Chapter one
I’ve never done one wild thing in my entire life,” Susan
Pettiford said aloud to herself, as she left the doctor’s office
that early October morning, shading her eye from the bright sun,
“but there’s a first time for everything. I’m going to know what
it’s really like, if it’s the last thing I do.”’
As cold as it was that mid-January morning, perspiration
streamed from her scalp to her chin, and she rolled down the window
of her bright-red Taurus, eased away from the curb and headed for
the apartment she’d sub-let a few days earlier. What a blow! She’d
come back to Woodmore, North Carolina after an absence of sixteen
years because her late father’s only sister had died and left her
heir to all that she had, including a house. Settling in a town of
thirty-five or forty-thousand inhabitants wasn’t her idea of a life,
but fate seemed to be making decisions for her.
Pains shot through her middle, and she tried to ignore
it as, for months, she’d tried to overlook her other symptoms. She
thought of going back to New York and seeing a doctor there, but she
knew the diagnosis was correct, knew it before she went to the
specialist. Driving fast, as usual, she put the thirty-five miles
that separated Winston-Salem from Woodmore, North Carolina quickly
behind her. Inside her rented apartment, she dropped herself on the
over-sized leather sofa that brought to her mind the den of a
self-assured man. Fortunately, she wouldn’t be staying there for
long.
Susan leaned forward, braced her elbows on her thighs
and cupped her chin with her palms. What a mess! What an awful mess!
Her life, all that she’d hoped for and dreamed of right down the
drain! Had a sigh ever seemed so ominous? The breath that seeped
out of her had the sound of agony, and of hopelessness, too.
She got up, opened a crate and let its contents spill
out on the bedroom floor. Then, she wrapped her hands around the
purple-velvet box that she bought with her baby-sitting money when
she was thirteen, opened it and looked at the four little dolls, two
female and two male—symbols of the children she hoped one day to
have—went into the kitchen and tossed the box into the trash bag..
Seemingly drawn to the floor-length mirror in the narrow
hall, she stopped and stared at herself. She looked the same. She
felt the same. But she wasn’t the same. In two weeks, she’d be half
a woman. Thirty-four years old and unable to bear children.
“Count your blessings,” the doctor had said. “I just
told a thirty-year-old woman that she has breast cancer.”
“I hope you announced that to her with more compassion
than you just showed me,” she thought, but didn’t say.
Susan gathered her resolve, strode to the telephone and
dialed the doctor. “This is Susan Pettiford,” is there anything you
haven’t told me?” she asked when he took the phone. “I want to know
everything right now.”
“Well,’ you’ll have hot flashes, but we can give you
something for that. Some women have difficulty with sex, but that’s
partly a matter of attitude. Of course—“
She interrupted him. “And partly a matter of what else?”
“Oh, it may not happen in your case. We’ll cross that
bridge when we get to it.”
She hung up. Dissatisfied, hurt and angry. It wasn’t his
body. She wished she knew someone who’d had had a hysterectomy and
with whom she could discuss it.
While eating her lunch of milk and a peanut butter and
raspberry sandwich, she remembered that the lawyer for her aunt’s
estate had invited her to his wife’s bir6thday party that night. At
least it’ll take my mind off that operation. She wanted to wear red
to the party, but decided that flamboyance wasn’t in order, and
chose a pale-green chiffon short evening dress. And silver
accessories. Since she didn’t know how the local women dressed, she
decided not to wear her mink coat—a mark of distinction in New
York—and put on her beige-cashmere coat instead.
She saw him the minute she entered the room. She
couldn’t have missed him for her towered over everyone there, and
his persona commanded attention. What was more, he saw her, and she
was glad she’d left that red dress home. Almost immediately, the man
headed toward her with their host at his elbow.
` “I’m so glad you could come, Ms. Pettiford,” Mark
Harris, Susan’s lawyer said. “This is Lucas Hamilton, a close
friend and former classmate. Lucas, Susan is an interior decorator,
so I expect the two of you will find that you have much in common. “
The bulk of Lucas Hamilton blotted out all else within
the perimeters of her vision, and she had no choice but to gaze into
the eyes of one of the most handsome men she’d ever met.”
