Snowflakes on the Sea (5 page)

Mallory felt her face flush, but she didn’t look away. Nathan’s gaze lingered at her lips for a long moment, causing her a sweet, singular sort of discomfort.

“So,” Diane said, too cheerfully, “how is it that the notorious Ms. O’Connor isn’t cavorting before the cameras?”

Mallory felt strong and confident for the first time in weeks, though she couldn’t decide whether the quality had its roots in the long talk with Kate or the way Nathan was quietly making love to her with his eyes. Both, probably.

“The name is McKendrick,” she said pleasantly, with a slight lift of her chin.

Something changed in Nathan’s eyes; there was an earnest curiosity there, displacing the teasing hunger she’d noticed before.

Diane looked mildly upset. “I thought ‘O’Connor’ was your professional name,” she said in an argumentative tone.

“O’Connor was my maiden name,” Mallory replied sweetly, with a corresponding smile. “I
am
married, you know.”

Nathan raised one eyebrow, but he said nothing. He merely toyed with the handle of his coffee mug.

Diane was obviously at a loss, but she recovered quickly. Leveling her devastating blue eyes at Nathan, she seemed to forget that Mallory was even in the room. “What have you decided about that television special, Nathan? I think it would be great to go back to Australia again, don’t you? And the money is fantastic, even for you—”

Mallory suddenly felt bereft again, shut out. Those feelings intensified when she saw a sparkle in Nathan’s dark eyes. What was he remembering? The beautiful, awe-inspiring Australian countryside? Walks along moon-kissed beaches with a warm and willing Diane?

“The people are so friendly,” he mused aloud.

Especially the ones who wear Spandex jeans and lip gloss,
Mallory thought bitterly.

Diane laughed with unrestrained glee and clapped her elegant hands together. Her whole face shone with appealing mischief as she smiled at Nathan. “I thought I would
die
when you were presented with that kangaroo!” she sang, and her voice rang like music in the simple, homey room.

Nathan grinned at the memory, but then his eyes strayed to Mallory, just briefly, and darkened with an emotion she couldn’t quite read.

“They gave you a kangaroo?” Mallory put in quickly, in an effort to join the conversation. “What did you do with it?”

He shrugged, and his gaze was fixed on some point just above Diane’s glowing head. “I gave it to the zoo.”

“And then there was that great Christmas Eve party,” Diane trilled, tossing a look of triumphant malice in Mallory’s direction. “My God, the sun was coming up before
that
broke up—”

Nathan frowned, clearly irritated by the mention of the holidays. Or was he warning Diane not to reveal too much? “Ho, ho, ho,” he grumbled.

Mallory lowered her eyes to her coffee cup. Her shooting schedule hadn’t permitted her to join Nathan at Christmas, and while they hadn’t discussed that fact in person, the subject had generated several scathing exchanges over long-distance telephone. She said nothing.

But Diane went mercilessly on. “You can’t imagine how
odd
it seemed, swimming outdoors on Christmas Day!” There followed a short, calculated pause. “What was it like
here,
Mallory!”

The shot hit dead center, and Mallory had to work up her courage before daring to glance at Nathan. His features were stiff with resentment, just as she’d feared.

“It was lonely,” she said in complete honesty.

Diane was on a roll, and she knew it. Cloaking her animosity in sweetness, she smiled indulgently. “Now, Mallory, don’t try to convince us that you sat at home and pined. Everybody knows what super parties Brad Ranner gives, and I read that you celebrated the holidays in a romantic ski lodge high in the Cascades.”

Mallory had forgotten the write-up she’d gotten in the supermarket scandal sheets over Christmas week. One had borne the headline, McKENDRICK MARRIAGE CRACKING, and linked Mallory to a country-and-western singer she’d never even met. Another had, just as Diane maintained, claimed that she had carried on an interesting intrigue in the mountains.

Neither claim was true, of course, but she still felt defensive and annoyed. Why did people buy those awful newspapers, anyway? If they wanted fiction, books were a better bet.

Diane giggled prettily. “No comment, huh? Is that what you told the reporters?”

