Unlikely Lover (14 page)

He was learning that the hard way. As he tried to find the right words to smooth over the hurt, to stop her until he could sort out his puzzling, disturbing new feelings, she whirled and went out the door.

“She sure is in a temper.” Lillian sighed as she hobbled out of the living room and down the hall. “Sure is going to be lonesome around here without her.” She stopped and turned, her eyes full of regret and resignation. “I guess you know what I told her.”

“I know,” he said curtly. “Everything.”

She shrugged. “I was getting older. She was alone. I just wanted her to have somebody to care about her. I’m sorry. I hope both of you can forgive me. I’ll write Mari and try to explain. No sense trying to talk to her right now.” She knew something had gone badly wrong between them, and the boss didn’t look any more eager to discuss it than Mari had. “I hope you’ll forgive me.”

“I already have.”

She looked up with a wan smile. “She’s not a bad girl. You…will let her come back if I straighten things out and stop trying to play cupid?”

He studied her quietly. “You heard what was said out here, didn’t you?”

She stared at the floor. “I got ears that hear pins falling. I was all excited about it, I thought you two were…Well, it’s not my business to arrange people’s lives, and I’ve only just realized it. I’ll mind my own business from now on.” She looked up. “She’ll be all right, won’t she? Thanks to us, she doesn’t even have a job now.”

He was dying inside, and that thought didn’t help one bit. He didn’t want her to go, but he was going to have to let her.

“She’ll be all right,” he said, for his own benefit as well as Lillian’s. Of course she’d be all right. She was tough. And it was for the best. He didn’t want to get married.

What if she went back and married someone else? His heart skipped a beat and he scowled.

“Can she come back, at least to visit?” Lillian asked sadly.

“Of course she can!” he grumbled. “She’s your niece.”

Lillian managed a smile. “Thanks for letting her come. You could have fired me.”

“Not on your life—I’d starve to death.” He smiled halfheartedly. “I’d better change.”

A truck started up, and they both looked toward the window as Mari went past sitting beside Billy in the ranch truck.

Ward’s face hardened. He turned on his heel without a word and went up the staircase. Lillian sighed, watching him. Well, the jig was up and no harm done. Or was there? He did look frustrated. She turned and went toward the kitchen. Maybe things might work out better than she had expected. She hummed a little, remembering the explosive force of that argument she’d overheard. And then she smiled. Where there was smoke, there was fire, her daddy used to say.

* * *

A week later, back in Atlanta, Mari was just getting over bouts of crying. Her small savings account was enough to pay the rent for the next month, thank goodness. She had bought groceries and cleaned her apartment and done her best not to think about what had happened in Texas.

Getting a job was the big problem, and she haunted the unemployment office for secretarial positions. There just weren’t any available, but when there was an opening for a beginning bank clerk, she jumped at it. She hated figures and adding numbers, but it wasn’t a good time to be choosy. She reported for work at a big bank in downtown Atlanta, and began the tedious process of learning to use computers and balance accounts.

After Mari was settled in Aunt Lillian called to make sure she’d made it home all right.

“I’m sorry, girl,” the older woman said gruffly. “I never meant to cause you any hurt. I just wanted someone to look after you when I was gone. Now that I know I’m going to live, of course, I can do it by myself.”

Mari was touched by her aunt’s concern, even though she felt as if part of her had died. “I’ll be okay,” Mari promised brightly. “I’m sorry I had to leave so suddenly. I guess you figured out that we’d had a big argument.”

“Hard to miss, the way you were going at each other before you left,” Lillian said. “I knew the jig was up when he asked if you had the bus fare. He said you both knew I’d been spinning tales.”

“We knew almost from the beginning,” Mari said with a sigh. “We played along because we both think so much of you. But no more cupid, all right? You’re much too tall to pass for the little guy, and you’d look pretty funny in a diaper carrying a bow and arrow.”

Lillian actually laughed. “Guess I would, at that.” She paused. “The boss left an hour ago for Hawaii. He said it was business, but he wasn’t carrying any briefcase. He looked pretty torn up.”