“Mark said you’re new in town. Would you have dinner
with me tomorrow, Sunday? I’d like to get to know you.”
She looked around for Mark and saw that he was on the
other side of the room. “Why does he think we have so much in
common?”
“I suppose because I’m an architect. You didn’t say
whether you would or wouldn’t have dinner with me Sunday evening.”
A week earlier, she would have shimmered with delight,
but now, she couldn’t encourage a man’s attention. She had no right.
She laid back her shoulders and got a firm grip on her resolve.
“That’s right. I didn’t. I’m sure we’ll have other opportunities to
see each other. This is, after all, a small town.”
Both of his eyebrows shot up, and she’d have sworn that
his chin jutted out. “As you wish,” he said. “It’s been
interesting.” She watched him walk away, and it struck her that
Lucas Hamilton was unaccustomed to rejection for any reason or by
anyone. Oh, well. He can’t possibly be as disappointed as I am. The
kind of man I’ve always wanted in my life, and I have to let him go.
She spent a few minutes talking with a local minister, who
introduced himself as the Reverend Gilford Ripple, and with Sharon
Hairston-McCall, publisher of The Woodmore Times. An
interesting woman. The idea dawned that life in Woodmore might be
more rewarding that she’d imagined, and she began to mingle with the
guest, hoping to find among them a future friend.
#
Sitting in the comfort of his cathedral-ceiling living
room later that night, Lucas Hamilton reflected that he’d just had
his first dusting off by a female, a woman who interested him as
much as any woman he’d ever met. She didn’t even try to make it
palatable, didn’t offer an excuse. He’d been thirteen years old when
he asked his mother’s best friend what was so great about sex—and
he’d asked her because he’d caught her staring at his crotch on more
than one occasion. She’d asked if he really wanted to know, and when
he said yes, she opened her arms, spread her legs and gave him what
he now regarded as a degree in the techniques of lovemaking. And she
eagerly polished his skill at it whenever he thought he needed it.
To her credit, the first time she saw him with a girl, she smiled,
waved and never made another move toward him. He’d often wondered
why he hadn’t become attached to her. His approach to her was the
first he’d made to a female and, in twenty-two years, he hadn’t had
a single refusal—until tonight. Susan Pettiford intrigued him, but
not sufficiently to cause him to chase her. He had more important
things to do with his time.
Lucas leaned back in the recliner and let his gaze roam
over the house he designed to his own taste and for his own comfort.
He had done well as an architect, had carved a name for himself in
Woodmore and as far away as Nashville. But he knew he wouldn’t be
satisfied until he wielded more influence and his name carried more
prestige than that of Calvin Jackson, the man who sired him. He
wasn’t after the man’s blood. His mother chose to have a four-year
affair with a married man, but she had no right to deny that man
access to his son and to withhold from her son a father’s care and
nurturing. But that did not absolve Calvin Jackson; in thirty-five
years, the man hadn’t once reached out to him. The short distance of
twenty miles separating Danvers, where Calvin lived, and Woodmore
made that seem ridiculous. He’d never spoken with his father, and if
he ever did, he wouldn’t be the one to initiate the conversation.
He got up and tuned the radio to the station that played
“golden oldies,” and both of his eyes widened when he heard “If you
knew Susie, like I know Susie.” Laughter poured out of him. “Well,
I’ll be damned. That gal must be a little witch,” he said aloud and
turned off the radio.
#
If Susan had been a witch, she would have ordered her
life differently. The morning after meeting Lucas, she set about
trying to make a liar out of the doctor who gave her that
heart-rending diagnosis. “I’m not taking this lying down,” she said
to herself and dialed the office of a famous endocrinologist in
Baltimore, Maryland.
“What will this do to my hormones?” she asked him. “Will
I grow facial hair, and what about sex?”
