Holding Hands (6 page)

Scott was seated in one of the chairs,
sunlight pouring over his shoulder as his fingers danced across the
keyboard of his laptop. His hair was as damp as it had been last
night, but the faint, spicy scent of his shampoo hung in the room.
He had on faded jeans and a navy blue T-shirt that showed off his
lean torso. His feet were bare.

She tried to remember what she’d been so
angry about last night. The dog. The fact that she’d swept Scott
away for this intimate escape and he was using it to catch up on
his work. The fact that they’d driven through wretched traffic and
flooded roads and wound up taking up residence in what had seemed,
in last night’s stormy gloom, to be a dreary little hovel. The fact
that she felt as if her husband and her marriage were slipping away
like the tide, tugging her down in a deadly undertow.

The fact that her mother and her daughter had
better love lives than she did.

“
Good morning,” she
said.

Scott peered up. A tentative smile flickered
across his face. “We’ve got power.”

She pushed herself to sit and saw the alarm
clock on the nightstand on his side of the bed. The digits glowed
red: 7:50. She couldn’t recall the last time she’d slept that late.
“You showered?”

“
We’ve got hot water, too,”
he reported. “Lights. And a hair drier, if you want
one.”

She wanted one. She also wanted to see that
sweet, hesitant smile brighten his face again. “I’ll go wash, and
then we can have breakfast.” The rabbit-food she’d called dinner
hadn’t filled her up very well.

She carried her bag into the bathroom with
her and shut the door. The lights flanking the oval mirror above
the pedestal sink glared. Her complexion was imprinted with faint
lines from wrinkles in the pillow case. At least she hoped it was
the pillow and not her age that had caused those lines.

The shower felt heavenly. She lathered her
hair, replacing the scent of Scott’s shampoo with the lush floral
scent of hers. Then she dried herself off, brushed her teeth and
made use of the hair drier hanging from a wall bracket beside the
mirror. Ah, the luxuries of modern living, she thought as her hair
dried beneath the hot gust blasting through the nozzle. Thank God
for electricity.

Her hair done, she plucked some underwear
from her bag. Her gaze caught on the teddy, neatly folded and
tucked into a corner, and she pulled it out.

Breakfast could wait. So could arguing.

She donned the lacy, tempting garment and
shivered. She felt colder wearing it than she’d felt completely
naked after her shower. What if Scott thought she was nuts? What if
he looked at her and said, “Why aren’t you dressed?”

If he did, she’d get dressed. And grab her
keys and drive to the veterinary clinic to spend the day with a
creature who appreciated her.

Drawing in a deep breath, she squared her
shoulders and opened the door, feeling even more chilled as the
cooler air outside the bathroom wrapped around her.

Scott finished typing something on his
computer, then glanced up. And gaped.

She stood frozen on the textured rug,
waiting, her nerves stringing tighter and tighter in the silence
that stretched between them. Finally, she couldn’t stand it any
longer. “Say something.”

“
Wow,” he said.

She stopped shivering and took a step toward
him. He practically hurled the laptop onto the table beside him and
sprang from the chair. When he was less than a foot away from her,
he halted.

“
What?” she
asked.

“
Take it off,” he said, then
yanked his T-shirt over his head.

She wanted to laugh, but he looked so
serious, so intent. Maybe he was comparing her to his students,
those gorgeous young things with smooth, glowing skin and no
creases marking their faces. Maybe he wanted to see how she
measured up, whether she could hold his attention when they were
both wide awake and no one better was around.

Then he hauled her into his arms and kissed
her, and she stopped thinking.

His chest was warm and solid against her. His
mouth was hot and firm. He held her so tightly she couldn’t remove
the teddy, but he accomplished that task for her, drawing the
delicate straps off her shoulders and down her arms, breaking the
kiss only to nuzzle her throat, to lean back and shove the teddy
further down her body. She slid her hands over the smooth skin of
his back, down to his butt, and he groaned.

