Heather Graham (18 page)

“Kim—”

Kim waved her hand as she sipped, determined that Lisa not be aware that Brian hadn’t told her anything. “I have to quit smoking!” Kim finally laughed when she was able to talk, dismissing Lisa’s worry over saying something wrong. “These low-tar things don’t seem to help a bit. Oh, look! Here comes Brian! Everything must be all set. Shall we go?”

Kim kissed Lisa good-bye on the cheek, her voice warm as she invited her to come back anytime.

What a hypocrite,
an inside voice said chastisingly. But she couldn’t help her feelings, nor could she help watching Brian’s warm embrace of the other woman without suspicion. She even felt a twinge of resentment as she watched her sons hug Lisa.

The resentment stayed with her as they drove home. Thankfully the twins were in a chattering mood. They connived Brian into blasting the car stereo and proceeded to give him an update on rock music. Kim was grateful the boys had opted to come. She hoped they would keep Brian from noticing how reticent she had become. But she caught his eyes in the mirror once, and she knew he was fully aware that something was very wrong.

To complicate matters, they returned to find her father on the doorstep. Robert hugged Brian before her, before the boys. He asked Brian a million questions before the door was opened and told him a million times how thrilled he was to see him back.

Hail the conquering hero!
Kim thought, stunned at her own spitefulness but too confused to fight the feelings. Once inside she finally managed to get a question out. “What are you doing here, Dad?”

“I came for the boys,” Robert said cheerfully, winking at Brian. “I wanted to give you two young people all the time I could!”

“That was nice of you, Robert,” Brian said. “Kim and I could have brought them, but I appreciate your coming. Kim, why don’t you go put on some coffee for your dad? Josh, Jake, run up and get your things.”

Kim opened her mouth and then snapped it back shut. Brian simply assumed authority, but she wasn’t about to have it all out with him with her sons and father present. She was close to tears, close to shouting like a lunatic. Perhaps making coffee was the best bet.

From the kitchen she could hear only snatches of the conversation that passed between her father and Brian. As usual, Brian sidestepped his own experiences. She could hear him chuckling over the new Tampa Bay football team. The voices faded away as the coffee finally finished perking, and then she heard them again as she put cream into her father’s and reminded herself to leave Brian’s black.

“…offers from several of the airlines,” Brian was saying, “but I don’t think I’ll take any of them. I don’t want to be gone even overnight. I’ve already been gone too long.”

Her father mumbled something Kim couldn’t hear.

“No, I’ll try the writing thing for a while and see what happens.”

Oh, he was a gem, Kim thought bitterly, asking her if she wanted to quit her job while he was planning on playing around writing.

Gritting her teeth, she carried the coffee out to the dining room table where the two men were sitting. The conversation naturally ceased as she joined them, and Kim asked her father about her mother.

“She’s fine, Kimmy, just fine. Anxious to have the boys and anxious to have you two for dinner as soon as you get back.”

Josh and Jake made their reappearance then, so she was spared getting into anything with both her dad and Brian. Robert gulped down his coffee and rose. “Ready, guys?”

“Yep, Gramps, all ready,” Josh assured him.

Kim and Brian walked them to the door. Her sons didn’t usually hug her when they were just heading for their Florida grandparent’s home, but today they did so strenuously. And they half strangled Brian.

“Be good for Gram, guys, okay?” Kim reminded them.

“We’re always good for Gram,” Jake told her indignantly.

And then they were gone. Kim kept staring after her father’s old but cherished Lincoln, feeling Brian’s eyes on her back.

He touched her shoulder. “Let’s go back in, shall we?”

He definitely knew there was something wrong. His voice, convivial to her father, had become very sharp.

Well, that was fine with her. She was ready to have it all out.

She swept past him back into the living room and sat on the sofa like a rod. Brian followed her, his arms crossed over his chest as he watched her.

“All right, Kim, what the hell happened between last night and this morning?”

“Oh, I don’t think anything actually happened between last night and this morning,” she responded with sardonic anger. “It all happened before. I’ve just been finding out about it now.”

“Oh?” His brows raised with tense interest. “And what have you been finding out?”

