The Lancaster Men (5 page)

“You know the number.” Whit motioned toward the telephone sitting on an oak table and crossed the room to the sliding glass doors. He opened them and stepped outside to light a cigarette while Rory picked up the telephone to dial the number.

Shari wandered over to the doors and leaned against the frame. Her gaze was drawn to Whit’s profile, sharply etched by the moonlight. It was a compelling face, lean and strong, roughly masculine. His brown hair glinted with gold lights, stirred by the night’s breeze.

Behind her, she was absently aware of Rory speaking to her mother on the telephone, but she was consciously noticing Whit’s hard muscled frame. It unnerved her to discover that her senses were tuning in to his latent sexuality. When his roaming glance touched her, she had to look away before he saw the awareness in her eyes.

“Shari,” Rory cupped his hand over the mouthpiece of the receiver as he urgently whispered her name.

Seeing the concern written in his expression, she pushed away from the door frame to walk quickly to him. “What is it?” She kept her voice low, not wanting to make her presence known to the woman on the other end of the line.

“It’s Mom,” he said. “She’s worried about you now. When I disappeared this afternoon, she tried to get in touch with you. When you weren’t with that family on the Coast, she—” He left the rest to her imagination. “Shari, she’s frantic.” He was half-listening to the anxious voice on the other end of the line. “She wants to know if I know where you are. What should I tell her?”

“You might as well talk to her,” Whit said. She pivoted when his voice came from directly behind her. She hadn’t been aware he had followed her
inside. He eyed her steadily. “Elizabeth won’t be satisfied until she hears your voice.”

He was right. She sighed a grudging admission and nodded to Rory that she would talk to her. Nothing had gone right since her vacation had started. Deceptions were bound to become unraveled sooner or later, she realized.

Rory handed her the phone. “Hello, Mother?” she said with forced brightness.

At first there was silence on the other end of the line. Then an uncertain female voice came back to question, “Shari? Is that you?”

“Yes, Mother. I’m sorry if I worried you, but I’m fine,” she assured her.

“But what are you doing there? I thought you were going to stay with Judge Fullmore and his daughter at Nag’s Head. When I called them and they said you weren’t there—”

Shari interrupted her. “They invited me but I had already made plans to spend my vacation time with Beth Daniels and Doré Evans, two girls who belong to my sorority. I must not have explained it very well in my letter to you. I’m sorry for causing you concern, Mother,” she apologized.

“As long as you are all right, I guess that’s all that matters.” Her mother sounded confused and uncertain. “But I’m sure you didn’t mention you were going to be at Grandfather Mountain.”

“They’re holding the Highland Games this weekend,” Shari reminded her. “Neither Beth or Doré had ever seen them. When you wrote in your letter that you wouldn’t be using the condominium this
summer, it seemed an opportune time to come here.”

“Yes, of course,” she agreed absently. “Then you will be coming home for a few days on your vacation?”

“I don’t know for sure,” she hedged against committing herself.

“But you are so close,” her mother protested.

“I know. It’s just that … my friends have made other plans.” It was a weak excuse. Even Shari heard its false ring.

“Shari, are you sure everything is all right?” her mother questioned. “Is there something you aren’t telling me?”

“No, of course not.” She answered the last question first. “I’m fine, Mother, really.”

Her reply was followed by several seconds of silence before Elizabeth Lancaster spoke again. “Is Whit there?”

“Yes,” she assured her in the event she thought he had come to some harm.

“May I speak to him?” her mother requested.

“Yes. Just a minute.” Turning to Whit, she handed him the phone. “She wants to talk to you now,” she said and shrugged her ignorance of the reason.

When he took the receiver from her, Shari moved away. Rory was standing to one side, wearing a dispirited expression. She walked over to him.

“How did it go?” she asked gently.

“I hate being the baby of the family,” he muttered in a spate of self-pity. “Nobody lets you grow up.
I’m nineteen but the way Mom acts, you’d think I was nine.”

Her gaze strayed back to Whit, but his one-word answers didn’t enlighten her as to the reason her mother wanted to speak to him. She returned her attention to her younger half brother.

“You’re right. Mother will probably still treat you the same way when you’re twenty-nine,” she sympathized.

