Hale's Point (8 page)

Tucker grinned. “I think it’s a great inspirational
technique.”

“I’m sure you do.” Draping the towel over her arm, she said, “Thanks
for the massage. I’m going to catch a hot shower, then read in my room for a
little while and turn in.” Tucker looked at his watch and frowned. “Yeah, I
know, it’s early, but I want to get back on schedule with my six-o’clock swim
tomorrow.” She was sorry she had said the word “schedule” when she saw the look
on his face.

“This regimen of yours blows my mind,” he said, picking up
his cane. “You know, you really don’t have to drive yourself like that, just to
stay in shape.”

“I’m not driving myself, I just—”

“Sure, you are. You don’t know how not to. Getting an M.B.A. is
just one more example of it. M.B.A.’s are for people who want to spend their
whole lives clawing up that ladder, maneuvering for the next deal, the next
promotion, the next raise. What joy can there be in that? What satisfaction?”

“The pay’s good.”

“Money? Is that what it’s all about?” He looked grim. “Maybe
this has managed to escape you, but it seems to me I’ve heard about a million
times that money doesn’t buy happiness. Trust me, it’s true.”

“That’s easy for you to say, isn’t it, with that silver spoon
hanging out of your mouth.”

“I earned my own way,” he said testily; she had touched a
nerve. “I started from scratch at sixteen and I worked for what I’ve got, so
don’t go tarring me with that brush.”

“Well, earning my own way is exactly what
I’m
trying to do, so don’t go condemning
me for it!” Her voice had risen, and now she struggled to control it. “I don’t
deny that I’m driven. If you knew how I grew up, how I lived—” She stopped
herself and took a breath. “It’s just that I want something better, and I don’t
like people telling me I’m some kind of mercenary—”

“I wasn’t saying that.” His raw voice adopted a quiet,
conciliatory tone. He took a step toward her.

She stepped back. “That’s exactly what you were saying, and I
resent it. I know what you think of me. You’ve got me all sized up.”

“If I do, it’s because you won’t let me near you. You grill
me about myself, my past, but you won’t tell me a thing about yourself. I’d
like
to know how you grew up, how you lived—”

“No, you wouldn’t.” The words quivered in her throat. He
seemed about to speak, but then just stared at her, his expression sober. When
she spoke again, her voice was softly grim. “You wouldn’t. And I assure you I
don’t want to talk about it. Good night.”

She turned, and he seized her with his free hand, gripping
her by the shoulder as he came around to face her. “Don’t freeze me out,
Harley. Maybe we only just met, and maybe we have nothing in common, but that
doesn’t mean we can’t communicate, for God’s sake.”

She twisted free of his grip and backed away from him. “‘Nothing
in common’ meaning I’m so driven and you’re so laid-back, right?”

“Well”

“You know, I’ve been thinking about it, and for a guy who
worked two and three jobs for years and built up his own business from scratch,
I’m starting to think you’ve got a lot of nerve calling
me
driven.”

He considered that, then shrugged. “I won’t argue that I’ve
been there. But that’s not where I am now.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning I’m taking a vacation from all that—maybe
permanently.” He seemed to be growing exasperated. “You’re right. I worked my
butt off for more years than I care to think about. Then one night I crashed my
airplane into the side of a mountain. Suddenly I couldn’t work at all anymore.
For a long time I couldn’t do much of anything—couldn’t hold a book, couldn’t
sit up in bed and watch TV, couldn’t even feed myself. All I could do was
think.
You
try doing nothing but
thinking for a few months. It’s a very useful exercise for shaking some of the
chaff out of your life. You could use it— you’ve got plenty there to shake out.”

Harley’s voice rose, and this time she didn’t try to tame it.
“Yeah, well, maybe I don’t need an airplane crash to help me set my priorities.”

His voice rose, too. “Honey, there could be a nuclear
holocaust and you wouldn’t question your life! You’d still be out there,
stopwatch in hand, timing things and measuring things and making sure
everything was going according to plan.”

