Distant Shores (22 page)

The magic words. “Iss good, isn't it?”

“You're a genius, Jack. A
god
. I was practically crying when Alex Rodriguez talked about leaving Seattle.”

Her words were a precious water that irrigated his dry heart.

He stepped back to let her inside. He smacked into the wall and stumbled sideways. “Oops. Sorry.”

She grabbed his arm to steady him. With one foot, she kicked the door shut. “I guess you don't need champagne.”

“I'm a little drunk,” he said. He thought maybe he'd whispered the confession.

She moved in close to him.

He felt her small, lithe body pressing against his, and he groaned, realizing suddenly how lonely he'd been in the last few weeks.

“Sally …” He didn't know what to say, what to ask for. All he knew was that his head was swimming and his dick was rock-hard. He could feel the blood draining out of his brain.

But he tried. Excuses and reasons staggered through his quickly shrinking brain. He had stumbled onto
Wait, Sally
when she kissed him.

That was the end of even pseudo-rational thought. When her lips touched his, he was lost. Time seemed to slow down and speed up at the same time.

He gave in; it was that simple. In some distant, hazy part of his mind, he knew he was doing a swan dive out of a high-rise building, but he couldn't make himself care. For months—years, really—he'd been holding himself in check, keeping steady to the vows he'd made to Elizabeth.

But now she was living in Oregon and she'd made it very clear that she didn't want him. Nothing had ever hurt like admitting that.

Sally gazed up at him, her eyes dark with the same runaway passion that was making his dick ache. “Well?”

His mouth was dry—it only made him think of places that were wet. “You know I'm still married,” he said, feeling that sentence was a personal triumph of self-control.

“Of course I know. I don't want your ring.” Smiling slowly, she reached down into his pants. “I'll take this instead.”

Jack couldn't help himself. He moved into her hand. He felt the top button on his pants pop free, felt the warm pressure of her fingers against his flesh.

He started to speak—although what he would say he couldn't imagine—

“Take me to bed,” she whispered.

Four little words that were his undoing.

TWENTY-THREE

Elizabeth finished the day on autopilot. As she'd defrosted the chicken and started the casserole, she'd thought,
Exhibit. My work.

She'd already browned the chicken and chopped the onions when she realized she was cooking for her old life. It was a chicken casserole that would easily feed eight people.

Once the meal was in the oven, she went into the pantry and pulled out the seascape. She would finish by tomorrow morning, and then start something else.

Maybe she'd try a watercolor next. In the old days, she'd loved oils, but she was older now. The smeary softness of watercolor appealed to her. And more important, she had a limited amount of time. She'd be more likely to make her five-works-by-the-festival deadline if she didn't work in oil.

She thought she heard a car drive up. Then a door slam.

Maybe Meghann had cleared her schedule and headed south for a girls' weekend.

Elizabeth hurried to the door and flung it open.

Anita stood there, wearing a flowing white dress and pink ballet slippers. A floppy purple hat covered much of her face. Beside her was a huge suitcase and a long, narrow cardboard box. A lime green taxi drove away. “Hey, Birdie,” she said, smiling uncertainly, “this is the beach I picked.”

Elizabeth didn't quite know how to react. First, there was Anita's appearance: she looked like something out of a Grimm's fairy tale, nothing like the Texas golddigger that was her usual style. Gone were the bright, garish colors and peroxided, high-rise hair. Now a simple white braid hung over one shoulder. There was something almost otherworldly about her, a fragility that bespoke great sadness.

And—even more disconcerting—was the fact that she was
here
, invading the solitude that had cost Elizabeth so dearly.

She remembered their last phone conversation. Elizabeth had been triumphant after painting class—and yes, tipsy. Had she
invited
Anita here?

No.

No invitation had been issued, drunken or otherwise. But she'd written that despairing
we're family
letter right after the break up. All of this flashed through her mind in an instant.

“I hope you don't mind me just showin' up. My mama would be spinnin' in her grave at such a breach of etiquette, but I was lookin' through travel magazines for a place to go, and I saw an ad for Oregon beaches. And I thought, hell's bells it must be a sign.”

“You look … different,” Elizabeth said clumsily. An understatement on par with
It rains in Oregon
.

Anita laughed. “Oh, that. All those clothes were for Edward. This is my natural hair color.”

For
Daddy
?

Her regal, aristocratic father had wanted his wife to dress like Dolly Parton?

Elizabeth couldn't process that. She didn't want to step aside, not for Anita-the-Hun, but what choice did she have?

You take care of her, you hear?

“Come on in.” Elizabeth grabbed the huge suitcase (What did Anita need with that much stuff? How long did she intend to stay???) and dragged it over the threshold.

