Sunshine and Shadows (14 page)

"I'll bet it's all in the wrist," he said.

"What?"

"The way you flip the crepe. It probably has to do with the way you move your wrist."

"No, I think it's more in knowing the surface of the pan. You know, some pans just aren't slick enough and require more of a toss."

She finished cooking that crepe and poured another. "Would you like to try it?" she asked, surprising him.

"I might ruin it," he warned.

"A ruined crepe isn't such a big deal," she said. He thought that if she'd smile, her face would be almost pretty.

"Okay, I'll give it a try," he said, moving over to take her place.

"It's almost done now, so get ready," she cautioned.

Jay jiggled the crepe from side to side. "Are you sure?" he asked nervously.

"Don't waste time talking—just do it!" Adele said.

Awkwardly he whipped the pan up and the crepe slid crazily out of it and onto the floor. He stood looking at it with a mortified expression.

Lisa walked in and saw the crepe, which had puddled into a gluey mess.

"What in the world—" she said, her eyes darting from Adele to Jay and back again.

"Remember when I tried to teach you?"

"I was fourteen," Lisa said.

"And you didn't do much better than this. Pour another one, Jay. About two tablespoons of batter will do the job."

"I'll clean up the mess," Lisa said, reaching for a paper towel.

Jay resumed his position at the stove. He waited until Adele said, "Now," and tried flipping again. This time he caught the crepe, although he didn't exactly catch it dead center. Batter oozed down the size of the pan, but he was heartened when Adele said, "Good! The next one will be perfect."

The next one was perfect, and the next, and the next, until Adele said, "Jay, you don't need any help from me. I'll start putting the filling in," and after that the two of them worked together while Lisa watched.

"What a great view of the river you have from this window," Jay said when the crepes were arranged on a platter and they moved into the dining room. Outside a powerboat cut through the rippling blue water, laying down a curling white wake. Across the river two boys fished from a white dock, their hair ruffling gently in the breeze.

"You two really should go out in Lisa's canoe this afternoon," Adele suggested.

"Jay has asked me to his town house to see some of his artwork," Lisa supplied.

"Oh? What kind of art?" Adele said with interest, and the conversation was off and running again. She watched Jay as he charmed Adele, noting the way he asked perceptive questions at exactly the right time and admiring his ability to listen instead of talk. Her heart warmed to him for caring about Adele. So few people did.

After brunch, Lisa and Jay escorted Adele into the living room and insisted that she settle down with the newspaper while the two of them performed the necessary cleanup chores.

"But—" objected Adele.

"No buts," Jay told her firmly, and he brought a footstool from across the room so that she'd be more comfortable.

"Shall I invite Adele to go with us to my place this afternoon? Out of politeness, I mean?" Jay whispered when he and Lisa were alone in the kitchen.

"Nice of you, but she'll be perfectly happy to sit all afternoon looking out at the river and knitting as she watches television," Lisa told him. She gave the counter top one last swipe. "Besides," she said, tossing the towel over the rod, "after yesterday when we were so well chaperoned, I'm looking forward to being with you and only you."

He slid his arms around her from behind and kissed the top of her head. "My sentiments exactly," he murmured.

Adele bade them a cheerful goodbye when they left, and Lisa slid her hand into Jay's as they walked to his car.

"You've opened the sunroof," she said, delighted.

"I wanted to see you with the wind in your hair," he told her.

"You want me to look like one of those shampoo commercials on TV," she accused.

"No, actually I'd prefer another kind of commercial—you know, those late-night nine-hundred-number commercials that show the woman lying on a couch wearing one of those lacy things? You know what kind of thing I mean—I think it's called a tommy," he said. He started the engine and turned the car around toward the road.

"A
tommy?
What in the world is—oh, you mean a
teddy!"
and she dissolved into gales of laughter.

"Have I said something funny?" he asked in bewilderment.

"No, I suppose if you don't know what it's called, you haven't been seeing many of them lately," she said.

"If you want to know if there are any other women in my life, the answer is no," he said firmly. Then he chuckled. "Unless you count Connie and a bunch of nuns." He turned suddenly serious. "How about you, Lisa? Any suitors?"

She looked at him. "Not lately," she told him.

At the guardhouse at the entrance to the development where he lived, Jay spoke to the security guard.

"This is Lisa Sherrill," he said. "Put her on my list of visitors."

After they were inside, Lisa said, "What was that all about?"

"He'll let you in whenever you come to see me without calling me to find out if it's all right," he said, smiling at her.

"I'm invited to visit when I'm not invited?" she asked.

"Anytime," he said. "Especially if you're wearing a teddy."

She had to laugh. "The only teddy I own, unfortunately, has one eye and stuffing falling out of his side. And his last name is
B-e-a-r."

Inside the town house, Hildy recognized Lisa immediately.

"She likes you," he said.

"The feeling is mutual," Lisa said as Hildy delivered a long sloppy kiss. "I haven't had a dog since after we moved to Stuart from West Palm Beach. She was supposed to make up for moving away from my best friend, and she did, in a way." She stroked Hildy's silky ears.

"Have you ever seen a dog who could count?" Jay asked with mischief in his eyes.

"I can't say that I have," Lisa said.

"Watch this," Jay told her. He went into the kitchen and returned with a handful of dog biscuits, one of which he held up in front of Hildy.

"How much is one and one, Hildy?" he asked. Hildy barked twice.

As he fed her a biscuit as a reward, Lisa asked skeptically, "What's the secret?"

"A dog with a brilliant mathematical mind," Jay said. He held up another biscuit. "Hildy, how much is three plus four?"

Hildy barked seven times and held her mouth open for the biscuit.

Lisa was mystified. There had to be a trick to it, but she couldn't figure it out.