“Of course, it will affect your hormones, and how it
affects sex varies. I doubt you’ll grow any facial hair. If you have
problems, make an appointment to come in and see me.”
Thanks for nothing. Now what? She answered the
telephone and heard the voice of the lawyer for her aunt’s estate.
“If you want to sell your aunt’s house, I have a prospective buyer.
I ought to tell you that your aunt enjoyed a bit of notoriety. At
forty-eight, she was one of the best looking women in town, and the
local men paid due homage. I suspect more than one person will want
that house, so you may wish to take your time about selling it.”
She thanked him and hung up. She’d always known of her
aunt’s beauty, and now, she suspected that her unmarried relative
enjoyed a full and fulfilling sex life, something that wasn’t
guaranteed her. Indeed, it would probably be her fate that the
operation would leave her asexual. Frigid.
She was not a virgin, but the earth had never moved for
her, although she’d given more than one man an opportunity to create
an eruption. The most she’d experienced was a few tremors, and she
was damned if she’d settle for that.
I’m not undergoing that operation until I have myself
one mind-blowing affair with a man I can dream about for the rest of
my life. But how was she going to manage that in a place where
she knew exactly six people, including two men one of whom was
married.
“I shouldn’t have been so quick to brush off Lucas
Hamilton. He’s not self-assured for nothing. The man wears his
success with women the way a peacock wears his feathers. And Lord,
you could drown in his eyes.”
A week later, still in a quandary, she lifted the
telephone receiver from its cradle and dialed information. “Could
you please give me the number for Lucas Hamilton, the architect?”
Her fingers shook as she jotted down the number. She didn’t think he
would turn her down, because his curiosity wouldn’t let him. She
dialed the number, and as she waited, she could neither breathe nor
swallow.
“Lucas Hamilton’s office,” the clipped-female voice,
which Susan suspected was automated, said.
“I’m Susan Pettiford. May I please speak with Mr.
Hamilton?” She thought her teeth chattered, but she wasn’t sure. At
the moment, nothing seemed real.
“This is Hamilton.” She nearly dropped the phone. What
would she say to him? Gathering her courage, she let out a long
breath and began. “Mr. Hamilton, I hope you remember me, I’m—“
He interrupted her. “I certainly do, Miss Pettiford, and
considering the reception I received when we met last week, I’m
surprised to hear from you.”
So far, not good. Best to brazen it out. “I can imagine,
but I’ve spent an entire week without speaking to anybody except
salespeople and, well, I’ve been led to believe that small-town
people are friendly, and I—“
“A city of forty thousand isn’t exactly a hamlet, Miss
Pettiford.”
May as well cut to the chase. “Look…will you forgive me
for being foolish and have dinner with me Saturday evening? It’s
rumored that I’m a great cook.”
“Will I…What?”
“Have dinner with me. I promise to pull out the stops.”
In the lengthy silence, perspiration dampened her from
her scalp to her waist. As she prepared herself to find a gracious
way out of it, he said, “My curiosity won’t let me decline. I’ll be
delighted. Where do you live?”
She gave him her address. “Seven thirty?”
“I’ll be there. Thank you.”
“Till then,” she said and barely managed to hang up
without dropping the receiver. As she had suspected, Lucas Hamilton
had the manners of a polished gentleman, but beneath it she detected
a core of steel. She’d better be careful
In the three days that followed, Susan did her best to
make the apartment that she sub-let furnished more like her own
environment. Being an interior decorator, there wasn’t much about
that furnished apartment that she liked. She softened the masculine
appearance of the living room with an antique gold and brown African
print that she threw across the sofa, then added burnt-orange
colored velvet cushions, a large fichus plant, and placed a crystal
vase of tea roses on the glass coffee table.
Saturday finally arrived, and after preparing a
seven-course meal worthy of Buckingham Palace, Susan set a table
equal to the standard of the meal, pampered her body, and dressed in
a deceptively simple sheath. The long-sleeved, high neck
burnt-orange jersey dress would have seemed prim, but for its color
and a right side seam that was slit from ankle to mid-thigh. With
nothing beneath the dress but bikini panties and a half-bra of
matching color, she figured that she was displaying her assets to
their best advantage. Gold bangles in her ear lobes softened her
pixie hair cut.
