Heather Graham (20 page)

She twisted around to glance at him uneasily. “I—I don’t know, Brian.”

“Do you love me, Kim?”

“I’ve always loved you, Brian, in fact and in memory. But moving back from memory to fact has been a bit of a transition.”

“Then how about we give it a try?”

“Okay,” she said huskily. “I wish I could look at you and say nothing matters because you’re back. And I am very grateful that you’re alive, but I feel strange about Lisa. I know I should be able to say I understand why it happened.”

“Kim, there’s one thing you’re wrong about. Things aren’t usually easy—not for me, not for anybody. I felt as if a knife had flashed through me that first night when Keith came here. And when I saw you together in his arms in front of that restaurant, I wanted to veer off the road and wrench you apart. It hurt, badly. But I love you, and whatever I have to learn to live past, I will. Neither of us has hurt the other purposely. Jealousy is a normal emotion. So is pain; so is anger. They come with living. When I first came back, I was so bitter it was terrible. My life, my youth—wasted. I blamed God, the United States, and the Air Force—in that order. But there’s really no one or nothing to blame, Kim. It’s over; it can’t be undone. I will never live completely without it, but I do want to live, and living, to me, is going forward. I can’t have the past, but I can have the future and what I make of it.”

“Brian,” Kim said, “I think I’m afraid of Lisa. It seems that she does understand you completely. It seems that it’s much easier for you to share with her. And she does want children, and I really don’t think that I do.”

He was silent for several seconds, then said, “First of all, Kim, you have to realize that I don’t now, or ever did, love Lisa.” He smiled. “If she were willing to produce a litter for me, I still wouldn’t love Lisa. I’m in love with you. But listen to yourself. You just said, ‘think,’ Kim. Does that mean you would think about it?”

“Well, yes…I suppose.”

“That’s all I would ask.”

“But, Brian, I’m not sure. And it is something that means so much to you.”

“It doesn’t mean as much as you do.”

She was about to reply when suddenly the phone rang, the sound sharp as it intruded into their conversation.

“I’ll get it,” Kim said, rising hastily.

“We’re supposed to be on a vacation,” Brian said with annoyance. “Why don’t you let it ring?”

“I can’t. I never just let a phone ring when the kids aren’t with me. It could be an emergency.”

Brian shrugged. “Okay.”

Kim ran across the kitchen to pick up the receiver. She didn’t think she was paranoid, but she simply couldn’t let a phone ring. She was relieved to discover that her caller was Lacey, but her relief was quickly followed by annoyance.

“Yes, Lacey. It’s Kim. What’s the matter?”

“I really am sorry to bother you.”

“That’s okay. What is it? I can’t understand what could have come up. I spoke to Mr. Simms about David Harris—”

“No, no. I’m not having any problems! I don’t know, maybe I shouldn’t bother you, but I’m worried about you.”

“Me?” Kim replied with surprise and confusion.

“Yes, well, I may be making a mountain out of a molehill, but did you do something to David Harris?”

Kim’s brow was tensing into a frown. “Lacey, what is this? Tell me what’s going on.”

“I don’t know exactly, but if I were you, I’d get in here if at all possible. Harris locked himself into Mr. Simms’s office this morning, armed with some kind of message to you from that
Tropic Living
magazine. Mr. Simms showed up in here a little later, and he started asking me questions about you. He wanted to know if I knew anything about your outside work, and then he asked me how I felt about directing the department.”

Kim felt bitter fury rising within her. “Go on, Lacey.”

“Well, that’s about it. I told him you hadn’t committed yourself to do anything for anyone. I also pointed out that it wasn’t your fault if magazines called you. He’s very fond of you, Kim, you know that, but Mr. Simms is also such a stickler for office rules. Oh, Kim! I feel terrible about this! You were trying to defend my job from Harris, and now it seems that he’s after yours in retaliation!”

“Don’t worry about it, Lacey,” Kim heard herself say. “I am coming in. And I’ll straighten it out,”

“That’s a relief,” Lacey muttered. “And, Kim, I don’t want your job. Not until you go on to be rich and famous!”