"How do you do it?" she asked.

Jay laughed. "I'm not telling, and Hildy won't, either."

"Let me try," Lisa demanded, but when she commanded Hildy to add two and two, the dog only whined and lay down with her head between her paws.

"I give up," Lisa said finally, surrendering the last of the biscuits to the dog.

"Hildy does, too," he said. "Back to the kitchen, , Hildy."

Hildy stood up and, biscuit in mouth, trotted obediently back to the kitchen and her bed.

After a few minutes, Jay took Lisa's hand and led her upstairs to the room he used for a studio.

He walked to the table in the middle of the room and threw the cover off his work. It was a sculpture in the making, a small, asymmetrical but definitely anthropomorphic figure. The form was fluid, rhythmic, and full of strength.

"This piece is something that I started when I was in law school in Tennessee," he explained. "I knew some stonecutters, who let me work in the back of their shop, and I discovered this slab of coral rouge marble in the storeroom. I knew that this stone was fragile and wasn't quarried anymore, and I saw the shape in it almost immediately. I put it aside from time to time, but I always go back to it. Someday I'll finish it."

"How much is left to do?" she asked.

"I'm at the polishing stage," he said. "Go ahead—you can touch it."

She ran her fingertips across the dramatic high contrast coloration. "I had no idea you were so talented," she said, turning wondering eyes upon him.

He shrugged. "I find sculpture the most satisfying medium. There's something about the physical demands—it requires more strength than other media. I like chipping away the stone to find the shape within. And I like knowing that what I create has permanence."

"What will you do with this when you finish it?"

He laughed. "Set it on a pedestal and enjoy looking at it, I suppose." He turned to her and circled his arms around her waist. "Which is what I would like to do with you, Lisa Sherrill. Had any experience with sitting on pedestals lately?"

She smiled up at him, entranced by the good humor in his eyes.

"Not much, but I'm willing to give it a try."

"Adventurous woman." Sounds of a warm lazy Sunday afternoon floated through the window—car doors slamming, people calling to one another, a revolving sprinkler slapping water against the fence. His face relaxed into a more serious expression.

"Exactly how adventurous are you today, anyway?" he asked. He slid a line of kisses from her temple to her ear and skimmed his lips along the sweet-smelling curve of her neck. She felt the first sensations of desire deep in her stomach and closed her eyes.

"Well?" he said, his breath feathering across her cheek.

"If you mean," she said, and swallowed. His hands were under her shirt now, caressing the skin at the small of her back. "If you mean will I have sex with you, I—"

"Don't say, 'have sex,'" he interrupted softly. "Say, 'make love.' I think I'm falling in love with you, Lisa."

She reared back to look at him, unable to trust what she had just heard him say, and he laughed softly deep in his throat. "Don't look so amazed," he said. "Don't you feel it, too? Don't the two of us seem right?"

"I feel—something," she whispered, closing her eyes, because then, just at that moment, she felt it so strongly. She had never thought to want someone so much that her mouth felt dry, that her legs wouldn't hold her up, that her insides felt as though they were melting from the heat of her emotion.

He cupped her face between both his palms and stared down at her for a moment.

"Why should it surprise you that I think about you all the time? That I daydream about kissing you, holding you and, yes, making love with you? That I think about your face, your lovely face, all of my waking hours?"

She started to demur, but his voice went on weaving its spell.

"If I'd sculpted a face like yours, I might have made your cheeks thinner, like so," he said, demonstrating with his thumbs to press hollows beneath her cheekbones. "And I might not have thought to make the eyes so wide, or the brows so feathery," he said. He studied her, taking in every detail as though he was memorizing the way she looked. "No, I would not have created you this way, and yet your face seems like perfection to me." He shook his head slightly and smiled. "Pure perfection," he whispered before kissing her again.

She remained motionless as his tongue explored textures of lips and teeth and skin. They stood in the square of sunshine from the uncurtained window, his face above hers cast in bright light—when she opened her eyes, she saw in clear detail the fanned-out creases at the edges of his eyes, the short spiky hairs of his eyelashes, the mole slightly in front of and below his left ear. She didn't find him lacking even under this intense scrutiny.

The sun felt warm upon her back, and his hands moved to the buttons of her shirt. She trailed a string of kisses down the side of his neck, aware of his breathing and her own coming into rhythm; her skin seemed to be drawing in the heat of his. She welcomed the cool air upon her skin where he parted the fabric of her shirt, and as he eased it off her shoulders, she lifted one shoulder and let it fall so that the delicate strap holding her brassiere slid away. He peeled away the sheer fabric, his breath coming faster now, and when she stood before him bare to the waist he stood as if transfixed, unable to tear his eyes away from the two fragile buds, small and pink tipped and exquisitely sensitive.

She moved toward him, suddenly shy, wishing that the sunshine were not so bright, wishing her breasts were bigger. His hands on her shoulders halted her movement.

"Beautiful," he said, and then, "I had no idea."

Before she could say anything he had dropped to one knee before her and touched his lips to her breast, gently, so gently, kissing the nipple where it rose against the creamy skin. She closed her eyes and wound her fingers in his hair, willing him not to stop, wanting to press him closer and closer, his face against her breast, her stomach, the secret flesh below.

At last, when his kisses had made her wild, he looked up at her. Slowly he drew her down to him until she was kneeling, too. He took off his shirt, his eyes never leaving her face. Lisa thought she had never felt such an emotional connection with another person. The light in his eyes was so passionate, so vivid and strong, that it seemed to draw her deep inside of him. She knew that what she felt was what he felt, too, and what's more she recognized her feelings as the natural culmination of the highly electrical fascination she had felt for him the first time she'd ever laid eyes on him.