THE Athertons lived in Layton, a suburb of Salt Lake City, in a pleasant bungalow that backed onto a wooded ravine. Wilfred met them at the door, showing Jenny the quail pecking in the grass behind their house, and telling her to watch for the deer who often helped themselves to the fallen apples under the trees. The house was flanked by an array of pumpkins with fearsomely carved faces, while a white-robed ghost hung from the ginkgo tree out front. Wilfred, out of his business suit, looked younger and more relaxed; his wife Pat was a charming blonde, a family doctor whose untidy house was very welcoming. Morgan felt instantly at home.
Their two girls, Lee and Sarah, were nine and seven respectively. They ignored Jenny’s tendency to hang back; and soon all three were involved in a rowdy board game.
Supper, a rather haphazard affair, nevertheless tasted delicious. All four adults helped clean up afterward, then Pat said, “Want to come down to the basement, Jenny? Our cat had kittens four weeks ago.”
“Come on, Jenny,” Sarah cried. “They’re real cute.”
As Morgan also started for the basement door, Riley put an arm on her sleeve. “Stay here, Morgan,” he said, “I want you to hear this, too.”
It was the first time he’d touched Morgan since that early morning kiss. And if their affair was over, what was the point of her hearing anything more to do with Jenny? “I like kittens,” she said stubbornly. “Let go.”
Instead Riley held fast to her arm, hooked the basement door shut with his good leg and looked over at Wilfred, who was putting away the last of the silverware. “Tell us about Beth, Wilfred, what she was like as a mother. I couldn’t believe that house. Mrs. Emerson starched like a ramrod, and Sneed like a dessicated corpse in a suit of armor.”
“You exaggerate,” Morgan said in a staccato voice. “A corpse implies a live body. He was like a safe. Locked tight with nothing of value inside.”
For a moment the old Riley was back, with his crooked smile that always made her knees weak. “Dead on, Morgan,” he laughed, and hugged her spontaneously.
Her body responded to him like tall grass to the wind. Wilfred smiled benevolently. “I don’t know that there’s anything I can say about Beth that you haven’t already figured out.”
“Try me,” said Riley inflexibly.
Playing with the clasp on the silver chest, Wilfred said with legal exactitude, “Beth wasn’t a bad woman, or a cruel one. But I think she’d forgotten what it was like to be young. She treated Jenny more like a possession than a child. A possession to be polished and put on show occasionally. But not a possession to be shared— she never brought her here, for instance, to play with our girls.”
“And hence no public schools.”
“Exactly. Jenny’s a bright little thing, and probably knows more from books than she’d have learned in school. But in other ways she’s missed out, and I think one of the best things you can do for her is put her in a regular school. In,” he smiled again, “regular clothes. You should have heard Pat on the subject of the ruffled dresses after the one time she met Beth and Jenny.” With gentle malice he added, “Jenny, of course, went to the best pediatrician in town. No family practitioners for her.”
“No sense of humor,” Riley said. “Beth, that is.”
“Absolutely none.” Wilfred put the chest away. “Never marry a woman without a sense of humor. It’d be very boring.”
“You can’t be calm and serene and have a sense of humor,” Morgan remarked to the ceiling.
“Touché,” Riley said. “One more thing, Wilfred. As soon as the business end of things is cleared up, I plan to head for Maine with Jenny. Is that wise, do you think? Or should I wait around here until she gets more used to me?”
“Go,” Wilfred said promptly. “She’ll remember what she needs to, and the rest she won’t miss.”
“That’s sort of what I thought,” Riley said quietly, and for a moment rested his gaze on Morgan. Morgan looked back, giving nothing away. He put an arm around her waist and said, “Let’s go check out the kittens.”
Leave me alone, she wanted to scream. If this is part of the game called intimacy, you’re cheating and I don’t want to play.
The kittens were adorable. Rashly, Riley said, “When we get settled in Maine, maybe we could find you a cat or a kitten, Jenny.” Jenny clasped her hands in delight, temporarily speechless. Morgan, once again, felt like weeping.
She was greatly relieved when Pat drew her into another room. “Are you and Riley going to dress up, Morgan? We do have a pumpkin costume for Jenny, and I’ve got a pirate’s outfit that Riley, I have to say, would look absolutely devastating in.” She added without a trace of envy, “Quite a man you’ve got yourself there.”
“Humph,” said Morgan. “Have you got a witch costume? A really ugly one. That’s what I want to wear.”
