When Next We Love Page 13

  “How dare you prowl through my room?” she demanded.

  “Oh, I dare a lot!” He moved his mouth toward hers and his hand slid around to find the tie in her towel. “When I know I’m right.”

  His head jerked back up suddenly as the door bell began to ring.

  “Who the hell is that?” he muttered fiercely.

  “Sherry.”

  “Who?”

  “Sherry Eastman,” Leigh said faintly. She had been saved by the bell, but she wasn’t sure if she was grateful for the interruption or not. “A friend of mine. You talked to her this morning, and you met her a few times—several years ago.”

  “Oh.” He was scowling now as the bell insistently rang again.

  “Will you go answer the door please.”

  “Maybe she’ll go away.”

  “She won’t go away,” Leigh said firmly. “She knows you’re here.”

  “All right,” he grumbled, eyeing her sternly. “I’ll entertain your friend while you dress, but you come out and get rid of her. Fast. We are going to talk, whether you like it or not.”

  “We’ve nothing to say,” Leigh said.

  “I have plenty to say, and I expect plenty of answers.”

  Leigh sighed as she watched his broad-shouldered form leave the room. If there were any chance—even the slightest chance—that he would believe anything that she had to say, she would be happy to talk to him. But Richard had done his undermining well, and her own foolishness in dealing with the night in Atlanta seemed sound proof of all that he’d had to say.

  If circumstances were not in her favor that morning, they were definitely against her as the afternoon rolled by. She found Sherry and Derek in the kitchen when she had dressed, discussing the aftereffects of the recent storm. Sherry, she could see, was having a rough time keeping her hands off Derek.

  “Leigh!” Pretty blond Sherry greeted her friend with a little hug. “I missed you!”

  “I wasn’t gone that long,” Leigh replied wryly.

  “But it seemed like forever!” Sherry exclaimed, flipping a piece of bacon, which caused Leigh to survey the cute little domestic scene going on around her. Derek was eyeing the toast and spooning butter over eggs. He was next to Sherry, brushing against her often with apparent comfort.

  Just like Richard! Leigh thought painfully. Happy and at ease with anyone attractive and female while demanding everything from her. Her heart constricted and hardened. Well, Derek could play his games, he could extract his revenge, but he would never have a kind word from her, never draw an admittance of any feeling except total disdain!

  Leigh sauntered farther into the kitchen and hoisted herself onto the counter. “Forever?” she queried with amusement. “You must have had very dull days!”

  “Not at all!” Sherry chuckled. “We had a super beach party. Everyone was there! Except you, of course. Poor Lyle was so upset! He was astounded that you took off for a trip without telling him!”

  Leigh winced as Derek’s head jerked upward and he turned to her with questioning eyes and an “ah-hah!” expression. Yet when he spoke, his tone was amused and nonchalant.

  “Who is poor Lyle?”

  “One of our resident artists,” Sherry responded quickly, draining the bacon on a paper towel. “Hopelessly enamored of Leigh. He has been for years.”

  Leigh’s fingers curled over the counter. She felt like a drowning woman with no sign of help in sight. Yes, Lyle had a crush on her, and yes, he had had one for years. But the gaunt young artist had also had a crush on Richard! He was respectful though, amusing and a friendly companion, a young man who liked to keep his love life a fantasy that appeared in his beautiful watercolors.

  It would be impossible to explain Lyle to Derek, especially when she could see by Derek’s grim features that he assumed Lyle to be the “island lover” of Richard’s grievance.

  The sunny kitchen had drawn strangely tense and silent, and Sherry, having no conception of what her innocent words had implied, looked between Leigh and Derek with confusion. Then she gave a startled whoop.

  “The eggs, Derek! They’re burning!”

  Somehow, breakfast made it safely to the table. Sherry took over the conversation, amusing Derek with tales of the flighty types that made up their immediate circle of friends. There was Sandra, a prolific but unpublished poet, who wrote most of her ballads for the sea gulls; Herbert, an artist like Lyle who took great pleasure in painting pictures of sand; Shirley, who wrote terrible tragedies for the confession magazines; and Norma and Harold Grant, who chartered their fishing boat for an income but who mysteriously disappeared for months on end to travel the globe when the whim caught their fancy.

