Sharing Sunrise (14 page)

“Not permanent, you mean?” He cupped her face in his hands. “Honey, I know that. I accept it. And when the time comes for you to move on, I won’t hold it against you. Remember, I’m going into this with my eyes open. But I’m going into it. You and I, together … It’s what I want for now. For as long as we can have it.”

“Sure,” she said, stepping away from him, gathering up one of the damp towels, wrapping it around herself and sitting on the stern seat, her knees pulled up. “And what happens when she does come along? Your long-term lady? The one you want to take on an extended honeymoon, sailing away together, then coming home to the roses and the babies and the fences?”

He hesitated, the unconscious tremor in her voice hurting him. He sat down, the tiller between them.

“What about her, Marian? I mean, assuming she even exists, she won’t matter. Not to you. Because by then, you’ll be gone.” The thought of another woman here with him, aboard this boat or any other, was laughable. There would never be anyone but Marian. The thought of her gone was painful but he knew it would happen; like he’d told her, his eyes were open. He knew that Marian was not a sticker. He’d be a fool to hope for anything more than what he knew he’d get, and Rolph McKenzie was no fool.

She leaned over and reached for him, clasping his arm in both her hands, shaking him, her towel slithering to the seat behind her. “What if I don’t want to go?” she demanded fiercely. “What if I never want to go? Will you spend the rest of your life secretly looking over your shoulder to see if she’s in sight, that perfect women of yours, the one who can make all kinds of rash promises and guarantees—the kind of promises you’ll believe?” She drew a deep breath and crawled over the tiller, kneeling beside him, splaying her hands over his chest. “Rolph, if you’re willing to believe her, whoever and wherever she is, why aren’t you willing to believe me?”

He pulled her onto his lap, cradling her head in his hands and kissed her long and hard until they were both breathing erratically. Together, they rose and stumbled below, sliding onto the berth, clinging to one another.

“Whoever and wherever she is,” Rolph said, “she doesn’t belong in this bed with you and me. I told you. As long as you’re with me, I won’t be looking for her, over my shoulder secretly or in front of my nose, openly. As long as I have you, I don’t want anybody else. Now shut up and kiss me, because that’s what’s important right now, and when you’re doing that, I can’t be looking over my shoulder, now can I?”

She shut up and kissed him, but her heart ached because he still hadn’t said why he found it so impossible to believe in her promises. What more was she going to have to do to show him she meant her every word?

Just as Rolph couldn’t look over his shoulder while she was kissing him, Marian found that her heart couldn’t ache while he was kissing her so she chose the path that drew her like a magnet, deep into ecstasy with him.

“You don’t have any furniture!” Marian stood, hands on hips, looking around the barrenness of Rolph’s living room.

“What do you call that?” He gestured at the desk and chair in one corner of the room, near the patio doors. “And this?” He nudged open another door with his foot and showed her a bedroom with a dresser, a king-size bed and a large-screen TV with a VCR, a DVD player, and a stereo.

The kitchen contained a card table and two folding chairs.

“I thought this was your home. How can you live like this? I mean, you own this place. You should own furniture. At least enough to make you comfortable.”

He gave her a look. “Do you?”

“Well, no. My apartment was furnished when I moved in and there didn’t seem to be any point in getting my own. I don’t know how long I’ll be in it.” Because I don’t know when my mother’s remission will be over and I’ll be needed at home again.”

He shrugged. “Then how can you complain about me not having furniture?”

“If I owned a home, I’d own its furnishings.”

“I have what I need,” he said. “I’ll get the rest … sometime.”

Oh. Of course. Understanding was painful. She knew when. When he found that paragon he wanted. Of course he wouldn’t buy furniture. Whoever and wherever his wonder-woman was, she’d want to choose. But living the way he did was nothing short of ridiculous, Marian thought. He didn’t even have a place to sit and relax, a place to entertain his friends and—

Through the open door, she saw that king-size bed and the huge television. It told her a lot about where Rolph entertained. She glared at the room and deliberately turned away from it, but it was there, and she was aware of it in a way she didn’t like. Over her shoulder, she took another look. It was still as … decadent as it had been five seconds ago, that big bed, the television angled just so, for easy viewing, the VCR suggesting rented videos. What kind? The kind Wendell had always liked to watch before and even during sex? She flicked another glance at the room and marched toward it to close the door.

