felt on her body so long ago. Yet though they were large, there was nothing clumsy about them. Harry’s hands had been graceful and delicate. And impersonal.

Abruptly, she realized that she was staring and shifted her gaze. She took another long sip and found her embarrassment waning.

“You know,” she told him, leaning forward slightly. “You’re very easy to talk to.”

“Right now, Mrs. Whitney—“

“Johanna.”

“Johanna,” he amended. “I think you’d find an aborigine straight out of the bush easy to talk to.”

She ran her fingertip along the fine crack on her mug. “You think I’m drunk?”

“I think you are, as the expression goes, feeling no pain.”

His choice of words struck a chord. “Oh now, there you’re wrong, my friend. I feel pain all right. I feel lots of pain. But it’s time to stop just standing there and taking it.”

He seemed to understand what she was saying. He had certainly heard enough about Harry during his short stay on the set. “What are you going to do?”

What was she going to do? Suddenly, she knew. “Well, the first thing is that I’m going to leave Harry.”

“And the next thing?”

“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I can’t seem to plan that far ahead yet.”

“But you will.”

She put down her mug, pleased by his answer. “Yes, I will. And you’re wrong.”

“Am I?”

“Yes.”

“About what?”

“An aborigine would be a lot more difficult to talk to than you.”

He laughed. The sound created a warm and happy sensation within Johanna.

Chapter Fourteen

The soft murmur of voices in the pub created a soothing effect. Johanna felt as if she could go on talking to Tommy for hours. There were no uneasy long silences, no sense that there was some sort of ritualistic feeling out of male and female going on beneath the words. They were just two people, talking. And enjoying each other’s company. Johanna leaned back in the booth and watched as raindrops lazily slid into one another and then raced down the multi-paned window. Beyond it, a heavyset man in a yellow rain slicker was hooking up the Mercedes that Harry had leased for her. Tommy had called a local towing service for her and had stayed to keep her company while she waited for it to arrive. It was he, not she who had braved the rain and had taken care of the details when the tow truck had finally arrived. At Tommy’s insistence, she had remained inside, nursing a third cup of coffee, this one sans the Irish touch. She wanted a clear head when she returned to the hotel.

Now, sitting opposite her, Tommy glanced out the window. He saw that the car had been secured and that the driver was climbing back into the cab of his truck. He turned back to look at Johanna. “It looks like you’re going to need a ride back to your hotel, luv.”

Johanna picked up her purse, then remembered she didn’t have her phone. Looking over to the far end of the bar, she saw that the public phone was occupied. She bit her lower lip in frustration. She had every intention of calling a cab, although the idea of going back right now, instead of waiting for a cab to arrive, was tempting.

“Oh, I couldn’t put you out any more than I already have.” Johanna smiled her thanks. “I really shouldn’t have let you wait here with me to begin with.”

“Why not? I’ve nothing else to do this evening.” He signaled for the check. “It’s been rather nice spending some time with an intelligent lady.” A barmaid responded quickly, having eyed him for some time. She took the money he tendered. “Keep the change, darlin’.”

The barmaid beamed and moved on, her hips swaying saucily.

Johanna wondered if Tommy knew that he was saying all the right things to her. His words weren’t polished or studied. And they seemed to tumble out as soon as he thought of them. There was an honesty to them that meant more than all the flowery lies she had ever heard. He was very sweet and guileless.

And young.

Robbing the cradle, Johanna
? As the thought played itself out in her head, she fidgeted slightly with her purse.

But no, it wasn’t like that. She was sure that Harry would have seen it in that light. He couldn’t conceive of a man and a woman carrying on a conversation for more than a few sentences before they started stripping off each other’s clothing. And while she had to admit that she found Tommy exceedingly attractive in a rough, earthy way, she was in no way inclined to carry that attraction to any sort of fruition.

Or so she told herself.

“You’re sure I’m not putting you out?” she asked, hesitating. “I can always call a cab.”

He cocked his head. He had only worked for Whitney Productions a little more than a month, but in that time he had picked things up and had heard a great deal about the man in charge. Harold T. Whitney was not the kind of man Tommy would have wanted to associate with on his own free time. He thought of him as a bully, a womanizer and a weakling. He especially disliked men who threw their weight around women and Harry was notorious for that. Seeing his wife, Tommy found himself disliking Harry to an even greater degree.

He wondered if she was afraid of being with him because of her husband. Or was it something else? “You can call one if you feel more comfortable—“ he began.

“Oh no,” she said quickly, not wanting him to think that under any circumstances. “It’s not that. I can’t think of when I’ve felt more at ease. You’ve been nothing but kind—“

Tommy leaned forward and she caught the musty scent of soap, cologne and man. Something within her stirred. “Then let me be a little kinder.”

