Passions of Chelsea Kane Part 12

"He %ias married once." Her stomach di;4pped. "When?"

"When he was in Pittsburgh. They dated in college and got marriod after graduation. He put her through law sch6ol. She put him through h.e.l.l." Chelsea thought of Hailey, a lawyer, too, who seemed to be making Carl thoroughly happy. "in what way?"

"She used him. Crooked her finger at him when 271 Darbom she needed an escort to go somewhere or an excuse not to go somewhere else.

Showed up when she felt like it, which wasn't a h.e.l.l of a lot of the time, from what he says. She gave lip service to wanting a family, then she got caught up in local politics. When old Leo got sick and Judd headed back here, she went the other way."

"Leo?"

"Streeter. Judd's father."

"Judd took care of him?"

"Takes care of him." Chelsea frowned.

"He's still alive?"

"Technically. He has Alzheimer'S." She gasped. She hadn't thought of Judd with a father, much less one tragically ill.

"That's why Judd came back. My guess is that as soon as old Leo dies, he'll be gone from here. Judd's got too much on the ball to be stickin' around a place like Norwich Notch the rest of his lve." But Chelsea wasn't ready tomove on Othat. "Alzheimer's. That's awful." She couldn't begin to imagine the heartache of it. Abby's situation had been different. Chelsea wasn't sure which was worse-seeing someone's body give out while the mind stayed sharp, or vice versa. "Is he at home?"

Hunter nodded. "Judd hires people to watch him. He wanders."

"Wanders?"

"Walks around any time of day or night. Just takes off out the door. He never knows where he's going, never knows he's going at all, and he never gets far-before he's found, but it scares the h.e.l.l out of Judd.

He's attached to the old guy." Chelsea remembered the questions Judd had 272 The Pa.s.siox0 or Chem= Kam asked when she'd told him about Abby. She should have guessed there w1hs more than idle curiosity behind them.

Leaving the drafting table, she went to the window. The afternoon was overcast, making the view hazy and gray, not at all crystal clear. She was feeling the same way. She had formed pictures quite without basis, it seemed. "I a.s.sumed his mother was dead, too. No?"

"Yes. But he barely knew her. She left when he was four." Chelsea turned back with a swallow. "Just ... left?"

"Couldn't take the town. She was the daughter of a summer family. Living here for the summer's real differenttfrom living here year '. She fell for Leo, m*riedjiim, had his baby, then went stir crazy."

"But how could she leave her child?" Chelsea couldn't conceive of it. It was one thing to give a child up at birth, as her own mother had done, but to walk away from a four-year-old who had a name, a distinct person. Vity, an attachment, was something else.

* Hunter didn't answer. His eyes fell to the floor, his brow furrowed.

He tucked his hands under his arms. Chelsea thought of all that Margaret had said about Hunter's mother and wondered what he was thinking. She was trying to decide whether she dared ask, when he snapped back from wherever he'd been. "What else?" She crossed to where he sat and was about to perch on the edge of the desk beside him when she remembered that he wasn't a toucher. So she perched a little distance away. "Does Judd have any siblings?" 273 Zarftmra Defingby Hunter shook his head. - *What happened to his wife?"

"She charged him with desertion and divorced him."

"Does he still love her?"

"Nope. Far's he's concerned, Janine was an error in judgment on his part. He's not making the same mistake twice." Something about the way Hunter was looking at her gave Chelsea an odd feeling. "Is that a warving?" He shrugged. "A one-night stand does not warrant a warning like that, Hunter."

"You're the one asking the questions. So you've got something in mind."

"Nothing deep," she a.s.sured him. "Definitely nothing deep." She was going to have enough to keep herself busy in the coming months without an intense relationship with a man. "But I bet you'd like to know who else he dates." She sure would, but she'd be d.a.m.ned if she'd let Hunter know.

"As a matter of fact," she said, and dared move closer on the edge of the desk, "I want to know who you date. Why aren't you married? Why don't you have kids?"

"Me?"

