Forever My Love (6 page)

“Kathy, I didn't mean to do this to you, I just wanted to get you and Shanna to safety. Want to try to start over for the evening?”

What else was there to do? She couldn't go home because they still had to find their daughter. And she couldn't stay in the cabin because she would throw her arms around him and burst into tears and beg him to make love to her just one more time, and give her one more memory to live on during the empty years to follow.

If they survived this, she thought fleetingly, then pushed the thought furiously away.

They would survive. She'd make Brent be careful, if nothing else. If he was going to make them go away, she was going to make him go away, too, she decided firmly.

“Dinner,” she breathed.

“Pardon?”

“You said that you wanted to start the night over. All right, you muscled your way to the helm. Want to muscle your way to the galley?”

“Sure.” He stood, reached down a hand to her and pulled her to her feet. Then he paused for a moment and she thought her heart stopped beating, that the whole world and time had ceased to exist. She thought he was going to touch her again, to say something, but he did not. He left the cabin and strode down the aisle to the galley.

“All right, Ms. O'Hara, what am I cooking?”

“I'm not sure,” she admitted. She opened the tiny refrigerator behind the carved oak counter and started looking through the provisions. “Omelets!” she said at last. She set a dozen eggs on the stainless steel counter by the sink then began adding other ingredients. “Mushrooms, peppers, onions, cheese, sausage—”

“Hold up on the sausage, Ms. O'Hara,” he instructed her. “That must be for the new love of your life. I detest sausage, remember?”

He spoke lightly but there was an edge to his voice. And when she glanced at him, he was leaning over the counter, watching her, a golden light glistening in his eyes. She hadn't forgotten the danger signals. She smiled sweetly, wondering why she felt such a rush of excitement at his anger. Was he jealous? If so, it was damned nice. He hadn't a thing to be jealous about, but he didn't know that. “Sorry,” she told him casually. “I guess I did forget.”

“Do you have any normal beer in there?” he asked her.

“Normal beer?”

“Good old American brew. Instead of your, er, friend's trendy water?”

Shanna had done some of the stocking of the galley, and all her life, she had stocked it with her father's favorites. Kathy tossed Brent a beer.

“Thanks. I guess memory does survive at times.”

“In your daughter's heart.”

“So is he much of a sailor?” Brent asked politely.

“He's fine.”

“Just fine? I would have thought that you would have demanded so much more out of life.”

“We were talking about sailing.”

“Were we? I had the impression we were talking about something else. Everything about him seems to be fine. Not good, not great, not wonderful. Just fine. You ought to be shooting for wonderful, Kathy.”

“Ah. Because you were wonderful?” she challenged him.

He smiled, his lip curving slowly. He bent close to her and lifted a lock of her hair, then slowly let it go. “Yeah. At some things. We were pretty wonderful.”

She pulled away from him, bumping her head against the cabinets. He started to reach for her, worried, and she pulled away again. “I'm fine! It's okay. Hey, you're supposed to be doing the cooking remember.”

“Yeah, sure.”

He sipped his beer, set the can on the counter and started to rummage through the cabinets. “Where the heck is the frying pan?”

“Amazing, isn't it? You remember the docks and the ships and everything else—but not where the pans are kept!” Deciding they were never going to eat if she didn't get him started, Kathy found the large frying pan and a cutting board. Brent managed to find some butter in the refrigerator, then the bread basket, and while she chopped peppers and mushrooms and onions, he cut slices of bread. As long as she was busy with the work before her, her eyes on her chopping, she thought she could manage a few queries.

“So tell me, Brent. How about you? Is Marla…just wonderful?”

He made a grunting sound. “Marla isn't anything at all,” he told her briefly.

“Whoops. Trouble in paradise?” she asked sweetly.

He cast her a glance. “Where are you getting your information?” he asked her. “If you've been reading those rag magazines, you should recall that they once had a story about the two of us breaking up because you were having an affair with an Arab prince.”