Anita stepped inside, looked around. She was wringing her hands together. “So, this is the famous beach house. Your daddy always wanted to see it.”

That sentence brought them together for a moment. “I begged him to come up for the Fourth of July.”

“Yes,” Anita answered softly.

“Come on, I'll show you to the guest bedroom. It's upstairs.” Elizabeth turned and walked through the house, dragging the rolling suitcase behind her. When she reached the foot of the stairs, she looked back.

Anita stood in front of the fireplace. A pretty red-gold sheen made her dress appear translucent. She reached out for one of the framed photographs on the mantel.

It was the one taken at Christmas, where the whole family stood clustered around the brightly decorated tree. They were laughing so hard their faces were scrunched up. All except Daddy; he looked grim and irritated.

And no wonder. He'd bought Elizabeth a 35 mm camera for Christmas. It had taken him twenty minutes—and at least that many tries—to get the automatic timer to work.

I don't care if your damned lips are ready to fall off,
he'd boomed, frustrated by their laughter,
just smile, damn it. This is fun.

It was the last picture she had of him.

Anita turned. There were tears in her eyes. “Could I get a copy of this?”

“Of course.”

Anita looked at the picture for a second longer, then headed for the stairs. Gone was the Bette Midler mince-step; in its place, a flowing gracefulness that suggested at least a few years of dance training. She stopped in front of Elizabeth.

“I didn't know where else to go, Birdie,” she said quietly. “I couldn't stay there another night.”

Elizabeth could understand that. Her father had generated a lot of heat. Without him, it would be a cold world. She looked down at her stepmother. Amazingly, she couldn't see the woman she'd fought with for most of her life. This new Anita was frail and fragile, a lost soul. “Of course it's okay, Anita. We're family.”

For better or for worse, it was true.

Jack came awake slowly, groaning. He felt as if he'd been hit in the head with a crowbar. He rolled over in bed; his outflung arm cracked onto the nightstand, sent the lamp clattering to the floor. He opened one eye. The clock read: 8:07.

There must have been a power outage last night. He never slept past five o'clock.

Then he noticed something on the floor. Red. Small.

Smacking his dry lips, he stared at it, trying to focus.

It was a condom wrapper, ripped in half.

He bolted upright. At the movement, his headache lurched into a run.

Oh, shit.
He glanced to the left.

The bed was empty.

Sagging forward, he closed his eyes for a long moment; then slowly, he pushed the covers aside again and got out of bed. He stumbled into the bathroom—where he saw that Sally had written a note on the mirror. In lipstick.

Great sex

XXOO

Sally

The
a
in her name had a little halo above it.

The headache kicked him in the skull, pounding.

It never would have happened if Birdie had moved to New York. If she hadn't left him.

(Yeah, try that one on for size.)

The message on the mirror stared back at him.

Great sex.

It had been pretty damned good; that was true. Not jump-up-hit-your-head-against-the-ceiling great, but damned good. It had rejuvenated him, made him feel young again.

Wanted.

It had always been a weakness in him, that desperate, aching need to be wanted. In rehab, one of the shrinks had told him that his neediness was a by-product of having alcoholic parents who died too young. He didn't know about that, or care particularly. What he did know was that it had almost ruined him once, that desperate need.

And it could ruin him again.

Let me give you some advice, man to man,
Tom Jinaro had said on the day he'd dangled the
NFL Sunday
carrot.
Stay away from drugs and DUIs and underage women. Opportunities can vanish in an instant.

If it got out that he'd had sex with his assistant …

The words
SEXUAL HARASSMENT
came at him hard. If Sally decided to, she could ruin him.

He'd set himself up as Mr. Morality, too.

“Jesus Christ,” he whispered, staring into the mirror. Sally's cherry-red love note cut across his reflection.

“Never again,” he said out loud. “It was a onetime thing. A mistake.”

Elizabeth didn't have to know. Ever.

“A onetime thing,” he said again, meaning it.

By the time he'd showered, shaved, dressed, and walked to the office, he felt better. Stronger and more sure of himself. He'd made a mistake—a whopper of one, to be sure—but it would stand alone. A high-rise of stupidity in the vast prairie of the rest of his life.

At his desk, he sat down and immediately started to go through the notes he'd made yesterday afternoon. He was working on a story about a horse camp in Poulsbo, Washington, called Blue Heron Farms, where disabled children learned to ride.

Suddenly the door opened.

Sally stood in the opening, dressed this morning in a slim black suit with an emerald-green silk blouse. Her smile was depressingly cheery.

She managed to make him feel old and young at the same time.

She closed the door behind her. “I'm sorry I left while you were still sleeping. I needed to be at work early,” she said.

“Don't mention it.” He felt sick to his stomach. Nervous, ashamed, and excited all at once.
Really,
he thought,
don't mention it
.