“That’s not fair.”

“I never said it was.” He was calmer now, weary. “It’s the
truth. The truth doesn’t have to be fair.”

“Very profound. You’re full of insights and wisdom, aren’t
you? You know, I could do without lessons in life from a guy whose answer to
difficult situations is to just
bolt
.
Someone who didn’t even bother to pick up the phone and call his own father for
twenty-one years. Does he even know where you’ve been all this time? What you’ve
been doing? God knows what he thinks. Jamie Tilton didn’t even believe me when
I told him who you were. He said he’d heard you were dead. Someone told him you’d
died in Vietnam.”

Tucker smiled as if this were preposterous. “I never went to
Vietnam.”

“Someone else told him you’d died in jail.”

The smile faded. He didn’t answer that one, she noted, just
lowered his head, closed his eyes, and rubbed the back of his neck. “I shouldn’t
be here. I should have left last night, not let you bring me back. I’ve done
nothing but irritate you.” He looked from her eyes to her mouth, and frowned.
Reaching out, he rested a hand lightly on her face and gently trailed his thumb
over her upper lip. “In more ways than one, I guess.”

It struck her then, why he looked different. He had shaved.
For her? The thought made her legs feel weak.

His fingertips stroked her face with a feathery touch, from
cheekbone to chin. He smiled again, but this time it was that shy smile that he
had worn last night when he’d asked her name. “I’ve got to tell you, though. I
mean, it may sound like a line out of a B movie, but it’s true. You’re really
very beautiful when you’re angry.” He chuckled self-consciously, the delicate
caress trailing down her throat and along one collarbone, coaxing shivers from
her. “Really. Just outstanding. I wish you could see yourself.”

Harley just stared at him, at a complete loss for words.
Finally he withdrew his hand, said, “Good night,” and went into the house.

***

The book Harley tried to read in bed was
Priorities for the Successful Manager.
She had already read the
first two chapters, “Stress in the Workplace” and “Strategies for Coping with
Stress.” Now she turned to chapter three, “Learning to Live with Stress,” and
reread the first page twice without absorbing any of it.

She closed her eyes and leaned back against her mountain of
pillows. What was that line from Thoreau that Tucker had quoted… something
about living a life of quiet desperation?

“What am I doing?” she whispered.

She heard a creak and opened her eyes. Everything was very
quiet. Then came another creak and a thump she recognized as the sound of his
cane on carpeting. He was upstairs. Her door was closed. She waited, and then
came two light knocks.

She cleared her throat. “Yes?”

A little pause. “Do you mind if I come in?”

She looked down at herself. It was a warm night, and although
she had pulled down the covers, she had not gotten under them. She wore her
favorite summer nightgown, sleeveless white handkerchief-cotton with a row of
tiny heart-shaped buttons down the front. It was thin, but you couldn’t see
through it—not quite. Not in the dim light from the little bedside reading
lamp, anyway. The left side had slipped off her shoulder, and she righted it,
then smoothed the skirt so it covered her legs down to the ankles.

“No, come in.”

The door opened halfway and Tucker paused in the darkened
hall. She could see him—he still had on the shorts and T-shirt he had worn that
day—but she couldn’t make out his expression.

“What are you reading?” he asked, taking a few steps into the
room.

She held up the book, and he frowned, coming closer for a
better look. He leaned his cane against the night table, took the book from
her, and turned it over, skimming the blurb on the back cover. “‘Prioritization
of strategies for minimizing job-related anxiety in order to maximize
managerial effectiveness’?
This
is
your bedtime reading?”

“Did you come up here to criticize my reading material?”

He sat down on the edge of the bed and laid the book on the
table. Without looking at her, he shook his head. Absently he ran a hand over
his now-smooth chin.

