Passing Through Paradise (20 page)

A haunted smile touched her lips. “So I waited until we were airborne, and I let him have it. I was so angry, I didn’t even stutter. And Victor just sat there beside me, listening. I don’t remember how many times we took that ride, how many tickets he handed the attendant. We just kept going around and around, and I talked like I’d never talked to anyone before. It was like . . . ” She paused, flashed a grin. “Like now, sort of. At one point, we got stuck at the top. That’s when he asked me to marry him.”

She folded her arms on the table. “Pretty romantic, isn’t it?” Her voice was flat. He wondered what had soured the memory for her.

“And he made it happen, didn’t he?”

“In a big way. We announced our engagement at the Providence Plantation Founders Ball three weeks later.”

“Victor did everything in a big way.”

“Yeah,” she said, holding his gaze with hers. “Even die.”

Chapter
23

I
n the wake of her confession, Sandra wasn’t sure what to say next. Waves struck the hull of the old trawler, thumping into the silence. The last words she’d spoken seemed to hang in the air, then dissipate like smoke on the wind. Maybe she’d said too much. People seldom wanted the unvarnished truth, even when they asked for it.

Malloy made an unlikely confidant, sitting there with his hair mussed and his eyes as clear as the sky after a storm, his hand covering hers. She tried to read his expression—a combination of incomprehension and regret that he’d broached the topic in the first place. Yet after last night, she wanted to open up to him. “Why do I feel like a waitress who just brought you a dish you didn’t order?” she asked, pulling her hand away.

Leaning back, he absently scratched his bare chest. The gesture, so alien, so
male,
drew her attention. “I guess I was expecting something—”

“Lighter. Cuter. Every couple has a fun story about the way they met. Getting their underwear tangled at the Laundromat. Falling in love in geometry class. With Victor and me, there was nothing fun about it. He helped me with a serious disability. Six months later, I was saying ‘I do’ in front of five hundred wedding guests. Actually, what I said was ‘Yes, I do,’ because I felt the stutter coming on.” She shook her head. “I can’t believe I told you that. I’ve never told anyone that story.”

“Why not? It’s a good story. Sounds like the two of you were a perfect match.”

He was right, but not in the way he meant. Victor had needed her as much as she’d needed him; she hadn’t realized it until the very end. He’d needed her unquestioning loyalty, her naiveté, her circumspection.

Malloy recaptured her hand. “I figured talking about it might make you feel better. But you look as though you—”

He broke off, but she filled in the blank. “Lost my best friend?” She’d thought so, but everything had changed the night of the accident. She questioned everything she thought she knew. What did she mourn? The life she used to share with Victor, or Victor himself?

“So he was the love of your life,” Malloy said, misreading the look on her face.

“I . . . why would you say that?”

He hesitated, then said, “Because you can’t move on. It’s been a year since he died, and I get the sense that five years from now, you’ll still be dwelling on this.”

That stung. “Why do you care?”

“You know why.” Standing up, he came around to her side of the table and pulled her up off the bench, into his arms. “Maybe I’m trying to figure out if there’s room for someone else.” He settled his mouth over hers and walked her backward through the galley, lifting her over the threshold to the bed. He tasted of oranges, and Sandra didn’t think of resisting. His passion for her was utterly intoxicating and she wasn’t about to deny him. For the first time in her life, she understood what it meant to be insatiable.

Much later, when Sandra awakened, she discerned a golden thread of light around the forward hatch. Lord, what time was it?

Malloy was still there, asleep in the heavy, guiltless manner of a child—or a man with a clear conscience.

She hardly dared to breathe. What had she done?

All her life she’d tried to please everyone, even if it meant shortchanging herself in the process and relegating her adventurous nature to fictional characters. This was life, Malloy was all too real, as vital and powerful as a storm at sea. Last night, she threw the rules out the window. She’d been a stranger to herself. The boat had all but burst into flames.