Smiling, she clasped her hands behind her back and strolled toward him. The clicking of her high heels sounded appallingly loud in the room. The only thing louder was the beating of his heart.

Onetime thing,
he reminded himself.

“About last night …”

She placed her hands on his desk and leaned forward. From this angle, he could see the lacy beige edge of her bra. Pale, firm breasts swelled beside it.

He tried not to recall how sweet she'd tasted, how pink her nipples were—

Stop it.

“You'll never guess who called for you this morning,” she said.

“Who?” He kept his gaze pinned to her face. Nothing below the collar. Or the top button at the very lowest.

“Your publicist. He asked me to pass along an offer … from
People
magazine.”

“People?”
He rose out of his chair. “What did they want?”

She hitched one hip onto the edge of his desk. “They want to feature you in the ‘Fifty Most Beautiful People' issue.”

“You're kidding?”

“This is the big time, Jack,” she said. “You're a star again.”

He didn't mean to do it, but he reached out, pulled her into his arms.

“Take me on the shoot with you,” she said, tracing his lips with one finger. “It's going to be at the Peninsula.”

He gazed down at her heart-shaped face and felt a sharp tug of desire. God help him, he wanted her again already.

Elizabeth tossed and turned all night, unable to sleep. She hadn't realized how accustomed she'd become to privacy until Anita showed up.

At dawn, she got dressed and tiptoed across the hall, then eased the door of the guest bedroom open. Anita was still sleeping.

She wrote a quick gone-to-the-beach note, then went outside.

Hugging her canvas supply bag, she climbed down the steps to the beach. The ocean was energetic today, surging forward and back. Thousands of shorebirds circled the distant rocks, cawing loudly.

She left the bag by her rock and kept walking, faster and faster, until it seemed completely natural to break into an easy jog. She took energy from the surf; it made her feel powerful and free. Off in the distance, she could see a pair of box kites sparring with each other in the wind. An osprey flapped down onto its nest in a dead conifer tree.

For a few glorious minutes, she forgot that Anita had shown up last night, dragging a suitcase big enough for a two-month stay.

Finally, she turned around and came back to her spot. Collapsing, breathing hard, she sat down on her flat rock and tucked up her knees, stared out at the endless blue sea. A few diaphanous silver clouds floated across the sky.

It felt good to push herself. After years of ignoring her body, she had finally figured out what really mattered. Who cared if she was a size four or a six or a fourteen? She just wanted to be able to run down the beach and climb up the stairs and ride her bike. Size wasn't the point; health was.

It didn't sound like much, but to a woman who'd spent almost thirty years counting calories and wearing control-top panty hose, it was freedom, pure and simple.

“Birdie, honey? Is that you?”

Elizabeth turned. Anita was standing a few feet away, wearing a long floral skirt and a heavy cable-knit white sweater.

Elizabeth reluctantly scooted sideways on the flat rock. “Here. There's plenty of room.”

Anita sat down beside Elizabeth. “Whew! Those stairs are a killer. No wonder you've lost weight.”

Elizabeth turned. “I
have
?”

“At least ten pounds, honey. Your clothes hang on you.” Her mouth tightened in disapproval. “ 'Course the baggy sweats you've been wearing would hang on Mama Cass.”

There it was again, the familiar sniping and criticism that had stained their relationship for years.
Just smile and go on,
she thought,
or it'll be a long visit.
“I guess exercising was the key all along.”

“I do yoga myself.”

Elizabeth hadn't known that. Come to think of it, she didn't know much about Anita's life apart from Edward. She jumped on that; it gave them something to talk about. “What else do you do? At home, I mean.”

“Regular things, I guess. I belong to a book club that meets once a month. Last month we read
The Hours
. I play bridge with the girls every Thursday morning. I volunteer at the women's shelter on Tuesdays. I knit enough afghans to cover a small country. 'Course your daddy took up most o' my time.” She stopped, fell silent for a long time. Then, softly, she said, “I don't dream about him. Every night I go t' bed, waitin' to see him … but he doesn't come.”

Elizabeth knew that feeling. “I've waited my whole life to dream about Mama. It's never happened.”

“It's like losin' him a second time,” Anita said. After another long pause, she added, “I always knew I'd outlive him. I thought I was prepared for it. What a fool I was. You can't prepare for losin' someone you love.”

Elizabeth knew there was nothing for her to say. Grief was like the ocean in front of them; waves kept rolling toward you, and sometimes, the tide swelled high enough to pull you under. Usually, it had to be handled alone, in the dark, when you were most afraid. But maybe Anita had come to Echo Beach because the dark was
too
quiet. Maybe she needed to talk about Daddy. “How did you and Daddy meet?” Elizabeth asked.