“Where shall I start?” Restlessly Kim stood and began to pace, her fingers clenching. “You came here insisting we were married, insisting we could pick up where we left off twelve years ago. But do you ever discuss anything with me? No! But Mrs. Barnes seems to know a great deal about everything, including the fact that you’re planning on another child, which is a real surprise. Were you planning to have this child with me, Brian? It would have been a nice idea for you to discuss such a thing with me. Since you didn’t, I’ll have to tell you now, forget it. I went through twelve years of child rearing by myself. I had to deal with the diapers, the sicknesses, the accidents, the crying in the night all alone! The kids are twelve now, and I am not starting over.”

She stopped her pacing for a moment to stare at Brian. He was dead still; his features were tense. The lines of his lips were white and compressed, and his eyes appeared to be ice crystals. She might tell herself that she didn’t know him anymore, but she knew him well enough to know that he was very angry, and she really didn’t care.

“If I was planning a child, Kim,” he said gratingly, “then yes, I was planning that child with you. I mentioned to Lisa once, before I had even seen you again, that one of the things that hurt the most was never having the pleasure of seeing my children grow and that I would, yes, like another child. I hardly think such a conversation merits this type of immature behavior on your part. And I’m very sorry to hear that you are so against it. I certainly didn’t leave you to bring up the kids alone on purpose.”

“I’m thirty-two years old, Brian.”

“Lisa is thirty-five. She hopes to remarry, and she hopes to have a family.”

“Wonderful for Lisa!” Kim muttered. “Maybe you should marry her.”

“Maybe I should.”

Kim froze for a moment. She hadn’t expected such a response. Neither did she dislike Lisa. She liked her very much; it was just that Lisa knew everything! Everything that she didn’t.

“Who was Lien Chi?” she demanded harshly.

Brian’s lashes fell over his eyes to shutter them, and he turned away from Kim and walked across the room. He finally faced her again, the blue of his eyes opaque yet somehow threatening.

“She was a Vietnamese woman,” he finally answered.

Kim was aware that she was sounding more and more like a cruel shrew, but she didn’t seem to be able to help herself. “That’s rather obvious!” she snapped. “But what was she to you? And…and…” She paused for only a second before saying bluntly, “Lisa said something about a tragedy with a child. Did you have a Vietnamese child, Brian?”

The threatening look in his eyes became one of sparkling blue danger. He started walking toward her, and suddenly she was frightened. He had been in the jungle so long. Had she finally said the words to touch off the snapping of his nerves?

“Brian, don’t come near me—”

Her words were cut off as he grabbed her shoulders, his fingers biting into them.

“Brian—”

She found herself shoved back to the couch, with him straddling over her. His handsome face was drawn more tightly than she had ever seen it, his expression chillingly grim.

“Brian—”

“Shut up!” His eyes bore into hers; his grip on her was merciless. “You’re determined to know everything, so you can damn well sit with a shut mouth and listen. Lien Chi was a Vietnamese woman who meant a great deal to me. And yes, we had a child, a little girl. She would be five now. I never told you about either for two reasons. They both are dead and no concern of yours. Besides, it’s been very hard to believe you would give a damn about anything. You avoided me like a plague for days. I was a ghost you would have just as soon kept buried because your life was streaming right along. You were worried about your own life.
What do I do? Move out on this lunatic or stay with him?
”

“That’s not fair, Brian, I tried to talk to you! You wouldn’t talk to me. You refused to—”

“I didn’t want to be humored, Kim. So now you do really want to know things? Lien Chi kept me alive at times. She brought us extra food; she brought us what medicine she could. There was a Frenchman who was a prisoner, too. He taught me how to survive. Our captor allowed us Vietnamese women. They were a good threat. If we tried anything, he would kill those we cared about. I was human, Kim. I have never, never been superhuman. Lien Chi listened to me for hours when I talked about you. If she had lived, I would have moved heaven and earth to bring her and our little girl back. I would have still come home to you. Lien Chi always knew I was absurdly in love with you, but I would have never disclaimed my daughter. But they both were killed. The Frenchman was sick, and Lien Chi was trying to treat him. Our daughter was with her. One of the mines on the bamboo cage malfunctioned and triggered. They all were killed, Kim, my daughter, Lien Chi, and that wonderful Frenchman. Are you happy, Kim? Now you know everything that Lisa knows.”