Cradling her chin in her hand, she studied him. She had thought he was ordinary, a simple workingman, but that wasn’t quite right. He was filled with an infinite variety of complexities she was only beginning to discover.

The handyman. He fixed broken things. In that way, he was exactly what she needed—someone to come into her life and bring her out into the world. Until now, she hadn’t realized she’d been stuck in her own head, out of touch with her senses, for so long.

When he made love to her, she stopped thinking. In his arms, she learned to explore sensation, instinct. It was not always comfortable, and sometimes it felt risky, but last night had been deeply fascinating in a way she hadn’t anticipated.

She listened to the waves and the wind, watched the play of light through the hatch, inhaled the subtle, erotic scent of their lovemaking. Everything was heightened by the physical intimacy they’d shared. Even after exchanging their personal baggage, they were still attracted to each other.

But now what?

Apprehension coiled inside her. He was becoming dangerously important to her. Deeper commitments were impossible, even though her heart yearned for them. She couldn’t let that happen, especially not now. She had to stay the course she’d charted for herself, and Malloy had to deal with the issues of his broken family. But Sandra knew their physical intimacy was going to make it harder for her to keep her secrets. She’d probably said far too much to him over breakfast.

She made an involuntary sound, trying to stave off another wave of tearful emotion. He opened his eyes, and his smile broke as slowly as the sunrise. They didn’t kiss, didn’t speak, didn’t even bother with foreplay this time, but simply and wordlessly joined and spent themselves, all in the space of moments.

It wasn’t nearly long enough. She came, but she wanted more, and gave a little grumble of protest as he moved away with a grin of sleepy satisfaction. He grabbed a water bottle from the shelf, took a swig and offered it to her. She dutifully took a sip. “That wasn’t what I had in mind, Malloy.”

He laughed. “Lady, you need an
OFF
switch.”

She lay back against the bank of pillows, savoring the gentle rocking motion of the boat. How had she lived so long without this? Lust and ecstasy had been foreign concepts to her, things that didn’t exist except as vague abstractions. She always assumed passion was something unreachable, something that might happen in a fairy tale or a country-western song. An ideal, not something that could actually happen to a person like her. Now she knew the tenderness, the intimacy, the heat and energy, and her entire world had changed.

“You have the strangest look on your face,” he said.

She took a hasty swig of water. “Do I? I came here last night to make a stand, and I wound up flat on my back without an argument.”

He rested his hand easily on the sheet covering her breast. “I wasn’t expecting it, either. Hoping, though.” He rubbed her suggestively. “Still am.”

An involuntary response shuddered through her. She wasn’t sure Victor was as important as he’d seemed when she’d stormed onto the boat last night. “I think my circuits are overloading.” She tucked the sheet under her arms. “What time is it, anyway?”

“Doesn’t matter. It’s Saturday.” His hand stilled, and she felt his attention fixing on her. “You were a virgin when you married Victor.”

Sandra froze. “Why would you say a thing like that?”

“An educated guess.”

Humiliation burned through her. So he’d sensed her inexperience, her ineptitude. She’d thought, from his responses to her, that for once she was getting it right, but apparently not. “H-how did you know?”

He shrugged, laid an idle hand on her knee beneath the covers. “You never struck me as the party animal of Rhode Island.”

“So I led a sheltered life,” she said. “So sue me. You’ll have to take a number.”

He pulled back, eyebrows raised. “That wasn’t a criticism. Christ, just the opposite.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

He pushed a hand through his thick hair. “I’m not like you, Sandy. Not good with words, so I’ll probably say this wrong. Last night you were . . . a revelation. There’s something incredibly sexy about total honesty.”

Had she been honest? In a way, she thought. Her body, the things she had felt, couldn’t lie. “Oh,” she said.

The corner of his mouth slid upward in a half grin. “Now you’re thinking too hard again. Say what you feel. Quit trying to analyze everything.”

