A Love for All Time (3 page)

Casey watched him leave. “He’s not playing with a full deck,” a voice, sounding strangely like her own, muttered.

Two

C
asey felt as
though someone had stuck a butcher knife in her chest and was slowly turning it. She had a strong desire to run from the image that faced her in the mirror, but her legs seemed disconnected from her body. She leaned forward and stared into gold-flecked eyes surrounded by bluish-green bruises, then, with deliberation, she studied the puckered ridge that crossed her forehead just an inch below the hairline and disappeared beneath the dressing on the side of her face. She closed her eyes and gripped
the washbasin as she swayed. The pain in her hands when she gripped, and in her chest when she gasped, was nothing compared to the pain in her heart.

“Oh, God!” she murmured. “Am I such a shallow, vain person that I can’t be thankful I’m alive?”

“Miss Farrow!” The nurse with the peachy complexion flung open the bathroom door. “You scared me to death! You shouldn’t be out of bed.”

Casey gritted her teeth. “I’ve lain in that bed for five days. I’m not a child. I’m the one that’s got to live with this face and I’ve got a right to look at it. Now, get out of here or I’ll scream the place down!”

“I’ve talked to your doctor,” the nurse said consolingly, “and we can shampoo your hair tomorrow. I know you’ll feel better when you see how we can arrange it to cover … your forehead. Please, Miss Farrow, Mr. Murdock will be very angry if he finds out I’ve let you get out of bed.”

“What the hell does he have to do with anything? He’s just the man who ran into my car. I never set eyes on him before the accident.” Casey was so immersed in her own misery she had to lash out at someone.

“I don’t know anything about that,” the nurse said firmly. “He’s paying me to take care of you and that’s what I’m going to do.” Her voice softened. “I know how you feel, Miss Farrow.” The girl’s sympathy was apparent and would have embarrassed Casey had she the strength to feel such an emotion.

“You can’t possibly know how I feel,” Casey said
crossly. “Beauty is my business! I’m supposed to be a walking advertisement for the products I sell. Look at my hands! They look like they’ve been through a meat grinder. Look at my face! I can cover up the rest of me, but not my face and hands!” Tears that came so easily rolled down her cheeks. “Oh, help me back to bed!” she muttered in despair.

Casey lay staring at the ceiling. She had never imagined that at age twenty-seven she could feel as though she had already lived a hundred years, that everything she had built her life around had collapsed in a heap. All that remained to be seen was if she had a position with the company at all. Neil had called from Los Angeles where he was opening a branch office. He told her that he would be back in Portland at the end of the week and would come to see her.

“I’m sorry you missed the regular conference,” he had told her on the phone. “Exciting things are happening. You know that model I’ve been trying to get? Jennifer Carwilde? The one with the dark hair and the gorgeous skin? Well, I got her! She’ll make a wonderful demonstrator. The girls will take one look at her and want to look just like her. Her skin is perfect. Not a blemish, not a single blemish…”

Not even foundation cream an inch thick would hide the blemishes on her skin, Casey thought with a fresh stab of self-pity. She lay silent, hugging her misery to her like a winter coat.

In the afternoon her father arrived with a huge bunch of flowers. In the short time Casey had known him she had become accustomed to the fact that her father never did anything in a small way. The bigger the better was Eddie Farrow’s philosophy. Big car, big presents, big apartment, big bills he was always struggling to pay. He swaggered into the room with a big smile that turned into a big frown when he looked at his daughter.

“What the hell happened to you, cookie?”

There was a weakness, a vulnerability about her father that at times tore at Casey’s heart. Eddie Farrow would never be able to stand on his own, therefore God gave him a glib tongue, a handsome face and body to attract lonesome women who had more money than brains. Casey’s long-suffering mother had understood this and set him free, but had continued to love him until the day she died.

“Hello, Eddie. Do I really look that bad?”

“Worse than I expected,” he said frankly. “That fellow Murdock said there was nothing critical about your condition, and that there was no need for me to rush to your bedside. He failed to mention that you look as if you’d been through World War Two.”

“Thanks a lot,” Casey said dryly.