At ten minutes before the appointed time, she stopped
pacing the floor, remembered to dab perfume behind her ears, to
lower the living room lights, put some soft music on the CD player
and take ice cubes out of the refrigerator. What else had she
forgotten? Too late for that. The door bell rang, and as if she’d
been soldered to the floor, she couldn’t move her feet. The bell
rang again, this time with greater urgency, or at least so it seemed
to her, and chills plowed through her body. Could she go through
with it? What if he didn’t fall for it?
The bell rang again, and to her, it sounded like a
warning. Maybe he would leave. She shook herself out of her trance,
rushed to the door and opened it.
“Hi.”
His eyebrows shot up, and she knew that the apparent
primness of her dress had registered with him. “Hi. I thought for a
while there that you had changed your mind and hadn’t bothered to
tell me.”
She forced a smile. Forced it because the man’s
commanding presence unnerved her; not because she lacked confidence,
but because she disdained trickery, was about to engage in it, and
his bearing said he wouldn’t tolerate it.
“I was raised better than that,” she told him. “Come on
in.”
When he handed her a large bouquet of yellow roses and a
bottle of Moet and Chandon champagne, it was her turn to raise an
eyebrow. “Thanks you, Lucas,” she said, trying out his first name.
“Yellow roses are my favorite flower, and I love champagne. We’ll
have it for desert.”
“I’m afraid it isn’t chilled.”
She smiled to put him at ease, but if truth be told, he
seemed at home; it was she who needed bolstering. “By the time we
get around to desert, it will be good and cold,” she assured him.
“Have a seat.” She led him to the living room, left and went into
the kitchen to refrigerate the champagne, and when she returned, he
stood where she’d left him.
His words were the only evidence that he’d watched her
walk away from him, but those words were revealing indeed. “I hope
you don’t mind my telling you that your dress had me fooled. I
thought you’d shrouded yourself for protection.”
Protection, eh? She sat on the sofa and motioned for him
to sit in the chair opposite her. And in spite of her effort to
appear dignified, laughter took possession of her until she bordered
on hysterics. After trying unsuccessfully to pry from her the reason
for her amusement, Lucas went into the kitchen, got a glass of water
and brought it to her.
“Drink this.” She took a few swallows, and he repeated
the question. “Now, what was so funny?”
That was the opening line she needed. “I guess it was
the idea that I needed to protect myself from you. Tell you the
truth, the suggestion seemed ludicrous.”
His face darkened into a frown. “So I’m harmless? I’d
like to know your other thoughts about me.”
“She ignored the remark. “I seem to have forgotten my
manners. What would you like to drink.”
She knew she hadn’t fooled him when a half smile eased
across his face. “Usually bourbon and water, but—“
“Bourbon and water it will be,”
They had already begun to fence with each other, and she
didn’t think that was the route to her goal. She’d have to change
the mood. Susan put a dish of hot canapés on a tray along with the
drinks—bourbon for Lucas and white wine for her—and went back to
him.
“I hope you like these. In fact, I’m hoping you will
like everything I cooked for you and that you’re hungry.”
He smiled again, and she was beginning to get the
feeling that she would never get used to it, that his smile would
always unsettle her. Maybe it wasn’t his smile, but her guilt that
caused her discomfort. She almost wished she hadn’t started the
charade.
“As long as you don’t give me chitterlings of chicken
livers, we’ll get along.” He said. “A good home-cooked meal isn’t
something I get every day.” He tasted the miniature kish. “If this
is a sample of your culinary talent, I can hardly wait for the
meal.”
He leaned back in the chair, sipped the bourbon (she had
bought the best, and she sensed he was aware of that and appreciated
it), and focused his gaze on her until it seemed to burn her skin.
“Why did you invite me to dinner?”
