Cooper stared at her. “You
already
have a prescription . . . ?”
Josie closed her eyes.
“Shit, Josie, are you telling me that this isn’t the first time you’ve had an ulcer?”
She took a deep breath, opened her eyes and looked at Cooper. His eyes were blue steel, his mouth a grim line in his face.
“It was only a little one,” she said. “I took the medicine the doctor gave me and adjusted my diet—”
“When?”
“During the Duncan contract—”
“Goddamn
it—”
“Cooper, it wasn’t that big a deal—”
Cooper threw the phone against the wall. “Not that big a deal?! Jesus, Josie, are there any other secrets you’ve been keeping from me? A brain tumor maybe? Any stray cancers?”
“Don’t blow this out of proportion!”
He stared at Josie, shocked by his sudden memory of last night. They’d made love. And afterwards, as he lay holding her, Josie had cried. She’d told him that it was nothing, that the tension from the past several days was making her overly emotional.
Cooper’s eyes filled with tears. “Aw Josie, last night you were really crying because you hurt so badly, weren’t you? I
hurt
you—”
“Cooper, no. The pain comes and goes. I was all right—”
“God, you’re still lying to me!”
Josie’s eyes flashed. “I’m
not
lying!”
“Then tell me that again, only this time, look me in the eye.”
She couldn’t do it. From the other side of the room, the telephone began to beep, signaling that it was off the hook.
“Yeah,” Cooper said hoarsely. “That’s what I thought.” The tears overflowed, running down his cheeks as he stared at her. He ignored them, as if he weren’t even aware that he was crying. “Do you realize how shitty this makes me feel?”
Josie reached for him. “How could I say no to you last night?” she asked.
“No,” Cooper said, pulling away from her, pushing himself up and off of the bed. “Just like that. No.”
“Yeah, right,” Josie said, her own face wet with tears as she looked up at him. “After you told me how badly you wanted to make love to me? After you said how much you needed me?”
“It seems to me as if that might’ve been a really great opportunity to say, ‘I’ve been meaning to tell you, Coop, but I’ve got a goddamned bleeding ulcer, and if we make love, it’ll hurt so much that I’ll cry.’ ” Cooper wiped his face with his arm, but that didn’t stop his tears. “Josie, God, how could you not trust me enough to tell me?”
His anger was gone, leaving only the hurt. Cooper looked so vulnerable, so betrayed.
Josie’s stomach burned. He was wrong. She hadn’t told him she was sick because she
did
trust him. She knew exactly what he would say and do if he found out that she had an ulcer, and she didn’t have time to let him fuss over her. She didn’t have time to stop working, the way the doctor had wanted her to. She didn’t have time for that stress reduction therapy he had recommended.
But Cooper wasn’t going to understand. Explaining wouldn’t help one bit.
What mattered now was that she had hurt him. She’d lied by omission, and now she was paying the price—she’d brought heartache to the one person she cared more about than anyone in the entire world.
The pain in Josie’s abdomen was suddenly so intense she could barely breathe. And for the second time in her life, she blacked out.
Josie woke up alone in a hospital room. An IV tube was attached to the back of her hand, and she felt thickheaded and drowsy. Drugged. She definitely felt drugged.
She was reaching for the nurse’s call button when the door to the room slowly opened. A head peeked in.
“Cooper?”
The door opened all the way, and David Chase walked in. “No, it’s me,” he said.
Josie stared at him. She knew they must be giving her some kind of sedative, but she didn’t think it would make her hallucinate.
David smiled at her expression, his lean face relaxing slightly. “I’m really here,” he said. “I flew down this morning.”
“Why?”
“Cooper called and asked me to come.” David pulled a chair over next to her bed and sat down. “You look like hell.”
“Well gee, thanks.” Josie frowned down at the IV. “Call the nurse for me, will you, David? It’s time for me to get unplugged. I want to leave now.”
David looked distinctly uncomfortable. “Josie, believe it or not, I’m here to negotiate with you,” he said. “Cooper’s still angry. He didn’t think he could even come in here without getting upset—or worse, getting
you
upset. And the doctor says it’s important right now that you try to stay calm and not spend any time arguing.”
“Arguing about what?” Josie asked. Despite the sedative, despite David’s words of warning, she could feel her blood pressure start to rise. Cooper was still angry at her. Lord, her ulcer couldn’t have been the straw that broke their relationship in two. Just a few nights ago, she and Cooper were talking about maybe someday having a baby. There was no way Cooper could have gone from thinking like
that
to wanting to divorce her this quickly, was there?