That would have been encouraging if Mari hadn’t known him so well, but she didn’t allow herself to feel hopeful. She wanted to tell Lillian just what the scalawag had offered to do, but she didn’t want to crush all her aunt’s illusions. He had been pretty good to Lillian, after all. He could afford to be. It was only eligible women he seemed to have it in for.

“He’ll be back in form in no time,” Mari told her aunt. “He’ll probably find some new woman to make passes at in Hawaii.”

“He made a pass?” Lillian sounded almost girlish with glee.

Mari groaned, realizing what she’d given away. “Well, that was what you wanted, wasn’t it?” she asked miserably. “You got your wish, but it wasn’t commitment he had in mind.”

“No man in his right mind ever wants to make a commitment,” the other woman assured her. “They have to be led into it.”

“I don’t want to lead your boss anywhere except maybe into quicksand,” Mari said darkly.

“You will come and see me again, won’t you?” Lillian probed gently. “When you get over being mad at him?”

“Someday maybe.”

“How about a job? Do you have any prospects yet?”

“Finally,” Mari sighed. “I started working in the accounts department of a bank this morning.”

“Good girl. I knew you’d bounce back quickly. I love you, Marianne.”

Mari smiled in spite of herself. “I love you, too, Aunt Lillian. Take care of yourself. Please take your pills.”

“I will, I promise. Good night.”

Mari hung up and stared at the receiver. So the boss had gone to Hawaii. How nice for him. Balmy breezes, blooming flowers, beautiful women doing the hula. Well, he wouldn’t be depressed for long or even missing the one that got away. Thank goodness she’d had sense enough to refuse his proposition. At least she still had her pride and her self-respect.

“And they’ll keep you very warm on winter nights, too,” Mari muttered to herself before she went to bed.

The bank job was interesting, at least, and she met some nice people. She liked Lindy and Marge, with whom she worked, and there was even a nice young assistant vice president named Larry, who was single and redheaded and just plain nice. She began to have coffee and sweet rolls with him in the mornings the second week she was at the bank. Little by little she was learning to live without the shadow of Ward Jessup.

Or she told herself she was. But the memory of him haunted her. She could close her eyes and feel the warm, hard crush of his mouth, the tantalizing seduction of his big hands. It had been so beautiful between them, so special. At no time in her life had she felt more secure or safe than she had with him. Despite his faults he was more man than she’d ever known. She found that love forgave a lot. She missed him terribly. Sometimes just seeing the back of a dark-headed tall man would be enough to make her heart jump. Or if she heard a deep masculine voice. Or if she saw Texas license plates on a car. She began to wonder if she was going to survive being away from him.

She called Lillian the third week, just to see how her aunt was getting along, she told herself. But it wasn’t Lillian who answered the phone.

When she heard Ward’s deep voice, her heart ran away. She hadn’t realized how shattering it was going to be to talk to him. She’d assumed Lillian would answer.

“Hello?” he repeated impatiently.

Mari took a calming breath. “Is Aunt Lillian there, please?” she asked formally.

There was a long pause. She couldn’t know that hearing her voice had made a similar impact on him.

“Hello, Mari,” he said quietly. “Are you all right?”

“I’m very well, thank you. How is Aunt Lillian?”

“She’s fine. It’s her church social night. Billy ran her over there in the pickup. She’ll be home around nine, I guess. Have you got a job?”

That was no business of his, especially seeing as how he’d caused her to lose the one she had in the first place. But hearing his voice had done something to her pride.

“Yes, I’m working at a bank,” she told him, mentioning its name. “It’s big and convenient to where I live. I work with nice people, and I’m making a better salary there than at the garage. You needn’t worry about me.”

“But I do,” he said quietly. “I worry about you a lot. And I miss you,” he added curtly, the words so harsh that they sounded quite involuntary.

She closed her eyes, gripping the receiver. “Do you?” she asked unsteadily, trying to laugh. “I can’t imagine that.”

“Someday soon I may work on making you imagine it,” he said, his voice deep and slow and sensuous.

“I thought I’d told you already that I am not in the market for a big bank account and my own luxury apartment in Victoria, Texas,” she returned, hating the unsteadiness that would tell him how much that hateful proposition had hurt her.

