Once in a Lifetime (30 page)

Her answer came slowly, as if she had to shift gears. “This…isn’t about you, Telford. It’s about me. A woman knows a man like you once in a lifetime. If she’s blessed, she can welcome him into her life without hesitation.”

“And you’re not that blessed?”

“Unfortunately. But for today at least, can we enjoy being together? Neither in my parents’ home nor in my own home did I ever experience such a warm, loving Christmas. I know I have to deal with our relationship, but not today, please. And I thank you for letting Velma share this with me.”

“Whatever you ask me for is yours, if it is mine to give. See you when I get downstairs.”

He hung up, looked out the window at the snowflakes that drifted lazily past and let himself relax as Drake’s white Jaguar eased into the driveway. He hadn’t thought it wise to drive into Frederick in such conditions, but you didn’t tell a grown man what to do. He loped down the stairs and opened the door as Drake and his friend reached the house.

“Welcome, Pamela,” he said, and meant it, when Drake introduced him to the tall, dark woman who smiled with a friendliness that appealed to him. He knew he’d like her. But when she extended her hand and accorded him a deference he hadn’t expected, he was taken aback.

“I’m glad to meet you, Telford. Thanks for the welcome. I’ve been a nervous wreck ever since I told Drake I’d come.”

“Why were you nervous?”

“Because he talks about you, Russ, Henry…” She looked up as one does when trying to remember. “Oh, yes, Alexis and
Tara as if his world revolves around you. I can’t wait to meet Tara.”

“We’re glad you agreed to have dinner with us.” Finally. Drake had a down-to-earth woman who could see past his money, status and good looks.

For half an hour before dinner, the brothers, their women, Henry and Tara sat around the lighted tree in the den—where the flames sparkled, and the odor of roasting chestnuts, fresh Douglas fir and fragrant potpourri teased their olfactory senses—getting acquainted and swapping stories. His heart kicked over when Tara sat on the floor beside him and supported her back with his leg.

“Mr. Telford, are you going to play the violin?”

He rested his hand on her shoulder, assuring her of her welcome. “After dinner, if you want me to.”

She smiled and laid her head against his leg in as possessive a gesture as he’d ever witnessed.

“What about some Christmas carols? Does anybody in here sing?” Velma asked.

After a long silence, Pamela said, “I sing,” and with a full and melodious soprano filled the room with “Oh Holy Night.”

Tears streamed down Henry’s cheeks. “My wife sang that song just like that. God rest her soul.” He wiped the tears with the back of his hand, and in a quick change of mood announced, “It’s time to eat.”

Alexis and Velma helped Henry put the food on the table, and with “Silent Night” playing softly on the radio, Telford said to Alexis, “Tonight and hereafter, guests or not, you sit opposite me at my table.”

“I usually do.”

“In the breakfast room, yes, but when we eat here, you don’t.”

“But…that’s reserved for—”

“The woman of the house,” he said, his impatience showing. “Damn convention. I’m sick of these games.”

Her soft brown eyes gleamed in the candlelight, and when
her hands moved restlessly up and down the sides of her shimmering silk dress, he knew she wanted to touch him. Two quick steps took him to her side, and she gasped when his arms went around her and his lips brushed hers. He stepped away, watched her grope for equilibrium and grinned with male satisfaction.

“Serves you right,” he said, gloating shamelessly.

She took the seat opposite his and tossed her head. “Absolutely. And I aim to get all of that that’s coming to me.”

“You two stop dallying with each other and let’s eat,” Russ said. “Velma, they get on my nerves.”

She treated him to a smile labeled for him alone. “
Your
nerves? If you ask me, they’re getting on their
own
nerves.”

After a meal of oyster stew, roast goose, wild rice, asparagus tips, mesclun salad, Stilton cheese, pumpkin pie, caramel cake, champagne and, for Tara, black-cherry ice cream, they all cleared the table, straightened the kitchen and went to the den, where the brothers paired off with their women.

“Do you think you ought to drive back to Frederick tonight?” Telford asked Drake.

“It isn’t a good idea, but we’ve already got a full house,” Drake said.

From that, he gathered that Drake didn’t plan to share his bed with Pamela. He hoped his brother intended to cultivate that relationship, because the more he saw of Pamela, the better he liked her.