David took her hand. “Josie, remember—this is a negotiation. You’re not going to like what I’m going to say—what I’m going to offer—at least not at first. But if you stay calm, we’ll be able to work out some sort of agreement—”
“I’ve handled negotiations before, David,” Josie said sharply. “I know the procedure.”
“It’s harder to do this when the outcome affects you so personally,” he said.
Josie closed her eyes. This
was
about Cooper. He
was
going to leave—
“Three weeks,” David said. “That’s what Cooper wants. But I think you can get him down to a week and a half. He’s also not going to be able to come into the hospital to visit you very often because of the kids, so I think if you—”
“What are you talking about?” Josie tried to lift her left hand to push her hair back from her face, but that was the hand the IV needle was in. “Ow,” she said, pulling her other hand free from David’s and using it to press down on her forehead. If she could only get these cobwebs out of her brain . . .
“Your hospitalization,” David said.
Josie looked at him blankly.
“For the treatment of your ulcer,” he said. He still got no response. “The doctor recommends a three week hospital stay, and Cooper wants that, too.”
“Cooper wants . . .” There was actually relief on Josie’s face. “That’s all this is about?”
David felt his eyebrows rising. Whatever sedatives they were giving Josie, they sure were working well. He couldn’t remember a time when even the mere thought of a three-week hospitalization wouldn’t provoke a loud, hostile reaction from Josie.
“I thought . . .” she said.
“What?”
“That you were here to discuss the terms of a legal separation,” she said.
Aha. So
that’s
why the relief. “Are things really that bad between you and Cooper?” he asked carefully.
“I don’t know,” Josie said, and for a moment she looked more like her four-year-old niece, more like a sad little girl, than the thirty-year-old whiz-kid president of a multi-million dollar company.
“Cooper’s angry at you,” David said evenly, “but he’s angry because he loves you. I don’t blame him. When I heard you had another ulcer last year and you didn’t tell me, well . . . I was steamed to say the least.”
Josie sighed. “I’m sorry.”
“The only thing
you’re
sorry about is the fact that you got caught,” David said with a wry smile.
“How’re things back at the office?” Josie asked. “Has the Thorton project been finished?”
“You’re not supposed to think about work,” David said.
“That’s like telling me I’m not supposed to breathe,” Josie countered. “Did you finish the damned Thorton project?”
“Yes. It’s done.”
Josie was silent for a moment, staring out of the window at the cold blue sky. She turned to look at David. “Three weeks is unacceptable.”
David smiled. This was more like it. “I think you can get them down to one and a half—”
“I’ll agree to two weeks of bed rest,” Josie said, “provided I’m out of this hospital and back at Brad’s house by tonight.”
David crossed his arms, then crossed his legs. “Cooper’s going to want you to promise you won’t get out of bed unassisted, and then only to use the bathroom. You’ll have to eat
all
of what he cooks for you, using the special diet the doctor’s provided. You’ll spend your day doing nothing more mentally strenuous than watching videotapes and television or reading, or maybe playing with Ben or Lucy. He’s going to want you to spend part of each day listening to an audiotaped series on stress reduction. You’ll only be able to call New York once a day—”
“Make that three times a day, and I’ll agree to all that,” Josie said.
David leaned forward, holding out his hand. Confused, Josie took it, and they shook.
“Congratulations, you’ve got yourself a done deal,” David said.
Josie’s mouth dropped open.
“Of course, you realize that if you renege on your promise,” David continued, “you’ll find yourself back here in the hospital so fast that your head will spin.”
“You son-of-a-bitch!” Josie laughed in shocked disbelief. “You were negotiating for
Cooper
?”
David grinned as he stood up and stretched his legs. “I said as much when I came in.”
“No,” Josie said. “You said . . .” She frowned vaguely. “I don’t remember what you said.” She looked back at David. “But I just assumed that . . . David, you’ve always negotiated
for
me, not against me. You’ve always been on
my
side.”
He leaned forward and kissed her gently on the forehead. “I still am.”
TEN
J
OSIE LAY
back in the bathtub, trying to ignore one of the relaxation technique tapes that Cooper made her play at least five times a day. The music was supposed to be soothing, but the truth was, it was pretty darn boring. If she could have reached the boom box, she would have turned off the tape and tuned in to the country radio station.
Mentally, she blocked the music and reviewed the work that had been completed over the past few days by her staff in New York City. They were moving at her projected pace, which really wasn’t quite as good a piece of news as it seemed. Because what if something happened? What if there was some kind of interruption? Taylor-Made Software needed to work
above
her projected pace, in order to store up some emergency time.
Because emergencies happened more often than not.