Eddie turned abruptly as if just realizing someone else was in the room. He smiled at the nurse, showing rows of perfect teeth that he spent a fortune to maintain.

“How about putting these posies in a little water,
sweetheart?” He handed the flowers to her and managed to lay a hand on her arm at the same time. Eddie was a toucher. He smiled and he touched and most of the time he completely charmed the females he did it to. The young nurse was no exception. A rosy glow flooded her face as he continued to stare at her as if his eyes couldn’t leave her face.

“I’ll see if I can find a pretty vase to put them in,” she answered shyly as the magic of Eddie Farrow worked again. She smiled sweetly, her eyes clinging to his.

“Hurry back,” he said, the words coming from deep in his throat.

Eddie didn’t move until the nurse left the room. That was another trick of his to make a woman feel special. When the door closed softly behind her, he eased himself down onto the chair and pulled at the creases in his trousers.

“You never miss an opportunity to practice. You’re always improving on your technique,” Casey said crossly. Any other time she would have smiled at her father’s flirtation.

“Of course, practice makes perfect.” Eddie was undaunted by her sarcasm. “To be able to attract the opposite sex is an art, Cassandra. Eye contact is the main thing. I—” He broke off when she waved her hand impatiently, then continued with determination. “I could teach you how to get any man you want, if you’d listen. Before long—”

“Knock it off, Eddie. We’ve been down this road
before. I’m in no mood for a lecture on how to snag a rich husband,” she said bitterly and drew an unsteady breath that caused a sharp pain in her rib cage.

“I am only trying to help you, Cassandra,” he said with just the right catch in his voice to make her regret her sharp words.

He really was quite handsome, Casey reflected sadly. His face was tanned from his Hawaiian vacation with Mrs. Somebody or other, and there was just the right amount of gray sprinkling his dark hair to make him look worldly, mature. All she inherited from him was his height and the color of his eyes. She thanked God she got her scruples from her mother because he had none at all. His next statement verified that.

“If we play our cards right, we can get a good-sized settlement out of this guy, Murdock. I understand he ran into you. The bastard was negligent! Any jury would look at you and tell you’re scarred for life. What about your career? You had a good chance to go right to the top in that company, but now—”

“Eddie, stop it! There’ll be no lawsuit,” Casey said sharply. “It was just as much my fault as his. I was warned to stay off the highway. Visibility was zero. I thought I would take a chance. I was tired and wanted to get home. The man at the station where I got gas warned me that there had already been one bad accident. Besides …” she started to say more, but in an instant decided not to reveal
the other reason why the accident could have been her fault alone.

“If you were warned to stay off the highway, so was he,” Eddie said stubbornly.

’That’s true,” Casey admitted. “But it still isn’t enough reason to sue the man. He could turn around and sue me. Have you thought about that? He could get a judgment against me and I’d be paying on it for the rest of my life.”

“You’re not being practical. A man in his position must have tons of insurance.”

“What do you mean? Have you been checking up on him? Eddie, I’ve told you before, don’t interfere in my life!” Anger flamed through her body.

“Don’t get in a snit, love. You’re in no condition to make a quick decision,” Eddie said firmly. “Dan Murdock is one of the lumber company Murdocks. I don’t know how he fits in, but I’ll find out.”

“Eddie!” She wanted to shriek at him, but it came out a low, menacing snarl. “I’m perfectly able to take care of my own affairs without any help from you. Need I remind you that I’ve been doing it for quite some time. And … by the way, I’ll be needing that five hundred I loaned you last year.”

Eddie laughed. “You look just like your mother when you’re all steamed up.”

“Don’t try to get around me by bringing up Mother. She was too good for you and you know it,” Casey snapped. “I’m not kidding about needing the money. I may be out of a job.”

“All the more reason to—”

“No! I’ve got insurance, which will help, and some savings. Dan Murdock saved my life. I’m not going to repay him by dragging him through the courts.”

“It appears to me he’s taken an inordinate amount of interest in you, cookie. Maybe you have other plans for him?” he said hopefully.

“You’re making me angry,” Casey said quietly. “Go away and come back another time. And by the way, what were you doing in Seattle?”