“How am I ever going to be able to convince her that I can take care of myself?” Rory wanted to know.

“You won’t.”

“Boy, you are real encouraging!” He flashed her an irritated look. “If you want to be helpful, I could use some suggestions on how I’m going to convince Mother that I want to leave. I don’t want to hurt her but I feel trapped at Gold Leaf. Whit thrives on all that pressure, but I can’t take it.”

Whit was off the phone and had joined them in time to hear the last of Rory’s protests. “What is it that you want, Rory?” he asked.

“That’s just it! I don’t know.” He revealed his inner frustration. “All I know is what I don’t want.”

“Give yourself time,” Whit consoled patiently. “You’re young yet.”

Rory glared at him, then shifted his glance to Shari. “Do you see what I mean?” he accused. “Nobody thinks I’m grown up!” He stalked from the room.

Whit darted Shari an amused glance. “I have the feeling I said the wrong thing.”

“That’s an understatement.” She smiled as Whit
moved away to settle into the matching armchair to the cranberry-colored sofa. She watched him light another cigarette and return the lighter to his pocket. “He was just complaining about being the ‘baby’ of the family. He’s convinced that no one thinks he’s old enough to make his own decisions.”

“Which is why he is so angry with himself because he doesn’t know what he wants,” Whit concluded with a throaty chuckle. “It must be hell.”

“It is.” Her smile broadened. Then she remembered. “Why did Mother want to talk to you?”

The glitter of amusement in his eyes grew brighter. “She wanted to ask if I had met your ‘friends.’”

His answer and his expression confused her. “Why?”

“You sounded so reluctant to bring them to Gold Leaf that Elizabeth became suspicious,” Whit replied.

“Suspicious? Of what?” Shari was more confused.

“She thought you might be vacationing in ‘mixed’ company; that some of your ‘friends’ might be men,” he explained with dry insinuation.

“Do you mean that she thought that I—” Shari couldn’t finish the sentence.

“Yes. It occurred to her that you might be ‘sleeping’ with one of your male friends and since you knew how strongly Granddad would disapprove of such an arrangement, you didn’t want to bring them home,” he said it for her.

“Why would she think something like that?” she demanded on an incredulous note.

“I imagine she has been listening to her lady
friends recounting stories about wild college girls and started worrying about her little girl.” Whit tapped his cigarette in the ashtray. “You have had three years exposure to college life—without parental supervision or guidance. It’s natural for her to wonder if you’d had an affair with a man—or are having one.”

“Well, I’m not and I haven’t!” Shari denied that allegation vigorously. “How could she think that about me?”

“You have never made it any secret that you date frequently,” he reasoned.

“That doesn’t mean I go to bed with them,” she retorted.

“I wasn’t suggesting that she thought you were promiscuous,” Whit replied calmly. “But it is reasonable to assume you could have been attracted to one of your dates.”

“I have been attracted to several men but none to that extent!” Shari insisted.

“You are a beautiful woman. And I seriously doubt that you are frigid.” He was watching her closely. “I never would have guessed that you were so hard to please.”

“I guess I am!” She felt her anger growing at the way he was cross-examining her. “If I’m too particular, then it’s all your fault!”

“Mine?” He raised an eyebrow at that.

“Yes, yours!” She moved toward his chair to emphasize her point.

His gaze narrowed. “Why is it mine?”

“Because—” She suddenly realized how heated the exchange had become.

The last thing she wanted to do was argue with him. She paused, releasing the tension that had built inside with a short laugh and sat down on the arm of his chair.

“Because nobody measures up to you.” She gazed at him with a certain pride and curved a hand behind his neck, letting it rest on the sinewed cords running from his neck to his shoulder. Her fingers absently rubbed them. “I haven’t met a man yet who has all that my brother does. I guess I’m just not prepared to settle for less.”

Instead of appearing pleased by her compliment, his expression became hard. “Don’t put me on a pedestal, Shari,” he warned. “I don’t belong there.”

“Can I help it if I want a man like my step-brother?” She tried to tease him into smiling. When that failed, she bent to lightly kiss his cheek.

Whit abruptly stood up, nearly unbalancing Shari from her perch on the chair’s arm. “You expect too much from me.”

