“I’ve never been to anything like this. It’s fun.” Rachel was caught up in the lively atmosphere of the Renaissance Festival. “Isn’t it?” she asked Quint, who walked alongside her.
The four children were a few feet ahead of Rachel and Quint, their heads bobbing back and forth, like spectators following the ball in a tennis match, as they took in the strange sights and sounds.
Festival personnel wearing period costumes and speaking a kind of pidgin Chaucerian English moved through the fairground, staging miniscenes with each other, acting as drunk or amorous or loquacious villagers.
“Fun,” Quint repeated doubtfully. He watched a medieval-garbed nun scold a pair of drunken villagers, and the men’s muddled responses drew laughs from the surrounding crowd.
“Well, I’ll admit there is pageantry and a certain infectious air to the whole thing, but I’m reserving judgment about how much fun we’re having. Those affected Middle English accents are awful beyond imagining and the costumes—”
“You seemed to be enjoying the cleavage of that buxom blond wench selling ale back there,” Rachel observed dryly. “You couldn’t tear your eyes away from Canterbury Tales Barbie.”
Her own ice green ribbed cotton sweater and slim-fitting wheat-colored jeans were a drastic contrast to her severe courtroom wardrobe, yet seemed downright demure in comparison to some of the festival players’ provocative attire.
There was plenty of overflowing cleavage on display, thanks to the low-cut gowns and corsets that plumped up flesh more efficiently than the modern-day Wonderbra. Some of the men wore tights and tunics, but most had on baggy pants and shapeless shirts, presumably the practical unflattering garb of peasants of yore. Long, dark, hooded cloaks, elegant yet somewhat sinister, were sold at one of the booths, but more fairgoers than actors were wearing them.
“I wasn’t staring, Rachel,” Quint assured her, tongue-firmly-in-cheek. “I was simply wondering if they had silicone implants back in the Middle Ages.”
“Sure. They had funnel cake, too. And deep-fried vegetables drowned in cheese sauce and frozen cappuccino.”
They’d passed booths selling that anachronistic cuisine, along with pizza slices, soft drinks, hot dogs, and ice cream. From the long lines at each booth, it was clearly modern crowd-pleasing fare.
They walked past a small crowd gathered around a festival actress—another blonde with an amazing chest stuffed into a brocade corset—who had engaged a male attendee in a bawdy conversation. The woman didn’t break character while the man stammered his replies and the onlookers laughed, enjoying the scene.
“Poor sap, you can tell he feels like a fool,” said Quint, warily eyeing those around him. “This is too interactive for me.”
The festival actors aggressively approached people to start a mock quarrel or pepper them with ribald questions and suggestions which other spectators—who weren’t targets themselves—found hilarious.
“I think I’m in hell,” Quint muttered a short while later when a young man dressed in raggedy village serf clothes demanded “a tuppence” to buy himself a cup of mead, a drink made of fermented honey.
“No,” Quint said firmly, refusing to be drawn into further banter.
Remaining firmly in character, the actor then turned to Rachel, and asked, “Why doth milady consort with Lord Cheapside here? If he doth not give gramercy to one such as I, certes you will be treated no better.”
Rachel smiled gamely and tried to think of an amusing comeback but before one came to mind, Quint caught her wrist and pulled her away. His dour expression did not encourage the actor to continue the repartee, so the young man turned to more willing participants.
“You looked ready to mangle the poor guy. It’s just pretend, Quint, like being in a play. Where’s your sense of humor?” Rachel reproved with a smirk.
“I don’t find it funny to be forced into a stupid skit where the other guy knows the script and I don’t. I hate being cast in the role of village idiot.”
“Since when do you need a script to follow? You certainly have no problem speaking extemporaneously, at least not in the courtroom. Of course, in the Pedersen case, I was the one cast in the role of village idiot, which would’ve been more to your liking.”
She said the words before they fully registered, and when they did, Rachel was astounded. She’d actually joked about the calamitous Pedersen trial! She wouldn’t have thought it possible.
Quint slid his fingers over her wrist and linked them with hers. “The problem with that case wasn’t you, Rachel, it was Pedersen and his tyrant complex that landed him in court in the first place. The man was indefensible. Even he will admit that now.”
“You are as slick as an oil spill, Quinton Cormack,” Rachel said tersely.
