Woman in Red (36 page)

“So how did you and William end up having a relationship?”

“That was my mom’s doing. She thought it was a shame, us boys growing up not knowing their grandpa. She was the one who needled Dad into letting us visit. In the end, though, it was just me who went. My brother always had something going on. Little League, junior varsity, crosscountry. Then once Patrick discovered girls you couldn’t have pried him loose with a crowbar, especially not after he started having sex, and believe me, he didn’t waste any time in that department. His wife was pregnant when they eloped, the two of them barely out of high school.”

“That must have gone over well with your parents,” she commented dryly, thinking about the current situation with Jeremy.

“No kidding. I thought they were going to go through the roof.” Colin shook his head, chuckling as though at some private joke. “You’d have thought the odds of that marriage working were next to none, right? But amazingly, Pat and
Ginny are still together. They just celebrated their twentieth. Their oldest is in college and Mikey just graduated high school.”

“Do you see much of them?”

“Not as much as I should. I was kind of out of commission there for a while. I even went a few years without seeing my grandfather, and by the time I was up to it, it was too late.” A source of deep regret, she could see, from the sorrowful look that crossed his face.

“I didn’t know your grandfather,” she said gently, “but he sounds like the kind of person who’d have understood. The main thing is, you got sober. I’m sure he’d have been happy about that.”

Colin regarded her for a moment, a small, considering smile on his lips. “You know a lot for a normie.” At the puzzled look she shot him, he explained, “As in normal. It’s AA speak for someone who’s not an alcoholic.”

She gave a wry laugh. “I’d hardly describe myself as normal. In fact, I’d say I’m anything but.”

“Maybe that’s what I like about you.”

“Oh? And I thought it was just my cooking.”

His smile widened. “That, too.”

Alice noticed that the shadows had lengthened; the patch of sunlight in which Shep lay had shrunk to the size of a dollar bill, which glowed atop the furry hump he made curled there on the porch. Reluctantly, she said, “I should be going. It’s getting late.”

Colin didn’t attempt to persuade her to stay, which made her wonder if she’d already worn out her welcome. As she rose to go, she felt strangely let down. She hadn’t expected anything to happen—in fact, it was the last thing she needed—but foolishly she’d thought it might. Whatever
she was feeling, it was clearly one-sided. Probably when he looked at her, he saw only a woman who’d spent her youth behind bars and who was now past her prime.

She’d turned and was about to walk away when she felt his touch against her elbow.

“Alice.”

Just that, her name, spoken so softly it might have been a whisper, and she knew. It hadn’t been her imagination after all: He wanted her. The knowledge brought a rush of joy so intense she needed a moment to compose herself before she could turn to face him.

Colin appeared uncertain, as if engaged in some sort of internal struggle. Then a corner of his mouth tipped up in a smile that was both hopeful and guarded. “I was just wondering what you would think if I kissed you.”

Alice was rendered speechless. None of the old flirtatious comebacks came to mind, the coy lines from back in the days when such repartee had come as naturally as breathing. In the end, she simply spoke the truth. “Actually, I’m not even sure I remember how. It’s been a long time.”

“For me, too.” He shoved his hands deep into the pockets of his corduroy trousers, as if suddenly not knowing what to do with them.

All of the perfectly valid reasons with which she’d been attempting to convince herself that now wasn’t the time to be embarking on an affair, building her case as thoroughly as Colin had Jeremy’s, vanished from her mind. She took a deep breath. “Well, then, what do you say we give it a try.”

He took her in his arms, tentatively at first. She closed her eyes as his lips brushed over hers. So far, so good. Then the kiss deepened and all at once she knew she was in trouble. She had the sensation of falling, as if she were tumbling
over and over in midair. Yet, strangely, it didn’t terrify her. Instead, she only found herself wanting more.

She wound her arms around his neck, pulling him close. How was it possible she’d gone so long without this? That she’d shut down to such a degree that even the most basic human needs had come to seem like impossible luxuries? Now the rush of being liberated was almost overpowering.

She sensed that Colin, too, had been unprepared for the suddenness with which they were swept up in . . . whatever this was. His hands that hadn’t known what to do with themselves were all at once taking charge, moving over her, touching her in places she hadn’t been touched in so long his fingers might have been brushing over her bare skin, the sensations were so acute. He kissed her neck, her earlobes, the hollow at the base of her throat, where a runaway pulse would have given her away if her own hands and mouth hadn’t already done so. The greedy kisses of a man who, like her, had been wandering in the desert for too long.

There, amid the lengthening shadows, they each found what they’d been looking for without realizing they’d been in search of it: a place to lay their burdens down, a temporary respite from the ghosts that haunted them. Love didn’t necessarily enter into it. That could come later, she knew. Right now all that mattered was that, for the moment at least, they weren’t alone.

“Shall we go inside?” Colin murmured when they finally drew apart.

“We’d better. Unless we want to give the neighbors something to
really
talk about,” she said, with a breathless little laugh. Never mind the nearest neighbor was half a mile away.

Indoors it was quiet. There was only the slow ticking of the regulator clock on the mantel and a fly buzzing against a windowpane. Colin led the way into the bedroom, a room so full of history that Alice felt it settle over her like the thick down comforter Colin used to cover her as she stretched out on the old sleigh bed.