Mallory clasped her hands together in her lap, felt the color drain from her face as she glared defiantly at Diane. She did not dare to look at Nathan. “I didn’t talk to any reporters,” she said stiffly, hating herself for explaining anything to this woman. Inwardly, she realized that she was actually explaining, left-handedly, the facts to her husband. “Those stories were utter lies, and you damned well know it, Diane.”

Diane sat back in her chair, apparently relaxed and unchallenged by Mallory’s words. She shrugged. “Sometimes they get lucky and print the truth,” she threw out.

Nathan’s voice was an icy, sudden rumble. “Shut up, Diane,” he said. “None of this is any of your business.”

A smile quirked one side of Diane’s glistening pink mouth. “They should have been watching
you,
shouldn’t they? I can just see the headlines now: ROCK STAR CAVORTS DOWN UNDER.”

Mallory flinched and bit her lower lip. She could feel Nathan’s rage rising in the room like lava swelling a volcano. Any minute, the eruption would come, and they’d all be buried in ash.

“How about this one?” he drawled, leaning toward Diane with ominous leisure. “PRESS AGENT FIRED.”

For the first time, Diane backed down. A girlish blush rose to pinken her classic cheekbones, and real tears gathered in her eyes. “I was only teasing,” she said. “Where
did
you spend Christmas, Mallory?”

“In Outer Slobovia, Diane,” Mallory replied acidly. “With fourteen midgets and a camel.”

Nathan roared with laughter, but Diane looked affronted. “We could get along if we tried, you know,” she scolded in a tone that implied crushing pain.

“I seriously doubt that,” Mallory retorted. “Why don’t you leave now?”

“Good idea,” Nathan said.

Diane bristled. “Nathan!”

Nathan smiled and stood up, gesturing for silence with both hands. “Now, now, Diane—no more gossip. After all, the camel isn’t here to defend itself.”

Diane flung one scorching look at Mallory and stormed out, slamming the kitchen door behind her. A moment later, the outer door slammed, too.

“Thank you,” Mallory whispered.

“Anytime,” Nathan said, sitting down again.

“Those stories about me—”

He reached out, cupped her chin in one hand. “I know, Mall. Forget it.”

Mallory couldn’t “forget it”; there was too much that needed to be said. “I was here, Nathan—right here, on the island. I spent Christmas Eve with Trish and Alex, and the next day with Kate Sheridan. I—”

His index finger moved to rest on her lips. “It’s all
right,
Mallory.”

She drew back from him, more stung by some of the things Diane had implied than she would have admitted. “What did
you
do over Christmas, Nathan?”

He looked away. “I drank a lot.”

“No Christmas tree?”

“No Christmas tree.”

Mallory sighed wistfully. “I didn’t put one up, either. But Trish had a lovely one—”

Suddenly, Nathan was staring at her. She knew he was thinking of the beautiful tree ornaments she’d collected in every part of the world, of the way she shopped and fussed for weeks before Christmas every year, of the way she always threw herself into the celebration with the unbridled enthusiasm of a child. “No tree?” he echoed in a stunned voice that was only part mockery. “No presents?”

Mallory had received a number of gifts—a silk blouse from Kate, books from Trish and Alex, a gold chain from Nathan’s sister Pat—but she saw no point in listing them aloud. The package Nathan had sent was still stored in a guest room closet at the Seattle penthouse, unopened.

She lifted her coffee cup in a sort of listless toast. “Just call me Scrooge,” she said.

F
ortunately, Nathan dropped the touchy subject of that Christmas just past—the first Christmas since their marriage that the McKendricks had spent apart—and said instead, “Your turn to cook, woman.”

Mallory glanced at the small electric clock hanging on the wall near the telephone, and started guiltily. Lunchtime was long past. “And cook I will,” she replied.

In the next few minutes, Mallory discovered that her husband had done a remarkable job grocery shopping; the cupboards were full. She was humming as she assembled sandwiches and heated soup, regardless of the fact that she had absolutely no appetite.

While Mallory labored over that simple midday repast, Nathan fidgeted at the table. He looked almost relieved when the telephone rang, and moved to answer it with a swiftness that injured his wife. Was it so hard for him to talk to her that he was grateful for any excuse to avoid it?