  “In fact,” Sherry said giddily, almost passing out with pleasure as Derek courteously lit her cigarette, “we’re having another barbecue tonight down by the beach to hear the calypso singers. Why don’t you two come?”

  “And meet Sandra and Herbert and Lyle and the rest?” Derek inquired politely.

  “Yes!” Sherry exclaimed. “I’ve been teasing about them really. They are very nice, normal people. I’m sure you’d enjoy them very much.”

  Derek contemplated her suggestion for a moment, then gave her his charming smile. “I’m afraid we won’t be able to make it. We’re going to go back to my place on Star Island tonight.”

  Leigh was so amazed by his sudden decision that she choked over her coffee. What had happened to his vacation plans? “I thought—” she began.

  Derek interrupted her quickly and suavely. “We have an album to work on. I want it wrapped up by Christmas, and to do that we’ll need every day from here out.”

  “Oh, Leigh!” Sherry said excitedly. “You are working on it too?”

  “It’s Leigh’s album,” Derek answered for her. “And we have to fit a wedding in somewhere.”

  Sherry’s cup crashed into its saucer. “A wedding!” she shrieked. She looked from one to the other of them quickly, her eyes reproachful and almost hostile when they alighted on Leigh. “You two?” She was decidedly incredulous.

  “Yes, us two.”

  Derek stared at Leigh, his lips twisted into a hard smile, his eyes daring her to dispute his announcement. He stood and came behind her chair to massage her shoulders with fingers that bit into her flesh. “We deserve one another, don’t you think?”

  It took Sherry several seconds to shut her mouth so that she could reply. “But I thought—I—”

  “Yes?” The prompting was pleasant.

  “No—nothing,” Sherry stammered. She inhaled deeply on her cigarette. “I didn’t think you got along particularly well.”

  Derek laughed and ran a finger along Leigh’s cheek. “We get along very well.” He chuckled insinuatingly. “When it counts.”

  Leigh despised the rush of blood that filled her face. She was hot and cold and furious. “Derek—”

  “I’m so sorry, love.” He feigned an apology. “I suppose you wanted to tell your friend yourself! Well, sweetheart, you got to tell Roger and the others, it seems only fair that I should be the first to tell someone.” His hands tightened on her neck. “I guess Sherry will have to tell ‘poor Lyle’ and the rest of your island friends.”

  Sherry didn’t stay much longer. Her hopes dashed where Derek was concerned, she began to look a little sick. Leigh was almost sorry for her. She determined to tell her the whole truth when Derek’s masquerade ended—whenever that would be!

  “Marvelous!” Leigh challenged hotly when she had shut the door on Sherry. “Just marvelous! How far do you plan to carry this—this absurd fiasco! Haven’t you already gotten what you wanted? Aren’t you satisfied yet?”

  Derek appeared surprised by her burst of anger at first; then his features took on similar grim lines.

  “I’ll carry it all the way to the altar, love,” he replied with quiet venom. “And I’ll be sure the altar I carry it to is a good hundred miles away from ‘poor Lyle.”

  Leigh didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Wh
en she opened her mouth, it was the first that came out—a hollow laugh, dry and bitter, verging on hysteria. “You’re an idiot, Derek, an honest to God idiot! You told me a few days ago you’d never marry because of me, and now you’re contemplating marrying me! Because I was such a rotten wife to Richard! What a deal you’re making for yourself, Mallory. Are you seeking revenge on me, or on yourself?”

  He walked to her slowly and cupped her chin in his hand. “Maybe both of us, love, maybe both of us.” Then he walked past her and she heard him move into her bedroom.

  She followed him to find him pulling clothing from her closet.

  “What the hell are you doing?” she demanded.

  “Getting your things,” Derek said curtly. “You heard me earlier, we’re going back to Star Island.”

  “You may be, I’m not.”

  “Oh, you’re coming, Leigh,” he replied, finishing with the closet and moving on to her dresser. “You’re coming with me if I have to truss you up like a spitted deer and throw you in the car myself.”

  Leigh’s mouth worked furiously as she searched for the right words to say. “You can’t do this! You can’t take me against my will! It’s against the law!”