The question came as a surprise, for she hadn’t
anticipated it and had no ready answer. She did her best to give him
a reasonable explanation. “In the two weeks that I’ve been back in
Woodmore, I’ve met six people, four women, my married lawyer and
you. I was lon…I didn’t feel like spending this kind of evening with
any of the other five, and I suspected you’d be a good
conversationalist and that you would enjoy a well presented, gourmet
meal.” She ignored his slightly dropped jaw. “Am I right?”
“You certainly are candid. Where did you live before you
came here, and what did you do?”
“I lived in New York City where I was principal interior
decorator for Yates, Bateman, Yates & Crown.”
He sat forward. “So that’s why your name is so familiar!
I know that firm of architects well. Are you married?”
“No. If I was, I wouldn’t cheat on my husband.”
After staring at her for a minute, a grin floated over
his face. “You would call what we’re doing here this evening
cheating?”
She wanted to kick herself for that slip. “Well, you
know what I mean.”
“I assume your relatives live in The Big Apple, too.” He
savored another sip of bourbon.
“No, indeed. My father died some years ago, and not long
after my brother married a Swedish woman. He lives in Stockholm with
her and their two children. My mother joined the Peace Corps about
five years ago and, ever since, she’s been saving Africa.”
Concern etched the contours of his face, mirroring his
compassion for her. “That’s too bad. Do you ever see her?”
“I’ve visited her twice, once in Nigeria and once in The
Gambia. Right now, she’s in Sierra Leone.”
“I see. Maybe she needs to help others. By the way, why
would the chief interior decorator for Yates and company architects
leave New York and settle in a small town like this one?”
“Because I don’t have a life there. Usually, I work days
begin at eight thirty in the morning and end at midnight. Most Yates
clients are wealthy, and when they hire you, they think they own
you. If Miss Importance gets an idea a midnight, she thinks she has
the right to call me and discuss it right then. I’ve proved that I
can handle the job; now, I want to smell the flowers sometimes. My
aunt’s will is what made me consider moving back here.”
“You’ll find plenty to do here, because there isn’t a
top decorator in this area. What does your mother think of your
plans?”
“Oh, she lives in a different world. For her, living
quarters are a matter of providing tin rather than mud structures
for poor women, so that their houses won’t be washed away in the
rainy season. By the way, Where’s your family?”
He appeared to withdraw, and she wished she hadn’t asked him.
“You’re not married, are you?” He’d have to be deaf, stupid or both
to have missed the anxiety in her voice. She might be conniving, but
she would not knowingly sleep with a married man, not even if that
were the only means of realizing her body’s potential.
If he noticed her concern, he didn’t make it obvious.
“If I was, I wouldn’t be here. I also don’t cheat.” He grinned at
that, but a somberness quickly settled over him like fog over a
mountain lake. “My mother lives on the outskirts of Woodmore, and I
see her from time to time, although I make certain that she doesn’t
want for anything.
She put her glass on the end table beside the sofa and
sat forward. “Don’t you like your mother?”
“I like her. The problem is that I resent her. I’m the
product of a long-term affair that she had with Calvin Jackson, a
married man, and she wouldn’t let him have any contact with me. I
know who he is and what he looks like, but I have never exchanged a
word with him. Every child deserves a father’s guidance and
nurturing, regardless of the relationship between his parents.
“But you’re an adult. Couldn’t you have contacted him?”
He leaned back in the big over-stuffed leather chair and
draped his right knee over his left one, comfortable with himself
and his surroundings. “Of course I could have, but he’s the father,
not I, and if he makes no effort to have me as a part of his life,
fine with me. I’m not going to beg him, and I don’t lose any sleep
over it, either.”
Without thinking, she reached across the coffee table
and patted his hand. “I’m so sorry. My Father was everything to me.”
The raw need that she saw in his eyes startled her, and she jumped
up. “I’d better serve the dinner. It takes a long time to go through
seven courses.”
Lucas savored the first course, quenelles of scallops
with Dugléré sauce, without saying a word. After swallowing the last
morsel of it, he put his fork on his plate and looked straight at
her. “If the rest of the meal is up to this standard, it may take
the sheriff to get me out of here.”