"Yes, you. You're plenty old. Everyone else around here has them. Why don't you?"

"I wouldn't know what to do with kids," he said, pushing off from the desk. "So you'd learn." He made for the stairway. "Don't want to learn."

"d.a.m.n it, why are you leaving?"

"Because there's nothing else to say." She crossed the room in pursuit.

"But I like talk- 274 Thel "A"ions Of ' ing." And she was tired, so tired of being alone. "So talk," he said as he started down the stairs.

"With who?" she called after him. "No one around here talks. This town is made up of clams."

"Then go back to Baltimore," he said, and disappeared on the floor below while she grasped the railing anklooked down. Something snapped in her. After weeks of being stared at, SKIZed around, and generally ignored, Hunter's walking away from her was one slight too many- Turning, she shot a frustrated glare around the room.

"Big n-dstake," she muttered, striding back to the drafting table.

"Neiler should have come here." She flipped off the lights on either side. "I'm a people person. I need hunian contact. I need interaction and communication and x4armth. I need talk." She s.n.a.t.c.hed up her briefcase and trotted down the stairs. "m off,". she said to Fern, uncaring that she was more jurt than usual. Everyone else in town was curt. She could be, too. The Pathfinder was parked deep in the driveway beside the Quilters Guild. She tossed her briefcase onto the seat, executed a crisp three-point turn, and sped off. Her foot remained heavy on the gas until she pulled in at the farmhouse. A few odd workmen lingered there, laying electrical wire through the kitchen, fitting pink pads of insulation between studs in the living room wall. She pa.s.sed them without a word, made straight for her bedroom, where she threw off her clothes, put on a singlet, shorts, and running shoes, then ran back down the stairs, past the workmen, and out. The air was humid and thick.

She forged through it, picking up and keeping a challenging pace. The 275 [email protected] Delbsow The Paswons of cjjesw JLRW exertion was therapeutic. After ten minutes she was sweating freely, but that felt so good that she ignored the distant rumble of thunder and ran on. She followed the main road out of town until she saw a familiar cutoff. It was the one Hunter had taken on the motorcycle that day. She took it, then, when her legs began to feel the strain of the climb, branched onto another road that leveled off from it. By the time she hit the main road again, she was farther from town than she had expected. Tired now, she headed back. The sky was growing darker under gathering rain clouds. She stopped to rest once, sitting on a rock by the side of the road with her head buried in her arms. Cirs and pickups pa.s.sed. Some slowed. She didn't look up until she was ready to run again, but her pace was labored then. She was feeling discouraged, weighed down by second thoughts about what she was doing in Norwich Notch. Not the I east of those second thoughts had to do with Judd Streeter. The rain came, large drops that were wet and cool, but the thunder remained distant.

Headlights went on, spotlighting her, then pa.s.sing. She was nearly at the Boulderbrook turnoff when a vehicle slowed and didn't pa.s.s. She gestured it by. When it continued to tall her, she glanced back. It was the Blazer and Judd. More determinedly, she waved him past. If he hadn't had the guts to face her at the office, she didn't want to see him now.

He pulled ahead of her and stopped, rolled down the window, and yelled, "Climb in." Though the rain was coming faster, she ignored him. She did the same when he honked. At the Boulderbrook road she turned in, then picked up 276 her pace when he turned In also. The farmhouse was half a mile down the road. She figured she'd have to push to do it in four minutes, gjven how tired she was. All phe wanted was a hot bath, a gla.s.s of wine, and a good cry. Judd had other plans. Speeding ahead, he pulled the Blazer in , climbed out, and strode toward her through the rain. She tried to run wide of him, but he reached forher arm and, using her Omomentum, had her swung around and against him in an instant. ' "What in the h.e.l.l are you doing?" he asked. She struggled to free herself. "Let me go."

"It's pouring." She kept pulling, but there was little traction on the wet leaves. "I always run in the rain."

"It's thunderine."

"Let me go, Judd." His hold tightened. "What's the matter with you?"

"I dpn't want to see you," she cried. "I want to go inside."

