A Promise to Cherish Page 3

  The blood surged to her face, to her toes, to the backs of her knees, as she stared at the pornographic film clip from a current movie. Her stomach went weightless. Her chest felt tight, and the short hairs of her arms and thighs stood at attention. The man and woman were intimately entwined, limbs and teeth bared . . .

  Sam Brown, you are disgusting! Abruptly she slapped the magazine shut, slammed the suitcase closed, and drew her hand back as if it had been singed, just as a knock sounded at her door.

  Her head snapped up. She swallowed and pressed cool palms against hot cheeks before crossing the room and opening the door with much more control than she felt.

  It was Sam Brown again. But this time his sport coat was gone and only one button held his shirt together at the waist. The shirttails were matted into a network of wrinkles, and in the deep V collar she again caught sight of the small silver cross set in turquoise. She dropped her eyes quickly from that bare chest only to find his feet bare too.

  “Seems we’ve done it again,” he ventured.

  “Seems,” she said crisply, not smiling.

  She found it impossible to confront his eyes right after having confronted his girlie magazine. Don’t be silly, Walker, he’s not a mind reader. But still she felt that if he got a closer look, he’d know what she’d been doing when he knocked.

  “I was getting set to go for a run when . . .” He flipped a palm up. “Same song, second verse.” He peered past her to his suitcase which she knew was lying on the bed with the top closed but unzipped. Still she stood like a palace guard, holding the edge of the door with one hand, blocking his entrance.

  “Listen, what I said before was inexcusable. I’d like to apologize,” Sam Brown offered.

  “I should think you would,” Lee returned tightly, the image from the magazine still vivid in her mind.

  He handed her the correct suitcase. “Is that any way to reply when I’m trying to bury the hatchet? The least you can do is be civil.”

  “All right. I . . . I shouldn’t have slapped you either. I’m sorry. There, will that do?” But her voice was hard and cynical.

  “Not quite.” He pointed to his belongings. “I’d like my stuff back, too. I want to take a run and work off all my recent anger and frustration, but my sweats are in there.”

  He tilted a peace-offering grin at her, and she stepped back stiffly and motioned for him to come in and take what was his. She watched the wrinkles on his shirttails as he lifted the cover of the suitcase to check cursorily inside. The magazine lay on top. He studied it a moment, then spun to face her, a dark glower lowering his eyebrows.

  “Look, just because a man buys a skin magazine doesn’t make him a pervert.”

  “To each his own,” she granted, but her tone was undeniably judgmental.

  “The rag’s got damn good interviews and movie reviews and—” Suddenly he turned sour-faced, slammed the top down, and zipped it with three jerks of the wrist. “I don’t know why the hell I should justify myself to you. And anyway, why do you think you have the right to convict a man according to what you find in his suitcase?”

  She sighed with overstrained patience. “Listen, do you mind? I’ve been in these clothes all day, and I’d like a bath and some supper. It’s been a rough day.”

  “Fine . . . fine.” He yanked the suitcase off the bed. “I’m leaving!”

  She was waiting to close the door on his heels, but before she could, he wheeled to face her. Almost angrily he stated, “I am sorry for what I said. It was totally out of line, but so are you for not gracefully accepting my apology and letting me off the hook. Those eyes of yours are gl—”

  “I said, apology accepted.”

  “Then how about if I buy you dinner and we can talk about . . . whatever? Anything but suitcases.”

  “No thank you, Mr. Brown. Not interested. I work for one insufferable sexist and can’t help being around him an unavoidable amount of time each week, but beyond him, I’m careful about who I spend my time with.”

  Deep wrinkles appeared in his forehead as he scowled down at her. He looked ominous and ready to blow his cork again, but Lee held her ground, facing him squarely, one hand on the edge of the door. She was conscious again of how erect his posture was—even more so as he held his anger tightly in check—shoulders squared back, the inverted triangle of bare skin on his chest as taut as the head of a drum. He wore a tight-lipped expression as his dark eyes seemed to penetrate her for a long, threatening moment. Then he turned on a bare heel and stalked away.

