An Indian Affair (3 page)

“Look at you,” Cindy said, smiling at Paula’s transformation. In her white nylon pantsuit and sensible shoes, she was a model of decorum. “Even your hair looks starched.”

“It is,” Paula replied. “It wilts like lettuce in this humidity unless I use a can of hairspray on it.” She picked up her purse and car keys from the counter. “Are you sure you’ll be all right here?”

“For heaven’s sake, Paula, what can happen? Go to work.”

Paula nodded, then peered at the cover of the book Cindy held. ‘‘What are you reading?”
 

“
Aboriginal Legends of the North American Indians
,” Cindy recited, not looking up.

“Um,” Paula said. “Sounds yummy. Save it for me, but don’t tell me the ending.”

Cindy raised her eyes.

“Okay, okay, I’m going. I’ll try not to wake you up when I come home.” She waved and then left, locking the door behind her.

Cindy worked in silence for two hours, interrupted only once by a phone call. She left a note for Paula saying that Mr. Axelrod in 12-C wished to inform her that his bathtub was leaking, and would she please contact the plumber. She was thinking about making coffee and taking a break when the doorbell rang at about nine-thirty.

Cindy got up to answer it, taking care to look through the peephole before she threw the bolt.

Andrew Fox was standing in the hall.

Her heart beating a little faster, Cindy opened the door.

He leaned against the jamb and folded his arms.

“Hi, Lucinda,” he said quietly. “Remember me?”

Chapter 2

Cindy was silent, painfully conscious that her hair was screwed into a straggling bun on the top of her head and that there was a badly chewed pencil stuck in it. She was also barefoot and wearing ancient, paper thin jeans faded to white at the seams. These were topped by a bleach spotted sweatshirt bearing the slogan: “Run for Life—The 1983 Juvenile Diabetes Marathon.” Why, just once, couldn’t she be wearing a black lace negligee when an attractive man appeared unexpectedly? Or at least a cocktail dress with high heels. But no. On such occasions she was invariably attired in the most ragged, ridiculous clothes she owned. It seemed to be a curse from which there was no escape.

He shook his head. “No response,” he mourned. “How quickly they forget.”

Cindy snapped out of it. “Of course I remember you,” she said, recovering.

“Good.” They stared at each other. “Well,” he went on, “do I stand out here in the hall like a student selling magazines?”

“I’m sorry, come in. Please excuse me. I just wasn’t expecting anyone.” She stepped aside and he walked past her into Paula’s apartment.

“Paula’s not home,” she said, watching as he looked around.

His light eyes moved back to her face. “I know that. I came to see you.”

Cindy’s pulse jumped. “Oh, yes?”

“Nice place,” he commented. “Last time I saw this apartment it was a mess.”

“When was that?”

“A couple of days before Paula moved in. She was having it painted, and Johnny and I carried some stuff up for her. He was here for a visit.” He eyed her levelly. “Paula didn’t seem to know what to do with me. I think she was afraid I was going to set a signal fire on the balcony.”

This so accurately described Paula’s attitude toward him that Cindy couldn’t suppress a giggle. He smiled at her response.

The telephone rang, interrupting their shared moment. Cindy moved to get it, took the message for Paula and hung up. She glanced around for a pencil with which to write it down. Fox stepped in front of her and removed the mangled pencil from her hair.

“Looking for this?” he asked mildly.

“Thank you,” Cindy said briskly, as if she had placed it there for safekeeping. This attitude was a little difficult to maintain as her hair, loosened by his action, tumbled from its confinement and fell over her right eye, obscuring her vision. Coughing delicately, she shoved it behind her ear unceremoniously, bending to scribble quickly on the pad.

“Lucinda, Lucinda, let down your hair,” Fox recited softly.

“I didn’t let it down, it fell down. Besides, that line is supposed to be for Rapunzel.” She tossed pencil and pad onto the telephone table.

“A princess by any other name...” he said, shrugging.

“I’m not a princess.”

He nodded wisely. “Oh, yes, you are. Take it from me. I can spot a princess a mile off, Lucinda.”

“Please stop calling me that,” she said faintly. “It makes me feel like I’m back in fourth grade, being called on the carpet by one of the nuns.”

“Okay. Cindy it is,” he replied, chuckling.

Annoyed at her loss of composure, Cindy gathered her hair in her hands, planning to bind it up again. Standing there facing him with it falling about her face made her feel childish and awkward.

He saw her intention and stayed her hand, closing his strong brown fingers around her wrist. “Don’t do that,” he said quietly. “Your hair is so pretty, such a nice color, not too brown or red and just a little gold at the tips. What do you call that shade?”

“Golden brown?” Cindy replied, swallowing, intensely aware of his touch.

“It looked beautiful this afternoon, like a beacon in that dull street, a glossy mane flowing over your shoulders.” His hand moved to touch the strands lying against her neck, and his fingertips brushed her skin.

Cindy closed her eyes. She had to put him at a distance, fast. She was definitely getting out of her depth.

She stepped back, away from him. “Do you always pay such extravagant compliments to women you’ve just met?” she asked frostily.

He hung his head, clasping his hands behind his back and staring at the floor. “I think I’ve just been put in my place,” he said, sighing dramatically. His mocking tone and exaggerated attitude of contrition had the desired effect on Cindy: her high-handedness became ridiculous in her own eyes. She was beginning to see that it was impossible to gain the advantage with him. The best she could hope for was a draw.

“Look, Mr. Fox,” she said evenly, deciding to try the forthright approach, “suppose you tell me why you came here.”

“Drew,” he corrected, dropping his chastened schoolboy act and resuming his normal stance.

“Drew,” she repeated dutifully.

“Actually,” he said, “I came here to apologize.”

Cindy frowned, puzzled. “Apologize for what?”