“Hello,” he muttered, and then, as Mallory watched, she saw him turn his back to her, saw the powerful muscles stiffen beneath his shirt. “Yes, Mrs. Jeffries,” he said in a low voice. “Yes, Diane is supposed to stay there. The band is coming, too—they’ll all be there before nightfall, I suppose. No, get extra help if you need it—”

Mallory set the sandwich plates down on the table with an eloquent
thunk
and whirled angrily to ladle hot soup into two bowls. Nathan was talking to his housekeeper, giving her orders to make Diane Vincent and the others comfortable in the sprawling Spanish-style villa on the other side of the island.
His
villa.

“Damn!” she muttered. She should have known that there would be no private time for the McKendricks—Diane and the band would see to that.

“Right,” Nathan said, turning to scowl at Mallory, as though reading her inhospitable thoughts. “Hell, I don’t care. Whatever’s in the freezer—”

“What?” Mallory grumbled. “No lobster? No filet mignon?”

“Shut up!” Nathan rasped, and then he colored comically and glared at Mallory. “No, Mrs. Jeffries,” he said into the telephone receiver, “I wasn’t talking to you. Well, they usually bring their wives, don’t they?”

“Whip out the satin sheets!” Mallory said, gesturing wildly with a soup spoon in one hand and a tuna fish sandwich in the other.

Nathan gave his wife an evil look and then grinned. “Oh, and one more thing, Mrs. Jeffries—put satin sheets on all the beds.”

Mallory stuck out her tongue and sank into her chair at the table with as much visible trauma as she could manage.

Clearly, Nathan was enjoying her tantrum. She knew that she was behaving like a child but couldn’t seem to stop. He ended the conversation with an additional order, meant to make his wife seethe. “We’ll need lots of towels for the hot tub, too.”

“We’ll need lots of towels for the hot tub, too!” Mallory mimicked sourly. “God forbid that Diane Vincent should have to
drip-dry!
”

Nathan was chuckling as he bid his housekeeper farewell and hung up. “Mellow out, Mall,” he teased, grasping the back of his own chair in both hands and tilting his magnificent head to one side in a mischievous manner. “I’m not planning an orgy, you know.”

“Why should you?” Mallory shot back. “The stage is already set for one!”

Nathan’s eyes darkened, and the mischief faded from their depths, displaced by impatience. His voice was a sardonic drawl, and he made no move to sit down and share the lunch he’d all but ordered Mallory to prepare. “This is enlightening. I didn’t think you
gave
a damn what went on at Angel Cove. You so rarely condescend to put in an appearance!”

Mallory swallowed miserably, all her saucy defiance gone. It was true that she avoided the magnificent house at Angel Cove—there were always too many people there, and there was always too much noise. “Sit down and eat,” she said in a small voice.

Surprisingly, Nathan sat down. There was a short, awkward pause while he assessed the canned soup and slap-dash sandwiches. The fare was no doubt much more appetizing at Angel Cove.

Mallory mourned, feeling wearier than ever, as she dragged her spoon listlessly through her soup. She felt Nathan’s gaze touch her, and involuntarily looked up.

“You didn’t decorate a Christmas tree?” he asked incredulously.

There was no point in trying to skirt the issue; she had known it would come up again. She swallowed the pain that still lingered from that lonely holiday and answered the question honestly. “No.”

“You?” Nathan pressed, no trace of his earlier irritation showing in his handsome, sensitive features.

Mallory nodded. “As far as I’m concerned, Christmas just didn’t happen this year.”

His eyes searched her face. “What about the things I sent? Did you get the package?”

Mallory managed a stiff smile. “I put them in one of the guest rooms, in a closet,” she said, thinking of the large parcel she hadn’t had the heart to open. “You got your gifts, didn’t you? I mailed early—”

“Good Lord,” Nathan breathed, shaking his head. It was clear that he either hadn’t heard her question about the carefully chosen gifts she’d sent to him or didn’t mean to answer. “Which closet?”