She thanked God for her brown skin; if she had been
lighter, the hot blood in her face would have betrayed her. “I’m
glad you enjoyed it,” she said in barely a whisper.
“That is an understatement.” His deep, velvet baritone
gave his words a seductiveness that she assumed he didn’t intend to
convey.
She was no expert at the seduction of a man, and she hoped the food
and wine would do their job. After the courses of sherry-garnished
cream of wild mushroom soup; peach sorbet; filet mignon, lemon-roast
waxy potatoes and asparagus that followed, he rested one elbow on
the table, fingered his chin and gazed at her. “If you tell me you
feed every stranger you entertain this way, I won’t believe you.”
If he could play hardball, so could she. “Did I tell you
that? When I do something, no matter what it is, I do it properly.
And you can write that down.” She didn’t look at him, but busied
herself clearing the table. When she returned with a green salad,
she noticed a difference in his demeanor, a big cat subdued by the
delights of fresh meat.
“That was impolite,” he told her, “and I regret saying
it. You didn’t have to go to so much trouble, but you did, and I’m
enjoying the fruits of it.” Charm radiated from him, and she told
herself to beware. She meant to be the seducer, not the seduced
whose reward for the evening was a kiss on the cheek and an
invitation to dine with him in a first-class restaurant. An
assortment of French and English cheeses, French bread and a smooth
red wine followed the salad. When she stood to clear the table, he
said, “I can do this,” gathered the dished and headed for the
kitchen.
This is working too well. I hope I’m not headed for a let down.
When she took the brandy Alexander pie out of the refrigerator and
put it on a plate, he whistled sharply. “I guess this is where I
opened the champagne,” he said, opened the refrigerator door, got
the cup towel that hung on the over door, wrapped it around the
champagne bottle and eased the stopper out without making a sound,
though she couldn’t see how he accomplished it.
“I see you’ve opened a lot of those,” she said. “The
champagne flutes are up there.” She pointed to a cabinet door, and
when he reached for the glasses, his hand managed to brush her
shoulder. “Let’s have this in the living room,” she said,
calculating that she would have to sit beside him on the sofa. She
put the pie on the coffee table, and as soon as he was seated, she
said, “How foolish of me. I have to get plates and some forks,” rose
and walked back to the kitchen, giving him an eye-full of her back
action. Music. That would help get his mind on sex. She sat down
beside him, picked up the remote control and within seconds, the
haunting music of “Paradise” filled the room. She cut the pie,
served it and waited while he poured the champagne.
“Thanks for the most intriguing evening and the most
delicious meal I’ve ever eaten,” he said raising his glass. “The
first course alone would have kept me happy for days.”
“But you haven’t tasted the desert.”
“Any desert I get will be an anticlimax.”
Her nerves seemed to rearrange themselves throughout her
body. She didn’t know what he meant, and she feared the answer if
she asked him. He tasted the pie. “This pie is out of sight, and I’m
convinced now that you meant to seduce me to putty.”
“Wh…why would I do that?”
“Beats me.” He took a long sip of champagne. “Probably
for the same reason you’re wearing this go-there-come-here dress. I
don’t know whether to make a pass at you or recite the Twenty-third
psalm.”
When she replied, “I’m sure you can figure it out,” he
put his glass on the table, stood and extended his hand. “Dance with
me. I’ve always loved this song,” he said of Percy Faith’s recording
of “Diane.”
Susan didn’t need to be coaxed, but she had begun to
like the man, and she wondered if she would some day regret what
she was increasingly certain would happen between them. She wanted
it, didn’t she? Hadn’t she planned it meticulously? She considered
backing out, but his arm eased around her, strong and masculine, and
pulled her to within inches of his body. And they danced. Danced
until that song and then another one ended. Danced as if they had
always danced. She didn’t know when she rested her head on his
shoulder and his other arm went around her, snug and comfortable as
if it had a right to her body.