  With a shaky sigh of relief, Lee closed the door, leaned her forehead against it for a moment, then slipped the dead bolt home.

  The tension of the day had keyed her up until her neck and shoulders felt stiff with fatigue. She leaned far back from the waist, slipped a thin hand to the nape of her neck, and kneaded. Eyes closed, hair trailing free, she wondered what had prompted Sam Brown to invite her to dinner. Then, recalling his choice of reading material, she thought she knew the answer.

  Lee flopped tiredly on the bed, crossed her arms behind her head, and tried to rid her thoughts of Sam Brown. But his face intruded, as she’d first seen it at the bid letting when he was accepting handshakes—smiling, laughing, pleased with himself. She remembered the tiny wrinkles at the corners of his eyes and wondered how old he was? Mid-thirties? When he scowled, he looked older—and he’d done plenty of scowling today! But his look of displeasure also made his undeniably handsome face even more good looking.

  She tossed a limp forearm over her brow. Handsome is as handsome does, she thought tiredly. She’d chalk this day up to experience and forget she had ever laid eyes on the man.

  The face of Floyd A. Fat Thorpe nudged Brown’s aside, and Lee wondered which of the two was more disturbing. Thorpe was going to be more offensive than ever after this fiasco. Especially since she had deliberately disobeyed orders and stayed the night in Denver. There were times when competing in a man’s world didn’t seem worth it. But she had to prove to herself she could . . . hadn’t she? Hadn’t she had to prove it not only to herself but also to everyone else who had helped wreck her life?

  She fell into a fitful sleep with the faces of Thorpe and Brown mingling in a collage of other disturbing faces from her past—Joel’s, the judge’s . . .

  A WAKENING with a start, Lee jerked her wrist up—seven thirty!—slid off the bed, and began undressing all in one motion.

  She ran a tubful of water, took a quick refreshing bath, and cursed the thin motel towels and cheap soap that scarcely lathered. Drying herself, she stepped to the vanity, then tossed the towel aside while she rummaged for her brush and began smoothing her hair. It reached just below her shoulder blades—a coarse, black mane thicker than wild prairie grass, so thick she leaned sideways at the waist as if its weight made her list. She leaned in the other direction, then stood straight, watching her breast rise and fall rhythmically with each brush stroke.

  Her hand stopped in midair, the brush momentarily forgotten as she somberly assessed her naked reflection. Unbidden came the seductive pictures of the magazine and with them the vision of Sam Brown’s face, his bare chest, his bare feet. She stared into her own dark eyes until her eyelids trembled, and she lowered her eyes. Her gaze moved down the long, lean neck to medium, pear-shaped breasts with dark nipples.

  Hesitantly she brought the brush forward and ran the back of it around the outer edge of her right breast. The cool, yellow plastic was strangely smooth and welcome against her skin. She drifted it along the hollow beneath the breast, then up to the nipple. Tingles of remembrance came fluttering.

  It had been a long time.

  There were things a woman’s body needed.

  She closed her eyes as she turned the brush over, thinking of the whiskers on a firm jaw as she felt the light scrape of bristles along the side of her full breast, down her ribs, across her abdomen to the hollow of her hip.

  A deep loneliness aroused memories of a past when her youthful dreams had consisted
of rosy pictures of how life would turn out. Marriage, children, happy ever after. What had happened to all that? Why was she standing alone in a motel room in Denver, Colorado, remembering Joel Walker? He was married to someone else now, and, truth to tell, Lee no longer loved him. What she loved was the memory of those dreams she’d had when they’d first met, the wild want of each other’s bodies that they’d thought was enough upon which to build a marriage. She ached for the time before all the mistakes had been made, before Jed and Matthew had been born.

  Lee opened her eyes to find an empty, sad woman before her. A woman with pale stretch marks snaking from hip to abdomen as the only reminder of two pregnancies. She spread her fingers upon them and slumped against the vanity. Then she pushed herself erect and lifted her eyes. Damn you, Lee, you promised yourself not to get bogged down in recriminations over what can’t be changed!

