Silk and Stone (24 page)

But that last impulsive gesture opened a floodgate, and he jerked the quilt up with both hands, staring blankly at it as her despair washed over him.

“It’s all gone. All of our savings. And it’s my fault.” Mom dropped to the sofa in their living room and stared blindly out a window hung with curtains Sam had made herself, to save money. Just as she’d made most of their
clothes, and worked at the store every afternoon and weekends, and done without everything she could for the past four years.

Sam stood numbly in the center of the small room, feeling the dull fury of betrayal, her gaze seguing from one piece of carefully tended flea-market furniture to the next. She, not Mom, had struggled to get them out of Aunt Alex’s pocketbook all this time, and even though she hadn’t been able to change the fact that Aunt Alex had made the down payment on this small tract house for them, Sam had taken pride in their ability, finally, to take over the mortgage notes.

They’d had ten thousand dollars in the bank. Sam had begun to feel independent and secure, to really believe they’d be free of Aunt Alex’s control in a few years, with money for Charlotte to attend college and Mom to pay bills without worrying—free, when Sam turned eighteen, to do whatever she wanted. Free to see Jake.

Charlotte huddled on the couch next to Mom, small and fidgety and infinitely trusting. “Mr. Drury is gone?” Charlotte asked sadly. “Why would he do that? He was supposed to start a health food magazine with our money.”

“He’s a con artist,” Sam explained, her stomach twisting. “He talked Mom into lending him money, and then he disappeared. He’s not coming back.”

“I was so sure of him,” Mom said, covering her face with one pale, thin hand. “I studied his charts, I saw good lines in his palms, I—”

“You saw stars and got a line all right,” Sam said. Mom’s wounded expression made her bite her lip. Her mother was an eternal optimist, and lonely, and deeply, irrevocably unable to tell the difference between sense and nonsense. “I did what my instincts told me to do,” Mom said wearily. “You have to trust your faith sometimes, Sammie.”

“No, you don’t. You have to trust cold, hard facts. And the fact is, Malcolm Drury looked a little like Daddy and talked like a dreamer, and you didn’t listen to
me when I pointed out that he couldn’t take Daddy’s place.”

“Sammie, don’t,” Mom said, tears sliding down her face. “I’m sorry. Don’t hate me.”

Sam couldn’t help crying too. “I don’t hate you. I hate that you asked Aunt Alex for money again.”

“Sammie, your aunt doesn’t mind. She loves us. She
wants
to help. It’s just a loan. I’ll pay her back.”

“We’ll
always
be paying her back,” Sam answered.

Alone at the store the next afternoon, Sam’s energy dissolved. Business was slow; no one had come in for an hour. She wandered to the storage room in back and sank onto a rump-sprung couch in front of a narrow window that let in a hot, murky beam of summer sunshine. She kicked off her sandals and sank on the hard vinyl cushion with her legs folded under her and her arms crossed on the couch’s back. The vinyl stuck to her bare legs beneath her khaki shorts; the sunlight was fiery on her arms and hands. She tugged uselessly at the short sleeves of her thin plaid shirt. Mom’s odd theories even included sunshine. Pollution was eating up the atmosphere, she said, and getting a tan was no better than sticking your head in a microwave oven.

Mom had greased Sam and Charlotte with antitanning lotions and shaded them with umbrellas for so many years that Sam had given up on ever seeing her skin turn a lovely, sunbaked brown. Her hands, when she bothered to notice them, looked as if they’d been molded from fine porcelain, and the perfect oval nails grew so fast, she had to pare them down with clippers every over day. She supposed Mom’s insistent regimen of vitamin and mineral supplements was responsible for that.

Resting her chin on her arms, Sam gazed dully at large hills covered in dingy office buildings and busy streets. On the edges of the city the mountains were cool and dark green, and a sweet-smelling bluish mist crept over them in the evenings. But here everything looked gray, even the air.

She wanted their savings back. She wanted to be so much older, and she wanted to believe that a boy she had talked to only three times in her life, a boy whose family her aunt hated, had not considered her graduation present an unwelcome reminder of silly promises he’d made to a child.

“Samantha?” The voice was very deep and rich. She lifted her head but couldn’t make herself turn on the couch for fear she’d only imagined it and would look like a fool if she searched for the source. She’d been so engrossed in thought, she hadn’t heard the jingle of the door chimes when someone entered the shop. “Samantha?” he said again, and this time she knew he was real. Somehow, he always found her when she needed his help. That wondrous mystery was the one strong, abiding pattern in the fabric of her life.

Her heart in her throat, she turned around slowly.

Jake stood in the doorway.

She wasn’t a child anymore—had never really felt like a child before—but now her body had caught up with the plan. A startling new awareness of being female complicated what had been simple devotion. Mother would say she’d discovered the yin and yang of sensuality.

Sam called it biology. And suddenly it was the most powerful force in the world.

