Storm the Author's Cut (17 page)

"About your engagement. You can't trade a husband for a career. This job is not your life."

She grinned. "I don't plan to give up men, just Ken."

He laughed, reassured. "So I'll have a new program director the beginning of July?"

"You will," she agreed.

"You'll be working with the new announcer, so I'll tell Ellen to give you the applications that come in. Short list the ones that look possible and we'll confer."

"And about today?"

"Stay another hour and wrap it up. John can do the live part and play your recordings."

"Thanks. I'll be back for the six o'clock news."

"Take the rest of the day. We'll get Anna in for the news."

Chapter 11

John and Bev helped her move into the house. Some of it was heavy going—like the big old oak bedroom suite that her father donated from the hotel. Despite the donations of furniture, her father was quietly disapproving of her recent actions—the break-up with Ken and her purchase of the old house on the waterfront.

When they were moving furniture in, a tough-looking logger from the next property came over and offered help. With the help of Kurt's muscles, the borrowed truck was empty in no time. Afterwards, they all sat around the kitchen table eating fried chicken take-out and congratulating themselves on a job well done.

"I was up at the hospital today," Bev told her casually.

"Who's sick?"

"No, I had an appointment with the director of nursing. About a job."

John was smiling, Laurie realized. John and Bev? She'd been so wrapped up in her own life that she'd missed something important. "You're staying in Queen Charlotte?"

"I guess so." Bev glanced up at John, bold and shy at the same time. "I start work next week. I gave my notice to Vancouver General this morning."

"Wow!" She hugged both her friends and they left early amid laughter, leaving Laurie alone in her new home. She felt pleased that she'd be seeing a lot of Bev in future, but inexplicably a little sad.

Alone in her house for the first time, she went out to the woodpile and chopped kindling, then started a fire in the living room fireplace. The flames danced, giving life to the shadows on the walls. Outside, the sun sent red streaks into the eastern sky. Laurie thought of Bev and John in each other's arms. She should be happy, pleased with her freedom and her own home—and she was, but she was lonely, too.

If Luke had been at her side, he might feel what she felt—as he had on that lonely cliff in the midst of the storm, as he had a half mile above the earth in the midst of a rescue search—but Luke wasn't anywhere around. She'd spent the week since she last saw him getting ready for her move, living in the McDonald's house, avoiding Ken and his family, leaving early and working late each day.

She was outside a lot the week following her move, chasing stories down on the waterfront as the salmon fleet came in and went out again. In the course of the week she saw most people she knew, but not Luke.

The new house was a joy to her. She spent her evenings redecorating the main bedroom, putting an old sheet over the oak furniture and stripping the wallpaper. Before two weeks were over, she had the bedroom repapered, deep red velvet curtains and a bedspread in the room—another legacy from her father's hotel. When everything was in place and the curtains hung, the room looked ready for anything.

Ready for a man.

Sleeping alone in that big bed would only make a woman more aware of her isolation. She closed the door on it and for two nights she slept alone in a single bed in the spare bedroom, then told herself she was being silly. The next night she lit a fire in the main bedroom to take the loneliness away, then climbed into the big bed.

She snuggled down alone and reminded herself that she absolutely did not want to share a bed with Ken. She had a vision of Luke sharing the room with her, tending to the fire, shadows from the flames playing over his bare torso. When the flames burned bright, he turned to her and walked slowly across the room to join her.

She thumped the pillow and twisted to her side, seeking sleep. Thoughts of Luke were too vivid. Ken had often complained about her lack of passion. She had read love stories where girls were inflamed with the need of a lover; but until Luke Lucas stepped towards her in the pool on Hot Spring Island, she had not believed any man could make her feel a need great enough that nothing else mattered.

She might tell herself that she had been carried away, influenced by the circumstances, but the moment before Luke touched her, she had remembered Ken clearly—and had pushed the memory away. On Hot Spring Island, the earth had moved for her, throwing her off balance, and she had welcomed it.

Given enough time she could grow a shell to protect herself from the temptation of Luke. As for the lonely nights, a cat might be a nice idea. If Luke weren't staying at the McQuades', she drive over to ask if they had a kitten needing a home, but if she were sensible, she wouldn't run the risk of seeing Luke again yet.

On Laurie's second week as a single woman living alone, Nat invited her to Sunday dinner, a cheerful feast eaten amidst Violet's artwork and Nat's scattered magazines that covered every topic from computers to yacht racing. The evening was good therapy and made her realize that Ken had been a part of her life for so long that breaking up with him had abruptly ended her social life.

Time to make some changes.

When Luke finally came to see her one evening, she had just finished her supper dishes. The fire was lit in the living room and the curtains open to the ocean. Laurie was standing at the window when she saw a truck drive in and park just behind her car. Luke got out and let a beautiful German shepherd dog out of the pick-up.

She opened the door. Luke stood beside his truck, smiling a little, holding the leash out to her.

"What's his name?" she asked.

"Max. He's a pure bred. He's just a year old, so he's pretty lively. He's friendly, but he looks serious enough that I don't think anyone is going to take a chance on tangling with him."

"Thank you." It wasn't enough, but she didn't know what else to say. Max nuzzled against her and she hugged him, feeling his warm body against her. "Come in, both of you. Would you like to see the house?"

When Luke stepped inside, she closed the door firmly behind him and stupidly stood staring at him, feeling about fourteen and uncertain.

"The house?" he said gently.

"Of course. This way."

He paused at the living room window. "This is nice. You must spend hours here, watching the ocean."

