Snowflakes on the Sea (14 page)

The snow was falling in the gray twilight by then, and the air was bracing, but not really cold. Mallory almost regretted agreeing to the offer of a ride home; it would have been nice to walk.

“You’re serious about selling your house?” Kate asked as she eased the small car out of Trish’s driveway and onto the main road.

Mallory nodded. “I realize now that I’ve been using it as a hideout, rather than a home.”

“You were happy there once. Naturally, you’re fond of it.”

Again, Mallory nodded. She wondered what advice her parents would have given her if they’d been alive. Would they have believed that Nathan deserved her trust and loyalty or would they have urged her to cut her losses and run?

The answer was easy. Janet and Paul O’Connor had liked and respected their son-in-law, after an initial wariness stemming from his unusual occupation, and they’d never been big on quitting.

“You’re wondering what your parents would have thought about this paternity mess, aren’t you?” Kate asked quietly.

Mallory chuckled. “Sometimes you amaze me. If you ever get tired of writing books, you could always become a mind reader.”

“I’d probably make more money,” Kate retorted with a wry grin. “I trust I can spare you the lecture about how you’re a grown woman now and you should think for yourself?”

“I would be grateful if you did,” Mallory said.

Kate’s attention was fixed on the snowy road. “We didn’t mean to upset you, Mallory—Trish and I. We just don’t want you to be hurt anymore.”

“You’ve never doubted Nathan since this thing started, have you, Kate? I don’t think Trish has either. Tell me, why do you have so much confidence in him?”

Kate flipped on her windshield wipers and peered out at the snow-dappled night. “He wears his heart where his tie clasp should be,” she said. “Love is an obvious thing, and I’ve never seen a more flagrant case than Nathan McKendrick’s.”

Mallory swallowed and looked out the window on her side of the car. “I wish I could be so sure as you are. S-sometimes I think he loves me, and other times—”

“Yes?” Kate prodded gently.

“Other times I think he can’t possibly be interested in someone as ordinary as I am.”

“Then the fault lies in you, not in him. You need to believe in yourself, Mallory.”

Since no point on the small island was very far from any other, it didn’t take Kate long to reach Angel Cove. During that brief time, however, Mallory seriously considered what her friend had said. It was true that she didn’t have much confidence in herself.

The question was, why? Paul and Janet O’Connor had been wise parents—they’d raised Mallory to believe she could do anything. And she hadn’t made such a bad showing. She’d gotten excellent grades in college, graduated with a teaching certificate, walked onto the set of a soap opera and landed a promising part.

In the warm confines of Kate’s practical car, Mallory sighed. Nothing she might accomplish seemed very impressive beside the glittering success that attended Nathan’s every move. But, then, who did she need to impress?

“Won’t you come in for a few minutes?” Mallory asked a few minutes later when Kate drew the car to a stop in front of the brightly lit house at Angel Cove.

Kate shook her head firmly. “I’d like to, but chapter seven awaits. Besides, the last thing you and that young man need is company.”

Mallory laughed and opened the car door to get out. After thanking her friend and saying goodbye, she bounded up the snow-dusted walk to the front door.

Nathan was just coming down the stairs when she walked in, and the house was deliciously quiet without the numerous members of his entourage. He grinned, as though he’d read her thoughts, and she blushed at the images his closely fitted jeans and soft, white sweater inspired.

“Hi,” he said. “Where’s your underwear?”

Mallory gaped at him, having forgotten all about the sales party she’d just left. “I beg your pardon?”

Nathan laughed, approached his wife and placed gentle hands on her shoulders. “I wasn’t getting personal, pumpkin. Didn’t you go to some kind of party at Trish’s?”

Feeling foolish and oddly electrified by this man who had been her husband for six full years, Mallory nodded. “It’s not underwear, it’s lingerie. And you don’t bring it home the same day like you would if you shopped in a store. You just order it.”

His gifted fingers were kneading her tense shoulders, and she could feel their warmth, even through her jacket. “Thank you for clearing that up. I’ll rest easier knowing the straight scoop about underwear parties.”

Mallory gave him a slight shove, although the last thing she wanted at the moment was distance between them. “You’re incorrigible. And by the way, you’d better give Alex a raise.”