She tried to wrench free, without success. Her knees felt like rubber, and it had nothing to do with running and everything to do with Judd.

Even now, while he held her against her will with the rain soaking them both, she was going soft and warm inside. He tried to steer her toward the Blazer, but she leaned away. "d.a.m.n it, Judd, let me go!" He gathered her close again and was on the verge of lifting her bodily when she twisted free, but he had her back in a second. "You weren't saying that last night," he accused, wrapping his arms low around her. She pushed against his chest. "You weren't forcing me last night."

"I'm not forcing you now," he ground out when she nearly squirmed free again, "I'm just trying to 277 Bmtorn Definshy get you out of this G.o.dd.a.m.ned storm."

"Concern?" she cried. She was suddenly overcome by months of emotions and needing an outlet. "is that concern I hear? It can't be. I must be confused. No one in this G.o.dforsaken place feels concern. No one talks, no one thinks, no one feels. I don't know why I ever thought it'd be any different. My father was right. I shouldn't have come here. No one wanted me then. No one wants me now." Judd had her backed to a tree.

"What are you talking about?"

"I shouldn't have come."

"d.a.m.n right. But you did." He swore. In the next instant his mouth covered hers. She tried to turn her head away. When he wouldn't allow that, she tried to keep her lips shut, but he ate at her resolve with hungry bites until, with a cry of surrender, she gave in. What happened then was like the lightning that should have come with the storm. She felt a blinding stroke, an intense need, then heat surging through her body. Before she knew what had happened, Judd had her shorts down and his jeans opened.

Lifting her off the ground, he impaled her. She cried out his name, holding on now for dear life. She didn't understand how she could want him this way, but the wanting filled her being. His voice was like gravel. "Wrap your legs around my waist, baby ... There ... There."

Using the tree for leverage, he thrust into her again and again until, with a high keening sound, she came. Within seconds he was pulsing powerfully inside her. Long after the pulsing ended, his body continued to tremble. "Jesus," he finally breathed, then said it again in a shaky sigh. She clung to hig neck, determined to stay that 278 The ra.s.sions of Cbehma way forever. Her existence was In layers, richness on satisfaction on drowsiness. Rain fell all around them, but it couldn't dampen the sated glow she felt. "Chelsea?" Her face was pressed to the side of his neck. "Hmm?"

"I didn't use anything. Is that a problem?" It was a minute before she understood what he meant. "No problem," she whispered meekly. After several more minutes he helped her with her shorts. When his jeans were fixed, he guided her back to the Blazer. She didn't argue this time. She was feeling mellow and tired. She curled against him during the short drive to the farmhouse ind took shelter under his arm for the walk inside. He led her upstairs Nd into the bathroom, where he undressed her, then himself. Once in the shower, he soaped her, turned her to rinse, separating her hair under the shower's spray. He toweled her dry at the end. She was exhausted. It wasn't six in the evening, but when he settled her against him in bed, she fell quickly asleep. Judd didn't sleep, but watched her while she did. Small things intrigued him-the paper delicacy of her eyelids, the gentle bow of her mouth in repose, the flush on her cheeks. When he touched her hair, it curled around his finger with a life of its own. When he skimmed a hand over her shoulder, she extended her arm over his chest, as though to hold him more tightly. ty He should have felt smothered by her need for nearness-he was sure he would in time-but for 279 now he didn't mind. It was novel. He never lingered with a woman this way, usually rolled out of bed the minute the loving was done. He had always been anxious to be on his way so that he could send home whoever was staying with Leo. He didn't feel in a rush now.

