Fool for Love (8 page)

"I know you must be thinking I'm a
heartless slut."

"That's not at all what I was
thinking."

"Then what?"

"I was wondering about Joe and how he's
coping with all of this."

"He said he'd wait until I got myself
together. However long it takes."

"That's good of him."

"It's probably far more than I
deserve after he waited years for me to get a clue about how he felt about
me."

"How do
you
feel, Janey? About
both of them?"

She thought about that for a moment.
"When I saw David under her while she rode him hard and fast—just the way
he likes it—it was like something in me shut down. Everything I'd ever felt for
him went away in that moment, and I don't think I can ever get it back."

"That's understandable. Anyone would
feel the same way after seeing that. What about Joe?"

Janey glanced at Maddie. "When I said
good-bye to him tonight at the ferry?"

Maddie nodded.

"All I could think about was how long
I had to wait until I could see him again."

Reeling from everything Janey had told her, Maddie
checked on Thomas one last time in his big new room before heading to the
master suite she shared with Mac. She still wanted to pinch herself to make
sure she wasn't dreaming about living with her own handsome prince in what
could only be called a palace compared to the tiny apartment she used to call
home.

Mac was already in bed, but he sat up when
she came in. The covers fell to his waist, and Maddie took a moment to
appreciate his splendid chest. She never got tired of looking at him.

"How is she?"

"Okay." Maddie released her hair
from the bun and shook it loose. "Don't forget she's already had a few
days to absorb the blow." In the gorgeous new dresser that matched the
king-size bed he'd insisted on, Maddie found one of the half-dozen silk
nightgowns he'd bought for her the same day they'd gone to the mainland to
order furniture.

After a quick trip to their spacious
bathroom to change and brush her teeth, she shut off the light and slid into
bed next to him. Like he had every night since the huge bed was delivered, he
met her in the middle and wrapped his naked body around her. Maddie had never
known bliss like that which came from sleeping in Mac's arms every night.
"Can you tell me again why we needed this massive bed when we only use
about three feet of it?"

He kissed her bare shoulder, sending goose
bumps all the way to her ankles. "When we wake up some morning in the near
future surrounded by kids, you'll know why." His big hand found her flat
stomach and branded her with its heat.

She knew exactly what he was thinking.
They'd come close a few times recently to disregarding caution, but so far,
caution had prevailed. Maddie turned so she could see him, wishing she could
share with him what Janey had told her.

"You're not going to tell me what my
sister said, are you?"

Startled, Maddie met his gaze, astounded
as always by how easily he read her. "I … ah…"

Mac laughed and kissed her. "It's
okay. You girls are allowed to have your secrets."

"We are?"

"Sure. I know you wouldn't keep
anything monumental from me. We have rules."

Guilt pinged through her. Yes, they had
rules—rules
she'd
insisted on. But telling Mac what had happened between
Janey and Joe would set off an explosion that could ruin a lifelong friendship,
not to mention what it might mean for their wedding.

Mac would never understand that Janey had
been the aggressor. He would only see that his best friend had betrayed his
trust and taken advantage of his baby sister when she was vulnerable. She knew
him well enough to be certain of how he'd react. So she said nothing. Instead,
she reached for him and kissed him, hoping to get her mind—and his—off what she
wasn't telling him.

"Mmm," he said against her lips.
"I wait all day for this."

"Me, too. I don't know how I ever
lived without it."

That seemed to fire his passion as he
devoured her with heated kisses, shifted her under him and settled into the
valley of her legs. "All this stuff with Janey," he said, kissing a
path from her mouth to her neck to her breasts, "makes me realize how
incredibly lucky we are."

Her fingers burrowed into his soft dark
hair, and her legs curled around his hips in encouragement. "We're
so
lucky. So very, very lucky." And she hoped against hope that she wasn't
risking everything by keeping a huge secret from him.

Using both hands, he brushed the hair back
from her face and gazed down at her in the milky darkness. "I love you,
Madeleine."

Her heart still tripped over itself
whenever he looked at her that particular way. "I love you, too."

He started to reach for a condom, but she
stopped him. She told herself it wasn't guilt that had her wiggling out of the
nightgown while keeping him trapped between her legs.

"What're we doing?" he asked
with a bemused expression.

"Throwing caution to the wind."

"Really?"

She crooked an eyebrow at him. "Are
you saying no?"

He started all over again with deep,
heated kisses. "I am most definitely not saying no."

Maddie smiled at him, loving him so
desperately, as he entered her for the first time without protection.

He threw his head back and moaned.
"Oh,
man
."

"Good?"

"I won't last long like this,"
he said through gritted teeth.

She slid her hands over his back to clutch
his backside. "Then you'd better make it count."

Mac proceeded to do just that.

Janey lay in bed in Mac's guestroom trying to decide whether or not she should
check the messages David had left in the last few days.

A soft giggle came from the room at the
other end of the hallway, and Janey realized her brother was probably making
love to his fiancée. For the first time, Janey had reason to envy her brother's
romantic harmony. He was happily settled, and she was in the midst of an
uproar. Avoiding it wouldn't make it go away.

With great reluctance, she powered up her
phone and dialed into voicemail. "Hey, babe, it's me. I'm between
patients, but I wanted to totally shock you by saying happy anniversary."
Janey laughed to herself that he had called her the day
after
their
anniversary. "You're shocked, right? I knew it. Thirteen years, can you
believe it? Time flies when you're having fun. This time next year, we can
celebrate together. Anyway, I just wanted to say I love you, so call me so I
can say I love you."