He lifted one eyebrow. “Yeah? Why?”

“Because the only reason Trish gave this party was to get a bathrobe for half price.”

Nathan laughed. “Could we please drop this conversation? I’ve got a candlelight dinner all laid out in the dining room, and you’re standing here talking about cut-rate bathrobes.”

Mallory unbuttoned her jacket, and her flesh tingled pleasantly beneath her clothes as Nathan took the coat from her with practiced hands. “A candlelight dinner, is it? And we don’t have to eat it in the bedroom?”

He feigned shock. “What? Eat on the very site of my ignoble defeat at Monopoly? Never.”

Mallory smiled, wishing that their lives could always be this way—unhurried, romantic and private. “Tell me about this candlelight dinner. Did you cook it?”

“Yes,” he said, guiding her out of the entry hall and through the doorway that led to the imposing formal dining room. “Mrs. Jeffries is in Seattle, visiting her sister. Therefore, I had no choice but to venture into the wilds of her kitchen and concoct a culinary delight unmatched even by your canned soup and tuna sandwiches.”

“Was that a dig?”

Nathan pointedly ignored the question and ushered Mallory to a chair at the long mahogany table that was usually lined with band members, their wives and girlfriends, and an accumulation of diverse hangers-on. Candles flickered elegantly over a repast of hot dogs, white wine, and limp french fries.

Mallory sat down with dignity, biting her lower lip to keep from laughing out loud. The ploy was unsuccessful.

Nathan, seating himself next to her, looked properly wounded. “You have no appreciation for fine food.”

“What on earth did you do to those french fries? They look positively anemic!”

He arched one eyebrow. “I put them in the microwave,” he answered defensively.

“After taking them from the freezer, no doubt?”

“Of course.”

“I see. Well, they’re far more appetizing if they’re browned in the regular oven.”

“Thank you, Julia Child.”

Mallory laughed and dutifully began to eat, and even though the french fries were still partially frozen and the hot dogs weren’t much warmer, she couldn’t remember a better meal.

“I’m selling my house,” she announced, once the fare had been consumed, her eyes on the kaleidoscope colors the candles were casting into her wineglass.

There was a short silence, followed by the inevitable, “Why?”

Mallory swallowed, though she had yet to touch her wine, and met her husband’s dark gaze. “Because it’s foolish to hang around over there, waiting for my childhood to come back.”

Nathan’s hand gently covered both of Mallory’s. “The place means a lot to you,” he said, and she couldn’t tell whether he was opposing her plans or approving them.

“I need to do it, Nathan—it feels right.”

“Then do it.”

“W-we have too many things that are yours or mine, and so few that are ours.”

“Everything I have is yours, Mallory—I thought you knew that.”

She felt tears burn in her eyes as she looked around at the huge dining room, with its elegant furnishings, its twin chandeliers, its oriental rugs. “I—I’ve spent so little time here, I feel like a guest.”

“You still don’t like this house, either, do you, Mallory? You’re only here to please me.”

She shook her head quickly. “I love this house, Nathan. It’s so spacious and airy and elegant. It’s just that usually—well—”

Nathan finished for her. “Usually, there are too many people here.”

Glumly, Mallory nodded.

“That will change now,” he said, and his gaze shifted from Mallory’s face. “I’m retiring, remember?”

Though she knew that he hadn’t meant her to, Mallory heard the reluctance in his voice. If he was reluctant now, how would he feel in a few weeks, a few months, a year? His career was understandably important to him. Would the loss of it make him bitter?

“I think one unemployed McKendrick is enough. Don’t give up music because of me, Nathan. I couldn’t bear to be the cause of that.”

His eyes returned to her face now, but their expression was unreadable in the dim light. “I love you, Mallory—and I need you. Our marriage is more important to me than anything else in my life, including music.”

“But you really don’t want to quit, do you?”

He left his chair to stand beside hers, and his hand was gentle under her chin. “I’m not sure, Mallory. The only thing I really have a handle on right now is that our marriage is on shaky ground.”

Mallory nodded in sad agreement and searched his face with wide, anxious eyes. “Nathan, please don’t retire because of me. There has to be some other way.”

He tilted his head to one side. “We need time, babe. Besides, do you think you’re the only one who ever gets tired?”