“For your injury. I stopped off at the hospital tonight and Paula fixed me up.” He touched the neat patch of gauze that had replaced his makeshift dressing. “She told me you got cut too, and I feel responsible.”

“Don’t be silly,” Cindy said, turning away. “It’s nothing.”

“I’ll be the judge of that. Let me see.”

Cindy thrust her arm behind her back.

He shook his finger in her face, “Let me see it, princess, or I’ll turn you over my knee.”

He seemed ready to do just that, so Cindy offered the hidden arm reluctantly.

Fox took her hand and pushed the sleeve back from her wrist, turning her arm over to see the inside. He gently probed the edges of the bandage, his touch firm and sure.

“No redness, no swelling. And another nifty wrapping job by Paula Desmond, R.N.” He looked up to meet her eyes. “I guess you’ll be okay.”

“I told you I was all right,” Cindy responded huffily, trying to pull her hand from his.

“Wait a minute,” he cautioned. “Not so fast.” Before she could react he raised her trapped fingers to his lips.

“What are you doing?” Cindy gasped.

“Isn’t it obvious?” he murmured, his mouth caressing her hand.

“No, it’s not,” she replied, tugging harder, but to no avail.

“I’m kissing it to make it well,” he said softly, trailing his tongue along her knuckles.

“My arm was cut, not my hand,” she said logically, trying to hang on to some shred of sanity. The moist warmth of his mouth was traveling up her arm like an electrical current.

“I’ll kiss that, too,” he responded, his lips moving past her wrist.

“Stop!” she cried, in a voice so loud and anxious that he obeyed her, surprising both of them. He released his hold, and she scrambled backward, her eyes wide.

“Are you afraid of me?” he asked, alarmed. He hadn’t intended to scare her.

Cindy didn’t know what to say. Fear didn’t exactly describe what she felt.

Fox watched her, his light eyes vivid, almost otherworldly in his dusky face. His black hair shone like polished ebony in the artificial light, and the white bandage stood out against it like a lonely patch of snow on dark macadam. In his tight jeans and loose cotton shirt, his expression alert, but patient, he looked like the modern embodiment of one of his ancient ancestors, who knew how to wait and listen.

“Just don’t...” Cindy said, leaving the sentence unfinished but gesturing to indicate that he should stand back.

“I won’t,” he replied, in a low tone. He guessed it was not a good idea to push her when she was in this mood.

Cindy took a deep, shaky breath. He waited until she met his gaze directly and then said, “I didn’t mean to upset you. Please allow me to make amends. Let me take you to dinner on Saturday night, that is if you have nothing else planned.”

Cindy heard herself saying, as if by rote, “I have nothing else planned.”

“Then you’ll go?” he asked, searching her face as if waiting for her to change her mind.

She nodded dumbly.

He smiled, his white teeth flashing against his brown skin. “Do you like seafood?”

“Why, yes. I do.”

“Fine. I know a place,
Neptune’s Table
, down in St. Petersburg Beach. It’s about a twenty minute ride. Would that be all right?”

“Okay,” she said. Anything would be all right.

“I’ll pick you up around seven-thirty.” He moved toward the door, intent on getting out before she called back her acceptance.

“All right.”

He stopped, smiled back at her, and then made a hasty exit. Cindy remained in the same spot for about a minute, trying to absorb what had just happened. Then she went into the bathroom and looked at herself in the mirror.

Her features were the same: straight nose, full mouth, large blue eyes, complemented by pale skin and burnished hair. But she felt different.

“You have a date with a bounty hunter,” she said to the girl in the glass, and then she shook her head.

She must be losing her mind.

* * * *

When Paula unlocked the apartment door at three-forty in the morning, Cindy was sitting on the sofa, an unread book open in her lap.

“You still up?” Paula asked wearily. “Those aboriginal legends must be more riveting than I thought.”
 

“That’s not it,” Cindy answered, as Paula slung her purse into a chair and slipped off her shoes.

Paula looked at her.
 

“Drew Fox was here. He asked me to dinner on Saturday night,” Cindy said.

Paula whistled. “Boy. I must say he’s living up to his reputation as a fast worker. What did you say?”
 

“Yes.”

Paula shook her head. “I can’t understand you. In school you always thought I was too wild; you had to be coaxed along to do anything. And now here you are dating the local heartbreaker, totally unfazed by all the stories I told you about him.”

“I’m not unfazed by them, or by him. As a matter of fact, I find him completely unnerving. But I like him.”
 

“Of course you do. Everybody likes him; he’s a charmer.” Paula unbuttoned her collar and ran her fingers through her hair. “Listen, kiddo, you’re talking to a veteran of that particular war. I had a monster crush on him the whole time I was in high school, when he was friends with Johnny. But his track was too fast even for me, and he runs it alone.” She peered at Cindy’s face, which was closed. “Okay, that’s all I’m going to say. You’re a big girl, you have to make up your own mind.”
 

“I have. And I will.”

Paula turned her hands out, palms up, in a gesture of surrender. “Did he say where you were going?”

“Some place in St. Petersburg Beach—
Neptune’s
Locker
.”

“You mean
Neptune’s Table
?”

“That’s it.”

Paula nodded. “What clothes did you bring? That’s a pretty fancy restaurant.”

Cindy looked stricken. “All I have are jeans and a few skirts. I wasn’t expecting an active social life. What will I wear?”

“Something of mine, I guess. In college that was your usual solution to such a problem.”

Cindy made a face at her. “You forced those clothes on me because you said I was never dressed right.”

“You never were. On the rare occasions that you went out at all you always looked like you were ready for a hot date in the reference stacks.”

“But the sharing was always your idea, right?” Cindy said slyly.

“Right,” Paula agreed wearily, aware of what was coming.