“If it’s a question of sleeping arrangements, she can bunk with me,” Alexis said, and slapped her hand over her mouth when she glanced at him. “Ooops!”

Talk about sticking your foot in it.
He grinned at her obvious discomfort.

Drake put a log on the fire and went back to his seat on the sofa beside Pamela. “I was thinking Pamela could have my bed, and I could crawl in with…uh-oh.”

“Look,” Velma said, certain that she could clear up the problem. “Nobody knows who’s spending the night where or
with whom. Russ and I are not—” she looked at Tara “—uh, you know, so Pamela can stay with me.”

“Really?” Russ tugged at a clump of Velma’s hair. “How do you know I want everybody to think that? I don’t spill my business. Besides, if you wanted to broadcast it, you should have said,
As of now.
So—”

She interrupted him, her smile luminous. “Well, honey, all you have to do is let me know…uh…what’s what.”

A roar of laughter erupted, but Russ stared down at her for a long minute, his face the picture of sobriety. Inscrutable. “I just might do that. Drake can open this sofa up and sleep down here in the den…provided that suits them.”

Telford picked up his violin and adjusted the strings, checking the tune. Tara didn’t remind him, but he knew she hadn’t forgotten. Sitting at his feet, she turned and faced him as he produced the strains of “Meditation,” to his mind, the sweetest music ever written. From the corner of his eye, he saw Russ put his arm around Velma and brush her lips with his own, while Drake clasped Pamela’s hand, leaned back and closed his eyes. He didn’t dare look at Alexis for fear he’d miss the notes.

At the end of the piece, Henry got up, walked over to the fireplace and stood with his back to it, his hands clasped behind him. “I ain’t prayed much in my life, but I will this night. I can quit worrying about the three of you. You…you’re all doing just fine.”

They sat around the fire, telling tall tales, drinking coffee and aperitifs and opening gifts. Tara received presents from everyone, including Pamela, and her squeals filled the house. Telford wanted to be alone with Alexis when he gave her her gift, but with everyone staring at him, he had no choice. She opened it and gaped. As she stared at the pearl necklace, her lips quivered, and he hoped she wouldn’t cry. She went to him, hugged and kissed him.

“Mummy, how come you always kissing Mr. Telford?”

“Because I love him. Isn’t that why you kiss him?”

“Oh, my,” was as much as the normally loquacious Velma seemed able to manage.

Henry thanked Alexis and Tara for his deep-sea fishing rod, laid it across his lap and shook his head. “I couldn’t have picked out a better one myself.”

Playing Santa Claus gave Telford a great feeling, even if it was mainly for adults. Maybe one day, he’d have his own children around him on a night like this one. He reached for the remaining package.

“Whoa! This thing must weigh forty pounds. What’s in it?” He read: “‘To Telford, Russ and Drake from Alexis and Tara with love.’”

The wrapping fell away from it, and he stared at it, unable to speak. His brothers rushed over to look at it and gaped, as he did.

“Will you just look at this?” He held up the bronzed image of his father.

“It’s just like him,” Drake said. “I won’t try to thank you, Alexis. It…it’s wonderful.”

“Yeah,” Russ said, blinking rapidly, and hugged her. “You’re one classy lady. I’ll never forget that you did this for us.”

“I knowed you was a smart woman,” Henry said. “Mr. Josh would’ve been real proud of this.”

“Let me see,” Tara said. “Mummy wouldn’t show it to me. She said I tell everything.”

He wanted to carry her to his bed and love her, love her until she gave up her reluctance and reservations and told him she would be his forever. But he sat still, catatonic-like, looking at her, letting her see through the walls of his soul. His lips moved with the words “I love you.” She smiled, and it was as if their hearts joined and beat as one.

“I have to put my child to bed,” Alexis announced. “I’ll fix breakfast, Henry, because you’re probably tired after that dinner you cooked.”

“I’ll help,” Velma said.

“Me, too,” Pamela chimed in, “if you’ll give me something to put on.”

“Sure,” Alexis said. “Breakfast at nine.”

She put Tara to bed and went back to the den with a gown, robe and toothbrush for Pamela, glad for an excuse to linger with Telford. He walked with her to her room.

“Want to come in?”

He shook his head. “If I did, I’d wake up in there tomorrow morning.”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“I’m beginning to choke on these crumbs you feed me.”