Chelsea felt good against him. Her body was warm and soft, supple in the way of an athlete, but feminine. He supposed part of that had to do with her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. They were larger than he had thought they'd be, which wasn't to say she was top heavy, just that there was plenty totouch. He liked her bed, too. And her room. Funny, but he would have pegged her for a white lady-white bed, sheets, walls-after seeing what she'd done with the attic in town. The feeling there was one of openness. Here, in the rust-colored sphere she'd created, the opposite was true. Rather than being claustrophobic, though, the room was cozy. He wondered if 'it was deliberate, If she found security in it, if the part of her that no one saw needed hugging. Chelsea stirred. She stretched against him, moved her cheek on his chest, brought a knuckle to her eye in the kind of gesture Judd had seen in children dozens of times. Then that eye opened. With the realization of where she was, she went still for a minute before tipping her head back and meeting his gaze. "What time is it?" she whispered. "Eight or so."

"I didn't mean to sleep."

"You were worn out." She still looked tired, he thought. Without makeup there were faint shadows under her eyes. He wondered if she was working too 280 Ibc Pa.s.sions of Cbrjsea Aume hard or if she was simply more vulnerable to pressure than she let on. She shifted, took a deep, still-sleepy breath, and came to rest with her eyes headed across his chest. "I'm sorry about before. I kinda lost it. That doesn't happen often." So he figured.

"What caused it?" She didn't answer at first. He could see a tiny crease bdtween her eyes, above the smooth, straight line of her nose. "I don't know." She thought for another minute, then said, "Hunter came by and we were talking, and I touched a raw nerve and he left, and it hit me that people around here do that a lot, and it made me angry." Judd liked her voice. There was a rhythm to it, a melody, which really was funny, given that she claimed to be tone deaf. "I like having people around," she explained in a way that didn't demand a response. "From the time I was little, I liked it. I was an only child, so maybe there was security in belonging to a group of friends. It wasn't that I was unhappy being home alone-I mean, I was never really home alone, there was always a housekeeper or a nurse or someone like that-but I liked having friends around more." Judd had been an only child, too, only he hadn't been so lucky. Most days, after school when he was little, he had been home alone-really home aloneuntil his father got back from work. Basketball had : him a place to go. It had also given him a sense of belonging. So he understood what Chelsea meant. "I'm a talker," she mused, then whispered a laugh that stirred the hair on his chest and tacked on a 281 Barbara ':361' Dehaww self-mocking, "obviously. My mother was that way. Not my dad, so much. He was busy at the hospital and all talked out by the time he got home. He was always there for my mother, but I think he mostly listened." She whispered another laugh, an affectionate one this time. "Poor guy. Couldn't get a word In edgewise when Mom and I got going."

"Is he still alive?"

"Uh-huh."

"In Baltimore?"

"Sometimes. Not so much lately. He's newly retired. He travels a lot." Judd felt an almost imperceptible tension creep into her. She shifted again, as though to ease a subtle pang. "I miss him," she said. So her father was one of the three she had mentioned. "Did he tell you not to come here?" That was what she'd implied when she'd been ranting in the rain. "He thought I should stay in Baltimore." "Who here doesn't want you?" She'd said that, too. "Everyone. No one. I don't know." She grew quiet. He waited for her to elaborate, but the quiet sounded suspiciously final. Then she seemed to reconsider. "There's a lot I don't know. I don't know what this is supposed to be, this whatever it is that's going on between you and me." He didn't know, either, so they were even. "I don't do things like last night, or tonight often"-the whispered laugh came again, dryly this time, along with the correction"-ever. I didn't expect this. It's not why I'm here."

282 nm Fa.s.slom of Chehmn K=w lie found some solace in the fact that she was as helpless against-and ambivalent about-the attraction as he was.

She hurried the next words out. "I was annoyed when you didn't come by the office today. I thought you'd want to say something or make sure I was all right or talk about whether it meant anything or whether it was going to happen again. I was feeling very confused.- So I guess I was touchy. Hunter annoyed me, so I left the office in a snit, and then I went out running and went too far, and then you came along." Adorably, she seemed to run out of breath, but only for a minute. "I don't want to feel this way. I don't want to be attracted to anyone this way. I really don't. There's too much else going on in my life." "I thought you said you liked having friends."

