Moonlight Man (16 page)

He ruffled her already messy hair until it stood out around her head like a glowing bush. “This,” he said to Sharon as soon as he’d swallowed, “is what I have to put up with. Orders, orders, day and night. I have to do this, I have to do that. And she doesn’t have to do one solitary thing. She won’t clean up after me, she won’t cook my meals, she won’t iron my shirts, she won’t wash my car. She won’t—”

“Hang around to listen to this garbage,” said Jeanie, standing up.

Quickly, Max took her chair and swung her down onto his lap, where she stayed with every indication of willingness, one arm linked around his shoulder, feeding him bites of her last slice of toast.

“And what was Auntie Sharon’s reaction to our news?” Max asked.

Sharon stared. “Did you say ‘Auntie’?” Jeanie’s grin was as wide as her husband’s. “I hadn’t told her yet. I was waiting for you to come back. But that’s why we came home, Sharon. Being morning sick in a hotel isn’t the nicest thing in the world.”

Sharon hugged them both. “The way I remember it, morning sickness isn’t the nicest thing in the world no matter where you are, but …” She shook her head in delight and disbelief. “I thought you were planning to wait a year.”

Max shrugged and laughed. “So did we. But we forgot to take into account the fact that while our cave had water, some food, a sleeping bag, and a blanket, it lacked one rather important element—a drugstore.”

“But we couldn’t be happier,” Jeanie said. “We’re going to name him Dungeon.”

“We are not,” Max contradicted. “We are going to name her Caverna.” Both laughed as if this had become a comfortable and beloved argument.

“But since we can’t agree,” Jeanie said, sliding off Max’s lap and putting more bread in the toaster, “We’ll likely end up calling him George.”

“Martha.”

Sharon poured coffee and a large glass of milk that her sister drank without protest.

“He doesn’t want to marry me,” Sharon said the next day when she and Jeanie were alone, the kids having reluctantly gone off to school, and Max was out for his morning run. Jeanie, looking slightly green, sat at the kitchen table nibbling crackers and sipping ginger tea. “At least that’s the only conclusion I’ve been able to come to, since he hasn’t mentioned the word.”

“You don’t suppose he’s already married to someone else, do you?”

Sharon frowned. Oddly enough, not once had that thought occurred to her. But it was certainly a possibility. “All he’s told me,” she said, “is that he was married, and his wife and son died. I’m not sure how. He doesn’t talk about it.”

“But no suggestion that he’s looking for any kind of permanent relationship with you?”

“He did ask if he could move in here with us, but I don’t want that. If he’s not ready to commit, if there’s the chance that he’s going to leave again come spring, it would be too difficult not only for me, but for the kids, when he goes.” With a hint of uncharacteristic bitterness, she said, “He feeds a stray cat too. I’ve often wondered if he means to take her with him.”

“Does he know about your marriage?”

Sharon nodded. “Everything about it.” Things, she reflected, that not even Jeanie knew. She often wondered if that was part of his reason for not wanting to make a commitment to her. Was he afraid that she would go back to being the way she had been, and he’d be stuck with a frigid wife?

“But the fact that you’re playing again, composing again, is due to him, isn’t it?”

Sharon smiled slowly. “Yes. No matter what happens, I’ll always have that to remember. It was the happiness, Jeanie. He made me so free inside, so full of joy that it just came spilling out. It’s as if it’s been pent up for so long that there’s no end to it. The music is renewed inside me, and I have to write it down. I’m compelled to play it.”

“Nothing could make me happier,” Jeanie said, squeezing Sharon’s hand. “What was that piece the two of you were doing together last night?”

“I wrote that for us. ‘For Harmonica and Harp.’ I know the two instruments aren’t traditionally even considered to be in the same world, but it seemed right for us. And I think it worked, but maybe I was too close. How did it sound? How much did you hear?”

“Not much. Not enough.” Jeanie smiled. “We couldn’t believe what we were hearing—or I couldn’t. Max thought there was something wrong when I came to a dead halt on the front porch and nearly dug my fingers into the bones of his wrist. He started to talk, and I just reached up and put my hand over his mouth and told him to listen, for God’s sake, just listen, that he was hearing a miracle! But then a little gust of wind came up, and he said miracle or no miracle, I was not standing out there to get chilled.”