His attitude puzzled her and she frowned. “I don’t understand.”

He breathed in deeply and released it, a weary resignation stealing over his expression. “Yes, that’s the problem,” he said cryptically, and reached in his shirt pocket for another cigarette. “Your friends are waiting for you.”

“You aren’t making any sense.” She shook her head, unable to fathom his meaning.

“Probably not,” Whit agreed and snapped the lighter flame to the tip of his cigarette. “I’ve had a lot on my mind lately.”

It seemed a reasonable explanation, one that Shari
was willing to accept. “And Rory and I aren’t helping matters any, are we?” she realized. “I’m sure you had more important things to do this weekend than come traipsing up here.”

“I had other things to do but not necessarily more important things,” he corrected. “Now, scram! Give a guy a chance to smoke his cigarette in peace.”

“Yes, sir!” She laughed, relieved to see his mood change and turned away to leave the room.

“Would you bring me the extra blankets?” Whit requested. “It’s too late to be playing musical chairs with the upstairs bedrooms. Everyone’s all unpacked and settled in, so we might as well leave the sleeping arrangements as they stand.”

“Oh, but—” Shari turned to protest.

His dark eyes were squinted at the smoke from the cigarette dangling out of the corner of his mouth as he worked the knot of his tie loose and stripped it off.

“This sofa folds out into a bed. I’ll sleep here tonight,” he stated.

Shari hesitated, aware of the logic of his decision yet feeling there was a more comfortable solution. “If you insist,” she replied finally.

“I insist.” Whit smiled at her with his eyes, a spray of lines radiating from the corners. “Go get the blankets.”

“I’ll bring them right back,” she promised and walked out of the study, closing the door behind her.

The extra bedding was kept in the linen closet in the upstairs hall. Shari ran up the steps to fetch it and take it back to Whit. When she reached the top
of the stairs, Beth was just coming out of Doré’s room.

“We’ve decided to accept Whit’s offer to use his boat and go for a midnight sail,” Beth told her. “Rory is coming, too. He’s in his room changing. Do you want to go with us?”

“Yes, but first—” She walked to the linen closet and opened the door to collect the extra blankets and pillows. “—I have to take this down to Whit.”

“Don’t bother to hurry,” Beth advised and gestured toward the room Doré was using. “Doré hasn’t made up her mind what she’s going to wear yet. You have plenty of time.”

Shari laughed, aware that their friend had a notorious reputation about the length of time it took her to dress. Of course, the end result was usually perfection, too, so perhaps the time was justified. While Beth continued to her own room, Shari carried the bedding down the stairs to the study. She knocked once and walked in.

In her absence, Whit had removed his suit jacket as well as his tie. His white dress shirt was unbuttoned at the throat and the sleeves were rolled up, revealing the dark tan of his forearms.

He was seated behind the oak worktable with his briefcase opened on its top and a stack of papers spread in front of him. He glanced up when she entered the room, a preoccupied look to his expression.

“I don’t suppose there is ever an end to paper work,” Shari observed with a sympathetic glance at the briefcase brimming with notes and reports.

“It’s self-perpetuating,” Whit agreed and pushed his chair back from the table to stand.

“It will only take a minute to make your bed.” She set the blankets on the cushion of the armchair and began removing the throw pillows and seat cushions from the sofa. “I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

“You always do, so why should this time be any different.” There was a wry slant to his mouth as he walked around the table to the sofa.

“When have I ever bothered you when you were working?” Shari challenged, ready to argue the point because she knew she was always careful not to interrupt him when he was busy.

“All the time.” The glint in his eyes told Shari that she was being baited even if the rest of his expression appeared dead serious. “I’ll help you lift the hide-abed out.”

Shari stepped to one side so Whit could fold out the mattress, assured now of his true reason for pausing in his paper work. The sofa bed was sometimes stubborn and required a little manhandling to lie out straight. She watched the muscles in his shoulders and arms flex and ripple under the shirt as he pulled the hide-a-bed out and folded it out flat. She had always known he was strong, but she had never thought of him in terms of hard flesh and bone.

For the span of a second, her wayward imagination tried to recall what he looked like in brief swimming trunks. Shari blocked out the picture before the image became clear, appalled by her sudden interest in his body.