She debated whether or not to remove her hand from his, but ultimately, she didn’t. The warmth of his palm and the strength of his fingers felt too good joined with hers.
“I hope you don’t really believe that, Rachel.” Quint’s voice was low and deep.
Was he really being slick or was he sincere? Whichever, he was certainly convincing. She was beginning to accept his point of view, maybe even agree with it. The fact that she could make a joke about the worst defeat of her career portended … something.
Rachel didn’t care to examine what.
She glanced up at Quint, whose rangy, athletic build was emphasized by the faded jeans and Philadephia Flyers shirt he was wearing. She was instantly assailed by intense sensual memories, of his lips on hers, his tongue in her mouth, his hands on her breasts. She felt her insides liquefy as she imagined his hands and his lips touching her in places that were suddenly throbbing and ultrasensitive.
It was lunacy, this physical effect he had on her. She should hate herself for it, but she couldn’t seem to work up even a middling dander. Reflexively, Rachel touched one finger to the purple passion mark on her neck. It had faded only slightly, but she hadn’t bothered trying to conceal it with makeup today.
“Did your sister comment on that last night?” Quint asked.
Rachel’s hand swiftly fell to her side. She was mortified that he’d been watching her and fervently hoped he hadn’t intuited what she’d been thinking. And wanting.
“She didn’t notice,” Rachel replied. It was true. While eating ice cream at Richman’s last night, the conversation had centered exclusively on Laurel.
“You could’ve had your face painted blue and she wouldn’t have noticed,” Quint said knowledgeably. “Laurel is the star of her own show, and you’re merely a member of the audience. Front or back row?”
Rachel thought of Laurel’s long soliloquy on the trials and tribulations of being Laurel. “I think I was way up in the balcony, last row,” she admitted ruefully.
“That’s usually where I am in those one-player scenes.” Quint gave her hand a sympathetic squeeze and pulled her a little closer to him.
She didn’t even consider moving away.
They reached a row of stalls where medieval arts and crafts demonstrations were being performed. There were also booths with festival souvenirs for sale. The children ran back and forth from one booth to another, thrilled with the merchandise.
“Ah, ye old tourist trap,” Quint murmured. “A taste of the twentieth century interjected into the fourteenth.”
Rachel hurried to take Brady and Snowy by their hands and guide them away from a rather risqué scene being enacted by yet another buxom young maiden and a lecherous young man who was practically drooling over the woman’s ample bosom. The crowd watching the pair were chuckling, but the two toddlers didn’t get the jokes, much to Rachel’s relief.
“Quint, would you buy me a sword?” cried Austin, his dark eyes glowing with excitement.
They all watched the blacksmith who stood over a fire, shaping metal into knights’ helmets and swords. The finished products were offered for sale in the stall next to the workshop and looked like genuine medieval wares.
“Arm you with a sword?” Quint was incredulous. “You’re kidding, right? After your adventures with the BB gun?”
“Sarah still has it,” Austin said sulkily. “She and Matt said they won’t give it back till they’re good and ready.”
“I hope that will be about ten years from now,” replied Quint. “I won’t buy you a sword, Austin. Find something else.”
“Sorn,” attempted Brady, pointing at one of the long metal swords. “Want that.”
It was definitely time for a change of scene, Rachel decided. “Let’s look at the puppets.” She pointed to another booth and herded the smaller children toward it. “Wouldn’t it be fun to have a puppet? Look, there are green dragons and—”
“I want a puppet,” Dustin said eagerly.
“Puppets are for babies like Brady and Snowy.” Austin was scornful. “Hey, Quint, I see what I want. Over there. A whip!”
Long, authentic-looking whips were being sold at one of the booths. Quint and Rachel looked at each other.
“This is going to be a very long day,” Quint said resignedly, as Austin tugged on his arm, pulling him toward the booth.
Rachel watched a glassblower for a few minutes before Brady and Snowy lost interest and moved on to a theater stall featuring a traditional Punch and Judy puppet show. The humor and the language was beyond the toddlers, who created their own game, making their new dragon puppets pretend to eat the grass, an activity they found far more entertaining than any historical reenactment.
Quint joined them later with Austin and Dustin, each boy clutching a knight action figure—a compromise on the whip, perhaps?—and a wooden Jacob’s ladder toy.