He spun her around, lifted her off her feet,
tossed her onto the bed with as much energy as he’d tossed aside
his laptop a moment ago. Then he dove onto the mattress beside her,
kicking the quilt aside and letting the soft linen sheets cradle
them. He eased the teddy over her hips and away. She slid open his
fly and shoved his jeans down his legs.

No, he didn’t need Viagra.

The air in the cabin shimmered with their
quiet moans, the rustle of linen, the whisper of skin against skin.
He tangled his fingers through the hair she’d so carefully
blow-dried and styled. He grazed her collarbones, claimed her
breasts with kisses, moved against her until her want for him grew
into an exquisite ache. And then he took her.

Maybe he didn’t look at her
anymore. Maybe he didn’t listen to her. But right now, for this one
precious moment, he wanted her. They were fully alive again,
husband and wife, partners, lovers.
He
wanted her
.

It was over quickly, both of them shuddering
as they came, their bodies pulsing together. For that brief moment
they were a single living, throbbing force, joined so completely
Meredith could not imagine them ever separating back into two
distinct people. But the moment passed and their bodies relaxed.
Their heartbeats slowed. They breathed.

Scott rolled onto his back beside her, one
arm looped around her. He stared at the ceiling. She did, too. A
quaint brass chandelier, the bulb holders shaped like daffodil
blossoms, hung above the bed. She hadn’t noticed that before.

Once again she waited for him to speak. He
didn’t, so she broke the silence. “I guess you liked the
teddy.”

“
That thing?” He gestured
toward a tangled mound of sheets near the foot of the bed. “Yeah, I
liked it. Maybe you can model it for me later.”

She laughed softly, but her anxieties were
returning, nipping at the outer edges of her soul, threatening to
devour her. “Scott. I tried so hard to lose weight so I’d look good
for you. And you never even noticed.”

He rose slightly, propped on one elbow, and
peered down at her. “Of course I noticed.”

“
You never said
anything.”

“
I never said anything when
you gained weight, either.”

That was true. He’d never criticized her,
never nagged her, never pointed out the difference between the
slender young woman he’d married and the chubby wife he’d wound up
with.

But he’d also grown distant over the years,
less attentive. He hadn’t complimented her. He hadn’t swooped her
off her feet the way he had just minutes ago. He hadn’t been wild
with passion for her.

“
Maybe you should have said
something,” she murmured. “If you no longer found me
attractive...”

“
Why do you think that? I
mean, yes, you look better now than you did then. But you’re my
wife. We’ve been married twenty-five years. It’s not as if I
see
you. Wait, that didn’t
sound right,” he conceded when she flinched. “What I mean is, when
you’re with someone a long time, you don’t do an objective
assessment of their physical appearance every time they enter a
room. What you see when you look at them is how you feel about
them, not whether they’re wearing a red shirt or mismatched socks,
or...or that thing.” He gestured toward the mound of linens again.
“What’s it called again?”

“
A teddy.” She wasn’t
mollified, though. When she looked at Scott, she saw him. His dark,
soulful eyes. His thin lips. The faint scar above his left eyebrow,
a souvenir from a bicycle accident when he’d been a child, in the
days before bike helmets were common. He’d hit a pothole and gone
flying, and he’d landed on a stick that had sliced into his
forehead, requiring a few stitches. Fortunately it hadn’t been
worse. But she saw that scar. Even after twenty-seven years of
togetherness, twenty-five of those years as husband and wife, she
saw it.

And he didn’t see her—at least, not unless
she was wearing something tantalizing from Victoria’s Secret.

“
Anyway, what was I going to
say? ‘You’re looking fat, honey’? You knew how you looked. You
didn’t need me to tell you.”

“
I need you to
see
me,” she said quietly,
her gaze resting on the light fixture above them, the petals of
glass. “I need to know I matter to you. We hardly ever even touch
anymore, let alone make love.”