"I do. But we're not friends. We're-"

"Lovers."' '. But I want friends. I want people to talk to and play with and have dinner with. I thought for sure I'd come here and meet people, and I have, but other than Donna, they keep me at arm's length. What do they have against me, other than that I'm from the big city and have money and that I bought part of the granite company?" He nearly laughed. She'd covered most everything. "You're beautiful, too.

That makes them nervous. She tipped her head back and argued, "I'm not beautiful, not really. I jusf make the most of what I have."

"Same difference." SO why does that make them nervous?" 283 "Because what you have Is more than what they have. The men don't make the money to give the women the means, and even if they did, the women wouldn't have the style to pull it off. It's a novin situation. So they keep you at arm's length." She straightened her head. Her voice was quiet again when she spoke, vulnerable. "Will they always?- Judd didn't have the answer to that. The Notch had been a closed community for as long as he could remember. Chelsea was unique in that she had bought into power. That could be good or bad. "It matters so much to you?" he asked * "I'll die if I have to spend the next year of my life in solitude." He wanted to remind her that she didn't have to be there, that she could go back to Baltimore any time. But he didn't. Because he wasn't sure he wanted her running back there so quick. Because he liked holding her. For now. "You don't have to spend the year in solitude," he said. "But no one will talk with me."

"I'll talk with you." She looked up. "You will?" She looked so sweet that for the second time in as many minutes, he nearly laughed. Instead he said, "Within reason. Three sentences at a time is my limit."

"Ah." She put her head down again and said more quietly, "What about the other?"

"What other?"

"s.e.x." He did laugh then. The sound surprised him, he hadn't made it in so long a time. It had just slipped out. 284 I The PAswons of Chelvea ILNW *What's so funny?" "The way you said the word. Like it's something foreign. "It is to me. This situation is, to me. I told you, Judd. I haven't ever done anything like this before."

"Slept with the hired help?"

"Slept with someone I don't know." She pushed herself up on his chest.

"We haven't exchanged two words before today."

"We have."

"Not about things of substance."

"Work isn't substance?"

"I'm not talking about work. __ I'm talking about personal things. Like your dad." The laughter dried up inside him.

"Nothin' to talk about there. He's sick. That's all."

"Who's with him now?"

"Millie Malone."

"Does she stay with him all night?"

"Sometimes."

"Does he like her?"

"Why does it matter?"

"Because I don't want to be taking you away from him, if it means he's unhappy." I Judd dragged in a deep breath. Closing his eyes, he looked back over years of wondering what Leo knew and felt and thought. I I "He's not unhappy," he finally said, and knew it was true. Leo was past knowing who fed him or washed him or put him to bed. In that, Judd was the unhappy one. Tossing back the sheet, he sat up on the edge of the bed. "Maybe we better not talk after all. Talking's too painful sometimes."

"The pain doesn't go away by ignoring it." 285 Derbam Dauns1ky "For a little while it does." He looked back over his shoulder to see her sitting, uncovered from the hips up, her hair a tangle of waves. "You want to know what this7--his dark eyes touched the bed-"means to me? It means a couple of hours away from the pain. If you can live with that, fine. If you can't, let me know now and we'll call it a day." He saw her swallow, a graceful flex of her throat. He watched the movement of her eyes, falling from his to his neck, to his shoulders. He saw the beat of a tiny pulse above her breast, at the same time that she moistened her lips and raised her eyes again. "I can live with it," she whispered. He brushed her nipple with the back of his hand, bringing a tiny cry from her throat. Her eyes closed; her breathing quickened. He retrieved his hand and waited while she recovered. After a minute she opened her eyes. Without guile she rose to her knees and moved to his side. She touched his chest, drawing large exploratory circles there in a pattern of gradual descent. Her hand pa.s.sed his waist, still exploring, but paused at his abdomen.