“As a matter of fact, I do.” Pat hesitated, then said indirectly, “Motherhood can be extraordinarily fulfilling, you know, even if there are days when an oil rig in the middle of the ocean looks appealing. And now I’ll mind my own business, Wilfred always says I involve myself far too much in other people’s lives, but then as I say to him, legal jargon does the exact opposite, don’t you agree?”
Morgan nodded weakly. Pat didn’t have any problems with intimacy. Riley should find himself a woman like Pat. There were probably dozens of them back in Maine who’d be falling all over themselves to mother Jenny for him. And warm his bed.
She hated each and every one of them.
The witch costume was beginning to seem more and more appropriate. It consisted of a long black cloak, a peaked hat, a corncob broom and a quite ghastly mask through which Morgan’s eyes glittered and around which her red hair flamed. “Maybe I’ll scare Jenny,” she said doubtfully. “I don’t want to do that. She woke up last night with a bad dream.”
“Kids are a lot tougher than you think. And this is Hallowe’en, you’ll be fine.”
Morgan left the basement room where she’d changed and went upstairs. Jenny was encased in a fat orange pumpkin, her arms sticking out and her legs in black stockings. An orange and green cap was anchored over her bunched-up hair. Pat said, “Hold still, Jenny, and I’ll make up your face for you.”
Lee was Big Bird and Sarah was practicing growling in her role as Oscar the Grouch. Wilfred made a surprisingly dashing highwayman, while Riley as a pirate took Morgan’s breath away. Riley took one look at her and began to laugh. “Am I finally seeing your true self?”
“Just keep me away from any cauldrons.”
He came closer and said for her ears alone, “I need a spell. I want it cast over a woman who’s bewitchingly beautiful but exceedingly stubborn. Can you help me out?”
“I could break the bewitchment.”
“It would take a coven of witches to do that. How in heck can I kiss you with that mask on?”
“You can’t,” Morgan said, and wished his shoulders didn’t look quite so broad in his full-sleeved shirt, which was open halfway down his chest. “You’ll catch pneumonia,” she added fractiously.
“There’s a cloak.” He picked it up off the table and swirled it around his shoulders. “I rather like this cloak. Perhaps I’m living in the wrong century.”
Pat had given him a black mustache and a patch over one eye, the combination making him look both rakish and dangerous. It was a good thing, thought Morgan, that they’d be chaperoned by Wilfred and three small children. A very good thing.
Five minutes later they set out, the children equipped with large plastic pumpkins to hold their treats. Darkness had already fallen, and the streets were busy with other children, dressed as goblins, Frankensteins, princesses and ghosts. Parents hovered in the background.
At first Jenny hung close to Riley. But after a few houses, when she’d been given chips, chocolate bars and a fudge stick, she pushed her way to the front at the next door, hollering, “Trick or treat!” in a very unladylike way.
Under different circumstances Morgan would have been enjoying herself. The costumes, the candlelit pumpkins and the ghoulishly decorated gardens were all great fun; and she loved watching Jenny enjoy herself. The trouble was, she loved it too much. Jenny, after all, was nothing to her. Jenny belonged to Riley.
When the children’s pumpkins started to overflow with treats, Wilfred said, “Time to head back, girls. You can give Mum a hand at the door handing out candy, how’s that?”
“And we’ve got to sort out our loot,” Sarah cried. “You got tons, too, Jenny.”
Jenny gave a little skip of delight. “Let’s go back and eat some.”
“Wilfred,” Riley said, “would you mind very much if Morgan and I hang back? There’s something I want to talk to her about, and one of the things I’ve already learned about being a father is the absence of privacy.”
Behind her mask Morgan made a muffled sound of protest. Both men ignored it. “No problem,” Wilfred said amiably. “Take your time—they can always watch a Walt Disney video while they’re stuffing their faces with junk.”
“Thanks,” Riley said, pushed up his eye patch and said to Jenny, “Morgan and I are going for a short walk, Jenny. You’ll be okay with Wilfred and the girls?”
“And the kittens,” said Jenny with a cherubic smile, and hurried after Lee and Sarah, clutching her candy to her fat orange chest.
Riley took Morgan by her black-cloaked arm. “Let’s go,” he said, and led her in the opposite direction to Wilfred’s. She scuttled along beside him; her feet were hurting in her black boots and she was sweltering behind her mask. When they’d reached a quieter section of the street, Riley slowed down, pulled her mask away and kissed her very thoroughly. “You smell of rubber,” he said, “and you taste like heaven.”
She had not attempted to struggle. What was the use? And besides, this was sex. This was the one part of their relationship that she understood. When he released her, she said pithily, “You’d have made a good pirate. Take what you want and to the devil with the consequences.”