The last of the sunlight slanting in through the curtains had faded, but Colin didn’t bother to switch on the lamp. In the soft gray light of dusk, he unbuttoned her shirt and eased off her jeans. With each new item of clothing removed it was as if she were being released somehow, from the chains that had held her bound for so long. For once, she wasn’t fretting about what the future would bring. She wasn’t questioning his motives or her own. She was too busy luxuriating in the feast of delicious sensations and in this new, giddy sense of freedom. She gave herself over to it, surrendering herself to his hands, as they moved over her naked body, and to his mouth that had kissed her so tenderly on the lips and was now exploring her with equal tenderness below.

She quickly grew acquainted with his body as well: the long, lean contours of his torso, the hair on his chest that tapered to a downy trail on his belly, his arms that had grown sinewy with muscle from all the outdoor work. Each crevice and plane and ridge was a fascinating new discovery. Colin was bigger than Randy, and adept in ways her husband hadn’t been. In bed, he wasn’t shy. Using his hand to guide hers, he showed her what pleased him and how she could let him please her.

Alice moaned as he pushed two fingers into her, rolling her hips up to bring them deeper into her. She felt as if she could come this way. And then she
was
coming, in waves
so intense it was as though she were being turned inside out. When it was over, she fell back with a gasp. It was a moment before she could catch her breath and whisper, “Now you.”

But Colin pulled away, murmuring, “Next time.” He hadn’t thought to buy condoms, he explained somewhat sheepishly. He hadn’t exactly been planning to seduce her.

“You mean all you thought about was kissing me?” she teased.

“I didn’t say that. But X-rated fantasies can’t get you into trouble,” he replied, nibbling on her ear.

He showed her then just how to pleasure him. An act she found more exciting, in its own way, than if they’d made love. Even then, it seemed they weren’t done. He gently pushed her onto her back and gave her more of what he had earlier, only this time with his mouth. Afterward, Alice could barely move. She felt as though she’d been drugged.

At last she managed to roll onto her side, propping an elbow under her head. Colin was lying on his back, staring pensively up at the ceiling, wearing a satisfied smile, but already she sensed him beginning to withdraw.

Alice touched his shoulder. “You’re not sorry, are you?”

He turned to look at her. “God, no. You?”

She should have felt reassured, yet there’d been something in the quickness of his response and the fleeting expression of guilt that had crossed his face that gave her pause.
He’s thinking about his wife.
Even though she was dead and the woman lying next to him very much alive. More alive, in fact than Alice had felt in years.

She was quick to stow away her own emotions, not wanting to get hurt. “We’re both adults and, as far as I know, unattached.” She aimed for a light, laissez-faire tone.

Alice waited for him to respond, but he’d gone back to staring up at the ceiling, still wearing that pensive look. His thoughts taking him places where she couldn’t follow. At last, he shifted so that he was facing her and reached up to smooth back a stray lock of her hair, saying, “That was amazing. But I should warn you, they don’t encourage this sort of thing in the program, not until you’ve been sober at least a year.”

“It’s not as if we planned it,” she said.

“I know. I just wanted you to be aware of what you’re getting into. I’m not exactly prime relationship material.”

The pleasure Alice had felt abruptly faded. “This is hardly the time for me to be thinking about getting into a relationship,” she said, in the same airy tone, “so you can put your mind at ease on that score, at least. As lovely as that was, I’m not looking for anything permanent.” It was the truth, she told herself, so why did she feel like a liar saying it?

Colin’s expression softened. “Alice—”

She cut him off, peering at her watch and saying, “Will you look at the time? Now I
really
have to be going.”

“So soon?” he asked, but at the same time she could sense that a part of him was relieved, the part that wanted to be alone with his thoughts.

“I’d love to stay, but I have some things to do at home,” she said briskly, bending to retrieve her clothes, which were scattered over the floor. They both got dressed, an awkward silence settling over them. They didn’t speak again until she was on her way out the door.

“Drive safely,” he said, kissing her lightly on the mouth.

Alice nearly laughed out loud. Drive safely? He should have cautioned her about losing her heart.

For a long time after Alice had left, Colin sat on the sofa, absently rubbing his jaw as he stared off into space, mulling over what had just happened. It wasn’t that Nadine wouldn’t have given her blessing, he knew. In fact, whenever they’d played that particular game of
what if
. . . she would always teasingly run through a list of friends whom she thought would make compatible replacement wives.

No, he thought, if anyone had a problem with his being with another woman, it was him. He’d been unprepared for the slew of emotions that Alice had unleashed in him. It was as if, having thought he was dredged dry, no more tears left to be shed, he’d discovered there was a whole new level of grieving to be done.

The only other woman he’d slept with since his wife’s death had been a one-night stand, after too much to drink at an office Christmas party. But the following day, aside from the usual free-floating morning-after shame, there had been none of the complicated feelings he was experiencing now. Because the woman hadn’t been a threat to Nadine’s memory.

Alice, on the other hand, wasn’t just some warm body to distract him from his grief. She meant something to him. What exactly he didn’t know, but one thing was clear: He didn’t want to see her get hurt.

His sponsor had warned him about this.
After the first six months you think you got it made in the shade. That’s when you
really
gotta watch out,
Dave had said. Dave Coffey, a big, tough, former biker with scraggly gray hair in a ponytail and more tattoos than Colin had ever seen on any one person. But he’d known what he was talking about.

Colin had let his guard down, allowed himself to believe he was out of the woods, and there, just as Dave had
predicted, was that old, familiar thirst, rising up in him, with all the intensity of those first weeks in sobriety. His hands trembled with it and his throat was parched. He felt the old St. Vitus’s dance start up in him, too, as if any minute he was going to jump out of his skin.