With a touch of nervousness, she licked her lower lip. “If you wish.”

Her unconscious reaction was very appealing to him. He wondered what it would be like to kiss her. Tommy rose and pulled back her chair for her. “I wish.”

Johanna glanced over her shoulder as she got to her feet. “You know, Tommy, you’re going to make some lucky girl a wonderful husband someday.”

“Someday,” he echoed easily, leading the way to the door.

“But not soon,” she surmised from his tone.

“No, not soon.”

He held the door open for her. Warm mist hit her face as she stepped out. London weather was truly awful, she decided.

With an unstudied movement, he put his arm around her shoulders and drew her close as they hurried down the street. “I’ve a bit of the wanderlust in me yet. It wouldn’t be fair to a wife if I wanted to just pick up and leave.”

Johanna tried not to think of how good he felt against her. “She might want to pick up and leave with you.”

He shook his head as they instinctively drew even closer together, united against the inclement weather. “The car’s over there,” he pointed. “Women are nesters by and large.”

“Are they now?” She laughed now and took his hand as they ran across the street together. She felt breathless and wonderfully alive, more alive than she had in a long, long time.

She stood, brushing rain from her face as he unlocked the passenger door for her. “I know of several who would argue with you on that point.” She slid into the van. The interior smelled of lemon drops. She wondered if he was partial to them.

“Then they wouldn’t be the ladies for me. I like a nester.” He put his key into the ignition. “And someday, I hope to find one.”

“You won’t have to look far.”

He turned his gaze on her.

He thinks I mean me
, she thought suddenly, embarrassed. “I—I mean that you’re an attractive young man and women are always on the look out for attrac—I’m not saying this right, am I?”

He laughed and covered her hand with his own. His hand was large, capable. Hers were small and delicate. He liked the contrast.

“I think I get the drift of it, Johanna. Now then, where are you staying?”

Relieved that things had been cleared up, she gave Tommy the address and he nodded, throwing the van into first gear.

Johanna looked down at the stick shift he handled so effortlessly without even thinking. “If I had to drive that, we’d never get out of the garage. I can’t tap dance and drive at the same time.”

“Tap dance?”

She pointed to the floor. “Too many pedals.”

“Oh.” He shrugged. “Like everything else, you get used to it.”

She thought of the demise of her marriage and grew serious. Some things one never got used to. “I suppose,” she said quietly.

He read her mood and wondered at it, but felt it best to let her have her privacy.

When they pulled up in front of the hotel, the doorman looked surprised to see Johanna alight from the rather sorry looking dark blue van.

“Shall I have the valet park this for you, sir?” he asked Tommy.

Johanna and Tommy exchanged grins at the formal question. Tommy handed the man his keys. “Just for a few minutes, if you don’t mind.”

Masterson took the car keys into his gloved hand, holding them aloft by his fingertips as if they have leprosy. “Very good, sir.”

“I always see a lady to her door,” Tommy confided to Johanna when they had passed through the revolving door. “My Dad made that a strict point of honor.”

“I wouldn’t want you disappointing your father,” Johanna laughed.

God, it felt good to laugh
. It had been so long since she had felt the desire to laugh. Her accidental run-in with Tommy had been a godsend. The pensive mood that had been haunting her was spent and she no longer entertained any feelings of being sorry for herself. She felt much too good for that.

When they arrived at her door, Tommy took the key from her and opened it. Turning the doorknob, he handed the key back to her.

“Good night, Tommy.” Johanna raise herself up on her toes and brushed his cheek with an affectionate kiss. “It’s been a very pleasant evening.”

He touched his cheek as she opened her door and smiled to himself. She was a lady, he thought, in every sense of the word. A lady he would like to see more of, if she were so inclined. He wondered if she was.

He saw that her shoulders stiffened slightly as she stood in the doorway. “Anything wrong?”

“I don’t know,” she murmured, then laughed at herself. “Just a feeling, I guess. Over-active nerves.”

She threw open the light switch. There was silence in the suite. A strange, unusual silence that she couldn’t quite put her finger on. But it bothered her. It was too early for the girls to be sleeping, she thought. And then she heard it.

A moan.

She went immediately to her daughter’s room. Tommy followed without being asked. Jocelyn lay on her bed, flushed and tossing fitfully.

“Jocey?” Johanna knelt down on the floor next to the bed. “Baby, what is it?” Johanna touched her daughter’s forehead. It was hot. Her whole body felt hot. Jocelyn was burning up. “Honey, where’s Megan?” Why hadn’t Megan tried to summon a doctor? Where was she, anyway? Guilt and frustration began to rise up. She shouldn’t have left them. “Megan,” she called out.