Before she got there, Rolph came up behind her and slipped his arms around her, pulling her against him. “Hey, what’s the matter?”

“Nothing,” she said, turning in his embrace. “I … I think I’m ready to go home. I mean, now that I have shoes on my feet again, I feel I can face the world.” Some kind soul had brought her shoes up from the wharf where she’d kicked them off, and left them beside her desk.

She burrowed against him. “Come with me, Rolph.”

Lifting her head, he searched her face with the green clarity of his gaze. “Marian,” he said after a moment, “no woman has ever been in that bed in there with me. And no woman ever will, except you, as long as you and I are together. That’s a promise.”

She blinked. “I … Dammit, how did you know?”

“Because, my sweetheart, you have the most readable face in the world. Those suspicious, resentful glances you kept shooting at my bed told me all I needed to know.” He brushed his lips over her eyelids, her cheeks, her mouth. “Will you share it with me tonight?”

Smiling, she said, “And any other night.”

He swung her up in his arms and strode into his bedroom. He deposited her in the middle of the mattress. It sloshed and gurgled for a moment before settling down, its warmth seeping into her back. “In that case,” he said, joining her on the bed, “I guess I’m going to have to go out and pick up a few more pieces of furniture. We might get tired of the bed. A sofa would be nice, and a recliner or maybe a loveseat. Maybe both, and a big, shaggy rug to lay in front of the fireplace.”

She unbuttoned his shirt, ran her hands into his chest hair. “This is all the shaggy rug I need.”

He grinned. “And you’re what I want to lay. In front of the fireplace or anywhere. Any time.”

His whiskers were a sharp bristle against her neck but Marian didn’t mind. “Okay,” she murmured. “Do it.”

It was dawn when he woke her. Waving a cup of coffee under her nose, he drew her from sleep and Marian opened her eyes to see the dappled light of the harbor bouncing around the room. That one glance was more than enough. She squeezed her eyes shut, rolled to her front and buried her face in the pillow. “Go away. It’s the middle of the night.”

“The sun’s up.”

“It’s summer, silly. The sun gets up in the middle of the night in these latitudes.”

“Five o’clock is morning.”

“Only to some people. Only to torturers who don’t fully qualify as people. Leave me alone.” She wriggled as he drew the sheet back and ran a fingernail the length of her spine.

“I,” he said, “am a morning person. “Don’t tell me you aren’t?”

“I aren’t.”

He kissed the back of her neck. “You were yesterday.”

“That was different. Night sort of blended into morning and we spent half the day sleeping because we hadn’t spent much of the night doing it.”

He chuckled. “The way I remember it, we did spend most of the night doing it.”

“Sleeping!” she wailed. “What I want to do now.”

He picked her up, carried her into the bathroom and into the shower where he stood holding her as she squalled and fought and kicked at him, but the cold water had the desired effect. Marian woke up.

Dripping, hands on hips, she glared at him when he stood her in the middle of the bathroom floor. “You’ll regret that, McKenzie. When I don’t get enough sleep, I’m mean and ugly and of very uncertain temper.”

“You haven’t got a mean bone in you, you’re too beautiful to be ugly and you’ve always had an uncertain temper. But luckily, I learned—recently—how to sweeten you, so why should I worry?” He grinned. “Come here. Want me to make you sweet?”

“I want you to let me go back to sleep.”

“No you don’t. You’re wide awake now.” He wrapped her in a big towel and rubbed her back. “Sweetheart, as much as I’d love to keep you captive in my bed for the rest of—For a long time, we have to face facts. Before long, this entire marina is going to be awake and I want you safely out of here before that happens.”

“But—” She stared at him. “Why? Rolph—”

He laid a finger over her lips. “Hush. I know what you’re going to say. We slept together. You aren’t ashamed of that. You don’t care who knows. Well, I’m not ashamed of it either, but I do care who knows.”

He gestured to where her slacks, blouse, and jacket hung neatly on the hanger they’d brought up from the boat. “Two days ago, you came to work wearing that very distinctive outfit. You were seen boarding my boat wearing it. If you’re seen leaving this morning in that same outfit, everyone will be perfectly aware that you spent last night and the night before with me, and I won’t have you the butt of any dirty male jokes.”