She had to smile, the story had been so ridiculous. They had both laughed over it, wondered whether to sue or not. Then Brent's lawyer had demanded a retraction and it had been given.

Kathy tossed the peppers into a little glass bowl and started on the mushrooms. “No, I haven't been reading rag magazines. I only read the front pages in the supermarket, and I try to refrain from reading about you at all.”

“Do you?” he asked wickedly. “You mean you're never just the slightest bit interested in what I'm up to?”

“Nope,” Kathy said, meeting his eyes, tossing a handful of mushrooms into the bowl.

“Ah, yes, that's because you're so involved with Mr. Fine.”

“He's a very considerate man.”

“That must be exciting.”

“Not as exciting as Marla Harrington, I'm sure.”

He sipped his beer again and leaned over the counter, watching her. “So what do you know about Marla? And if you're not interested, why do you know anything?”

“We share a child, remember?”

“I see. So what did our shared child tell you?”

“Just that she's a twit,” Kathy said sweetly.

“What makes you think I'm involved with the twit?” he asked.

“Well, if you're not involved with the twit, she's involved with you. She was draped all over you like curtains in that video.”

He started to laugh, straightening. She cast him a glance and nearly chopped off her fingertip. “It's nice to see you still have claws!” he told her.

“I haven't,” she denied.

“But that sounds like such a jealous comment!”

“It's not jealous at all. It's just a comment.”

“And you don't read anything about me, but you did see the video.”

“What did you want me to say to your daughter when she insisted that I come out to see it? She's very proud of you, you know. And I've never discouraged that.”

He was silent for a second, then she felt his eyes again, very warm upon her. “I know,” he said huskily.

Again, it seemed that the space around them was too tight, that he was too close. She could smell a hint of his aftershave, feel the warmth of his body. It was so easy to let the years apart disappear, to pretend that this was like many a voyage they had taken, to imagine that she could drop what she was doing, forget the omelet, cry out and throw her arms around him, and damn everything else.

“So,” she said quickly, desperate to break the spell, “is it on or off with you and Marla?”

“Marla? Not the twit?”

“Even twits have names,” she said pleasantly.

“It was never on,” he said.

“You should tell that to Marla.”

“I have.”

“I think she's in love with you.”

“All that from a video?” he demanded. “Are you sure you haven't been reading rag magazines?”

She smiled. “Women don't drape that way unless they're in love.”

“It was a video. She was acting.”

“She is a…friend, though, I take it?”

“I met her through the Hicks brothers. They always have lots and lots of friends around them. Why don't you just come right out and ask me what you want to know.”

She gazed at him, startled. “And what is it that I want to know?”

“If I'm sleeping with her or not.”

She kept staring at him. She wanted to tell him she could care less who he was sleeping with. “All right,” she said blandly. “Are you sleeping with her?”

He picked up a piece of pepper and popped it into his mouth. “No, and I never was. My turn. Are you sleeping with Mr. So-so?”

“Brent, that's none of your—”

“Are you?”

She exhaled. “I—no.”

He smiled and turned away, coming around the counter to pick up the eggs. He broke them into a large bowl. “I'm glad,” he said quietly.

“Oh? Was I supposed to remain celibate forever?”

“Hardly,” he said, whipping up the eggs. “But if you're going to have an affair, it should be a lot better than just fine.”

“Thanks. I think.” She hesitated. He'd turned on a burner and begun to cook. Once he'd flipped the omelet he glanced up to find her staring at him.

“What?” he demanded.

“I was just wondering about the rest of your life.”

“What about it?”

“Oh. Just what you've been doing with it.”

“And who I've been doing it with?”

“It's really none of my business, is it?”

He offered her a crooked smile, lowered his lashes and slid the omelet onto a plate without answering. He poured in the remaining mixture. “My life is rather at a stalemate,” he told her.

She didn't say anything, but picked up the plate along with napkins and silverware and asked, “Want to eat topside?”