“There are lots of games for kids over on the far side of the field,” Quint reported, “and there’s something called a Living Chess Game, too. Do you want to see it?”
“Cool!” exclaimed Austin, pausing to whomp his brother on the back. He took off with chubby Dustin running after him, hopelessly outpaced.
Rachel managed to jolly Brady and Snowy into coming along, though they would’ve been happy to stay put, absorbed in their play.
“They’ve been playing their puppets-eat-grass game for the past twenty minutes and still find it endlessly fascinating,” she marveled.
“A game they could play in their own backyards. Glad we made the two-hour drive and paid those stiff attendance fees for them.” Quint was sardonic.
“The Renaissance aspect of this fair is wasted on them, but they’re enjoying themselves in their own way. Uh-oh.” Rachel touched Quint’s arm, directing his attention ahead and to the right.
Austin had just pushed his younger brother into the path of a colorfully clad juggler, who was gaily juggling five or six bright rubber balls. Dustin fell to the ground and knocked the juggler off-balance. The balls went flying in five or six different directions.
“I think I’m finally beginning to understand the whys and wherefores of the Children’s Crusade,” drawled Quint. “The medieval Austins were shipped off to terrorize distant lands, leaving the villages in peace.”
“If only you would make politically incorrect remarks like that in court, you would be a far less formidable opponent.” Rachel was only half-kidding. “But in the courtroom you never hit a false note, not even in jest.”
“I think you’ve built up my courtroom prowess to mythical proportions, Rachel,” Quint said dryly. “A word to the wise … Don’t let me psych you out.”
She tilted her head, inquisitive. “Wade said you’re deliberately trying to psych me out in the Tilden case. He said it’s part of your strategy.”
Quint grinned. “Wade has more perception than I credited him with. I’ve always viewed him as Saxon Associates’ weakest link, but I may have to rethink that premise.”
“So you admit it? You were playing mind games with me?”
“Of course. A stock-in-trade technique, Rachel. You should know that.”
At this point she was more curious than angry. She looked up at him, her eyes meeting his, her lips slightly parted. It took a moment for her to speak. “But why are you telling me now? Isn’t giving away your tactics a mistake?”
“No, because it won’t change anything.” He put his arm around her waist and slipped his hand beneath the ribbed hem of her cotton sweater to lightly stroke her midriff.
The gentle kneading of his fingers on her bare skin was electrifying. Her nipples tingled in reaction.
“Anyway, I’ve gotten to know you better since I—uh—launched that missile by messenger,” Quint confessed. His dark eyes gleamed. “And to like you. I try to make it a point to be honest with the people I know and like.”
Was he being flippant? Or unremittingly frank? Rachel couldn’t tell. She wasn’t thinking clearly at all, not while being bombarded with sensory impulses unleashed by his lazy caresses.
His fingertips reached the edge of her bra and touched the lacy material before he slowly withdrew his hand from underneath her sweater. Rachel’s throat was dry. The way he’d casually fondled her—in public!—conveyed a possessive intimacy she hadn’t granted to him. Or had she?
She was struck by an odd feeling of déjà vu. The last time she’d felt so bewildered had been in the courtroom, during the Pedersen trial when her case was collapsing around her. Quint Cormack had been instrumental in that head-spinning event, too.
“Hey, lookit that!” shouted Austin, running back to join them. He pointed to a facsimile of wooden stocks, used to punish and humiliate lesser offenders in olden times.
A crowd had gathered around to view the mock trial being conducted.
“It’s a kangaroo court,” explained Quint. The kids were excited until he broke the news that no actual kangaroos would be a part of the proceedings.
Rachel listened to the byplay while struggling to regain her bearings. It was jarring to emerge from a sensual haze to the practical and prosaic world of children, though Quint seemed to do so with ease.
The “defendant” in the mock trial was a teenage boy with multiple earrings and a tattoo of a grinning snake on his arm. It was almost identical to the design on his black T-shirt.
“There don’t seem to be any lawyers involved in the proceedings. Do you think we should go over and offer our services?” Quint lightly nudged Rachel with his elbow.
“As a team or opposing counsel? Because I don’t want to represent that boy. I have a strong hunch he’s going to end up in those stocks, no matter who says what.” Rachel cast Quint a covert glance. “I see it as a kind of medieval parallel to the Pedersen case.”