Taking her hand, he moved it lower. "I'm too old to play games. Or maybe too honest." He curled her fingers around him and stoked the fire that raged in his gut. "I can give you this. I can give you satisfaction this way. Anything else and I don't know." Before she could say anything, he caught her mouth in a sucking way that locked her on and opened her lips. Then he filled her with his tongue because he liked the rawness of kissing that way. If she had trouble with it, he'd better know now. She kissed him back. That same way. Then straddled him, and took in every inch of the largest erec-" tion he'd ever had, and brought them both to 286 The Pa.s.sions of Cheftea Kane climax in the s.p.a.ce of minutes. Which went to show that his macho, 1-can-give-you-this talk was pretty dumb.

Which gave him something to think about other than Leo during the rainy drive home. 28-7 The raswons Of Cbelses fourteen HE NORWICH NOTCH HISTORICAL SOCIETY WAS in a Federal-style house done up like a private home. When Chelsea arrived, Margaret and two others were seated at a dark mahogany dining room table, littered with debris thav looked vaguely familiar. "From the Quilters Guild," Margaret told her politely.

"'Twas clever of you to have the remnants from the attic boxed and stored. We're finding treasures." Before Chelsea could see quite what those treasures were, Margaret was introducing her to the others, ushering her into the parlor, then disappearing into the kitchen for a fresh pot of tea. She returned with a porcelain pot, poured Chelsea a cup, and disappeared again. This time she came back carrying an accordion-pleated folder bulging with yellowed newsprint. "The Norwich Notch Town Crier was our weekly then, too," she explained. "These papers are from the time of Katie Love's death. I take it you've come about that." Chelsea had, but she also wanted to browse 288 -through the papers issued around the time of her birth. The library had them, but the library didn't have Margaret, who struck Chelsea as a good source of information. She figured that since Hunter "was just her age, under the guise of learning about his birth, she might pick up something about her own. Margaret settled onto a nearby rocker with the folder on her lap.

"Well, then," she said, and, as though that were enough, grew quiet.

Chelsea knew enough about the woman now not to be footed by her delicate look. Margaret Plum had a will of iron. She stoically did aerobics, efficiently directed pot-luck suppers and rummage Wes, and zealously disliked Hunter Love. The last bothered Chelsea, who did like Hunter, but then Abby hadn't always liked the doctors Kevin had taken under his wing. If one of those doctors had been Kevin's Illegitimate son, Abby would have been crushed. Not that Hunter was definitely Oliver's son.

But it was possible. @ Chelsea raised the tea to her lips and paused there to savor its smell. "Mango?" she asked, drawing the scent in again. "Apricot."

"It's wonderful." She had always liked tea, even toore so when she'd been plagued by morning sickness. It settled her stomach, had a smoothness, a serenity, to it. Now that the first trimester of her pregnancy was done, the nausea had eased. Still, she welcomed the smoothness and serenity. "We like tea here," Margaret said, crossing her ankles. She was wearing a pltim-colored cotton dress that' with its high neck, long sleeves, and fitted waist, looked aptly historical, particularly in 289 Barbou Definso comparison with Chelsea's swingy cotton tunic and tights. "in winter especially. Donna told you of our teas, didn't she?"

"Uh-huh." They took place in the library every Wednesday afternoon from October to May, the Notch's version of high tea, with cuc.u.mber sandwiches, cream-cheese crackers, and carrot curls.

Although in theory anyone was welcome, in practice the working women couldn't come, which left Wednesday afternoon tea to the Notch's upper crust. "Katie Love used to come to our teas," Margaret said smugly. She watched Chelsea closely, clearly pleased by her surprise. "But Katie was the wife of a stonecutter."

"She was also an artist. Actually, a quilter. She did many of our finest designs, and since she worked with us, she joined us for tea." Margaret's tone changed. "That was before, of course. After, well, "t much we could say to her." Chelsea sipped her tea in search of soothing. She was still slightly appalled by the way Katie Love had been treated and wondered whether her own birth mother had experienced the same. It seemed cruel to Chelsea that a woman would be punished for something that a man had done his share to create-but that was the feminist in her talking, the woman who planned to have a child out of wedlock and had no intention of being punished for it. "Who fathered her child?", Chelsea asked Margaret. "The devil."

Chelsea ignored that. "Was he a quarryman?"