“Do you realize what’s happening here?” he asked after a
while. She did, but she didn’t answer. “Did that champagne go to
your head?” he asked her.
“I’m cold sober,” she told him, in a frank admission
that she wanted him.
“So am I. I don’t want to leave now, but I will if you
tell me to go.”
“I want some more champagne.”
He tipped up her chin and stared into her eyes. “Don’t
you realize that I want you?”
With her gaze on his mouth, she wet her lips with the
tip of her tongue, and he bent to them. She welcomed him with lips
parted, took him in. No longer was it a matter of seducing him and
using him for her own gain, to have one completely satisfying sexual
experience before undergoing a surgical menopause at the age of
thirty-four. No longer was he merely a tool, a means of achieving a
coveted goal.
Tall, handsome, trim, intelligent, educated, wealthy,
charismatic and sophisticated, Lucas Hamilton was precisely what a
woman wanted in a man. But in that evening, she had discovered
strength in him, compassion, pain, and a vulnerability that ignited
in her a need to nurture him. Her arms gripped his shoulders, and he
tightened his hold on her until her nipples hardened against his
chest.
He stopped the kiss. “Where do you sleep?” She lowered
her gaze, lest he see the fear in her eyes. Suppose it didn’t work.
But in another ten days, it would be too late.
“Down the hall,” she murmured.
Minutes later, he stood looking down at her as she lay
on her bed clothed only in the burnt-orange bikini panties and
half-bra. “You are one beautiful woman. I wanted you the first time
I saw you.” With that, he shed his clothes and was soon holding her
tightly in his arms as if he thought she would escape. He surprised
her with his sensitivity and gentleness, testing and adoring until
she wanted to scream for him to join them. When at last he did, it
was a home coming. She didn’t know whether the storm howled
outside, in the bedroom or merely raged within her like nothing she
had ever imagined. She hit bottom before he hurled her into the
stratosphere and hung there with her until she thought her heart
would stop.
Half an hour later, he raised his head from her breast,
stared into her eyes for a second, and then kissed her. But it was a
kiss mean to soothe rather than to communicate, and she knew it. He
separated them, and she turned on her side, away from him, overcome
with emotion as tears trickled down her cheeks. She buried her face
in the pillow to muffle her sobs, but she couldn’t control the
jerking motions of her body. His hands gripped her shoulders.
“My Lord! Are you crying? Look at me!” His voice carried
an urgency and something akin to fear. Or was it concern? “I said
look at me, Susan.” She forced herself to open her eyes and try to
force a smile, though she failed at the latter.
“Are you sorry?” he asked her.
“It isn’t that. It’s…I didn’t know I could feel like
that. I’m…just overwhelmed.”
He exhaled deeply, clearly relieved. “I know what you
mean.”
“Thank you for being so…so wonderful,” she whispered and
hugged him.
He kissed her quickly, almost perfunctorily, rolled over
and locked his hands behind his head. “This is a night I’ll never
forget, Susan, and I have a feeling that you won’t either. I have a
thousand questions, but I’m not going to ask any of them, because I
don’t want to spoil this for either of us.”
“I have questions, too, Lucas, but they’re questions
that I have to ask myself.”
“I don’t doubt it. Will you be upset if I leave? I need
to come to terms with this, and I can’t do that unless I’m alone.”
“No. I want you to know that I enjoyed every minute
we’ve been together, and that I don’t regret anything.”
“I hope you feel that way when you wake up tomorrow
morning. I’ve enjoyed being with you, and I mean that. I’ll let
myself out.”
When she heard the door close, she got out of bed,
locked the door and went into the living room to clear the coffee
table, but discovered that he had done that. In the kitchen, she
found that he put the plates, forks and glasses in the sink and the
remainder of the pie in the refrigerator. She poured a full glass of
wine, went into the living room and sat down.
She got what she wanted, but would she be able to live
with it? How was she going to reside in Woodmore, see that man and
know that he thought her different from the woman she was, that his
estimation of her would likely be unflattering. He’d said nothing
about seeing her again, and he probably wouldn’t because he had
promised nothing. And she would rather not see him. What on earth
had she been thinking? She gulped down the wine, showered and went
to bed. Would she have been better off not knowing how a thorough
loving made a woman feel?