The dog Max walked to the fireplace and paced a circle on the hearthrug before lying down.

"I light a fire in the evenings and watch the ocean when there's a moon."

Luke stood at the window, turned away to watch the water. He was a silhouette outlined by the sunlight coming in the window—only form, with no detail, as she had seen him that night on Hot Spring Island.

"I've got redecorating plans," she told his back. "The wallpaper is old and it doesn't go with the furniture—but first I'm going to do the kitchen. I'll show you."

She busied herself making coffee while he examined the kitchen and made suggestions for the new cupboards she was talking of having installed.

"And the rest of the house?" he asked.

"Just bedrooms upstairs, and a study downstairs—or it will be a study when I've done with it. It needs a lot, and I don't know where to start. It will all take time, of course." It was a project that might take years, but the house was comfortable, her very own home.

"Shall we have our coffee in the living room? The fire is nice." She wasn't going to show him upstairs, couldn't stand in the doorway of the main bedroom while he looked in at that bed. She led the way firmly to the sofa near the fireplace.

They drank their coffee as the sun set. Luke sat on the sofa; Laurie, crosslegged on the carpet on the other side of the coffee table from him.

"How's Yvette?"

"I flew her back to Prince Rupert and she caught a cruise ship to Alaska."

"She's in Alaska now?"

"If she didn't fall overboard."

"You don't care?"

"We're not buddies, Laurie. We've spent the regulation times together that cousins do—family Christmases, weddings and the like."

Laurie remembered how they had looked in the dining room, the beautiful, tall woman with her hand intimately on Luke's arm.

"She's very beautiful."

"When I was ten, she smashed my model airplane to bits because I wouldn't let her fly it. Anyone who does a thing like that can't possibly be beautiful."

"No," she agreed, crazily pleased. "Tell me—"

"How's Ken?"

"He's told his friends what an unfeeling bitch I am. I've lost some friends—people I thought were friends."

He set his cup down on the table, looking intently at her. "Regrets?" he asked.

"I'm sorry that I hurt him. I'm not sorry it's over."

Luke set his cup on the table. Her hands were circled around her own cup and he took it from her, setting it beside his own.

"Any other regrets?" he asked softly.

Her hand trembled in his. "I don't know," she whispered.

His thumb moved over the back of her hand. She remembered his touch on her hands, her back, and her breasts. She remembered, too, his skin under her palms, the tickle as the hair of his chest curled around her fingers.

If she were on Hot Spring Island again tonight, would she turn away from Luke, walk away from his arms?

"No," she said finally. "I don't regret it."

She pulled her hands away when she realized her words sounded like an invitation, She could not regret the incomparable experience of making love with Luke, but Luke in her bed, here in her home, was something she didn't think she could handle.

He let her hands go, leaned back in the corner of the sofa.

"More coffee?" She didn't wait for an answer, but got to her feet and took his cup.

When she came back, he was reading a book he'd found on the coffee table.

"Have you heard from your father?" she asked.

Luke turned another page in the book. "Yvette must have called him right away. He sent me a telegram demanding I fly down and see him, gave me date and time and flight number."

That didn't sound very hopeful. You couldn't end a two-year-old estrangement by walking in and starting to give orders.

"Did you answer?"

He grimaced. "It gets kind of exhausting, being at war with my own father. In the end I 'phoned him. After all these years, I thought we might have been able to talk, but I'm beginning to doubt it."

"What happened?"

He shrugged, closed the book with a snap. "He wants me back in the business."

She tried to visualize his father. After all this time, after the bitterness of their parting, he must want badly to establish contact again. "I wonder why he sent a telegram instead of calling—or coming here. Maybe he was afraid you wouldn't want to see him. If he sent a telegram, at least he didn't have to hear you say no to him."

Luke's smile was bitter. "I doubt it, Laurie. I don't think he gives a damn what I have to say. Let's talk about something else,"

"What about your mother, Luke? Tell me about her."

He moved restlessly to his feet, going to the window. "Not tonight. Tell me what you've been doing the last few weeks. Have you started your new job yet?"

"I'm getting there. We've been setting up interviews for next week—for the new announcer."

"Won't you miss being a roving reporter?"

"I really want to get my fingers into the decision making part of the station, but I don't want to spend my days the way my predecessor did. I'm hoping I can mould the job to suit my own temperament. Of course that means molding Nat, so I hope he'll see it my way, too."

When Max whimpered and walked to the door, they put on his leash and went out to walk on the beach. It was dark, but there was moonlight shining on the water, lighting the beach enough for them to find their way. The waves surged gently on the beach and they moved slowly, talking without tension. Laurie freed Max from his leash, then Luke threw sticks for the excited dog to chase.

"What have you been doing this last couple of weeks, Luke?"

"Flying." He bent to pick up the stick from Max. "I flew to Vancouver last week to pick up a new plane—another Goose."

"Business is good?"

"Pretty good. I've picked up a subcontract for a daily scheduled flight to the mainland."

She whistled, impressed. The scheduled flights were controlled by the Department of Transport and, strictly speaking, belonged to the large airlines. However, small routes like that from Haida Gwaii to the mainland were not always profitable for a large plane. Consequently, the larger airlines sometimes subcontracted the routes to smaller companies who could operate profitably with fewer passengers.

When the moon went behind a cloud they turned back, finding their way by feel, holding hands, stumbling in the dark and laughing at Max as he circled them excitedly. They found her house by the light on the porch. Luke kept her hand, walking her to the door.