“Are you refusing me?” She stood erect, her chin up and shoulders squared. “You told me I could have anything I asked for if it was yours to give. Right?”

“Yeah. I said it.”

She tossed her head to emphasize her point. “What I want right now is you. Down here or upstairs in your room. I don’t care which. I need you.”

His Adam’s apple bobbled furiously, and he swallowed hard. “If you knew how hungry I am for you, you’d run into this room and close the door. I doubt I’m capable of finesse tonight.”

Just the way she wanted him. Hungry and wild. Without that veneer of polish and good breeding that he wore like a banner. Yes. She wanted the primal man, unadorned.

“If that’s what you’re offering, it’s exactly what I want. I’ll take whatever—”

His mouth was on her, hard, demanding and fire-hot, as his hands roamed her back, her hips and her erected nipples. He walked through the door with her in his arms, kicked it shut, closed Tara’s door and slipped down the zipper of her dress. Seconds later, she lay on her bed, skin bare, while he stood above her tearing off his clothes.

She raised her arms to him, and her hips began to rock as she anticipated the feel of him, hard, bare and every bit of him hers. He went into her arms and gripped her to him, leaving nothing between them but the sweat that beaded on his chest, bathing her breasts. Musky. Erotic. Filling her nostrils with the scent of man.

She twirled her tongue around his left pectoral, squeezed his buttocks and tried to swing her body beneath his.

“Slow down, sweetheart,” he said.

Heedless of his words, she went after the prize. She’d take the niceties some other time. Impatient, she lifted her left nipple to his mouth and held his head as he suckled her and with her other hand found him and stroked in that way he loved. He moved to her other breast, sucked it greedily into his mouth and let his hand drift slowly down, teasing and tantalizing until she thought she’d scream. At last his fingers captured her feminine folds and began their talented dance, stroking, twirling, raiding the pit of her soul. She raised her body up to him, sheathed him and spread her legs for his entry. His moans thrilled and excited her, and she tried to pull him to her, to hasten that moment when she would again feel the driving force of his powerful body.

“You’re not ready, honey.”

Exasperated, she cried out, “Then get into me and make me ready.”

She stroked him with skillful hands until he capitulated, moaned her name and flung wide his arms. “Do whatever you want to me. Take me. For God’s sake,
take me,
” he moaned. She urged him on to his back, straddled him and took him into her. He went at her then like a roaring storm, his movements wild and uncontrolled, and she gloried in his earthiness, matching him move for move and stroke for stroke.

The clenching and swelling began, sucking the energy out of her, and he flipped her over on her back and drove with rapid strokes, unleashing a power he hadn’t previously shown her. He moved up higher on her body and swallowed her screams as he hit that special nerve and she locked around him, claiming him, owning him. Then, he was over her, in her, all around her, unleashed. A human hurricane driving her to one explosion after another until at last, he shouted his own release and collapsed upon her.

Tears cascaded down her cheeks. She couldn’t live without him. So she had to take a chance and tell him everything. But
not now when she was so full of him, when she didn’t know the difference between him and her. But tomorrow. She’d tell him tomorrow.

Hours later, Telford stared into the darkness. The sexually naive woman he made love with in Cape May had become a hot, possessive lover, and she wouldn’t stop there. She bloomed from his touch the way seedlings rise to the sun, and as if he’d deliberately nurtured her and shaped her to his tastes and preferences, she suited him to perfection. And she’d changed him, altered his needs and the ways in which he wanted them satisfied. What if, in the end, she refused him? He told himself he was bigger than anything that could happen to him, and he had consoled himself with those words many times. But he no longer believed them.

When she dragged herself into the kitchen Christmas morning, shortly before eight-thirty, Pamela and Henry had the breakfast ready. It amused her that Velma, who was as punctual as a clock, hadn’t come downstairs. Neither had Russ. Figuring out who slept with whom wasn’t difficult, especially as Drake was outside shoveling snow.

After a lazy day, she told Telford, “It’s unreasonable to expect Henry to cook a big meal again today. Let’s fix something for supper.”

He agreed and made sandwiches while she cooked leek soup. After supper, they cleaned the kitchen.

“I hope Drake’s interest in Pamela is serious,” he said, “because I like her a lot, and I can’t say that about any of the others.”