Quint laughed.
Rachel felt inordinately pleased. Though she normally presented an ultraserious demeanor regarding her career—Wade was the jokester of Saxon Associates—making Quint laugh delighted her.
Although it wouldn’t do for her to develop a stand-up comedy routine based on the Pedersen loss, she cautioned herself.
“Looks like you’re right about the outcome of the trial,” Quint said as the teen was led to the stocks. “A fix from the start.”
Not that the accused seemed to mind. When his head and hands were firmly locked in place in the stocks, the crowd cheered, and the boy laughed and made faces, plainly relishing all the attention.
“He doesn’t seem to be taking his punishment very seriously, does he?” Quint traced his thumb over Rachel’s palm.
She felt the familiar pleasant tingling start all over again, deep inside her. This time, she tried to pull her hand away, but he held on and drew a slow widening circle in her palm. Those seductive little tingles quickly turned into a fiery glow of heat.
Which she had no business feeling, Rachel admonished herself, not while she was responsible for four young children at a festival in Pennsylvania. Especially when her young charges were headed toward … A mud fight!
“Quint!” she cried, and hearing the note of alarm in her voice, he dragged his eyes away from her beautifully shaped mouth.
He followed her gaze to a mud puddle the size of Lake Erie, where some actors playing drunken serfs were staging a fierce argument. It was inevitable that one of them would reach down and scoop up a handful of mud to pelt at another.
“Oh, no!” Quint took off in a run and swept Snowy and Brady off their feet, seconds before they could wade into the sea of mud. He was too late to rescue Dustin, whom Austin had given a hearty shove.
Dustin ended up in the middle of the serfs’ fight and caught a mud ball right in the chest. “Hey!” The boy looked around, torn between tears and anger.
“Get ‘em, Dust,” hollered Austin and plunged into the mud himself, merrily throwing gobs of the stuff at anyone within pitching distance. His aim was exceptionally good.
“Austin’s the pitcher on his Little League team,” Quint said to Rachel. He held on tight to the squirming toddlers in his arms. “The coach says the kid is a natural talent.”
“That figures,” Rachel muttered. Young Austin Cormack also seemed to have a natural talent for finding targets, no matter what his choice of projectile. “Shouldn’t we stop them or something?”
The mud war was in high gear. The actors seemed to be having fun and so were Austin and Dustin and the younger recruits, mostly preteen boys, who’d joined in. The majority of adults beat a hasty retreat from the melee and watched from out-of-mudball range.
Despite Rachel’s halfhearted suggestion for intervention, she couldn’t bring herself to go any nearer to the rowdy brawl. She did not want a mud bath, and now the actors were beginning to drag surrounding onlookers into the mire, despite their reluctance to go.
A gleeful Dustin rolled around in the muck claiming to be Babe, the pig from one of his favorite movies. Austin continued to pitch mudballs with the accuracy of a junior Fernando Valenzuela.
“I think I’ll take Brady and Snowy to feed the ducks down by the pond,” Rachel said, snatching both children from Quint’s arms. “We’ll meet up with you later, okay?”
“Have fun. I’ll just stand here out of the line of fire.”
“Looking for clients who want to sue for damages attributed to assault by mud?” Rachel couldn’t resist needling him. “I hope you brought along your cards to pass out.”
“That’s in the same league as ambulance chasing, Rachel. Ouch! I think I’m insulted.”
“No, you aren’t. Because you have to admit that Cormack and Son have taken some rather unlikely cases,” Rachel reminded him. “The Doll House and its slimy proprietor jumps immediately to mind.”
“Saxon Associates definitely wouldn’t put out the welcome mat for the likes of Eddie Aiken. Which doesn’t mean I like doing business with the guy either, my self-righteous little crusader,” Quint added dryly.
Rachel blushed. “I’m neither self-righteous nor a crusader, I just believe in upholding certain standards.”
“Extremely high ones, Rachel.”
“Well, yes. I suppose so. I’m—not going to apologize.”
“I don’t expect you to. Choosing only the classiest, wealthiest clients is nice work if you can get it. Cormack and Son has to go with the old saw ‘a reasonable doubt for a reasonable price.’ Out of sheer necessity, my clients haven’t always been on Lakeview’s ‘A’ list.” Quint was unrepentant.