“Morgan,” Riley said, “while you were getting dressed in this rig, I phoned the airline. I made three bookings to Maine for tomorrow afternoon that I have to pay for tomorrow morning. Will you come with us?”
Her jaw dropped. “Me?” she squeaked.
“Yes,” he said with monumental patience. “You.”
“No,” she said feebly. “Oh, no, I can’t do that.”
He took her by the shoulders. He was standing with his back to a house whose owners had strung scarecrows dressed in ragged clothes from the trees, and planted plastic gravestones under the trees; the figures waved back and forth in the breeze, the porch light casting shadows sharp-edged as knives. Morgan yanked her mask from around her neck and pulled off her witch’s hat, wishing this was happening somewhere else to someone else.
Riley said, “You don’t have to go back to school until after Christmas. You’d like where I live, right by the sea. Give us a chance, Morgan. Come with us tomorrow.”
“Don’t you hear what you’re saying?” she said jaggedly. “Us, us, us. You’ve got Jenny, Riley. You don’t need me.”
“You’ve got that wrong. I do need you.”
“As Jenny’s surrogate mother?” she flashed.
“No! But Jenny exists, Morgan. She’s my daughter and I have to do the very best I can for her. For now, she has to come first, don’t you see that?”
“As you never came first in the orphanage,” Morgan answered with unhappy truth.
He grimaced. “That’s right. I have to give her all that I’m capable of. No matter what the cost is to me. To you and me.”
“The timing’s all wrong,” Morgan said wildly. “It’s too soon, Riley. Much too soon.”
“Too soon for what?”
The wind was ruffling his hair and the scarecrows swayed in a horrible travesty of hanged men. “You and I. That’s what I mean. We met under circumstances that weren’t exactly ordinary, and then four nights ago we started going to bed together and it’s all new and I don’t have a clue what’s going on, and then all of a sudden you find out that you have a child. A seven-year-old daughter who needs you. I can’t handle it, Riley. It’s too much pressure.”
“I know the timing’s atrocious, do you think I haven’t figured that out? But it is what it is, Morgan, and that’s what we’ve got to work with.” He pushed her hair back from her face. “I’m not asking you to move in with me. But you could rent a cottage near us, and we could see each other on a regular basis. Take our time.” He gave her a faint smile. “Go on dates, go to the movies, walk on the beach. Normal stuff. No gunshots or rattlesnakes. No melodrama.”
It was on the tip of Morgan’s tongue to ask, “Riley, do you love me?” But she wasn’t sure she wanted to hear the answer to that particular question. “You’re nothing like the kind of man I’ve always pictured myself getting involved with,” she said with a kind of desperate honesty. “All we do is fight and have incendiary sex. You can’t build a relationship on that.”
“How do you know? Have you ever tried?”
“Why would I?” she said shortly.
“You didn’t fight with Chip or Tomas, and sex with them was a big yawn. Or so you said.”
“I want the kind of marriage my parents had,” Morgan retorted, and wondered why she didn’t sound more forceful. “There’s nothing wrong with steadiness and affection.”
“I never said there was. In fact, I could do with big doses of both, and so, I’m sure, could Jenny. But be careful here, Morgan. You know what I think you’re looking for? Perfection. The perfect man. Who’ll never raise his voice or upset you or make any demands on you that you don’t want to fulfill, and who’ll give you a nice, boring life in suburbia with 2.4 children.”
“I’m not!”
But Riley was warming to his theme. “That’s what it is—you’re looking for Mr. Perfection. Well, let me tell you something. He doesn’t exist. He’s a figment of your imagination. But I exist, Morgan. I’m real. Not perfect. I’ve got a temper, and I hate being helpless and dependent, and intimacy scares me to death. And I’d sure as hell make demands on you. Because—and you can now add arrogance to the list of my faults—I think you were only half alive until I came along. I watched your face the first time we made love. It was as though a part of you emerged that had never seen the light of day.”
For a moment Morgan was struck dumb. She had come to much the same conclusions herself, that Riley made her feel vibrantly, if not always comfortably, alive. “That was in bed,” she said. “I’m not denying that sex with you was absolutely astounding.”
“Was?” he repeated sharply.
“Jenny doesn’t need a third person around. She needs to accept you as her father and grow to love you without someone else like me hovering around on the sidelines. Riley, I loathe this conversation, can’t we go back to Wilfred’s?”
“You’ve got far too much courage to run away like this!” With a sigh of frustration he dropped his arms to his sides. “Here’s another of my faults—I hate begging. But Morgan, please come with us tomorrow. Please.”
“No,” she said. “I couldn’t possibly do that.”