He turned to her. “I came up here to see if you’d let me
spend the night with you.” She stared at him, eyes wide in disbelief—not at
what he wanted, which she had suspected, but at his breathtaking candor. He
said, “Pretty smooth seduction, huh?” That shy smile again, the lazy brown eyes
staring back.

“That’s probably not a good idea,” she said.

He reached toward her with both hands, gently took her face
between them, and looked her straight in the eye. “No, I think it’s a great
idea.”

She laughed, partly from nervousness and partly because his
sincerity disarmed her—but only momentarily. There were many reasons not to
sleep with Tucker Hale, and she would spell them out, since he seemed to like
the straightforward approach.

She forced a note of cool reason into her voice and said, “We
haven’t exactly been getting along real well.”

He said, “Then we should try to get along better.”

He shifted his hands, his long fingers twining through her
hair to wrap around the back of her head. Her scalp tingled at his touch,
little rivulets of pleasure coursing through her. He pulled her slightly
forward as he moved closer. She thought,
I
shouldn’t let him kiss me,
but then she felt his warm lips on hers, and her
will weakened.
It’s just a kiss,
she
thought, closing her eyes.
Just one kiss.
Then I’ll make him leave.

He was surprisingly gentle, his lips barely grazing her own,
which felt extraordinarily sensitive. Then he leaned into the kiss just a bit,
his mouth moving slowly over hers. There was no irritation from stubble this
time; his skin was smooth against hers.

He lingered over the kiss, softly coaxing her into returning
it, which she did, at first tentatively, then with real warmth. As her
resistance evaporated, she felt both apprehensive and excited. This sense of
being overwhelmed by a man was new to her, and she found that a certain part of
her, a part she had not known of before, welcomed it.

He was so large, so sure of himself. Everything about him was
masculine, even the scent of his warm skin mingled with hints of tobacco and
shaving cream.

Her heart pounded furiously. To react so strongly alarmed
her, and she pressed her hands against his chest to push him away, pausing when
she felt his own rapid-fire heartbeat.

When they finally drew apart, he was as breathless as she,
and he looked surprised, as if the kiss, in its quiet intensity, had taken him
aback.

His expression altered then, as desire replaced surprise. She
saw an unmistakable, age-old need in his eyes, and a kind of panic seized her.
She should have resisted him more firmly, she should have had more
self-control. Now he would presume too much. His hands slid to her shoulders
and he pressed her back against the pillows.

She said, “Tucker, this is nuts. We’ve known each other less
than twenty-four hours.”

He smiled, watching his own fingers stroke her throat from
chin to sternum. “What better way to get acquainted?”

She threw her head back against the pillows, chuckling in
exasperation, and he took advantage of her position to kiss her throat softly,
all over. The left side of her nightgown had slipped down again, and his lips traced
a path along her exposed shoulder. Easing his hand between them, he slipped the
first little heart-shaped button out of its buttonhole.

She struggled to remind herself that this wasn’t a good idea.
“Tucker,” she said, her voice unsteady. She put her hands on his shoulders. “This
is pointless. You’re leaving soon. I don’t even know when.
You
don’t even know when.”

With his mouth near her ear, he murmured, “Then we should
take advantage of the time we have.” He took her earlobe between his lips and
gently tugged as he unbuttoned the second button. His fingertips glided down
the narrow opening of her nightgown, between her breasts, and then up again.
When he rested his hand, palm down, on her upper chest, she knew he could feel
her drumming heart.

With the other hand he gently kneaded her thigh through the
thin cotton, then gathered a handful of the fabric and pulled, uncovering her
lower legs. She felt his hand on her knee, and then he reached under her gown
to stroke the bare flesh of her thigh. His breathing quickened, and she felt
the muscles in his shoulders tense.

“Tucker…” she whispered. He answered the whisper with a
kiss; this time a deep kiss, one of unmistakable longing. He took claim to her
mouth with demanding force, pinning her back against the pillows as he explored
her lips and tongue with his own. She realized her grip on his shoulders had
tightened.