  She took a firmer grip on the brush and began styling her hair, angrily brushing so hard her scalp hurt, dragging the heavy black mass around the back of her head and securing it just above and behind an ear in a heavy, smooth knot. Her skin was naturally bronze and needed neither foundation nor blush, but she accented her eyelids with silver shadow, curled her lashes, and applied eyeliner and mascara. Her lipstick was two-toned, a rich claret accented by white lipliner. She dashed a touch of perfume behind each ear and turned to get dressed.

  She donned a pair of baggy white pants that tapered at the ankle above high-heeled wedgies of canvas and rope, then a cavalry-style shirt of pale blue stripes that buttoned off center and had short puffed sleeves ending in ruffles at the elbow. A generous ruffled collar stood up around Lee’s jaws, which she knew emphasized her long, graceful neck. Stepping to the mirror, again she added the ever-present feathers—this time hanging them in her ears, light blue wisps that dangled when she turned to retrieve her purse and head down to dinner.

  The dining room was almost empty. Night had nearly fallen and the lights of Denver were glimmering on one by one beyond the windows. Lee paused in the doorway, peering into the dimness where unobtrusive music played quietly. In a far corner a gray-haired couple was sipping coffee. The only other occupied table in the room was taken by Sam Brown. He glanced up from a newspaper as Lee paused in the doorway. Their eyes met briefly before he turned expressionlessly back to his reading, angling the paper to catch the last fading light from the window beside him. Lee waited, feeling awkward and conspicuous as she studied the back of the cash register. At last a waitress led her to a seat.

  Unfortunately it was in the middle of the floor and faced Sam Brown. Again he lifted his eyes. Again they returned laconically to his newspaper, and Lee felt more than ever like the lead act in a one-ring circus.

  The waitress handed Lee a menu. “Kind of slow tonight,” the woman commented, her voice ringing like a clarion in the empty room.

  “So I see.”

  “Can I get you anything from the bar?”

  “Yes, a Smith and Kurn.” Lee was conscious of Sam Brown’s eyes directed her way again. “I know it’s an after-dinner drink, but somehow I’m always too full then.” She laughed nervously, damning herself for explaining, knowing she’d done it not for the waitress’s benefit but for Sam Brown’s. What did she care what he thought?

  The waitress crossed to his table. She handed him a menu, and their voices also resounded clearly through the room.

  “Something from the bar, sir?”

  “An extra dry martini with pickled mushrooms, if you’ve got ’em.”

  My, aren’t we fussy, Lee thought testily. Pickled mushrooms!

  “We sure do,” the waitress replied, and moved away to leave the room with nothing but that dim music which could scarcely fill the uncomfortable tension spinning between their two tables.

  Lee searched her menu, immediately spotted what she wanted, but taking refuge behind the wide folder for a full five minutes until the waitress finally arrived with her drink gave Lee someplace else to focus her attention.

  The chocolate-flavored drink was refreshing. Lee sipped and followed the waitress with her eyes as the uniformed back hid Sam Brown momentarily from view.

  “We gave you a couple extra mushrooms. How’s that?” came the pleasant question.

  “Great, thank you.” His deep voice reverberated in Lee’s ears.

  When the woman stepped back, Sam’s eyes caught Lee’s. Immediately she ducked to take a sip of her drink. The glass felt slippery in her hand. She dried her palm on her thigh, and applied herself to the menu again, ever so studiously, damning the waitress for walking off without asking if she was ready to order.

  The woman returned at last with pencil and pad. So far Lee had managed to keep her eyes off the table by the window.

  “Can I take your order now?”

  Does a one-legged duck swim in a circle? Lee bit back the snippy retort and forcibly pasted a pleasant smile on her face. She attempted to speak softly, but the words came ringing off the walls like gunshots.

  “I’ll have ocean perch, no potato, and Thousand Island dressing on my salad.”

  “Would you like something in place of the potato?”

  “Would I ever, but I’m being firm with myself tonight.” There followed a false laugh that Lee hardly recognized as her own while Brown’s eyes probed once again. She suddenly felt as if she’d told him something personal that he had no right to know and damned herself for making the innocent comment.

