Rekindled (20 page)

With an arrogant shift of his shoulders, he left the doorjamb and placidly headed away. “You find the substitute,” he called over his shoulder. “I’ll be staying here.”

She trailed him. “You can’t!”

At the bathroom door he turned so suddenly that she nearly bumped into him. She took a defensive step back.

He raised his right arm to rest high on the door. His left, with an angry red scar glaring from its upper half, hung by his hip. His body was a solid wall of stunning man.

“Are you going to stop me?” he drawled with an insolent silver gleam in his eye.

Anne tried to think up a sensible reply. When none came she turned on her heel and retraced her steps. She was hungry, she told herself. She needed breakfast. But she didn’t do more than nibble on the scrambled eggs and toast that she made.

What to do. If she wasn’t so far away from home and so badly in need of that distance, she might have simply packed up and left. But she wasn’t staying out of pride. She did need the distance.

“Aren’t you eating?” Again his voice startled her. This time, though, he was fully dressed. His jaw was clean-shaven and smelling of a lime aftershave. His hair was neatly combed and reached back collar of his wool plaid shirt. A wide leather belt hugged his hips, dark blue jeans his legs. Tan desert boots color-coordinated with his hair. His eyes were light green and calm.

He repeated the question. “You’re not hungry?” The way he looked at her plate said that if she wasn’t, he was.

With a sigh of defeat she pushed the dish across the table. “Help yourself”

With an exaggerated, “Thank you,” he lowered himself into a chair and took her up on her offer. She was starting to think that he might actually have manners, when he said, “Geez, no wonder you’re so thin. You’ve scrambled these eggs so dry they’re impossible to swallow. If this is the way you always cook, it’s a miracle you haven’t wasted away to nothing.”

Anne’s jaw dropped. Jeff had never complained about anything, least of all her cooking.

Sitting straighter, she said, “If you don’t like my cooking, then don’t eat it! As a matter of fact, I don’t like you very much, so why don’t we dispense with breakfast and get to work finding a solution to this mess.” Only when she stopped, did she realize she’d been shouting. There were also tears in her eyes again. Again. Jamming her knuckles against her mouth, she looked away.

More softly, Mitch asked, “How did you get into this mess, as you call it, Anne? Why aren’t you with your husband?”

“That’s none of your business.”

“Are you divorced?”

“No.”

“Are you working on the separate-vacation concept?”

“No.”

“He doesn’t know you’re here?”

She gave a bitter laugh. “No.”

“You’ve run away?”

Her composure cracked. “Will you leave me alone? Just go! Get out!

Let me be!”

He didn’t move. “Why did you leave your husband?”

“That’s none of your business!”

“No? In my book, marriage is a precious thing. Some people treasure it and then lose it through no fault of their own. Others throw it away. If we’re going to spend the week together, I want to know which it is. So tell me why you left him. If it was just your lousy cooking or your selfishness in the shower, he’d have left you.” He paused. “Is that what happened?”

She looked him in the eye. “He didn’t leave me. I didn’t leave him. We loved each other. He was in an accident, and now he’s dead. Dead!” Her chair scraped across the floor as she stood abruptly, reached angrily for his plate, and stormed to the sink. She slammed the food facedown in it. Then emotion overwhelmed her. Bracing shaky arms against the counter, she hung her head. Helplessly she gave in to quiet sobs.

She didn’t hear him come up, but there was a genuine softness in his voice. “I’m sorry. I wouldn’t have pushed if I’d known. It was thoughtless of me.”

She brushed at the tears. “It doesn’t matter.” But it did. It had been months since she had cried, but she couldn’t seem to stop. When she brushed them away, more tears came. To her horror, they came faster, until she was a sniffling bundle of misery.

Had she been thinking clearly, she would have shied from him the instant his hands touched her shoulders. But clear thought was beyond her. She needed comfort, and he offered it. Turning her, he pressed her head to his chest and held her while her whole body shook.

“Better?” he murmured when she finally quieted. He stroked her hair, smoothing loose strands from her damp cheeks as she nodded. It was only when he framed her face with his hands to inspect it that she realized she was hugging his waist.

Awkward, she blushed, stepped back, and turned to leave.

