My Fair Gentleman (14 page)

Remembering the instant of her crash, Allie narrowed her eyes. “Where’s your other skate guard, Sarah?”

Sarah looked startled, then she shrugged. And smiled.

Allie’s first impulse was to smash something harder than a peach in the girl’s face this time. Pure instinct stopped her short. Instead, she faced Tommy again. “She threw her skate guard in front of me so I’d fall.”

He shot Sarah a suspicious glance.

“She’s lying! I did no such thing!”

“I don’t lie,” Allie said, recapturing Tommy’s gaze. “Funny. I used to think she wasn’t good enough for you. But anyone who’d stay with her knowing what she’s like…well, there’s only one reason you’d do that.” She saw the flicker of guilt in his eyes and felt her stomach sink. “I guess that means you’re good enough for each other.”

Pushing into a shaky glide, Allie moved back into the slower lane of skaters. She felt bruised and sad, but not bad about herself. And that was worth something, she guessed.

Holly streaked up in a blur of blue.“Kevin told me you fell. Are you hurt?”

“I’m okay. I hope I didn’t ruin your dress, though.” A streak of gray slashed down the middle.

“Forget the dress—it’ll wash clean. Did you see me out there?”

“Yes. You were awesome, Holly.”

“That’s what Kevin said. You were right, Allie! It was like he saw me for the first time. We talked for five minutes while Becky just stood there and glared. Do you feel like getting a Coke or something?”

“Not really.” Allie noted her friend’s crestfallen expression and added, “But you go on ahead,”

Holly beamed. “Thanks, Allie, I won’t be long.”

A flash of blue, and Allie was alone again. She probably should take a break. Her elbows stung. Her knees ached. She finger-brushed her hair and made a face. Ice had melted in the strands.

A tall boy skated up on her left. Dark hair, dark eyes, cute smile. “Hi, you’re Holly’s friend, aren’t you? My name’s Brian.”

“Hi. My name’s—”

“Allie,” Tommy finished for her, skating up on her right. “She’s a friend of mine, too. At least, I hope she’s still a friend.” With his blond head tilted down and his vivid blue eyes asking for acceptance, he was her Johnny Angel in the flesh.

“Friends don’t abandon the friends they came with,” she managed.

“I didn’t. Sarah got mad and left with Becky.”

“She got mad?”

Tommy grinned, and she thought her heart would burst
Alien-style
out of her chest. “I guess I made her mad,” he admitted. “Do you mind if I skate with you awhile?”

She glanced to her left and wondered when Brian had skated off.

“I’d really like to,” Tommy added.

“I’d like that, too.” She couldn’t get much happier than this, Allie thought.

Then Tommy reached for her hand.

R
ESISTING AN URGE
to fuss over Joe’s swollen nose, Catherine reached for the bottle of cabernet sauvignon and filled two glasses. “Take a sip.”

She watched in unabashed enjoyment as he lifted his glass and swallowed. His new haircut exposed the strong clean line of his jaw and muscular neck, the surprisingly noble flow of his brow and well-formed head. His rugged masculinity seemed somehow intensified by the shorter cut. Just looking at him curled her toes.
Why
couldn’t Carl make her feel this way?

He lowered his glass and caught her staring.

“What do you taste?” she asked, startled at the huskiness in her tone.

“Wine.”

“Can you be a little more specific?”

He frowned at his glass. “Red wine.”

She leaned forward and carefully replugged the bottle of cabernet.

“I’m not being a smart ass, Catherine. I really don’t know beans about grapes. I’ll just have to memorize what you tell me. Go ahead. Give me some tasting notes.” He put down his stemware, sat back and laced his fingers over his stomach.

He was right. She shouldn’t expect him to recognize the subtle traits she’d spent years learning to identify. Setting aside the chardonnay cork she’d been
about to replug, she lifted her glass toward the light and mimicked her father’s lofty expression.