“Thanks, Lacey,” Kim murmured. She barely heard Lacey’s “good-bye” as she thoughtfully returned the receiver to the phone bracket. Damn! She’d give her eyeteeth to laugh in David Harris’s face and tell him he could create all the damn problems he wanted and she didn’t give a damn because she was sick of taking pictures of hams anyway. But she needed her job. She didn’t know about her marriage’s working out, but right now she couldn’t let Brian down. She had to keep a home running smoothly for him while he tried to get on his feet, tried his wings at writing, got himself a job!

“You’re going in to work?”

She almost jumped a mile, then turned to see that Brian wasn’t a half foot away from her. “You startled the hell out of me!” she said accusingly. Why was she always forgetting that he had learned to move swiftly and silently?

“Sorry,” he murmured. His eyes looked at her strangely, as if he were hiding something but were also trying to reach into her soul with his blue gaze. “Did you say you were going in to work?”

“Yes, I’m sorry, Brian, but something important has come up. I’m not expecting this to take long.”

“You’re supposed to be on vacation.”

“This can’t be helped.”

“You need to do something about that job of yours.”

Kim twisted her jaw with irritation. “Damn it, Brian, I don’t always need your advice! I did manage to survive on my own!”

“I know you can survive. The point is that I care. Never mind, for the moment. I’ll drive you in and wait, and after we can have an early dinner somewhere.”

Kim hesitated. She wasn’t sure she wanted him around for this, but it would be hard to turn him down.

“You don’t need to drive me. Stay here; enjoy the pool. We can talk more and go to dinner when I get back.”

“I don’t want to enjoy the pool alone. It’s no problem. I’ll drive you, and our vacation together starts tonight. We can pack a few things now and head out right away. That is, if you’re still willing to come with me.”

“Yes, I am,” she murmured. But was she? She had been miserable, certain that they were doomed. Still, Brian was right. Things between them were special, too special to be given up with no attempt at understanding and coming to grips with her feelings. Besides, if she protested any further, he would get suspicious. She tried to cover a sigh. It should be all right. All she wanted to do was closet herself with Mr. Simms and assure him she wasn’t committed to doing anything else, to promise him that she wouldn’t.

She lifted her hands in a helpless gesture. “All right—if that’s what you’d like.”

“That’s what I’d like,” he said firmly, taking her elbow and guiding her toward the staircase. “Come on, let’s get dressed and packed.”

“Where are we going?”

“Don’t you like surprises?”

“Not always.”

“This one you’ll like. Ironclad guarantee.”

Thirty minutes later she was watching him as he drove. He seemed calm and casual, but the same strange expression was in his eyes each time he looked at her. How much of her conversation had he heard? she wondered. Surely not enough to realize she was having real problems. Lacey had been doing most of the talking.

He glanced at her and smiled, and she smiled back. It had been nice to go upstairs and get dressed together. They had left off the serious conversation, both putting it on hold for later. Brian had chatted idly about the twins, about his parents, and about her parents. It had been like really sharing a marriage again, the part that went beyond the sex, beyond the problems. It had been one of the little niceties that went along with loving and being together: she adjusting his tie; he helping her with her zipper.

And he looked marvelous now, his hair damp and combed back. The lines of his bronze features were enhanced by the lightweight casual sports jacket. They should use him in commercials, she thought vaguely. Twelve years in the jungle, and he looked like the perfect young executive.

He reached his hand out in the space between them, and she took it.
Maybe, Brian,
she thought,
maybe we can get past all this—

“Where am I going?” he asked her.

“Oh!” she exclaimed, and gave him the address on Fowler where the agency was located.

A few minutes later they were parked in the lot beneath the building. She had thought about asking him to wait in the car, but she could hardly do that when the temperature seemed to be a hundred degrees in the shade. “We’re on the fourth floor,” she told him a little nervously. “I’ll introduce you to Lacey, and you can wait in my office.”

Kim was both amused and secretly pleased when the pretty receptionist half tripped on her heels in her haste to stand and meet Brian. Kim took him into her office and then instantly regretted the idea when Lacey also seemed flustered by his mere presence. She didn’t mind Lacey’s admiring her husband, but she was afraid that in her capacity of being temporary hostess, her nervousness might make her a little too talkative.

“I’ll just be a minute, Lacey. Brian, have some iced tea—I don’t recommend the coffee—and I’ll be right back.”