Her eyes shone with a silver glow as she looked at Sharon. “I was so happy to hear that music coming from your harp!” She clutched her sister’s hands in her own. “Don’t ever let anything stop you again. Promise me. Sell it under a pseudonym if you must, but keep doing it!”

“I promise,” Sharon said, and explained that she was doing it for herself, that it wasn’t for sale under any name, just in case Ellis found out and managed to steal it.

“But that means the public won’t have it,” said Jeanie sadly.

“It doesn’t matter. I have it. We have it.” Then, getting to her feet, she glanced at the clock. “But since my livelihood comes from my job at the library, I’d better not be late.”

“Hi.” The deep voice just behind her sent Sharon spinning around, nearly crashing into the cart of books she was shelving. “Got time for lunch today?”

“You bet!” Her face shone with love and gladness, and he wished there was time to go home for lunch. What he wanted for lunch demanded privacy. Instead, when the head librarian came back from her own break, they made do with a corner booth near the back of the little cafe near the library.

Crowding in next to her, he slid an arm around her waist and drew her tightly against his side. “Can I kiss you here?”

Leaning her head back against his shoulder, she said, “You can kiss me anywhere.”

When he came up for air, he murmured, “And how about ‘everywhere’?”

She swallowed and inched away from him before she was tempted to disgrace herself in front of the young waitress who was approaching. “That,” she whispered, “comes later.”

When they were alone again, she said, “You didn’t have to take off like that last night, Marc. You’d have been welcome to stay.”

He gave that little half-shrug she found so charming, and quirked a crooked smile at her. “I didn’t want to intrude, and I didn’t know what you intended to tell your sister about us.”

She looked him square in the eye. “I told her,” she said, “that we’re in love and sleeping together when we can do it discreetly.”

He looked away from her, stirred his coffee, and then turned the spoon over and over in his fingers, like a baton twirler. Glancing up, his eyes shadowed by drawn brows, he said, “And she asked why we aren’t getting married.”

Sharon nodded slowly. “More or less.”

“What did you tell her?”

This time, she shrugged and looked down at the table. “There wasn’t much I could tell her, was there? Except that …” She shrugged again.

“Except that you haven’t been asked.”

Still keeping her eyes downcast, she said quietly, “That’s right.”

“How is she with a shotgun?”

Sharon tilted her head back and gave him a long, hard look. “Jeanie is my sister,” she said, “not my father. And I’m not pregnant or in any danger of getting that way, so I don’t think talk of shotguns is appropriate. Besides, I am thirty-seven years old. I make my own decisions about my life.”

When the waitress had served her chicken strips and his cheeseburger, he nibbled on a fry. “If that were a decision you were being asked to make, what do you think it would be?”

“That’s an unfair question, Marc.”

His shoulders slumped. “Yes. I guess it is.”

He slid out of her side of the small booth and over to the other side, and ate his lunch in thoughtful silence.

Then, locking his hand around her slender wrist, he leaned forward and said hoarsely, “If it were my decision to make, mine alone, then we’d be married right now. But it’s not, Sharon. I … oh, hell, this isn’t the time or the place, and there are things you need to know about me. Can you come over tonight? Right after work?”

She looked at him, searching his pain-filled eyes. “Just tell me one thing, Marc. You said that your wife had died. Is that the truth?”

“Yes,” he said.

“Do you have another wife somewhere else?” His eyes widened in shock. “No! No, Sharon. I swear it. I have loved two women in my life. You are the second one. I never even thought about marrying again until I met you.”

“Then I’ll come over tonight. Max and Jeanie are taking the kids out for dinner and to a movie anyway, since it’s Friday. I was going to go, too, but I’ll just call and say I’ve made other plans.”

“Okay.” He nodded once, got to his feet, and stood looking down at her. “Just remember, Sharon. I love you.”

“I’ll remember,” she said, but doubted if he heard her. He had spun around and was gone.

You can’t do this
, he told himself, pacing back and forth across his small living room.
You have to do it,
another part of him argued.

Do it, and you lose her.