“All right. I never really knew sex could be like . . . like. . .”

“Like this?” His hand slipped upward from her knee, sending ripples along her nerve endings.

She gasped, forgot what she was thinking. Again.

“You and Victor weren’t very physical,” he remarked. It wasn’t a question, rather a statement.

Discomfited, Sandra shifted away. “You have no way to judge that.”

“I ‘m not judging you. Simply trying to get to know you.”

“Suppose I did the same to you?” She drew her knees up to her chest. “Suppose I went poking into your past with your ex-wife?”

He spread his arms, and the sheet slipped below his waist, but he didn’t seem to notice. “Be my guest. I’ve got nothing to hide. Do you?”

She knew without asking that sex had not been the problem between Mike and Angela. How could it have been, when he had that intent way of concentrating on pleasure, pushing everything else in the world away.

“You blush a lot,” he said, studying her. “I like that.”

She didn’t know how to respond, so she fell silent, sifting through the past. She and Victor had shared the same bed. They danced together, walked hand in hand through the wet brick streets of Providence, gazed at each other across the linen-covered tables of exclusive restaurants, went on vacation together, spent holidays together.

With no basis for comparison, she used to think that was the essence of marriage. In one stormy night, Malloy had shown her a new world, a world filled with wonders she hadn’t seen before, sensations she hadn’t felt before.

He touched her shoulder, drew her around to face him, a question in his eyes.

She cleared her throat. “Victor and I—that is, we weren’t. . . Our marriage was not centered on the—the bedroom.”

“Was there another woman?”

She recoiled from that, pushing him away. “Not everyone is a sex maniac.” She wanted to hide from his probing stare. He had been best friends with her husband for ten years, maybe more. He’d watched Victor grow from a boy into a man, had shared confidences only best friends ever share. Maybe he knew. Maybe he’d known all along. “Answer me, Malloy. What are you asking?”

“I thought I knew,” he said, still looking at her oddly. “Did I ask the wrong question? Should I have asked if
you’re
okay?” He smiled, and she was amazed that a man with beard stubble and rumpled hair could look so charming. “After last night,” he added, “I know the answer to that. So I wondered if Victor—I don’t know—if there was some kind of problem with his . . . performance.”

The irony of it struck her. His performance. He’d been a consummate performer.

As a new bride, she used to study self-help books that promised she could heat up her marriage by becoming the aggressor in the relationship. But each time she had tried to initiate lovemaking with Victor, he’d fallen back on the classic excuses. He was tired. He felt nauseous from overeating. He had a migraine. He stayed up so late at night that she often ended up falling asleep with the light still on and a book on her chest. Most mornings, he left the bed before she awakened. The one time she’d encouraged him to see a doctor had been one of only two times he ever lost his temper with her.

She used to worry that she wasn’t glamorous enough, sophisticated enough, sexy enough. Sure, other men came on to her occasionally; her social life with Victor placed her in the public eye and she’d endured her share of propositions.

Of course, she had never once been tempted. When Victor had chosen her to be his wife, he had chosen wisely and well. Not because she was such a great catch, but because she had the one quality he needed above all others — she would never, ever breach his trust.

Not even after he was dead.

Chapter
24

T
he new floodlights looked like shit, Mike observed as he got out of the car in front of his house. Or not his house—what the hell should he call it? Ex-house? Step-house? Ordinarily, the sad implications of the term would bother him, but he had other things to think about these days.

A lot of other things.

He paused to check his reflection in the dark-tinted car window. For the Father and Daughter Dance, he’d borrowed the Carmichaels’ Cutlass Supreme. His hair was too damned long; he couldn’t recall the last time he’d been to the barber. But the fifteen-year-old tux still fit, and Mike had even managed to dig up a pair of cuff links, the ones he’d worn at his wedding. He hoped Mary Margaret wouldn’t notice the bow tie was a clip-on. The only guy Mike knew who actually tied them had been Victor Winslow, an expert at it by the age of ten.