Mallory shrugged, though nonchalance was the last thing she felt. “You are a man of many closets,” she remarked lamely.

“Mallory.”

She frowned at him. “The room Pat sleeps in when she stays at the penthouse.”

Nathan looked thoughtful, and a long silence followed. Finally, when both husband and wife had finished pretending to eat, he stood up, scraping his chair against the linoleum floor as he moved. “I don’t think you’re up to greeting the band,” he said in a voice that was gruff and tender at the same time. “Not tonight, at least.”

I’ll bet you were counting on that,
Mallory thought, but she only nodded, relieved that she could deposit the remains of her lunch in Cinnamon’s bowl and spend some time gathering her scattered thoughts and emotions. “Say hello for me,” she mumbled, holding back tears as Nathan bent to brush her cheek briefly with his lips.

When he was gone, Mallory ambled aimlessly into the living room where she went through the contents of several bookshelves and found nothing she wanted to read. She was being stubborn and stupid, and she knew it. Damn, anybody with any guts at all would have gone over to the villa on the other side of the island and—

And what?

Mallory flung out her arms and cried out with self-mocking drama, “God, I’m so depressed!”

There was no answer, of course, but Mallory’s gaze fell on the video recorder hooked up to her portable television set, and she remembered her favorite remedy for depression—old Jimmie Stewart movies.

Five minutes later, she was curled up on the sofa, immersed in the opening, snowy scenes of
It’s a Wonderful Life.

The cold press of Cinnamon’s nose awakened her with a start, and Mallory sat up on the sofa, alarmed. The house was cold and dark, and she knew without making even the most cursory search that Nathan was nowhere within its walls.

Patting the dog’s head in quick reassurance, Mallory scrambled to her feet. She turned on a lamp and turned off the video recorder and the TV and saw by the glass clock on the mantel that it was nearly three in the morning.

Poor Cinnamon hadn’t had any dinner at all.

“I am a dog abuser,” Mallory said sleepily. Then, her thoughts churning, she made her way into the kitchen and quickly refilled Cinnamon’s dishes with food and water.

Where was Nathan?

Mallory found her purse and rummaged through it until she found the medication her doctor had given her when she had been released from the hospital. She took one capsule into her palm, glared at it for a moment, filled a glass with water and assured herself of hours of deep, undisturbed sleep. If Nathan was at Angel Cove, making music with Diane Vincent, she didn’t want to know.

It was late morning when Mallory awakened, and the house was filled with strange sounds and smells. It took her several moments to identify them. She sat up in bed, wide-eyed with disbelief. Turkey? The house definitely smelled of roasting turkey, and the lilting notes of Christmas music filled the air.

Mallory tossed back her covers, frowning in curious consternation. Deck the halls? What in the world was going on?

Wearing only Nathan’s old football jersey, which she had put on in the wee hours of the morning after taking the sleeping medication, she made her way out into the kitchen. A glance at the window revealed yet another snowfall, this one lacking the fury of recent storms.

“Nathan?” Mallory ventured, still frowning. The kitchen table was littered with eggshells, onion skins, bread crumbs, wilted celery leaves and an assortment of dirty mixing bowls. “Nathan!”

The recorded Christmas music came to a sudden and scratchy halt, and Mallory wandered toward the living room to investigate. Her mouth fell open in wonder, and her third call of her husband’s name died on her lips.

Nathan was standing in the corner beside a fully decorated Christmas tree, grinning like a little boy. With a flourish, he flipped a switch, and the tree was suddenly alight with colorful, glistening splendor.

“Merry Christmas, pumpkin,” he said.

Mallory’s sentimental heart twisted within her, and tears of delighted surprise smarted in her eyes. “Nathan McKendrick,” she whispered, “it is the middle of January!”

He smiled, the Christmas tree switch still resting in one hand. “Not in this house it isn’t. Aren’t you going to open your presents?”

Mallory’s blurred gaze dropped to the base of the fragrant evergreen tree and a number of brightly wrapped packages. In that instant, she knew where Nathan had been during the night, and how badly she had misjudged him.

“You went all the way to Seattle!”

Nathan shrugged. “It seemed the logical thing to do.”