Don’t and you lose her.

So, you lose either way, but wouldn’t it be better for her to remember you with some respect, for her to think of you as a man who was simply unable to make a decision, than a … Marc pounded his fist into the palm of his hand and continued pacing, knowing that no matter what he did, it could be exactly the wrong thing. She loves me. She’ll believe in me.

He hated his own cowardice, telling himself that there were no guarantees in life and this whole situation had gone on too long. He was in no better shape than he’d been six years ago, a reeling drunk in the back alleys of Toronto.

Then, his father had found him, dragged him out of there, pasted the broken pieces back together, and sent him out to find a soul to put inside the shell he’d become. He had found that soul, but it hadn’t been enough, not until Sharon had filled the emptiness and given the body and soul what they lacked—a heart. What kind of a man was he if he refused to tell her the truth because it was a risk?

Wheeling around, taking the stairs two at a time, he chose a positive action over the negative ones he’d been taking. He had time to shower before Sharon got here. He didn’t want her to have to smell his gutless fear on him.

Sharon knocked. There was no reply, although the lights were on and the drapes wide open. She knocked again then opened the door. From upstairs, there came the rushing sound of the shower, and she wandered around the living room, too nervous to sit. What could he have to tell her that was so terrible? When he’d left the cafe, his face had been so pale, she’d wondered whether he was safe behind the wheel. Her relief at seeing his camper parked where it belonged had gone to her head, making her dizzy, telling her exactly how much of her worry she had stuffed down where it wouldn’t be visible even to her. That was something she had learned to do a long time ago. Recently, though, she’d been unlearning it. With Marc’s help, and in the warmth of his loving care, she had been unlearning a good many lessons from the past.

Her biggest fear now was that the future might be in jeopardy. What future? a little voice asked her. Have you ever been given any reason to hope for a future with Marc? She knew that even if she hadn’t, until today, she’d harbored a hope, a crazy, unquenchable hope that this relationship was the ultimate one.

Her restless feet carried her into the little den Marc used as an office, and she turned the picture frame on his desk, finding a snapshot of herself that she hadn’t known about. When had he taken it? In the summer or fall, obviously, since she was wearing a sleeveless blouse and the tree behind her was in full leaf. A breeze had caught her hair, lifting it back from her face, and she was laughing at something, likely one of the kids. Six weeks ago, she’d have been horrified to know that her next-door neighbor was taking telephoto pictures of her. Now, she smiled and set it back down again, loving him just a little bit more.

At that moment, his fax machine came to life, startling her. She spun around and looked at it as the paper came flopping out into the basket.

The fax was addressed to Jean-Marc St.-Clair, with a string of degrees after the name, and came from a law office somewhere in Toronto. The name Jean-Marc St.-Clair rang a distant bell, and she frowned. It was an unpleasant bell, and while she realized that the fax was not meant for her, she saw at once it was, however,
about
her! She read on:

Ref. your client, Sharon Leslie:

There is no record of Sharon Leslie ever having signed a power of attorney to Ellis Murcady or any other individual or organization. Therefore, we feel that his having copyrighted her material in his own name during the term of their marriage constitutes a fraud. After consultation with certain members of the music community, particularly staff at the Royal Conservatory where Ms. Leslie was trained, we further feel that a strong case can be made to show that past, and very possibly present, work credited to the current Mrs. Murcady is uniquely that of Ms. Leslie.

In private consultations, several justices, including your esteemed father, have given their opinion that Ms. Leslie would have just cause to bring suit against her former spouse and have every expectation of winning such a suit, regaining the royalties lost to her. Naturally, whatever she might compose at this time can certainly be copyright by her with no fear of Mr. Murcady’s being able to claim the work or any proceeds from it.

It ended with kind, personal regards and a scrawled set of initials.

Sharon stared at the paper for several seconds, dimly aware that the shower had shut off upstairs. Could this be true? Could she win back what Ellis had stolen? And even if that weren’t possible, was her name really her own, her present work her personal property? She picked the paper up and gazed at it again. That was what it said. She couldn’t be misinterpreting it, could she? Still holding it, she turned to go upstairs to Marc. He would know! He was a lawyer and—