“Moderately deep color, tinged with purple,” Lowering the glass, she breathed in a teasing mix of fragrances. “Enticing nose of blackberry and…mint, I think.”

She closed her eyes and tipped the rim to her lips, letting the liquid swirl across her tongue and palate. In a serious tasting, she wouldn’t swallow. But then, nothing that involved Joe was ever serious.

“Rich velvety flavors. Nutty young oak. Ripe blackberry.” She sipped again. “Mmm, lots of underlying vanilla. Superb balance, well-knit and finely resolved. I remember now why this is Father’s favorite.” She took another healthy sip before opening her eyes.

Joe closed his gaping mouth. “Get outta town. You can tell all that stuff from just a few sips?”

She tried not to preen. “Well, I might have missed something. I’m a little out of practice.”

He reached out and filled another empty glass with chardonnay. “Do this one,” he ordered, pushing the glass her way.

“Pass me a wafer first.” She ate the dry biscuit he offered, then lifted the rapidly fogging glass of chilled white wine. “Pale gold color,” she observed, bringing the rim to her nose. “Citric…slightly floral bouquet.” She sipped the contents, again closing her eyes to focus her senses on taste alone. “Green apple, with hints of vanilla. Good structure, with balanced acidity.” She indulged in another swallow. “Ah, I’m getting lovely lemon tones dominating the finish. Very nice.” Opening her eyes, she flushed as Joe saluted her with his glass of cabernet.

“Pretty damn impressive. Useless and pretentious, but impressive. Who taught you this parlor trick?”

“It’s useless and pretentious. Who do you think?”

“Your father.”

“Go to the head of the class.” Returning to her glass of red wine, Catherine savored another sip. “Let’s review the cabernet notes again. I want you to remember them.”

She settled back and drilled him in earnest, making him repeat her words until she was certain be wouldn’t trip up. They moved on to the chardonnay and then the merlot, both of them honoring Carl with a toast for providing the excellent vintage. She felt a delicious thrill of rebellion at swallowing her “tastes,” dispensing with wafers altogether and not even bothering to use a fresh glass for each wine.

By the time they sampled the last bottle, a light herbaceous
fumi blanc,
Catherine positively glowed with optimism. Her student had not only mastered the tasting notes, he’d delivered them with good diction, proper English and Sebastian/Cary Grant urbanity. She poured herself a teensy bit more wine and beamed.

“You have a beautiful speaking voice, Joe. Deep. Confident. With your memory for facts and quick wit, you’ll make a wonderful sportscaster.”

His ears reddened endearingly. He propped the stem base on his thigh and circled the glass rim with one fingertip. “Norman has booked me some time in a studio next Wednesday. I’m going to make a new broadcast demo tape to send out.”

“That’s great. Then what?”

His hand stilled. “Then I hope to God someone out there takes a chance on hiring a screwup like me.”

She peered at his shuttered expression and realized he was serious. “I’d hardly call you a screwup. You made it to The Show. You’ve raised a lovely girl any man would be proud to call his daughter.”

“Yeah. Too bad I haven’t made her proud to call me Dad.”

At Allie’s age, Catherine would have given anything to have a father like Joe. “From what I’ve seen, you’re a wonderful dad.”

“You’ve only
seen
the last three weeks.” His mouth twisted. He set his wine on the table as if he’d suddenly lost his taste for it. “Last summer I promised Allie we’d go somewhere special together during her Thanksgiving break. Then a friend of mine won a skiing trip and invited me to go on Thanksgiving weekend. I figured, hey, I’d never get another offer like that. Allie wouldn’t mind waiting till her Christmas break to do something.”

“That’s when you injured your knees?”

He made a sound of disgust. “Eight hours of surgery, three months of rehab. No trip for Allie.”

“Accidents happen. Don’t be so hard on yourself.”

He raised tortured eyes. “I pissed my career down the toilet and hurt my little girl—all because I was too selfish to think about anything but having fun.”