  “Really? We’ll see.” He dragged two suitcases across the room and tossed them onto the bed. “Shall you pack or shall I?” As Leigh continued to stare at him speechlessly, he shrugged and began to stuff her clothing into the suitcases.

  “This is all very interesting,” she finally said coolly. “But tell me, Mr. Mallory, how do you plan to make me marry you? You can hardly spit a bride like a deer and walk down the aisle with her. And I will never marry you willingly. I will never go through another marriage like—”

  “Your marriage with Richard?” Derek jeered.

  “Yes, my marriage with Richard.”

  “That’s right, love, you won’t. I’m not Richard. But cheer up. If you manage to divorce me, you’ll be twice as rich.”

  Leigh choked back laughter and sat on the bed to watch him. He was dead serious! She blinked back tears. There was nothing in the world she could desire more than a lifetime commitment to him. In her secret dreams she had prayed that Derek would one day discover that he loved her with all his heart, needed her like air to breathe, cherished her as she did him.

  And now he was planning to make her his wife. But he didn’t love, need, or cherish her. He simply wanted to make sure she had no other life. He would bring her to heel, dominate and overpower her. Then he would go about with his own life, traveling, staying out, seeing whomever else he so desired. Just like Richard.

  But she had fallen out of love with Richard and his behavior had become bearable. Richard, after their whirlwind courtship when she had given her heart, had quickly proved himself to be an unprincipled liar, weak despite the front he showed the world.

  There was no weakness in Derek Mallory. In twenty years he had never thrown a professional temper tantrum, never been accused of anything but a judicious and fair mind, never been attributed characteristics other than generosity, toleration, and dignity.

  She would never fall out of love with Derek. And the pain would be forever unbearable. No, she couldn’t marry him. Even as her pulses quickened at the thought and her heart pleaded that it was better to have a fraction of his time than nothing, her mind rebelled. He could force her to Star Island, but he could never make her say the words that would bind her to a life of never-ending misery and despair:

  “Are you ready?”

  Leigh snapped into the present. “Now?”

  “Yes, now,” he barked impatiently. His eyes roamed over her half-prone position on the bed. “Unless that’s an invitation?”

  She scrambled up. “I—I have to write Maria a note. That is,” she drawled tartly, “unless you’ve already told her we’re leaving again?”

  “Write your note. I’ll be packing the car.”

  Leigh stalked into the kitchen and began to write her note to Maria, explaining that she would probably be gone for several weeks. She was in such a turmoil that the pen ripped through the paper and she had to start over. After she had done so, adding Derek’s phone number in case the housekeeper should have difficulty finding it if necessary, she wrote out an advance check for the next month. Glancing at her wristwatch, she noticed that the procedure had taken her much longer than she had expected. She was surprised that Derek had not come after her to bully her into hurrying!

  She moved into the living room but he wasn’t there. A quick glance out the front door showed her that the Audi was packed, but there was no sign of Derek. Puzzled, she walked tentatively down the hall to her bedroom. The door to the room she had shared with Richard stood ajar. She paused and looked in.

  Derek was standing very still by Richard’s heavy oak desk. His eyes were clouded, seeing nothing, his face white beneath his tan. His strange appearance astounded Leigh so that she, too, stood still for several seconds, watching him. Then she called his name softly, but he didn’t hear her.

  “Derek!” she called again, more loudly. He started, like a man coming out of a trance, and turned slowly to her. “I’m ready,” she said, softly again, unable to fathom the haunted air about him.

  A tremor shot through him. He shook himself, as if to remove an unwanted and annoying insect. A faint smile curved his lips but did not reach his eyes. “Good. Did you get the music?”

  “The music?” Leigh queried faintly.

  “The music. Your rough drafts.”

  “No, I’ll run up and get them now.” But she didn’t run. She watched him, completely puzzled and not at all sure he was all right. “What are you doing in here?” she finally asked.

  “The phone …” he said vaguely. “I wanted to let James and Emma know that we were coming back.”

  Leigh didn’t dispute him, yet his answer made no sense. There were phones all over the house. “I’ll go on up and get the music then …” she said, backing out of the room.

  “You don’t come in here much, do you?” Derek asked suddenly.