No, she wasn’t happy at all. She could barely assimilate his horror story, nor could she stand the feel of cruelty in his grip on her, the look in his eyes that went beyond anger.
He hates me,
she thought,
and it isn’t fair. I can’t change circumstances any more than he could, and he’s wrong. I was confused, but I always cared.

“Brian, you’re hurting me.”

“Am I?” He shifted his weight slightly.

Kim felt the quivering in her lips getting out of control. “Brian,” she murmured brokenly, “I’m sorry—I’m very sorry—”

“Are you?”

“Of course.”

His expression didn’t alter a hair, and her misery and confusion suddenly catapulted back to anger. “Brian, you’ve no right to behave this way toward me! You condemn me for Keith, but you were sleeping with another woman. You—you had a child.”

“Do you have any idea what it’s like to lose a child, Kim. To see it all happen? Dear God, I hope you never do! As for Keith, you’re wrong, Kim. I never condemned you. I just wanted my life back. There might have been more men in your life. I don’t know. You’ve never told me anything either except that you were confused.”

“That’s not true. Last night—”

“Yes, last night.” He sighed bitterly, and his hold on her loosened. She could still feel the grip of his thighs over her as she sat half-sprawled on the sofa. “Last night you decided that you did still love me. But does that hold in the morning, Kim? People say a lot of things in the midst of passion. Zillions of promises have been made in the bedroom. And maybe we did prove something. We are unique together. Time didn’t change that. You know it as well as I do. But by the light of dawn you just might have started to wonder if that was enough for you.”

“Damn it, Brian! Quit judging me. Quit condemning me! I didn’t change with the morning. I just learned that you didn’t give me an iota of the trust you gave another woman. And maybe you should know something, too, Brian. Lisa is a sweet woman. I admit I liked her very much. But she wasn’t a saint either, Brian, she was human, too. She wasn’t living all those years entirely alone.”

He didn’t, reply to her, and something in the cold, stony expression he wore sent chills racing down her spine. She opened her mouth, astonished by the pain and jealousy that swept through her. No sound came at first, and she tried to shift beneath his iron hold. He didn’t move. She opened her mouth again and managed to rasp out her question. “Did you have an affair with Lisa Barnes?”

He was silent for a moment, and then he replied, “No.”

Kim allowed relief to swamp through her system for a second, but then the sick weakness was riddling her again. She didn’t believe him, but she didn’t have to ask him again. He suddenly released her and stood and walked to the bay window, staring blankly out.

“I never had an affair with Lisa. I slept with her one night.”

“What?” Kim’s whisper was shot through with accusation and pain.

“I had just returned when I saw Lisa. And I just learned from my parents that although you hadn’t remarried, you were seeing Keith Norman steadily and planning on moving in with him. Lisa was hurt. After those years of searching, praying, I brought her the news that it all had been futile. And I was uncertain myself, Kim. I had no idea how you were going to feel. It was natural that Lisa and I clung to each other, found strength in each other.”

“Oh, God…” The words escaped Kim. She wasn’t terribly sure what devastated her so badly about learning the truth. Maybe it had been the conversation she had overheard between the twins. Maybe it was the guilt that had riddled her about Keith when Brian had been so demanding of her, when he had come home, not to her but to another woman instead, a woman he had then invited into her home.

She suddenly found herself standing, her nails digging into the palms of her hands. “Brian,” she heard herself saying, her voice an unnatural hiss, “you bastard! How could you? How could you have brought her here?”

“Kim.” He turned back to her, and his eyes were filled with both pain and an irritation that seemed to be steadily growing. “I just told you that there was nothing between us but loneliness, one night that meant nothing but friendship.”

“You brought her into my house, Brian!
My
house!”

“
Our
house,” he said in correction, the tone of his voice grating. “Kim, damn you, you wonder why I find you difficult to talk with! This is exactly why. We both know not only that you’ve been seeing Keith for several years but that you won’t even tell him the truth about the present situation. I never lied to anyone, Kim. Lien Chi knew I loved you. Lisa knew I loved you. I saw no reason for her to suffer because circumstance put us together for a single night.”