He put his hands on her shoulders and turned her toward the pond. “Now go feed the ducks while I stick around here pretending I don’t know my mud-crazed little brothers, who are wreaking even more havoc than the paid performers.”
Snowy and Brady were pulling on Rachel’s hands and the trio headed toward the pond. Rachel glanced over her shoulder to catch another look at Quint, who was watching his younger half brothers play.
He was as laid-back about the boys’ behavior as he was about his repulsive client Eddie Aiken, Rachel thought, torn between admiration and astonishment. Though she could never condone representing an Aiken, her instincts told her that Quint’s response to his kid brothers was more realistic than hers.
Her initial impulse would’ve been to lecture the boys, the way the older Saxons always used to scold Wade for running around and making too much noise and generally getting into mischief, unlike the perfectly behaved Rachel and Laurel.
Quint let his kid brothers race around like wild boys. Or were boys that age just naturally wild and full of energy? The ones at this festival seemed to be, behaving a lot like Austin and Dustin.
As a child, Wade had acted that way, too, though he had been continually reprimanded for it, mused Rachel. No wonder he’d preferred spending all his time with the Sheely family when he’d finally discovered them. Nobody expected things to be quiet and orderly in a house with ten kids.
Thoughts of the Sheelys inevitably brought Dana to mind. Quint had mentioned that she’d gone to north Jersey today to work on a personal injury suit his firm was handling. Rachel had listened with radarlike intensity as Quint talked about his paralegal but hadn’t detected anything other than fondness and respect in his tone.
In the light of day, she felt none of the niggling jealousy that had disturbed her last night. Maybe it was because she was the woman with Quint at the festival, not Dana Sheely; maybe it was the way he looked at her, his dark eyes intent with interest and an almost-irresistible hunger.
Rachel, Snowy, and Brady arrived at the edge of the pond, where she bought specially packaged duck food from a nearby vendor. The children were wildly excited by the ducks, who swam over in increasing numbers for the meal being tossed their way.
While she watched them, Rachel’s mind drifted back to this morning’s drive from Lakeview to the festival. During the more peaceful periods, when the two older children were entertaining the two younger ones with stupid jokes and even sillier songs, Quint had discussed his latest personal-injury suit with her.
It was their first neutral, professional conversation, and Rachel enjoyed it immensely. She admired the way Quint’s mind worked; his analytical skills were first-rate. When not in the position of opposing counsel, she could appreciate his ability to almost instantly separate minutiae from essentials. The way he was able to cut directly to the heart of complex legal issues would prevent missteps and time-wasting diversions, yet conversely, made him an expert at obfuscation. The cloud of confusion he so ably created could send the opposing counsel into a morass of missteps and time-wasting diversions. It had happened to her in the Pedersen trial.
But as they talked, Quint seemed to value her own ability to evaluate and prioritize, to respect her input on hypothetical issues. He didn’t mind her questioning the theories he tossed out, and she let her own ideas flow. Both relished the give-and-take like the lawyers they were, but this time they weren’t adversaries.
She’d learned in their conversation today that Quint was a graduate of Stanford Law School and had been on Law Review, which placed him at the top of his class. She hadn’t known that, hadn’t bothered to check his credentials either before or after the Pedersen case.
Her mistake, Rachel realized ruefully. And a major oversight it was. Last year when Frank Cormack’s attorney son had moved to town from California, all the Saxons had assumed that Quinton had undoubtedly received his law degree from some minimally accredited school whose campus was the beach with a curriculum featuring surfboarding and New Age crystals.
The collective Saxon hubris had contributed mightily to their fateful loss, Rachel finally admitted. They had wholeheartedly believed the Pedersen case was unwinnable for anyone but Saxon Associates. Certainly, no relation to the inept Frank Cormack could possibly be knowledgeable in complex labor and civil-rights litigation, the two underpinnings of employment law. But Quint had proven to be.
Truth be told, he had mastered the fine points, ones Rachel hadn’t even touched upon. The jury couldn’t be faulted for finding in favor of Quint’s client.
He was also no slouch in the tort law department either, into which the subject of personal-injury fell. After listening to Quint outline his detailed strategy for the Polk personal injury suit, Rachel knew that North Jersey Power was sunk if they were stupid enough to take the case to court And she began to believe that not even Aunt Eve could have won the Pedersen case against Quint Cormack. He was that thorough, that cunning, that talented an attorney.