Mallory had been to dozens of Nathan’s concerts, and she was suddenly conscious of the incredible energy he expended when he performed. Add to that the constant travel and the endless rehearsals, and the formula for physical and emotional exhaustion was complete. “Then take six months off,” she said quickly, “or even a year.”

He looked away, considering. “A year,” he said, finally. “I’ll take a year off. At the end of that time, we’ll talk again, Mrs. McKendrick.”

Mallory offered a handshake to seal the bargain, but Nathan did not return the gesture in the usual way. Instead, he turned her hand and kissed the delicate, supersensitive skin on the inside of her wrist.

She trembled involuntarily, and Nathan chuckled in gruff amusement.

“Umm,” he teased. “A year of candlelight dinners and lovemaking—I may never go back to work.”

His tongue found the inside of her palm, teased it ruthlessly. “You’ll—be—bored,” Mallory managed, between gasps of helpless pleasure.

He drew her up and out of the chair, held her close. “Never that,” he said, his lips at her temple now.

“Nathan.”

His hands were drawing her sweater upward, making warm soothing circles on the small of her back. “I want you,” he said.

Mallory shivered as both his index fingers found their way beneath the waistband of her jeans and circled her to meet boldly at the snap in front. It gave way, and so did the zipper.

Mallory gasped as he drew her jeans down over her hips, her thighs, her ankles. “Nathan,” she protested, even as she stepped out of the jeans. “This is the dining room!”

He was kneeling before her now, and his hands were idly stroking her ankles, first one, and then the other. “How appropriate,” he said.

In the morning, Mallory awakened to find that the snow had stopped. Humming, pleased that she had for once woken up before Nathan, she scrambled out of bed and made her way into the master bath. There, in the massive sunken tub, she took a long, luxurious bath.

She was about to get out of the tub again when she noticed the froth of pink chiffon hanging, half-hidden, from a peg on the inside of the open door.

Do not jump to conclusions, Mallory,
she thought. Slowly, she rose from the tub, climbed out and wrapped herself in a thick, thirsty towel. Her feet seemed reluctant to obey her mind as she forced herself toward the door and the bit of pink fluff hanging so naturally upon it.

It’s probably mine,
she assured herself.
I probably left it here, like the swimming suit and the teddy and—

She took the garment down from its peg carefully, frowned as she turned it in her hands. It was a nightgown, short and tiered with lace-trimmed ruffles, and Mallory had never seen it before in her life.

She swallowed the aching lump that had risen in her throat and read the tiny gold label tucked away in one seam of the gown. The words stitched there made Mallory’s eyes widen, replaced her rage with embarrassment, and caused her to stomp one foot and bellow, “Nathan McKendrick!”

He appeared as though summoned from a genie’s lamp, peering with comical caution around the framework of the door.

“This isn’t one bit funny!” she cried, waving the gossamer pink gown at him. “How long did it take poor Mrs. Jeffries to stitch ‘Trust me, Mallory’ onto this label!”

Nathan’s broad, bare shoulders moved in an idle shrug. “Not long—she’s a whiz with a needle.”

She was still waving the nightgown. “I thought this was—I thought—”

“For shame, Mrs. McKendrick.”

“Rat!”

He laughed. “Put your clothes on before I ravish you. We’re spending the day in Seattle.”

Mallory flung the nightgown at him, embarrassment still coloring her cheeks and quickening her breath. She couldn’t have spoken if it had meant her life.

Nathan dodged the assault of pink ruffles and swatted her playfully on the backside. “Where is your sense of humor, woman?”

Seething, Mallory swung one foot at him, trying to kick him in the shins. She missed, and her towel slipped unceremoniously to the floor, baring her to his delighted gaze. She went to retrieve the towel, but he was too quick—he grabbed it and waved it as though it were a matador’s cape.

“Toro!” he yelled.

Despite her fury and her embarrassment, an involuntary smile tugged at one corner of Mallory’s mouth. She kicked at him again, somewhat halfheartedly this time, and, in an instant, he had dropped the towel and caught both her elbows in his hands, pulling her close to him.

She wriggled, trying to free herself, but the motion only increased her awareness of Nathan’s hard, masculine frame. “I th-thought we were g-going to Seattle,” she stammered.