Victor again. These days, he was never far from Mike’s mind. Not just because Victor had been married to Sandy, but because something kept bugging Mike, something about the way Victor had died. He had a nagging feeling that something was missing from the accounts of that night, despite the persistence of the WRIQ news team. Mike had read and reread the reports. He’d even studied transcripts of the medical examiner’s inquest, filed on the Internet under public records. Something didn’t add up. He kept trying to think of a way to question Sandy, but he didn’t want to push. Despite their new intimacy, certain boundaries stayed intact. She was touchy as an alley cat when it came to Vic. Mike would probably be better off if he left things alone—but he was quickly finding out that he couldn’t leave her alone for a lot of reasons.

Running a finger around the stiff edge of his collar, he walked to the front door. Kevin’s army of action figures posed at the edge of the walkway or crouched in tunnels dug in the flower beds, and the sight of them gave Mike a sharp pang. He missed the little stuff like this —seeing his son lost in a fantasy world, going about the serious business of play.

He rang the bell, noticing a new “No Solicitors” sign by the door.

“Just a sec.” Angela’s heels clicked on the wood floor, and then the door opened. She was in the midst of putting on an earring and held her head cocked to one side, her bright blond hair falling over her shoulder.

“Hey, Ange.” Mike stepped inside.

She dropped the earring, and it pinged across the floor toward his feet. They both stooped to retrieve it, inadvertently bumping shoulders. “Sorry.” Mike straightened up, handing her the little gold loop. “Here you go.”

After a second, he realized she was staring at him. Her full lips were parted slightly, and her eyes were wide. He realized she hadn’t seen him in a tux in years. “Thanks, Mike,” she said at last.

“Is my best girl ready?”

She cast a glance at the stairs. “Almost.”

He shifted from one foot to the other. He’d lived in this house for more than fifteen years, yet each time he came here, he barely recognized the place. Angela was always changing the decor. The house smelled different, too. Not bad, just. . . different. His ex-house, ex-wife. Ex-life.

“Where’s Kevin?”

“He was driving Mary Margaret nuts all afternoon, so I had Carmine take him over to the restaurant. He likes doing his homework in the break room.” She handed him a red paper heart from the hall table. “He made you a Valentine.”

Mike unfolded it, and a smile tugged at his mouth. In careful lettering, his son had written: “Dad: Happy V.D.”

Showing it to Angela, he said, “It’s a keeper.”

“I’ll say.” She laughed and shook her head. She was such a knockout, he thought. Always had been.

“So,” he said. “I’ll have her home by nine.”

“Good. It’s a school night.” She gave a dry laugh. “What am I saying? You know that. She’s really excited about going to a dance. Ah, Mike. She’s growing up so fast.” Angela looked up at him with such familiar, soft-eyed longing that for a moment he lost his bearings, forgot where he was. Ex-house, he reminded himself.

Rattled, he took a step back, spreading his arms. “How do I look?”

She eyed him from head to toe. “Not bad for a townie. But your tie’s crooked.” She stepped forward, putting her hands up to adjust it.

Her nearness surrounded him, swallowed him up. He knew her with an intimacy wrought by years—knew every inch of her body, her perfume, the sound of her breathing. It was something that didn’t go away when the divorce decree was delivered.

Her fingers trembled as she fixed his tie, and he realized she was probably thinking the same thing he was—he could see the pain and defeat in her eyes. When she finished the tie, she didn’t step back, but rested the palms of her hands against him as though absorbing his heat through them.

A faint sigh slipped from her. “Sometimes I wish . . . God, Mike,” she whispered, then stopped as tears filled her eyes.

He clenched his jaw, bracing himself, then said, “Ange. I wanted so much for us.”

She tucked her fingers beneath his lapels and slid her hands downward, polished fingernails glittering. “I know, Michael.” Her voice broke. “Why didn’t we make it?”