“That’s a wonderful sentiment,” she said, stepping out of his embrace. “Beautifully, eloquently, put. Too bad I don’t believe one single, solitary word of it.”

“WHAT—”

Marian shoved Rolph through the bathroom door. “Out!” She shut it and locked it behind him. He hammered on it. She hooked her bra. “Go away. I’m doing what you want. I’m getting dressed.” She pulled on her slacks. “Then I’ll leave. Quietly, of course, carrying my shoes and tip-toeing so that I don’t alert anyone to my presence here at this unseemly hour.” She tugged her silk blouse up over her shoulders and buttoned it before grabbing her jacket and draping it over her arm. She opened the door.

Rolph stood there waiting, blocking her way.

She shoved him again. “Move.”

“Oh, hell, you’re misunderstanding me completely!”

“I don’t think so. I understand this much. You have no intention of going public with our relationship.”

“To protect you, Marian!”

“Yeah? And what if I don’t want to be protected?”

She swung away from him, picked up her shoes and stepped out onto the deck. He followed her, his eyes blazing with righteous indignation as he took her shoulders in his hands and spun her to face him. “You have to be protected! The guys who live down here can be animals! They make mincemeat of a nice girl’s reputation given half a chance. Dammit, they’re bachelors!”

She laughed. “And so are you.”

He looked startled. “But … that’s different. I don’t indulge in locker-room gossip. I won’t talk about you. I won’t—”

“Acknowledge publicly that you and I are lovers.”

He looked unhappy. He also looked stubborn. “No. I won’t.”

“Okay, then. I will.” Before he could stop her, Marian whirled away and ran to the railing. “Good morning, Sunrise Marina! My name is Marian Crane and I am Rolph McKenzie’s girl!”

A startled Great Blue Heron flew off a barnacle encrusted piling with a noisy flapping of wings. A hatch popped open on the third finger out. A head poked through. Marian waved her shoes. “Good morning!” she called. “It’s a beautiful day and Rolph McKenzie woke me up so we could enjoy it together!” The man laughed and waved back, said something she couldn’t hear, and stepped out onto the wharf, where he was joined by a woman who stood staring up at Marian and Rolph. She waved at the woman, too, and then at a little child in a yellow life-jacket who came out from behind a piling and gaped up at her.

“Have you ever been in love?” she called down to him. The little boy shook his head, his eyes big and brown in his sun-tanned face. “Just wait,” she said. “It’s wonderful! You’ll love it when it happens to you.”

Rolph was torn between embarrassment and amusement. “Marian, dammit, be quiet!” He tried to swing her away from the rail.

She grinned at him and dropped her shoes, one at a time, to land with two distinct thuds on the wharf twenty feet below. One bounced overboard with a splash. The little boy ran along the float, bare feet thudding, and fished it out, his passage bringing another couple of heads out of hatches, another person or two on deck. “It’s a wonderful day to be in love,” she told them and people nodded sagely, made appropriate comments accompanied by huge smiles and resigned, amused shakes of their head.

Marian danced across the deck, singing, “Oh, what a beautiful morning …” in a clear yet throaty voice that surprised Rolph. He hadn’t heard her sing since she was a child. It crossed his mind that he was the one who’d made her sing and that had to count for something, but his embarrassment grew and grew, blocking out any sort of philosophical thought. He just wanted her to stop this foolishness. When she finished the stanza and bowed to the applauding audience below, an audience that had grown to alarming proportions, he knew that it was time to go. It was past time to go. He grabbed her hand and headed for the ramp leading down from his deck feeling as if he were about to be keelhauled. It had never happened to him before, but he figured this was it.

All along the wharf, people greeted them, smiled, a few made arch comments and Rolph growled answers, his face turned red when Marian sunnily assured the boaters that not everyone was a morning person, and suggested they ignore his ill-humor, promising to feed him breakfast and bring him back in a better mood.

On the esplanade along the harbor shore, Marian again began to sing, swinging Rolph’s hand between them as they walked toward the parking lot. Early strollers glanced at them, smiled, then looked away.

“Would you be quiet?” he begged, after an elderly man stopped and stared, turning around to watch them as they departed.