This time he was the one to flinch, and his
voice was edged in anger when he responded. “Is that what this is
about? Sure, it would be nice to have sex more often. But we get
home from work, and we eat dinner, and then you’re on the phone
with your mother. And then you’re on the phone with Emily. And then
you’re off walking the dog. I suppose I should be grateful the boys
don’t call you every day, too.”

“
My mother and Emily like to
talk to me,” she said, wishing she didn’t sound so defensive. “And
they like to
listen
to me, too. They ask me for my opinions, my advice. They ask
how I’m doing.”

“
And what do you tell them?
Do you say you’re doing fine except that your husband doesn’t make
love to you?”

“
No, of course not.” A sob
swelled in her throat and she swallowed it back down.

“
And Skippy? He listens to
you and asks for advice, too?”

“
He doesn’t always obey me,
but yes, he listens. And he’s affectionate.”

“
And I’m not,” Scott said,
verbalizing her implication.

She wished this conversation had never begun.
Finally, she was talking to Scott, finally he was talking to her,
but the words hurt. How ironic that she could be a communications
manager, yet communicating with her husband had become a painful
ordeal.

“
At the end of the day, I’m
tired,” he said. “You come home from walking the dog, and if I’m
not already asleep, I’m halfway there. You’re more interested in
what’s going on with your mother and the kids than what’s going on
with me, anyway.”

“
That’s not
true.”

“
You’ve never asked me about
my book. I’m knocking myself out to get it done, and you don’t even
know what it’s about.”

Her pain increased, augmented by a hefty dose
of guilt. What he’d said was true; she didn’t ask about his book.
Its very existence irked her, because it absorbed all his
attention, leaving her neglected. “I talk to my mother and
Emily—and Skippy—because you’re, yes, knocking yourself out. You’re
buried in work. I don’t want to bother you or distract you.”

“
Right.”

“
You bring your laptop on a
weekend getaway!” This time it was her turn to gesture, not at an
alluring lacy undergarment but at his laptop, plugged in and
humming on the table next to the chair.

“
Because I’ve got a
deadline. I’ve got an editor on my back. I’ve got classes to teach
and students to meet with, and I don’t have a spare minute, and you
went and planned this damned getaway without even checking with me
first.”

“
If I’d checked with you,
you would have said no. You told me that yourself.”

He sighed, subsiding, his head sinking deeper
into the pillow and his arm sliding away from her, coming to rest
on the mattress. “I would have said no.”

Another tense silence. “I want more, Scott,”
she murmured. “I want us to talk to each other. And listen.
And...and hold hands.”

He said nothing.

“
Tell me about your book,”
she said. “It’s about elections, right?”

“
Do you really
care?”

“
I do.” She rolled onto her
side and looked at him,
saw
him. Saw the anger in his gaze, the resentment
tensing his jaw. Resentment and anger and something more. Worry.
Fear. She gathered his hand in hers, folded her slim fingers around
his thick, strong ones, and stared straight into his eyes. “Tell me
about it.”

“
It’s about how the
Electoral College is anti-democratic, and it essentially makes
voting for President meaningless if you don’t live in a swing
state. It’s about
de facto
disenfranchisement, and how that’s influenced
voting patterns over the years as the country has become more
polarized.”

“
Interesting,” she said,
meaning it. “Tell me more.”

He shrugged modestly. “There’s lots of
number-crunching and analysis.”

“
Can our democracy be
saved?”

“
I haven’t written that
chapter yet,” he said with a crooked smile.

“
It’s an important subject.”
She leaned forward and brushed his lips with hers. “I’m glad you’re
writing it, because you care so deeply about it. I care, too,
Scott. I want to know about your research. Your book. Your work. I
want to know.”

She leaned into him for another kiss. He
returned this one, soft, tender, his mouth warm, his tongue
seeking. This wasn’t like the wild, hungry kisses he’d given her
when she’d stepped out of the bathroom clad in the teddy. This was
the kiss a husband gave his wife when, at long last, they were
connecting. It was the kissing equivalent of holding hands.