“Wait,” he ordered, but gently now. “Why don’t you sit down. I’ll make breakfast for both of us. You can even water down the coffee if you’d like.”

He hesitated. In the silence, she saw a glint of humor in his eyes. “Funny. I’ve taken my coffee strong and black since I was sixteen. Someone told me it would put hair on my chest. I guess you don’t want that, do you?”

Anne smiled sadly. “Not quite.” Her voice still quivered, but her eyes were drying fast. She felt more calm now, purged.

“You sit down,” he repeated, “while I cook. Then we’ll decide what’s to be done about this … mess.”

Anne helped herself to a fresh cup of coffee, adding hot water from the tap, then returned to her chair. He worked in silence, cracking eggs into the heavy iron skillet, toasting a fresh batch of bread, pouring two glasses of orange juice, toting it all to the table.

She ate everything on her plate, matching him egg for egg, toast for toast, juice for juice. Then he poured her a second cup of coffee, filled the creamer with water and put that too before her.

Back in his chair, he said, “I spent a lot of time last night thinking about this. I planned to do some fishing, some hiking, some reading, and a lot of sleeping. What had you wanted to do?”

She tipped up her chin. “Read. Work. Take walks, explore the neighborhood, enjoy the solitude.”

He looked out the window. Bright sun lit the yard. “Look, this may sound crazy, but I think we can both stay here. We both seem to want quiet and solitude. We can each just go our own way.” He looked at her. “I know this area, and, trust me, there won’t be another place to stay on such short notice.”

She tucked a handful of hair behind her ear. This wasn’t quite the vacation she had imagined, but he had a point. He didn’t seem willing to leave. Barring her own return to New York, there wasn’t any alternative. Her thumb moved on the ceramic mug. “This isn’t what I wanted.”

“Me, neither. But it’s the only fair thing. If I have to put up with your hot showers, you can put up with my black coffee.”

“What about the beds? Every move you make rattles on the ceiling. I wanted to sleep.”

“Yeah, I wanted that, too, but the bed up there is too damned small and uncomfortable. Why don’t you try sleeping there?”

“Because you’re there.”

“Then why don’t I sleep downstairs?”

“Because I’m there.”

“Damn it,” he sighed, “I don’t want to share your bed. Why don’t we just switch?”

She wasn’t a fool. “After you’ve told me how small and uncomfortable the attic one is? No way!”

“Then don’t complain about the noise.” In one swift move he was up, stacking the dishes, dumping them in the sink. When he turned back to her, a silver wave had fallen across his brow. “You clean up. I cooked.” He left the room so quickly that Anne’s protest met thin air.

“But-it was-my food-” Slowly she faced the dishes. If this was a preview of the week, things looked grim.

But Anne was tired of grim, so she took a positive approach. Starting with a long walk through the woods, she followed the line of a low stone wall across the hilltop and down a gently graded slope until the road intersected her path. The view was spectacular from several points where the forest door opened to the village below, its tall white church steeple catching the afternoon sun.

As she followed the dirt road back to the house, the climb steepened. She stopped to rest a time or two. All was peaceful. The murmur of the breeze was a welcome switch from the grating sounds of the city, the lush ferns on the forest floor were a far cry from stone sidewalks, the chipmunk skuttling through the brush was far better than a guard dog on a leash by the curb.

Accustomed to the gray of the pigeon, she smiled at the chickadee’s black cap and white bib and the red breast of the robin. She watched the play of the sun through the boughs of thick, healthy trees. The crispness of the air, sharp without chill, invigorated her.

When she finally returned to the house, Mitch was nowhere about. No car, no man, no note. Exhausted from fresh air and lack of sleep, she stretched out on her quilt and fell into a deep and restful sleep.

The tension of the past weeks took its due. When she awakened, it was dusk. After freshening up in the bathroom, she fixed a supper of soup and crackers, then settled before the fire to finish the mystery she’d started. But the story’s momentum had been broken. She never quite got back into the terror of it.

When she finished the last page, she sat back to watch the flames. Their play entranced her, calmed her, lulled her into a peaceful daze, and for the very first time, and at long last, she felt removed from Jeff’s death.