“You know exactly why,” he said, “but you’re the mother of my children, and for their sake, I won’t drag you down that path.”

Angela’s face turned pale, then hard. A footstep sounded on the stairs, and he looked up to see Mary Margaret on the shadowy landing, watching them. Jesus, how long had she been there?

He and Angela stepped apart. “My tie okay now?” he asked.

“Perfect,” she said, blinking, swallowing.

“Ready, Princess?” he asked.

Mary Margaret hesitated, then came slowly down the stairs. As she stepped into the light of the foyer, Mike’s heart seized with emotion. She looked incredible in a pretty green dress, her hair done, a glaze of pink lipstick on her mouth, her eyes shining. His little girl wasn’t so little anymore.

“Sorry, ma’am,” he said, forcing a grin. “I was just looking for my daughter.”

She giggled. “Lame, Dad.”

“You look absolutely beautiful,” Angela said, holding the door for them. “Have a wonderful time. And spit out your bubble gum before you get on the dance floor, young lady.”

Mike cocked out his arm. Mary Margaret didn’t see it at first, so he nudged her with his elbow. She giggled again, then tucked her hand in and walked with him to the car.

She chattered like a magpie all the way to the Y, and Mike kept sneaking glances at her. Gone were the round baby cheeks, the chubby, dimpled hands. What a bundle of contradictions she was, blowing bubbles through her lipstick while admiring a fresh manicure.

He parked, and she forgot to wait for him to get the door for her. She spat her gum on the ground, then practically bounced with nervous excitement as they went inside to a candlelit room filled with giggling girls and their fathers, who’d skipped dinner to take them dancing and raise funds for the Y. Most of the men were busy helping themselves to little triangular sandwiches with the crusts trimmed off, heart-shaped cookies and paper cups of punch that turned everyone’s teeth red. Paper hearts hung from the ceiling, and a mirrored ball spun like the slow blink of a lighthouse beam, casting diamonds across the milling crowd. A few brave pairs of dads and daughters were dancing to “Georgia on My Mind.”

Mike and Mary Margaret stood at the edge of the room for a minute, looking around. “That’s Allie Monroe,” she said, indicating a girl with curly hair. “She just got braces. And the one dancing right by the DJ is Kandy Procter. Her dad’s related to that TV news lady. He’s
bald,
isn’t he?” Mary Margaret’s face glowed, and she grabbed Mike’s hand. “And everybody’s checking you out. You’re the bomb, Dad.”

“You might change your mind after you see my dancing.”

“We don’t have to dance if you don’t want to.”

The music changed to “My Girl.” Perfect. “Are you kidding?” he asked. “Come on, gorgeous. We’re dancing.”

Leading her out to the floor, he forced himself to remember the steps Sandy had taught him. Forward-left-back-right-forward. He hoped like hell he wouldn’t blow it.

He didn’t blow it. He and Mary Margaret danced as though they were old hands, never missing a beat. The way she looked up at him, with such wonder in her eyes, made him feel ten feet tall.He’d spent the past year nursing bitter regrets about all he’d lost; now it was time to move on. Moments like this reminded him that somethings would always be a part of his heart, no matter what.

The song ended, and he twirled her under his arm like Sandy had shown him.

“I thought you said you didn’t know how to dance,” Mary Margaret said, grinning.

“Yeah, well, I took a few lessons.”

“Really? From who?”

He could tell from the look on her face that she wished she hadn’t asked. But she had. “From Sandra Winslow, as a matter of fact.” He hesitated. “Do you have a problem with that?”

Mary Margaret hesitated, her face answering without words. “I’m hungry, Dad.” She headed for the refreshments table.

Fine, he thought, following her. She didn’t want to hear it. She might have to one day, though. Since last weekend, when he and Sandy had all but ignited the boat, he’d thought a lot about what it would be like, having her as part of his life. He’d have to bring her together with his kids, and not just incidentally. He wondered if he could do that.