“I’ll be fine,” Brian assured her. “Lacey can show me some of your work. That is, if I won’t be taking her away from anything. I really don’t need to be entertained.”

“Oh, no, Mr. Trent!” Lacey gushed. “I’ll be happy to show you—”

Kim closed the office door behind her with a shrug. Not only was Brian a striking man, but he was a bit of an anomaly to those who knew about his past: a twentieth-century hero.

Telling herself that she had to forget Brian for the moment and go salvage their income, she hurried to Mr. Simms’s office and was shown right in. The gentle man lifted his brows at her with some surprise but then obviously ascertained that someone from the office had called her. “Well, Kimberly, I won’t ask why you’re here. I’ll only tell you it was unnecessary. I would have never let this thing come to a head without speaking to you myself.”

Kim breathed a little sigh of relief and sank into the chair across from the desk. “Thank you, Mr. Simms.”

“Well?”

Confusion hit her for a second. “Well? Oh, Mr. Simms, I have received several offers for free-lance work. I haven’t accepted any. I admit that I did play with the possibility, but understanding how you feel about it, I will not accept any outside work.” She was quiet for a moment. “I need my job, Mr. Simms.”

“As I said, Kimberly, I would have never let you go without giving you a chance to defend yourself. David came to me because he was concerned. He cares about you, Kim, and he didn’t want you getting in over your head and allowing our photography department to suffer.”

Kim said nothing. She knew damn well David didn’t care about her, so she couldn’t pretend to accept that he did. But she didn’t feel like arguing with the employer who paid her salary.

“It’s a pity you had to ruin your vacation with this—”

Kim stood up. “We hadn’t started out yet anyway, Mr. Simms. I still don’t even know where we’re going.”

“Well, wherever, have a good time.”

“Thank you.”

She left the office with mixed feelings of anger and relief. How did contemptuous rats like David come to exist? Something else was bound to come up, she was sure. David would never do anything overt, but if he were determined to get her fired, he wouldn’t give up this easily.

Both Lacey and Brian were out of her office when she returned. She sat in her swivel chair and rubbed her temple, assuming Lacey had decided to show Brian the darkroom or something.

“Lacey—oh, Kim! Imagine seeing you here. I thought you were off for the great reunion.”

She glanced up at the half-opened door to see David Harris entering. She made no attempt to smile or respond. She stood, facing him grimly. “David, what I’d like to know is: Just what would you accomplish by seeing me fired?”

He cast off his own dry smile and faced her across her desk. “I wasn’t really trying to get you fired, Kim,” he said very quietly. “I just wanted to give you a little warning. I don’t like being dragged over the carpet, which is what happened when you interfered. You need to learn to stay out of my way, sweetheart.”

“Oh, really, David? My understanding of the real problem is that Lacey preferred to stay out of your way. Or maybe this stems back even farther, David. Maybe the problem here is that both Lacey and I tried to stay out of your way.”

He laughed and grabbed for one of her hands. “Sweetheart, you know your problem. But cheer up. If hubby doesn’t make the grade this time, you can still come to me for a few pointers. I told you once I’d teach you a few things. You don’t need to be jealous of Lacey.”

“Jealous…” Kim began disgustedly, trying to wrench her hand away. “David, you—”

“You’d better get your hands off my wife this second.”

The command came from the still-open doorway. Both Kim and David instantly glanced that way in alarm. A very nervous Lacey was hovering behind an incredibly irate Brian, who was moving into the small office.

“Brian Trent!” David began, attempting to ignore the situation. He offered his hand as if they were old friends.

“Cut it,” Brian said simply. He was on David’s side of the desk, and he sat casually on the corner, glancing at Kim before he spoke. “You know, Harris, I understand you gave my wife some trouble when I was, quote, unquote, dead. She was basically a single woman then, Harris, so I couldn’t have had an objection in the world if you had dated her. But, Harris, you are one of those lechers women complain about. First Kim, and then Lacey.”

He stood again and gazed at Kim with a sad smile, then with a shrug that placed something like a sparkle into his eyes. Kim could only stare at him wordlessly, wondering desperately how he had figured out that her disastrous encounter had been with David Harris.