The rain wasn’t falling in drops, it was coming down in sheets. Though the windshield wipers of Wade’s car tried valiantly to clear the glass, the force and volume of the rain made visibility a near impossibility. Many cars had given up the battle and pulled onto the shoulder of the road to wait out the storm, but Wade wasn’t ready to concede defeat. He steered his Mercedes through the deluge, sandwiched between two monster trucks in the right lane who had also chosen to soldier on.
Strange how it could be sunny in New Jersey, cloudy in New York, but once across the Connecticut state line, a rainstorm of Noah’s Ark proportions suddenly reigned. Wade groaned at his own bad pun. Things were really bad when he started talking aloud to himself—and managed to sound like a nerd while doing it.
Of course, things really were bad, he reminded himself, and went down the list. This morning’s disastrous meeting with the Tildens and his aunt at the police station. The disturbing news about Shawn Sheely’s association with Misty Tilden. As for Aunt Eve’s confrontation with Chief Spagna … Wade winced. He couldn’t let himself think about how badly that must have gone.
Admitting that his aunt was right about the speed of gossip in Lakeview—it could beat sound and light—and that he owed the Sheelys advance warning, he’d driven to their house to break the news of the Shawn-Misty connection. And encountered even more frustration.
The only Sheelys at home were Katie and Emily, and neither was functioning at top form. Katie’s goateed friend was with her and she had little interest in anything else, especially not her ancient boss Wade Saxon. Emily was chattering away with several of her clones while passing the portable phone among them. The young teens welcomed Wade with all the enthusiasm of racketeers receiving an IRS agent whose specialty was money-laundering.
After ascertaining that their parents were out of town for a wedding and wouldn’t be returning until close to midnight, Wade casually inquired about Dana’s whereabouts. He knew she’d planned the trip to north Jersey and was greatly cheered to learn that she’d gone alone.
It was the first and only bright spot of the otherwise dismal day, though he didn’t allow himself to dwell on why it felt as though a dark cloud had suddenly lifted.
“Dana called from Sagertown and said she’s going to drive up to Connecticut and surprise Tim and Lisa,” Katie told him, her blue eyes amorously following the bad imitation of Brad Pitt around the kitchen. “She won’t be back till tomorrow night.”
Suddenly Wade felt an irresistible, overwhelming need to visit his best friend. It had been far too long since he’d spent time with Tim, not since Christmas, and it would be good to see Lisa and the kids—his honorary godchildren!—too. Plus, he could really use Tim’s input on the Shawn-and-Misty situation. Maybe Tim would volunteer to talk to the kid himself, and they could work out what to tell their folks, Sheely-to-Sheely.
Thus sparing Wade the unpleasant task of breaking the news himself. And if Aunt Eve should need bail money after her Spagna encounter, well, his parents were in town. She could contact them.
That cinched it for him. Connecticut offered a necessary respite from this very aggravating day.
But that dark cloud which had metaphorically lifted in Lakeview seemed to have literally descended over the state of Connecticut, and as his car waded along the turnpike, Wade was beginning to regret his impulsive trip.
Which took much longer than it should have. It was late in the afternoon, after a drenching harrowing journey, when he finally arrived in the tidy neighborhood near the naval base where Tim and Lisa Sheely lived with their children.
He felt as if he were navigating a boat rather than driving his car through the watery streets. The fast-falling overabundance of rain was taking its toll on the overwhelmed storm drains; being at sea level left no room for runoff. Already, rivers of water gushed along the sides of the street, beginning to meet in the middle.
But none of that mattered to Wade as he pulled his car into the driveway right behind Dana’s little brown Chevy. Instantly, his road fatigue evaporated, and he felt a buoyant surge of anticipation, which he tried to tell himself was due to this impromptu reunion with his best friend.
It almost worked … until he saw Dana sitting on an Adirondack chair on the front porch of the house. Wade stopped dead in his tracks, shocked by the combined forces of desire and pleasure that overtook him.
He forgot that they’d parted on less-than-amicable terms last night, that in fact, he was furious with her for relegating their unmistakable passion to a mere footnote in experimentation. That she had cold-bloodedly mistaken the unmistakable was just one of the many grudges he held against her. Kicking him out of her house was right up there, along with causing him a miserable, sleepless night the likes of which he had never before experienced.