The sound of his familiar voice had tears
spilling from her eyes. By "between patients," had he really meant he
was between bouts of passionate sex?

She listened to the rest of his
messages—increasing concern about where she was, why he couldn't reach her, and
finally, irritation. "I'm going to call your mother if I don't hear from
you within the hour.
Where are you?"

Janey had never realized before just how
available she'd been to him. Whenever
he
had time to call, she'd always
been there. Well, not anymore. Curling into a ball in the comfortable bed, she
clutched the pillow tight against the pain of David's betrayal. Even days
later, the images ran through her mind like a horror movie she could never
escape. If only she hadn't seen it. But if she hadn't, he might've gotten away
with it, and she might've married a cheating scumbag.

"Not my David," she sobbed into
the pillow. "How could you do this to me? How could you do this to
us
?"

In the midst of unbearable pain, Janey
longed for Joe's strong arms, his soft words of comfort, his steady presence.
With the phone still clutched in her fist, she considered calling him, if only
to hear his voice. She thought about it for several minutes before she dismissed
the idea as patently unfair. Before she could consider spending another minute
with Joe, she had to put David in the past—literally and emotionally.

She cared for Joe far too much to risk hurting
him any further by dragging him onto the roller coaster she faced in the
immediate future.

Her stomach ached at the thought of seeing
David tomorrow, of confronting him with proof of his infidelity, of calling off
their engagement, of canceling their long-planned wedding.

As if she had conjured him straight out of
a dream, she heard Joe's deep, sexy voice telling her she could get through
anything, that she was strong and capable and resilient. He believed in her,
and knowing that made it possible to believe in herself. She
would
get
through this, if for no other reason than he was waiting for her, and she
couldn't wait to find out what they might be together.

Joe tapped on the bar at the Beachcomber, signaling the bartender to bring him
another round. He'd lost count of how many boilermakers he'd already consumed.
However many, it hadn't been enough to dull the throbbing ache in his chest
that had started the minute Janey walked away from him earlier.

The sexy bartender who always flirted with
him quirked a questioning eyebrow. "What's up with you tonight? You're
hitting it hard."

"Just supporting the local
economy." He heard the slight slur in his speech and didn't care.

She poured him a new shot of whiskey and
opened another bottle of beer.

He tried to remember her name. Charley.
No. Katie.
Chelsea!
That was it. They'd spent a memorable night together
upstairs three or four summers ago, and ever since then, she'd angled for a
repeat performance. Those days were over, he reminded himself. Janey had ruined
him for other women.

Thinking about her soft skin, her fragrant
hair, the small but firm breasts that fit perfectly in the palms of his hands,
the exquisite joy of being inside her when she came… Joe moaned.

"You okay, Joe?" Chelsea asked,
looking at him now with concern etched into her pretty face.

Looking up at her, he was startled to
realize he'd moaned out loud. It wouldn't do for the owner of the Gansett
Island Ferry Company to be seen falling down drunk at the island's landmark
hotel. He knew that, of course, but it didn't stop him from downing the new
shot in one giant gulp that burned all the way through him. What sweet relief
it was to feel something other than desperate fear that he'd never spend
another night with Janey.

After years of wishing and hoping and
praying, all his dreams had come true in an unexpected interlude that would
haunt him for the rest of his days if it was all he ever had of her. His heart
raced with anxiety at the thought of never being with her again, and his stomach
lurched. If he didn't get out of there immediately, he was going to be sick all
over the bar. With a gesture for Chelsea to put the drinks on his tab, he
tossed a twenty on the bar for her and ran out to the back alley where he was
violently ill.

Sweaty and chilled, he leaned against the
clapboard building and decided he'd been stupid to think booze would cure what
ailed him. Only one thing could cure him, but he couldn't have her tonight.
Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, Joe staggered back inside and up
the stairs to the room he kept on the third floor for nights he spent on the
island. This wasn't one of his regular nights, but he'd missed the last boat
back to the mainland.

In his room, Joe studied his haggard
reflection in the mirror before splashing cold water on his face and brushing
the sour taste from his mouth. Without bothering to undress, he landed face
down in the lumpy bed and slipped into tortured dreams about the one he loved
but couldn't have. Every time he managed to get his arms around her, she
somehow slipped away. The horrible dance went on all night until he woke with a
start to blinding morning sun.

Rolling onto his side, Joe groaned at the
inhuman pain in his skull. Surely agony like this meant that someone had
stabbed knives into his forehead and temples while he slept. He gripped his
head to keep it on his neck as he sat up and tried to shake off the horrible
dreams. A new surge of nausea had him rushing for the bathroom, where he
discovered that whiskey burned even more coming back up than it had on the way
down.

He couldn't remember the last time he'd
drunk himself into such a stupor—or the last time he'd had better reason. A
freezing shower snapped him back to life, which also brought him right back to
why he'd turned to alcohol in the first place. Leaning his head against the
cool tiles, he yearned for her and called himself six kinds of fool for being
so stupid as to make love to her when she wasn't really his. He should never
have let that happen until she was free and clear to love him the way he loved
her. The one thing the whiskey couldn't change was the irrefutable fact that he
had only himself to blame for his misery.

He turned off the shower, grabbed a towel
and scrounged for some clean clothes. Dressed in khaki shorts, a green Gansett
Island Ferry Co. polo shirt and topsiders, Joe made his way—painfully—down to
the gift shop, where he bought three packets of Advil and downed every one of
the six pills. Normally, he'd be face-first in coffee at that hour, but he didn't
think his fragile stomach could handle it.