It had been a nightmare-first news of the plane crash, then the limbo when rescue teams set to work, hope when survivors appeared, total and utter despair when the worst became reality. But her heart felt lighter now than it had at any time since then. She didn’t know if it was the change of scenery, or the start of true healing. But it felt good.

Of course, Mitch was still gone. Though it was after nine, he hadn’t returned. Just as well. They were like fire and water.

She had to give him points, though. He hadn’t gone on and on about what a shame it was, how young a widow she made, how tragic that Jeff had been taken from life in his prime. She’d had enough pity to last a lifetime.

So he can’t be all bad, she mused, even if he does make bitter coffee.

The evening passed quietly. Anne left her chair only to feed the fire. After a time, her lids grew heavy. She fell into deep sleep from which only the sensation of movement much later disturbed her. She opened groggy eyes to find herself in Mitch’s arms.

“What are you doing?” she cried and began to squirm.

He held her tighter. “Putting you to bed.” They were already at the door of her room.

“Put me down. I don’t need your help.”

He dropped her on the bed. “Don’t worry. I’m not doing you any favors. I’m thinking of me. You were sleeping in my chair.”

Before she could begin to call him out, he pivoted and left, slamming the door behind him.

Sunday brought more of the same. On the plus side, the weather was grand, crisp and clear once the early-morning fog lifted. Having slept her fill, Anne was up early, putting on her own pot of coffee to assure herself a cup to her liking, before showering and dressing. The door to the attic remained closed. If Mitch was still asleep, he slept soundly. Everything overhead was silent.

After breakfast, she rewalked yesterday’s route, this time extending it to the brook that babbled down the far hillside. In keeping with the nip in the air, the first of the birch leaves were starting to yellow. The sun picked them out from the rest and added a glow.

Removing her sneakers, she rolled up her jeans and, where the water was shallow, waded across flat granite boulders. It was the kind of thing she and Jeff would have done. Now she was alone, yet strangely peaceful. Enjoying herself, she leaped lightly from stone to stone.

Returning invigorated to the house, she tackled the first of the papers she had to translate, making good headway with the English-to-Spanish piece until her stomach grumbled. By then there were stirrings from the upper quarter. She worked until he was in the bathroom and dallied in the kitchen until he returned to his room. When he came downstairs, she was back at work, sitting at the small desk that stood beneath a side window of the living room.

Then the trouble began. For nearly ten minutes he looked over her shoulder while she worked as best she could. Then he made a racket with pots and pans in the kitchen. When that ended, there was whistling, loud and persistent, the same tune, over and over and over again.

Worst were interruptions of the “Hey, where is…” variety. First it was, “Hey, where’s the salt?” Then, “Hey, where’s the ketchup?” Then, “Hey, where’s the large spatula?”

By this time she knew he was baiting her, so she didn’t scream. Calmly, she put down her pen, set her glasses aside, and made for the kitchen to register a civil complaint.

“Are there any more? migod, what are you doing?” She ran across the room, only to drop her outstretched arms in disgust and raise her eyes heavenward in search of patience.

“What’s the trouble?” He was all innocence.

She peered once more into the half-empty jar in his hand. “Those are my macadamia nuts. I’ve been saving that itty-bitty jar for this vacation!

“

“So I’ll buy you another jar. Is money that tight?”

Anne scowled. She reached for the jar and clamped on its lid before he could take more. “It’s not the money. It’s the principle. I love macadamia nuts.”

“I’ll get you more,” he repeated calmly.

She returned the jar to the cabinet. “Can I trust you to leave it alone, or do I have to put it in my room?”

He grinned and folded his arms on his chest. “I haven’t had macadamias in ages. I’d forgotten how good they are. But you can trust me. At least, when it comes to the nuts.”

For a split second, she thought she heard something sexual in his drawl. Then, dismissing it as a figment of her imagination, she turned and stalked off.

By Monday, a pattern emerged. Anne rose early each morning and hiked the countryside. Mitch slept late enough to ensure a replenished supply of hot water for a long shower. Meals were widely scattered and eaten alone from supplies that remained separate and distinct.

By Tuesday Anne felt well rested and relaxed. If Mitch continued to toss in his sleep, she had either gotten used to the noise or she slept soundly enough herself to blot it out.