Insomnia had never been a problem for him. Until last night he’d always managed to sleep like a baby no matter what.
But right now, swept away by the sheer euphoria of seeing her again, he forgave her everything.
Dana, who sat huddled in the chair which she’d dragged as close to the side of the house as she could to avoid the blasts of rainy wind, leaped to her feet as Wade raced from his car to the porch. Wade, here? She couldn’t have been more amazed if a spaceship had landed on the lawn and a troop of little green men were advancing toward her.
“What are you doing here?” she demanded as he joined her on the porch.
Though Wade had made the dash from his car in record speed, he’d still gotten rained upon, and as he brushed the droplets of water off him, Dana scurried to the opposite end of the porch to avoid getting splashed.
And to avoid being near him?
Wade scowled. Clearly, she hadn’t experienced the same exultation he’d felt upon seeing her. But then, why should she? Last night meant nothing to her; she had been buzzed on some specialty liqueur from Bangladesh and feeling a little horny, so she’d decided to use him—and then, just as arbitrarily, to kick him out.
All the negativity which had vanished at his first sight of her returned in full force.
“I’m here to visit Tim,” he replied belligerently. “My best friend. Any objections?”
“Why did you come today?” Her question sounded more like an accusation.
“Because I wanted to see Tim and Lisa and the kids.” Wade was really frosted now. “Why did you come today?”
Their eyes met. And widened with dawning horror at the same moment.
“Did you come to talk to Tim about what happened yesterday?” they both chorused the same words at the same time.
“No!” they both issued the same denial.
Their gazes held. Dana took a deep breath and her lips parted. Wade gulped, dragging his eyes away from the sight of her slightly open mouth, tempted beyond reason to put his tongue or his fingers or some other part of himself in it, just so he could satisfy his raging need to be inside her in some way, in any way.
He sank into the chair she had just vacated and covered his lap with his dark blue windbreaker to conceal the incriminating evidence of his unwelcome lust. “Dana,” he began shakily.
“Don’t call me that,” she snapped.
“Why not? It’s your name, isn’t it?”
“One that you’ve never used. Don’t start now.”
Dana turned away from him to stare at the unrelenting rain that was battering the pretty spring flowers into the ground, making everything look dark and dreary and dismal.
Which exactly mirrored her mood.
After she’d cried herself to sleep last night—she, who’d never cried over a man in her life, whose last fit of inconsolable weeping had been years ago, and appropriately at the funeral of dear old Grandpa Sheely—Dana had awakened this morning and firmly resolved to put the unfortunate incident with Wade Saxon behind her and never to think about it again.
She had successfully kept her vow during today’s sojourn in Sagertown while interviewing Ken and Marcia Polk, a plethora of doctors, and photocopying medical reports. Unfortunately, all the driving time alone in the car gave her way too much time to think. To brood. To ache with pain over Wade Saxon’s utter and absolute rejection of her.
The prospect of returning to Lakeview and her bedroom, where the most hurtful and humiliating repudiation of her life had taken place, had been too awful to consider. She’d decided to drive farther north and pay a surprise visit to her brother and his family, and then phoned home with her plan. Katie promised to pass along the word to their parents.
Too bad she hadn’t also called Tim and Lisa to share the news of her visit.
“They’re not home,” Dana said flatly, looking out at the rain. If it kept up, this street would be more like a canal than a road. Already the water was covering the paved surface and beginning to spill onto the slightly raised sidewalks.
“What?”
Dana darted a glance at Wade to find him staring at her so intently, so strangely, that she was instantly self-conscious. “Tim and Lisa aren’t home,” she clarified, and nervously smoothed the pleats of her gray skirt.
After the long hours at the Sagertown hospital, not to mention all the driving, she knew she must look like a rumpled frump. Which normally wouldn’t have bothered her, not around Wade, who’d seen her sweaty from exercising and dirty from rollerblade falls and a windblown, salty mess at the shore.
Except she hadn’t been one of his cast-off rejectees then, and now she was. Now it hurt that he looked at her and saw a woman he didn’t want.
“They’re not here?” Wade heaved a groan. “Are you sure?”