His back was to the light, his face in shadow. She had no idea what he was thinking. Or feeling. She herself felt raw all over, and once again she wanted to weep. A downpour like a desert rain. She jammed her mask back on her face and her hat on her head, and started back toward the Athertons’ house. Riley, in silence, followed her.
The streets were emptying of children, she noticed vaguely. It must be getting late.
Too late. Too soon. Had she ever, even on the worst of days in school, been this tired?
The next couple of hours passed in a blur for Morgan. The three girls were engrossed in the adventures of the Lion King, each with a rationed heap of treats in front of them. Morgan got rid of her witch costume, had a drink, made conversation that apparently made sense, and ate rather a lot of nachos and salsa. Eventually she and Riley drove back to the hotel.
Jenny fell asleep in the car. Riley carried the little girl up to their room; the sight of Jenny’s long brown hair falling over Riley’s sleeve filled Morgan with a tumult of emotions, chief of which was pain. Dammit, she raged inwardly, this is ridiculous, I’m wallowing in sentiment.
At the adjoining doorway, as Riley bent to deposit Jenny on the bed, Morgan said coldly, “Good night.”
“Good night,” he responded, just as coldly. “Jenny, it’s okay, I just want to get your pajamas on.”
Morgan closed the door. She had a stomachache, she was as jittery as a canyon wren, and she knew she couldn’t possibly go to bed yet. She went into the bathroom, replenished her makeup and brushed her hair, and left the room. First she went to the cafeteria, where she ate a club sandwich. Then she walked into the bar.
It was attractively laid out, with velvet-covered wing chairs grouped around small tables; in the far corner a pianist was playing jazz, rather well. Morgan ordered a vodka and orange and leaned back in her chair, listening to the notes wander over the keyboard without apparent purpose yet somehow achieving a coherent whole.
It was time to go back to the desert. First thing tomorrow that’s what she’d do.
This decision made her feel minimally better. She ate some peanuts and slowly drank her vodka.
A dark-haired man walked into the bar and looked around.
He saw her almost immediately. He strode over to her table, sat down and signaled to the waiter. “Scotch on the rocks, and another drink for the lady,” Riley said. Turning to Morgan, he added, “Jenny didn’t even wake up. The hotel provides a baby-sitting service, but I shouldn’t stay long in case she has another nightmare.”
“I should have left the hotel,” Morgan said shrewishly. “That way you wouldn’t have found me.”
“I’d have caught up with you sooner or later.”
He tossed back some peanuts. Their drinks were delivered. Leaning forward, Riley said, “I wasn’t thinking straight out there at Wilfred’s. All that stuff about the flight tomorrow, I blew it. It hit me while I was putting Jenny to bed. What I really want.”
He took a gulp of Scotch. “The timing’s as bad as it can be and I won’t make any fancy speeches about falling in love with you because I’m not sure I even know what that means. But I do know one thing. I can’t bear for you to stay in Utah tomorrow while I fly right across the country with Jenny. Leaving you behind.”
As she opened her mouth to protest, he said, “Just hear me out, will you?” and took another long drink. “I want you to marry me,” he said, with as much emotion in his voice, thought Morgan, as if they were discussing the purchase of another pair of boots. “I was an idiot to say I didn’t want you to move in. Of course I do, but as my wife, and if I insulted you with all that talk about rented cottages, I’m truly sorry. I’m also very thankful I worked this out before I got on the plane tomorrow.”
He smiled at her, clearly relieved to have his speech over with, and drained his drink.
Distantly Morgan was aware of gratitude that he’d phrased his proposal so ineptly; because that way it was easy for her to refuse. Sitting up straight, she said, “You didn’t insult me with the rented cottage. But you sure have insulted me by asking me to marry you when you don’t even love me. And in case you’re wondering, the answer’s no.” She added belatedly, “Thank you.”
“I didn’t say I don’t love you! I said I didn’t know what love is.”
“Then I suggest you find out before you propose to anyone else.”
“Morgan,” he rasped, “I figure I’ve waited thirty-five years for you to come along. I’m not about to ask anyone else to marry me.”
“Then why, ever since Jenny’s appeared on the scene, have you behaved as though I’m an inconvenient stage prop? Something to be tripped over or shoved out of the way.”
“I didn’t know how to treat you! I want to make love to you so badly it must be written all over me—but it’s not a message for Jenny to read. Plus I don’t have a clue what the future holds for you and me. I can’t afford to raise false expectations in her mind, now can I? Making Jenny trust me is my number one priority, surely even you can see that?”
“The only thing I can see,” Morgan said stonily, “is that our affair is over. Over before it really began. Quite frankly, I wish it had never—”
“Can I get you another drink, sir?”