“Sure. There's a great moon out there tonight.” He was still staring at the frying pan, and still grinning, she thought. Then his eyes rose to hers. “You're not afraid to be with me, up there, in all that moonlight, are you?”

“Have you taken up turning into a wolf during the full moon?” Kathy asked. Then, before he could reply, she answered herself. “Never mind. You always were a wolf by the full moon. And any other moon, at that.”

“Not always.”

“Oh?”

“It depends on the available prey,” he told her.

“Ah, I see. Where do ex-wives fit in?”

“I've only got one,” he reminded her.

“So?”

“It kind of depends on the ex-wife,” he said. He flipped the omelet, slipped it onto a plate and smiled innocently at her. “What are you drinking, Ms. O'Hara? Wine cooler or a foreign beer?”

“A domestic beer will be fine, thank you, Mr. McQueen,” she said sweetly, then quickly preceded him up the steps. She felt the warm breeze touch her, and she was instantly aware of the moon. It was very full, glowing with a soft shimmer over the water. The
Sweet Eden
rocked gently at anchor. Across the lightly rippling waves, Kathy could see the lights of the shoreline. It was a beautiful view, stunning. And they were all alone within it. She couldn't see another boat anywhere. There was nothing to see except for the lights on the shore, the velvet darkness of the sky and the beauty of the moon and the stars. And there was the water, too, seemingly eternal. The shoreline was the only touch of civilization, and it seemed a long way away.

She perched on the padded fiberglass bench, and in another moment, Brent was with her. He sat down on the curve of the seat, so that they weren't touching, and yet they weren't very far apart. He offered her a beer and she silently passed him a fork and napkin in return.

“What a stunning night,” he murmured.

She nodded, watching the stars. “Where would you be, Brent, if you weren't here?” she asked him impulsively.

“What?” he asked softly.

“If you weren't so worried about Shanna. Where would you be, what would you be doing tonight?”

“I thought you weren't really so interested in my life.”

“What would you be doing?” she repeated.

He shrugged. “Well, I was supposed to be meeting with Johnny, remember? And I was supposed to be meeting Robert, so I would have been doing one of those two things.”

“And if not meeting with people?” Kathy persisted.

He smiled. “This particular Saturday night I was invited to be out with Shanna and David and his parents.”

“You were!” Kathy exclaimed. “I was invited, too.”

“And Shanna probably knew that neither of us could come.”

“Well, actually, David invited me. Shanna didn't want me to come because—” She broke off.

“Because of What's-his-name, right?”

“Axel,” she said dryly, “and I could swear that you do remember that name.”

“Maybe.” He finished his eggs and set the plate aside, stretching his arms across the seat and sitting back comfortably. “Speaking of Mr. Fine, where were you and he supposedly headed tonight?”

“Dinner.”

“Ah, dinner.”

“Yes, it's a meal you eat at night.”

“And I'm sure he does it very well. Only in the best restaurants. He probably speaks French with a very American accent but likes to impress his dates by using the language to order wine, right?”

Kathy put down her plate, feeling her temper sizzle. It didn't help one bit that what he was saying was the truth, right to the bone. She stood and stared at him, her hands on her hips. “At least he never walked out on me.”

“What?”

It was a mistake to be sarcastic, she quickly realized, a mistake to give away the least emotion—because he was up and on his feet, too, and staring her down.

“Dammit, I never just walked out on you!”

She spun around and grabbed the plates and started down to the galley. He was right on her heels. “Kathy, don't walk away. I'm trying to talk to you.”

“I tried to talk once, too,” she snapped. He wasn't going to leave her, he was right behind her, watching her every move. She'd meant to wash the plates, but he was too close, so she hurried up the steps.

And he was still right behind her. He was going to touch her. She turned, her fingers clenched at her sides, staring at him. “I don't want to talk anymore, Brent. We had that argument and when I wanted to try to understand it, you were gone! So don't start with me—”