“But you’re building a new career now. And little girls are resilient. Allie forgave you, didn’t she?”

“I guess she did. I hope she did. But for months she wouldn’t smile, wouldn’t look at me. Or if she did, it was like—” He shot up from his chair and started
pacing, as agitated as a caged tiger prodded with a stick.

“It was like what, Joe?”

“Like I’d just drowned her kitten. The same way Vicky used to look at me.”

Vicky. The wife he never mentioned. Catherine watched him stride back and forth, wanting to comfort him but sensing there was more. “Why did Vicky look at you that way?”

“Lots of reasons. I was always on the road. I cared about my buddies more than I did her. If she cooked better I would come home for dinner more often. If she was funnier I would laugh like I used to. If she wasn’t pregnant I would still love her___Hell, the more I told her that was ridiculous, the worse she cut herself down and the guiltier I felt.” He stopped and plowed his fingers through his hair. “Even the sex went sour after a while, and that’s what got us into trouble in the first place.”

Catherine ignored an irrational stab of jealousy. She nudged his vacated chair with her toe. “Please sit down. I feel like I’m at Wimbledon.”

He gave the chair a disoriented glance, then did as she asked, stretching his long legs out beside her.

“Thank you,” she said. “Now finish the story.”

“It’s not very original. We’d only dated a couple of months when she got pregnant. Vicky swore she hadn’t missed a single pill. Maybe she had, maybe she hadn’t, but she’d been raised in foster homes and had no family, so I did what I thought was right.” He reached for his wineglass and took a deep swallow. “From the beginning, her mood swings scared me. One minute she was Julie Andrews singing on a
mountaintop, the next she was giving me
that look.
Or crying. She cried a lot.”

“Did her obstetrician know she was depressed?”

Joe nodded. “He said it wasn’t unusual with so many hormonal changes going on. Told her to lay off caffeine, walk every day and take her vitamins. 1 pretty much tuned out her crying after that. Yeah, I was a real supportive husband.” He raised his glass and drained the contents, his eyes bleak with self-contempt. “Then I came home one afternoon from a three-day road trip and found her still in bed. I don’t think she’d gotten out of it since I left. Her hair was dirty, her eyes were dull—and God, she was so thin,”

“What did you do?”

“I cleaned her up and got her to eat, then called her obstetrician and gave him hell. After that, Vicky saw a psychologist every week during her last trimester of pregnancy.”

Ah. The missing link. The reason Joe distrusted “shrinks.” “What was the doctor’s name?”

“Whitmire. Tall, distinguished-looking, fancy office in downtown Tucson.” From his tone, Joe might have been reading the man’s rap sheet. “You know him?”

“No.”

“Lucky you. He had Vicky so dependent on him she dreaded taking time out to deliver the baby and miss a few appointments. I think she fell in love with the guy.”

Transference. Catherine wondered how she’d deal with it when she opened her own practice. “It’s not uncommon for patients to develop strong feelings for their counselor.”

“If she liked him so goddamn much, why the hell couldn’t he make her better?” It was a cry of anger. And pain.

“I’m sure he tried.”

“Trying doesn’t cut it if you strike out, doll.”

Catherine felt a stir of uneasiness. “Dr. Whitmire wouldn’t have been able to prescribe medication until after the baby was born. And sometimes counseling by itself isn’t enough.” A thought occurred to her. “Did the two of you ever see Dr. Whitmire for joint counseling?”

Joe scowled and looked away. “So now it’s my fault?”

“What’s your fault? Her depression?”

“I was getting a lot of good press that year, okay? When you’re playing hot and signed with a farm team, you can’t miss practice and games, or you might miss the one time that scout is sitting out in the stands. I couldn’t lie on a couch and blow my shot at making The Show.”