  “No, no I don’t.” Leigh’s eyes moved over the room, taking in the queen-size water bed that Richard had adored, the Florida pine paneling, the heavy Victorian dressers and desk. “No,” she said again. “I moved my things out the day I heard about Richard’s … accident. I haven’t been in here since. Maria comes in to clean.”

  “Richard’s things are still all here?”

  Leigh wasn’t sure if he were asking her a question or making a rhetorical statement. “I haven’t touched anything of Richard’s,” she said. “I always tell myself I have to get to it but I never do.”

  Derek nodded as if her words had been the answer to a deep and mystifying puzzle. “Go on,” he said gently, “get the music. I’ll check the doors and be in the car.”

  Amazed and incredulous at his abrupt change of behavior, Leigh backed the rest of the way out of the room. She sprinted up the stairway to the studio where she kept her work, organized the composition and her scribbled pages of notes, bound them, and hurried on out to the car. Derek waited at the steering wheel, his eyes dark and pensive, strangely distant. They focused on her sadly as she hopped into the passenger seat.

  “Leigh, you’re right. I can’t make you come to Star Island if you don’t want to. I think your work should be published, but I have no right to force you to work on it. We can hire Samantha.”

  He wasn’t taunting her in any way, Leigh saw. In the few minutes that she had spent wording her note, something had happened to change him drastically. But what? She wasn’t sure that she liked his new solicitude and uncanny remoteness.

  “I—I don’t mind working with the group,” she said stiffly.

  Some emotion raced swiftly through his golden eyes, an emotion Leigh couldn’t begin to understand. He turned the key in the ignition and stared straight ahead, his attention on the road.

  They rode in silence for miles, neither thinking even to switch on the car radio to alleviate the stilted tension between them. Lei
gh finally remarked on the beauty of the endless water as they passed over the remarkable seven-mile bridge that spanned the lower islands. Derek responded with an absent yes, and Leigh gave up all attempts at conversation. She didn’t speak again until they cleared the Keys and were coming upon the mainland and it wasn’t by choice then. The rumblings in her stomach were becoming embarrassingly loud.

  “Do you think we could stop to eat?” she asked hesitantly.

  Once again Derek looked as if he had been snapped out of a trance.

  “I’m sorry. We have gone hours without a meal. Will Durty Nelly’s be all right?” he replied.

  “Lovely.”

  Despite its disreputable name, Durty Nelly’s was a particularly fine crab house. Derek and Leigh both ordered the specialty, crabs, and draft beers. When the waitress had bustled on her way, Derek watched Leigh’s face, his soul-searching eyes oddly intent. Their beers arrived and he sipped his, lit two cigarettes and handed her one.

  “I want you to know,” he said in a cloud of smoke, “that I’m very sorry. About everything.”

  Leigh lowered her eyes nervously, unsure of how to relate to this new person. She inhaled, exhaled, and sipped her beer.

  “I’m glad you’ve decided to work on the album,” he continued. “You are a talented lady, and your light shouldn’t be hidden under a bushel. But you won’t be harassed anymore by me. It’s reasonable that you stay at my house, but you’re free to come and go as you choose. I’ll introduce you to the dogs so that you won’t have any trouble with them.” He paused, sipped his beer again, and absently swiped at the long-gone mustache. He opened his mouth, closed it, and took another long swallow. “About last night …”

  Leigh uttered a muffled protest and waved her hand. Her eyes were glued on her table mat; she couldn’t raise them to meet his. His hand caught hers in the air and covered it on the table.

  “No, Leigh,” he said. “Listen to what I’ve got to say. I’m sorry about that too. Very sorry. I promise nothing like that will happen again either. I’d like to go into this as friends. Do you think we can?”

  Leigh was speechless, her heart torn in two. That Derek was being unerringly kind, apologetic, and gentle was something that she should love. But what did it mean? Did he no longer want her? Had their evening together, the one that had brought her to a heavenly cloud despite everything, been nothing to him at all? Had he decided she was not worth pursuing? Not until this moment, not until his promise that he would leave her alone, did she realize that, whatever the bitterness, whatever the antagonism that raged between them, she wanted him desperately—on any terms. His vile temper was preferable to his total rejection.