#
When Lucas stepped outside the four-unit apartment
building in which Susan lived, he turned, locked his hands to his
hips and gazed up at her windows. He didn’t expect to see her at
one; he needed to assure himself that he’d been there, that he was
not hallucinating, that he’s eaten that meal and then had the most
satisfying sexual experience that he could recall. He walked up
Eighth Street East to his car, got in it and drove to his home on
Parkway Street facing Pine Tree Park But he didn’t want to go inside
where, alone and cloistered within familiar walls, events of the
preceding four hours would take over his mind and emotions. After
putting the car in the garage, he walked around to the back of the
house and sat on the deck.
Lucas regarded himself as a careful, cautious man who
did not act impulsively, and he could find no reason or excuse for
having allowed Susan Pettiford to seduce him. She attracted him, but
she didn’t bowl him over. He shook his head as if in wonder. What
was more, she had planned to seduce him, and by the time she served
that stupefying pie, he suspected as much. Still, like a lemming
bound for the sea, he let himself coast right into it. A woman with
her looks could find an eligible man any day, so why had she done
that with a man she’d seen once and rejected summarily?
He got up and leaned against a post. Something was
rotten in Denmark. He’d hardly gotten inside of her when he realized
she had far less experience than a man would expect of a woman her
age. Thank God he’d had the presence of mind to use a condom.
Shivers raced through him. He hadn’t remembered to examine the
condom afterwards to determine whether it broke. He flexed his right
shoulder in a quick shrug. Even though he didn’t know her, he
doubted a woman as accomplished and as proud as she would trick a
man into impregnating her. But you never could tell. What was her
game?
The dilemma would remain with him for a long time, he
knew, because he always sought to understand himself and the events
in his life. He unlocked the back door and went inside. What on
earth had he been thinking? He didn’t have one-night stands with
women like Susan who staged them in order to stake a claim.
“That was stupid, and it’s over,” he said to himself as
he headed up the stairs. “No more of that for me.” He stripped and
got into the shower. “But she sure is one hell of a lover!”
Ever cautious, he called his friend, Mark, the next
morning. “Tell me something about Susan Pettiford.” To his mind, the
request was a reasonable one, since Mark invited him to his wife’s
birthday party expressly to meet Susan.
Mark’s laughter didn’t console Lucas. “What about her?
You can see as well as I can, man. All I know is that as executor of
her aunt’s estate, I had to beg her to come down here and claim her
inheritance. She didn’t seem particularly interested in a house, car
and bank account. Said she was used to making it on her own, that
she liked her job and wasn’t interested in moving from New York to a
town in North Carolina. She finally agreed to come here and have a
look at the place, and the strange thing is that the house and its
location half a block from Wade Lake really got to her.”
“Does the will stipulate that she live here?”
“She has to live in the house for a year in order to
inherit what, around here at least, is considered a sizeable
estate.”
“That’s a heck of a job she’s got up there in New York.”
“I know, but I gather success comes at the expense of
everything else. She stood on the back porch of the house, looking
out at the lake, took a deep breath and said, `This is pure heaven.
Imagine living in such a peaceful environment!’ I wouldn’t be
surprised if she moved down here.”
Although that news revved his engine a bit, his head
told him he’d be better off with as much distance as possible
between the two of them. Hadn’t old man libido kicked into action
this morning the minute he awakened with her on his mind?
“You’re interested? I thought the two of you didn’t get
on too well.”
“That was on the surface. I had dinner at her place last
night. She’s an elegant woman, to say the least.”
“That’s the impression I got,” Mark said. “You coming to
club meeting next week?”
“Probably. Thanks.”
He hung up feeling that he knew little more about Susan
Pettiford, the person, than he did before he called Mark. He didn’t
intend to get further involved with her, but it wasn’t in his nature
to leave a problem unsolved.