He said something rough under his breath. “Yes, I know that,” he said gruffly. “I wish you were here. I wish we could talk. I made the biggest mistake of my life with you, Marianne. But I think it might help if you understood why.”

Mistake.
So now that was all he felt about those magical times they’d had. It had all been just a mistake. And he was sorry.

Tears burned her eyes, but she kept her voice steady. “There’s no need to explain,” she said gently. “I understand already. You told me how much you loved your freedom.”

“It wasn’t altogether just that,” he returned. “You said Lillian had told you about what happened to me, about the woman I planned to marry.”

“Yes.”

He sighed heavily. “I suppose she and my mother colored my opinion of women more than I’d realized. I’ve seen women as nothing more than gold-digging opportunists for most of my adult life. I’ve used them that way. Anything physical came under the heading of permissible pleasure with me, and I paid for it like I paid for business deals. But until you came along, I never had a conscience. You got under my skin, honey. You’re still there.”

She imagined that he hadn’t told anyone what he was telling her. And while it was flattering, it was disturbing, too. He was explaining why he’d made that “mistake” and was trying to get them back on a friendly footing. She remembered him saying the night he’d come to her room that he’d had that intention even then. It was like lighting a match to the paper of her hopes. An ending.

“Don’t let me wear on your conscience, Ward,” she said quietly. “You can’t help the way you are. I’m a puritan. An old-fashioned prude. I won’t change, either, even if the whole world does. So I guess I’ll be like Aunt Lillian when I’m her age. Going to church socials and playing cupid for other women…” Her voice broke. “Listen, I have to go.”

“No,” he ground out. “Marianne, listen to me!”

“Goodbye, Ward.”

She hung up before he could hear the tears that were falling hotly down her cheeks, before the break in her voice got worse. She went to bed without calling back. He’d tell Lillian she’d called, she knew, but she couldn’t bear the risk that he might answer the phone again. Her heart was in tatters.

She went to work the next morning with her face still pale and her eyes bloodshot from the night before. She sat at her desk mechanically, answering the phone, going over new accounts, smiling at customers. Doing all the right things. But her mind was still on Ward and the sound of his voice and the memory of him that was eating her alive.

It would get better, wouldn’t it? It had to! She couldn’t go on like this, being haunted by a living ghost, so much in love that she could barely function as a human being. She’d never understood the idea of a couple being halves of the same whole until she met Ward. Now it made perfect sense because she felt as if part of her was missing.

When a long shadow fell across her desk just before lunchtime, she didn’t even look up.

“I’ll be with you in just a minute,” she said with a forced smile as she finished listing a new account. And then she looked up and her body froze.

Ward stared down at her like a blind artist who could suddenly see again. His green eyes found every shadow, every line, every curve of her face in the stark, helpless silence that followed. Around them was the buzz of distant voices, the tap of fingers on keyboards, the ringing of telephones. And closer there was the rasp of Mari’s hurried breathing, the thump of her heart shaking the silky pink blouse she was wearing with her gray skirt.

Ward was wearing a suit—a very elegant three-piece beige one that made him look even taller than he actually was. He had a creamy dress Stetson in one big hand, and his face looked thinner and drawn. His green eyes were as bloodshot as hers, as if he hadn’t slept well. She thought as she studied him that he was the handsomest man she’d ever seen. If only he wasn’t such a coldblooded snake.

She stiffened defensively, remembering their last meeting. “Yes, sir?” she said with cold politeness. “May I help you?”

“Cut that out,” he muttered. “I’ve had a long flight and no breakfast, and I feel like hell.”

“I would like to point out that I work here,” she informed him. “I have no time to socialize with old acquaintances. If you want to open an account, I’ll be delighted to assist you. That’s what I do here. I open accounts.”

“I don’t want to open an account,” he said through his teeth.

“Then what do you want?” she asked.

“I came to take you home—where you belong.” He searched her puzzled eyes. “Your boss will be sorry you have to leave, but he’ll understand. You can come with me right now.”

She blinked. Somewhere along the line she was sure that she’d missed something.

“I can what?” she asked.

“Come with me right now,” he repeated. He turned the Stetson in his hands. “Don’t you remember my condition? I’m dying, remember. I have something vaguely terminal, although medical science will triumph in plenty of time to save me.”