“I wouldn’t be out on the porch in the rain unless I was sure they weren’t here.”
They listened to the rain, watched the water lapping the sidewalk. “Maybe they’ll be back soon,” Wade offered hopefully.
Dana promptly dashed that hope. “No, they’re gone for the whole weekend. When no one answered the door here, I went to the neighbor’s across the street because I know she has a key to take in the mail and feed the fish when Tim and Lisa are away. She told me they took the kids and went with two other families to spend the weekend in Mystic.”
Wade brightened. “If she has the key—”
“She gave me the key in case I wanted to stay in the house tonight, but I hadn’t decided if I wanted to or not.” Dana removed the house key from the pocket of her gray suit jacket. “I just got here about ten minutes before you did, and I was still thinking what to do.”
She fingered the key another second. “Now I’ve decided—I’m not going to stay. I’ll drive home tonight.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. Look at the street, it’s already a swamp, and the ones closer to the ocean will be even worse.” Wade rose to his feet to deliver his argument, just like in court. “Driving back in this rain would be suicidal. It was bad enough getting here, and I heard on the radio that the storm is socked in over New York and New Jersey now.”
“I’ve driven in the rain before, Wade,” she said snottily.
He didn’t miss the contemptuous inflection she gave his name; “shitbird” could’ve been substituted and been perfectly in context. And the look she gave him was icy enough to freeze fire.
God, she hated him now! Wade balled his fingers into fists as fury and despair washed over him in alternative waves.
“Just what in the hell is going on with you, Dana?” he demanded, giving her name the same treatment she’d accorded his. “If you’re having an affair with Cormack, and you—”
“An affair?” She was too astounded to mask her incredulity. “With Quint? Me?”
Wade’s eyes narrowed. He knew her well enough to know if she were lying or completely baffled. Her response fell directly into the latter category. “So you’re not.”
Too late, Dana wished she’d grabbed his misapprehension and gone with it. But she knew it wouldn’t work now. “No, I’m not. Not that it would be any of your business if I were,” she added coldly. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll return this key to Mrs. Madison and—”
“You’re not driving back to Lake view tonight, Dana. It’s almost six o’clock and the rain—”
“I know what time it is, I know it’s raining, and you’re not going to tell me what to do, Saxon!” Her temper flared to flashpoint. “If you’re afraid to drive in a little rain, okay, take the key and you stay here tonight.”
She tossed the key at him. He caught it, disappointing her. It would’ve been infinitely more satisfying to watch him groping on the ground for it, preferably on his hands and knees.
Dana started to leave the porch for her car, striding purposefully but not at breakneck speed. Her pumps with their three-inch heels—on assignment, she found the additional height a useful advantage—did not allow for the quick pace of sneakers.
She was stunned when Wade’s hand snaked out to grasp her arm. She hadn’t been expecting any interference from him or she would’ve made a run for it, high heels and all.
“Look, you’ve voiced your concern. Consider it duly noted,” she said crossly. “So you’re off the hook if I crash or drown on the drive home. You can honestly say you tried to warn me, but I refused to listen to Wise, Wonderful You. It’ll play very well with my family.”
She pulled her arm free and attempted to continue her exit.
When Wade caught her around the waist with both hands just as she was about to step off the porch, Dana realized that she’d made a major miscalculation.
“I gave you the key, what are you—”
“Shut up!” he roared.
Dana gaped at him. She’d never seen him so angry, and the spectacle flummoxed her. Wade Saxon didn’t get enraged—he got testy or irritable or annoyed but never wildly, emotionally furious like the Sheelys.
She and Tim and Mary Jo and Tricia had occasionally discussed Wade’s temperament and decided he didn’t have it in him to blow up the way the Sheelys sometimes did. They had their flaming Irish tempers while he possessed the cool, ironic detachment of a WASP. After all, his surname was Saxon, as Tim had pointed out. How much more White-Anglo-Protestant could you get?
Except Wade didn’t seem at all cool or ironic or detached right now, he was as explosive as any Sheely had ever been. Dana gulped.
He lifted her off her feet and didn’t set her down until he had placed her against the front door. When she tried to get away from him—which she did, quite frantically—he used his body to anchor her there while he shoved the key into the lock.
Pushing the door open, and her along with it, Wade and Dana stumbled inside the empty house.