“Business and … pleasure. A friend of mine has property up there and she wanted me to look it over.”

“Why? You don’t have a license to sell real estate in Washington.”

“Who said anything about selling?” Eddie answered, his laugh wide, emphasizing the tiny dimples at each corner of his perfectly groomed mustache.

“You’re hopeless!” Casey exclaimed, but there was a fondness in her eyes as she looked at him.

“What a thing to say to your father!” He got to his feet with a stricken look on his face as if he took parenting seriously.

“You should have been an actor.”

“Should have been? I am an actor. Life is a series of one-act plays and I play a part in each of them.” He touched her cheek with one finger. “But I care very much about my only offspring.”

“How do you know?”

“How do I know what? That I care—”

“No,” she interrupted. “How do you know that I’m your only offspring? Do I have brothers and sisters floating around out there?” She lifted her hand in a circling gesture.

“Who can say?” he said dramatically. “Who knows what seeds we sow as we travel life’s highways? I think John Barrymore said that.”

“It figures,” Casey said dryly. “Bye, Eddie. Thanks for the flowers.”

The nurse didn’t return to the room for quite some time after Eddie left and Casey assumed he had detained her in the hallway. She dismissed him from her thoughts as the image of Dan Murdock crowded into her mind.

She had seen nothing of him for several days, but he had called her each evening since he was away. He talked freely about himself.

His family had lumber interests near Bend. He was there, now, negotiating with a foreign buyer. Business had been slow due to the building slump and they had been forced to lay off some of the workers. The new contract would mean jobs, he told her, and they were cutting the profit built into their bid to the limit in order to provide those jobs.

He asked if her father had been to see her and if she had heard from her employer. At that time she had answered no to both questions. Last evening she told him she didn’t need the private
nurse, but he insisted she keep her on for a few more days.

Casey gazed out the window as evening approached and tried to visualize his face. His features appeared vaguely in her mind’s eye, but she could clearly see wide shoulders, the strong line of his body, a firm waistline tapering to lithe hips, the chest molded to a soft white shirt, and long muscled legs which moved with assurance. He was physically in the peak of condition. As a male specimen, Casey mused, he was unquestionably superb.

During their phone conversations she was careful to speak to him with the quiet courtesy of a stranger, answering his questions and asking none of her own. Eddie was right about him showing an unusual amount of interest in her. Why? Did he feel guilty? A part of her hoped he never called again, the other part listened for the ring of the phone.

Casey had had her share of emotional entanglements during the last ten years. She had lost her virginity her first year out of high school. It shocked her into the realization that she was following her mother down the primrose path with a handsome rake who had no intentions of being true to her. After that at least three times a year some would-be seducer laid seige to her body, but Casey remained inviolate. And she was determined to make herself financially secure so she would never be forced to do the menial work her mother had done.

But she’d never met a man who’d come even
close to being anything like Dan Murdock, she realized suddenly. Bits and pieces of conversation kept coming back to her. Things about reincarnation, and about him knowing she was special to him. She wished her mind had been clear that night and she could have asked him what he was talking about. Suddenly she hoped it would be a long, long time before she saw him again. She didn’t need his pity. The thought of him looking at her as if she were a caterpillar crawling out of his salad caused her to close her eyes and clench her teeth. She went cold, then hot as she imagined how she must have looked to him—black ringed eyes, face swollen beneath the bandages, her hands like chicken’s feet! And that was the part of her he could see. The doctor told her she had over fifty stitches in her right breast. She had no intention of going bare breasted on a public beach so that part of her injuries had been relegated to the back of her mind, although she was acutely aware that she would never again be able to wear a sleeveless sundress, a low-cut evening dress, or appear on the beach in a skimpy bathing suit.

The door opened and closed softly. Casey kept her face turned toward the window and blinked rapidly at the tears in her eyes. Miss Peachy-Complexion would be going off duty soon. She was sick to death of the girl hovering over her. She opened her mouth to tell her not to turn on the lights when a whiff of something masculine reached
her nose. An icy hand squeezed her heart and Dan’s deep voice said, “Hello, Casey.”