Morgan gave a nervous start; she hadn’t noticed the waiter. “Yes,” said Riley, “a double,” and passed him a couple of bills. Then he said forcefully, “I don’t want our affair, as you call it, to be over. I’ve never been in love with a woman before, so I don’t know what it’s like. I don’t know the lingo. But I’ll tell you how I feel about you. You thrill me the same way I’m thrilled when a great blue whale rises from the waves, its spume blowing like mist in the wind. You’re as joyous as dolphins at play, as dangerous as a hurricane at sea, as indecipherable to me as whale song echoing in the deep. To think of losing you hurts me in the same deep place that I hurt when I have to watch a beached whale dying in the sand.”
Struck dumb, Morgan gazed at him. Never in her life had anyone spoken to her that way. She felt humbled and inadequate and achingly sad. Because, of course, she didn’t love Riley.
“That’s the only language I know, Morgan. Not the language of romance and red roses.” He gave a sudden, wry grin. “I don’t even like red roses.”
The waiter deposited the glass of Scotch on the table. Leaving the drink untouched, Riley said urgently, “Marry me, Morgan. It’ll work out, I know it in my bones. Because I think we met for a reason, out there in the desert. We were meant to meet.” He smiled again, that lopsided smile that always made her melt inside. “Maybe we owe Lawrence a vote of thanks.”
Morgan gulped the last of her drink and didn’t smile back. She felt as though the day had gone on for far too long. Wishing she could conjure up some anger, hating herself for saying what she was about to say but knowing she had no choice, she muttered, “It’s a beautiful language, Riley, and more than I deserve.” Bravely she looked straight at him. “I can’t marry you because I don’t love you. It’s that simple.” As though she had to repeat herself in order to know her words for the truth, she said, “I’m not in love with you. In like and in lust, maybe. But not in love. I’m sorry. And now I need to go upstairs because I’m pretty sure I’m going to cry like a bucket. Don’t come up with me—please?”
She got to her feet, clutching her wallet. Riley stood up, too. He looked very pale in the dim light. “So this really is goodbye.”
“I’m not going to check out of the hotel tonight because I’ll have to say goodbye to Jenny in the morning,” she babbled. “So I’ll see you tomorrow. Good night, Riley.”
She ran across the carpet, took the first elevator to their floor and unlocked her door. Then she locked the adjoining door, fell across the bed and smothered her sobs in the pillows.
The next morning remained for a long time in Morgan’s memory as the worst in her life. She showered, realizing it would be her last one for a while, dressed in her bush pants and dark green shirt and braided her hair. She also threw all her new clothes into their boxes and bags. When Jenny tapped on her door, she was packed. “Hello, Jenny,” she said brightly. “Ready for breakfast?”
The three of them ate in the hotel cafeteria. Riley was putting on a good act for Jenny’s sake, but Morgan could recognize all too clearly the marks on his face of a sleepless night. She herself looked very much like a woman who had cried herself to sleep. Ten showers couldn’t have changed that.
They went back upstairs. Once they were in the room, Riley said, “Morgan has to leave soon, Jenny. She’s not coming with us to Maine.”
Jenny had been reaching for her bear. She stopped and looked around at Morgan. “You’re coming on the plane with us,” she said confidently.
“No, Jenny,” Morgan said, her throat dry. “I’m staying here. I’m going camping in the desert.”
“But I want you to come with us!”
“I can’t.”
Jenny’s little mouth drooped, her eyes the same stubborn blue as her father’s. “I want you to come on the plane, too,” she repeated obstinately. “I like you.”
Almost, Morgan changed her mind. Almost. “Riley will take very good care of you and you’ll love your new school,” she said weakly. “But I’m on vacation still, and that’s why I’m going camping.” She kissed Jenny on the cheek and wasn’t surprised when the little girl pulled away. “I’d better get going, I’ve got a long drive ahead of me.”
Riley handed her an envelope. “My address and phone number. I live in a little place called Machin’s Cove in northern Maine. I want your address in Boston.”
“I probably won’t be back there for quite a while.”
“Morgan.”
She flinched at his tone, scribbled the information on a piece of the hotel stationery and said breathlessly, “Goodbye, Riley. I hope you and Jenny have a good flight.”
He made no attempt to kiss her. His face was locked against her. Like Sneed’s, she thought numbly, and fled next door to gather up her gear. Fifteen minutes later she’d checked out and was driving away from the hotel.
Away from a man who had brought her body to life, and from a child who in two short days had found a place in her heart.
Morgan put her foot on the accelerator and headed for the interstate.