  He ordered prime rib, medium rare, baked potato with both butter and sour cream, the house dressing—without being told what it was, which for some reason irritated Lee, who ate in restaurants seldom enough not to be adventurous—and a cup of coffee.

  This time when the waitress moved away, the eyes of the two diners met and hesitated on each other for a longer moment. Sam Brown now leaned back in his chair with lazy nonchalance, one shoulder angling lower than the other as he rested a negligent elbow on the table and touched the rim of his glass with five fingertips.

  Lee sipped her drink and looked pointedly away, but the distracting memory of his magazine pictures came niggling again. She felt his eyes on her and for a moment had the disquieting impression he was stacking her up against his naked tootsies, wondering how she’d compare. To Lee’s dismay, the memory of her stretch marks emblazoned itself across her mind.

  “Did you get your bath?”

  At the sound of his lazy question her eyes flew up, and she colored as if he’d just spoken an obscenity, then glanced quickly at the old couple in the corner. They were sipping silently, paying no attention whatsoever.

  “Yes. Did you have your run?”

  He smiled crookedly. “I tried, but the damn air in this city is so thin I felt like I was having a heart attack.”

  “A pity you didn’t.” She quirked one eyebrow and made the ice cubes bob with a poke of her finger.

  “Still don’t believe me, huh?”

  She lifted her glass, eyed him over its rim, took a long, sweet sip, then slowly shook her head from side to side. “Uh-uh.”

  He shrugged indifferently, took a pull on his cocktail, and studied the view outside the window. The way he had one shoulder back farther than the other made the yellow knit shirt hug his chest like a wet buckskin. The front zipper was lowered several inches and the silver cross winked at Lee while she tried to pretend he wasn’t there. But it was impossible when, a moment later, the old couple arose, paid their bill, and went away, leaving Lee and Sam the only two in the room.

  The waitress returned, deposited their first courses, and disappeared again.

  Lee dove into her salad like a sinner into a confessional. But every clink of fork upon bowl seemed amplified and disturbing. The sound of her own chewing seemed explosive in the room. She scarcely kept from wriggling in her chair while feeling Sam Brown’s steady gaze resting on her in an increasingly distracting manner.

  His voice split the quiet again. “You know this is ridiculous, don’t you?”

  She looked up to find him wi
th hands resting idly next to his salad bowl.

  “What is?” she managed.

  “Sitting here like a couple of little kids who just had a fight over who broke the mud pie.”

  She couldn’t think of a single sane reply. With an engaging grin he went on. “So, you’re gonna stay in your yard and I’m gonna stay in mine, and we’re going to glare at each other over the fence and be lonely and miserable while neither of us will make the first move.”

  She stared at him, gulped down what felt like an entire, unbroken head of lettuce, and said not a word.

  “Can I bring my salad over there?” he asked finally, then added charmingly, “If I promise not to break your mud pie?”

  The wisp of a smile threatened her lips and before she could control it she had chuckled, the sound bringing a wash of relief. “Yes, come ahead. It’s awful sitting here trying not to look at you.”

  He and his salad and his pickled mushrooms were up and across the floor in three seconds. He settled himself at her table, gave her an audacious grin, and declared, “There, that’s better,” then dug into his lettuce with gusto.

  She had called him a liar, a cheat, and a pervert. What possible course of conversation could successfully follow that? she wondered uneasily. To her relief, he came up with one.

  “I have to admit, you’re the first lady estimator I’ve ever seen.”

  “I’m the first lady estimator I’ve ever seen,” she admitted.

  The deep lines on either side of his mouth dented in. “How long have you been one?”

  “I began in the business three years ago and have been an estimator for a little over a year.”

  “Why?”

  Her eyebrows curled in puzzlement. “What do you mean, why?”

  “Why choose a career in a tough business like this that’s traditionally been dominated by men?”

  “Because it pays well.”

  He accepted that with a nod of the head. “You work for old Floyd Thorpe, huh?”