“Logical!” Mallory choked, beaming through her tears. And then she raced across the room and flung herself into the arms of her own private Santa Claus.

Their embrace subtly changed the mood. The brief melding of their two bodies sparked a charge that lingered long after Mallory had opened the beautifully wrapped gifts that Nathan had originally mailed from Sydney.

Sitting cross-legged on the hearth rug, still clad in the soft-washed and somewhat shabby red football jersey, Mallory made a sound that fell somewhere between a chuckle and a sob. “There aren’t any presents for you!” she mourned.

He arched one eyebrow and folded his arms, and a wicked grin curved his lips as he assessed her speculatively. “I can think of one,” he teased. “And I can’t wait to unwrap it.”

Mallory turned the color of her football jersey, but her heart sang with the desire this man stirred in her. She looked at the glittering litter surrounding her, the sumptuous gifts, the Christmas tree. Finally, she dared to look at Nathan, who was perched on the arm of the old-fashioned sofa, looking even more handsome than usual in his dark blue velour shirt and gray flannel slacks.

“I love you,” she said, as awed by the intensity of her feelings as she had been the day she first faced them, more than six years before.

Though he was a tall and muscular man, Nathan moved deftly. Within a moment, he was kneeling on the hearth rug, facing Mallory. Gently he traced the outline of her cheek with a warm index finger. His voice, when he spoke, was hoarse with emotion. “I hope you mean that, lady.”

Mallory shifted to her knees with as much grace as possible, and wrapped her arms around Nathan’s neck. Her answering pledge was in the kiss she gave him.

Tenderly, without breaking the kiss, Nathan pressed Mallory backward until she lay supine on the large oval rug. His right hand stroked her collarbone, the hollow of her throat, and then slid beneath the neckline of the jersey to close possessively over one warm, rounded breast. She groaned as his thumb brought the rosy center swiftly to a sensuous peak.

The kiss ended, and Nathan’s lips strayed, warm, to the sensitive place beneath Mallory’s ear and then to the pulsing hollow of her throat. She moaned once again as he drew the neckline of the jersey down far enough to expose a breast.

Idly he surveyed this first sweet plunder of his conquering, as though it were some rare and special confection, to be savored and then consumed slowly. After what seemed like an eternity to Mallory, he lowered his head and nipped gently at the peak awaiting him, causing his wife to writhe. She gasped with shameless pleasure as he softly kissed the pulsing morsel and then tasted it.

He laughed, his breath warm on the tender globe he fully possessed. “You like that, don’t you, pumpkin?” he teased in a rich, baritone voice.

Mallory nodded feverishly, unable to speak.

Nathan circled the pink fruit of her bounty with a warm, tormenting tongue. “Umm,” he murmured as his right hand moved over Mallory’s knee and then beneath the jersey to her firm, satiny thigh.

She squirmed, instinctively parted her legs in an early and desperate surrender. Her hands moved of their own frantic accord, to explore the muscular hardness of his back, beneath his shirt.

He shuddered with pleasure at her touch, and as his mouth closed hungrily over the breast that had grown warm and heavy for him he caressed her inner thighs with gentle fingertips and then tangled them in the nest of curls where sweet, ancient secrets were hidden.

Mallory whimpered as he parted the silken veil to pluck gently at the treasure sheltered there, bringing it to the same throbbing response as her distended nipple. “Yes,” she gasped as he drew the football shirt ever upward, unveiling the spoils of his impending conquest. “Yes—”

And suddenly she was totally bared to him, the jersey flung aside. She was grateful when he wrenched off his shirt and hurled that away, too. She could touch him then, entangle her searching fingers in the crisp dark hair curling on his chest, feel the loving, countering warmth of him.

Easily he lifted her, so that she was sitting on the edge of the sofa. Then, kneeling, he gently parted her knees, stroked the tingling, delicate flesh along her inner thighs. A primitive groan of surrender escaped her as he lifted one of her feet, and then the other, placing them so that the heels were braced on the sofa. This accomplished, he pressed on the insides of her knees until she was totally, beautifully vulnerable to him.