He walked toward her slowly, gauging her with intense green eyes hooded with black lashes, as if he had to catalogue her details as thoroughly as she studied his. Sam didn’t know where to look first. She saw him through a fog of rediscovery colored with disturbing shyness. He was much taller than she remembered, an inverted pyramid of wide shoulders, thick arms, and lean hips set on long legs. His hair was a soft reddish-black, the color of a hot charcoal ember, and it swept back from his high forehead in a glossy, rebellious mane that stopped just short of his collar. He wore a thin blue shirt with the sleeves rolled up, and thin suspenders with brilliantly colored beadwork on them, and faded jeans just loose enough to make the
suspenders look necessary. The jeans were threadbare around the bottoms, which sank into the folds of leather boots that made no sound on the hard floor.

He eased down carefully on the couch, an arm’s length away, resting big, rough-looking hands on his knees and regarding her with an unwavering gaze that took her breath away. Dazed, she fumbled inside the collar of her shirt and slowly drew out the necklace. When he saw the thin, tarnished chain with the homely gemstone dangling from it, his face relaxed. He raised one hand toward her, stopped with his outstretched fingers posed near hers, and waited. Sam hesitantly touched her fingertips to his; the contact burned away the awkward moment, and she slid her hand into his. Immediately their hands merged in an intimate grip, his thick fingers weaving gently between her slender ones. She clutched his hand atop the cushion between them.

“You did that the first time I saw you,” he said, his voice low.

“What?” Her own voice was a whisper.

“Held my hand like you’d never let go.”

They were silent, every second hinged on the next heartbeat and the warm clasp of their hands. “I don’t remember that,” she admitted sadly. “Did you mind?”

“No. I’m glad you haven’t changed.”

“I’ve been called stubborn more than once.”

“That’s all right. People confuse faith with stubbornness.”

She couldn’t help herself. She lunged to her knees on the couch, flung her free arm around his neck, and hugged him, turning her face away but pressing her cheek against the warm, smooth side of his neck. Just as quickly she sank back on the couch, but continued to hold his hand tightly. Either he or she—or both of them—was trembling. “Hello again,” he said gruffly. “I heard you had some trouble.”

She stared at him, amazed. “Where did you hear?”

“News gets around. I keep an ear tuned.”

“You must have long-range antennae.”

“You could call it that. Tell me what happened.”

Before she knew it, she was pouring out the details of
Mom’s infatuation with Malcolm Drury, who had invaded their lives with glorious ideas about starting a magazine about herbal medicine, then bolted as soon as Mom invested their savings in his plans. Sam shivered. “We had money in the bank. We were doing fine. We didn’t need Aunt Alex’s help anymore. But the money’s gone. Mom made a mistake with it. I couldn’t stop her.”

“I know.” He said that quickly, then looked as if he wished he hadn’t. Sam peered at him, searching her mind for explanations. Of course. She said very carefully, “I bet I know who told you. I bet his name’s Joe Gunther. Because you asked him to help us, and he always has.”

He seemed, oddly enough, relieved. “You must be psychic.”

She flinched. “Please, don’t even joke. I live with that kind of junk. Mom’s happy to believe in it, but as far as I’m concerned, every self-made guru on the planet ought to be rounded up and shipped to a desert island, where they could con only each other out of money.”

A strange, somehow lonely expression crossed his face. “You don’t trust anyone. You’re afraid to. Even me.”

It was as if he’d seen right through her, to the tired, frightened core. Sam bit her lip and stared out the window. She wanted so badly for him to stay. She had a thousand questions to ask about himself. His hand pressed tighter around hers, a disastrous, coaxing gentleness that frightened her because it was so irresistible. Nothing and no one but he had ever made her feel that way. The shock of seeing him again segued into alarm over the consequences. “I decided a long time ago to take care of my mother and my sister. Aunt Alex means a lot to them. Maybe she’s the only one I can trust.”

“You hate being afraid of her,” he said.

That bombshell made her instantly defensive. She couldn’t deny it, but how did he
know
? “And you’re not?” she asked coolly.

“I’m afraid of what she can do to other people in retaliation. I’m afraid of what she can do to
you.
”

A soft
oh
of pleasure melted through her, but couldn’t erase the anxiety. “Then why did you come here if you
know it might only cause trouble?” He looked away, his eyes shuttered, a muscle working in his jaw. “I’ll leave soon. For your sake.”

“I—Jake—I don’t want you to—I wish …” Her voice trailed off miserably, and her shoulders slumped. “You must have a lot of girls,” she said finally. “And a car. And … freedom.” She glanced at him. “You can even vote now.”

“You’re wrong about the girls.”

“Hah. The way you look? You’d be crazy not to—” She halted, wishing she could pull those words back.

“Must be crazy then.”

“I could pass for eighteen. I
feel
that old.”

“There’s no hurry.”

“Oh, yes, there is.” She thought to herself,
If I were eighteen, I’d go anywhere you asked me to go. I’d stay with you. I’d learn all about you, and I’d do every shocking thing I’ve thought about since I first read the sexy novels Mom keeps hidden under her bed
.

Jake said something under his breath. It sounded like
Down, boy
, but was spoken in such a hoarse whisper, she couldn’t be certain. “What?” she asked.