“Of course you couldn’t—”

“I took a whole week off when Allie was born until Vicky got back on her feet. She loved the baby— you can ask my mother. Mom was with her for three weeks after I got back in the game schedule. When she left I thought Vicky could take care of the baby by herself no problem.” He shifted to the edge of his chair, positioned to spring up. “I mean, other women go back to office jobs after four weeks, don’t they?”

“Joe—”

“It’s not like Vicky had an eight-to-five job. All she had to do was take care of one little baby—”

“Joe,
stop.
” Catherine’s stomach clenched in queasy anticipation. “Allie told me her mother died
of complications after she was born. Exactly how did Vicky die?”

The defensive gleam in his eyes vanished, replaced by staggering anguish and guilt. “She slit her wrists an hour after Mom left. I came home that night and found Allie squalling in her crib. Vicky was in the bathtub…” His large frame shuddered.

Even though some part of her had guessed, Catherine’s breath whooshed out.

“You once wanted to talk about my ‘aversion to marriage.’ Well, now you know the truth. I can’t handle being responsible for someone else’s happiness. When the pressure’s on, I don’t even step up to the plate, much less take a swing at the pitch. I killed my wife as sure as if I’d held the razor blade.”

Catherine’s lungs inflated so fast she got dizzy. “That’s melodramatic nonsense! Did Dr. Whitmire warn you Vicky might have suicidal tendencies? Prepare you for handling postpartum depression? Call you when she didn’t schedule an appointment after the baby was born?”

He shook his head warily.

No wonder he had no respect for her profession. “A thorough evaluation and a conscientious counselor could have advised you to take preventive steps. But even then there’s no guarantee Vicky wouldn’t have taken her life.”

“I wasn’t there for her,” he insisted.

“Listen to me, Joe. If she’d waited to use that razor blade until right before you were due home, her attempt might have been the proverbial cry for help. But she didn’t wait. In fact, it sounds like she made damn sure she’d succeed.”

He looked a bit stunned.

She leaned forward and took his hands into her own. “Maybe you weren’t the most supportive husband. Maybe you could have been more sensitive, I don’t know. But I
do
know that each and every one of us is responsible for our own happiness—no one else can make us happy. If Vicky really wanted to kill herself, nothing short of twenty-four-hour observation or physical restraint would have kept her safe.” Her thumbs massaged his knuckles. “It’s not your fault, Joe. Let it go.”

For an instant his beautiful brown eyes were free of all pretense, his fear a precious gift of trust. “It won’t change anything. I’ll still be a screwup.”

She squeezed his hands. “No, you’ll be standing at the plate, swinging at every pitch. That’s all anybody expects. When it gets right down to it, that’s all any of us can do.”

J
OE GAZED
at the deepening twilight and sipped his cabernet. Catherine had insisted on doing the dishes alone after their spontaneous meal of soup and sandwiches. The backyard patio provided needed distance and a chance to think.

He rehashed their conversation at length, one phrase replaying over and over in his mind.
It’s not your fault, Joe. Let it go.
His rigid stance gradually relaxed. As if awakening from a dream, he grew aware of the beauty surrounding him.

Crickets sawed a high-pitched tune. A warm breeze rustled the leaves in a towering pecan tree. Roses swayed seductively against the tall wooden fence. Within this patch of paradise, a measure of peace settled into his heart. Maybe in time he actually
could
let it go.

He wandered toward the fence and breathed in the spicy-sweet fragrance of at least a hundred blooms. One perfect white blossom caught his attention. Reaching out, he touched the velvety petals and thought of Catherine’s skin.

A swirl of emotions hit him harder than Carl’s punches. Lust, possessiveness, respect, wonder—a longing of the soul he’d scoffed at when playing the lead in
Romeo and Juliet
all those years ago. But the bard had known his stuff. Forbidden love tempted like the apple lured Eve.

The back door opened and closed, drawing his gaze. Catherine walked toward him carrying the bottle of cabernet and a filled wineglass. The dark liquid remained level even when she stepped from Flagstone onto grass. He never tired of watching her move.