Josie closed her eyes, trying to remember to keep her breathing slow and steady. Lord, but she was antsy. She was
dying
to get back to New York, to get back to the office. But most of all, she was dying to get out of Walterboro, Tennessee. Every day she heard an echo of her mother’s voice saying, “Get out. Get out while you still can.” And every day, the walls closed in a little bit more.
“Mind if I come in?”
Josie opened her eyes to see Cooper standing in the doorway. She shook her head. “No.”
He sat down on the lid of the commode, resting his elbows on his knees. “Tomorrow it’ll be two weeks,” he said quietly. “I thought it was probably time for us to have a talk.”
Josie nodded. “We’ll have to start making arrangements for the furniture and the house and—”
“Whoa.” Cooper held up his hand. “Don’t get ahead of me here, Joze.”
He turned off the tape that was playing—proof that it even bugged
him
—and looked at Josie. A smile softened the lines of his face.
“God, you’re starting to gain weight,” he said, “aren’t you? I can’t tell you how good you look, babe.”
Josie raised her eyebrows. “I’ll bet you say that to all the naked women you find in your bathtub.”
Cooper’s teeth flashed white as he grinned at her. He didn’t look so bad himself, Josie thought. He was tanned from spending all those hours playing outside with the kids every day. She’d heard them from her bedroom, playing in the yard, Cooper and Ben laughing and shouting. No laughter from Lucy yet, though. She sighed.
“What are we going to do about Lucy?” she asked.
“Maybe the first question we need to answer is simply, ‘What are we going to do?’ ” Cooper said.
Josie frowned. “What do you mean?”
He studied his boots as if they were the most fascinating objects in the world. When he finally looked up, he asked, “Joze, these last few weeks—They haven’t really been
that
awful, have they?”
Yes.
But he was looking at her so hopefully, she couldn’t say it. Not that way, anyway.
“Well,” she said carefully. “We both upheld our ends of the deal without killing each other.”
“But the point I’m trying to make is that the company got along just fine without you,” Cooper said. “Surely these past two weeks have proved that they don’t need you there twelve hours a day, six days a week.”
“These past two weeks have proved that I can successfully go on an extended vacation without everything going to hell in a handbasket,” Josie said. “I have absolutely no idea what would happen if I stayed away any longer.”
“Then maybe we should experiment,” Cooper said. “Let’s keep going. Let’s turn these weeks away into a couple of months—hell, why not a year?”
Josie stared at him. What was he saying? Lord, she knew exactly what he was saying, she just couldn’t believe her ears.
Cooper’s eyes were electric with intensity. He gave her his most beguiling smile, trying to charm her into agreeing with him. “I like living this way, Josie,” he said. “I don’t want this to end. I was thinking—why don’t we stay?”
Josie couldn’t move. She couldn’t say a word because her mouth refused to work. She was paralyzed with horror.
Cooper mistook her silence for open-mindedness, for a willingness to listen. “This is a great house,” he said. “Sure, it needs work, but we’ve got the money, we can afford to fix it up. And the yard—God, Joze, what I would have given for a yard like this when I was a kid.”
Cooper wanted to stay. He wanted to live
here,
forever, in Nowhereville, Tennessee. He wanted her to give up her job, set her company free, let it drift into oblivion and bankruptcy.
The walls moved, quickly now, squeezing her, choking her, burying her alive. This
had
to be some kind of nightmare. Cooper knew how she felt about living in a dirt poor small town, let alone one in Tennessee. How could he ask this of her?
“And think how good it would be for Lucy and Ben if we stayed,” Cooper was saying. “This is their home. They like it here—it’s comfortable and familiar to them. But what’s in New York City?”
My company, Josie thought. My entire life . . .
“Our apartment isn’t set up for kids. It’s not big enough—they’d have to share a bedroom, or I’d have to give up my home office. We’d have to pack up everything that’s breakable—which is damn near everything. We don’t have a yard, or even any kind of playground nearby. New York City’s a hell of a place to raise kids, Joze—”
“But there are museums and theaters and art galleries.” Josie finally found her voice. “They’d have the opportunity to get the best education in the world—”
“But only through private schools,” Cooper argued. “The public schools in New York City are scary—”
“Not as scary as the schools down here,” Josie said. “There’s no money in this part of the state, Cooper. What little there is is spent feeding people, not on the school systems—”
“But at least they don’t have a problem with kindergarteners bringing handguns to show and tell—” Cooper broke off, shaking his head. “We’re arguing about this. We’re not supposed to be arguing.” He took a deep breath and looked at Josie. “I guess this means you don’t like my idea.”
The tips of Josie’s fingers were shriveling into prunes, and she pulled the plug, letting the water start its escape down the drain. “I spent most of my life trying to get out of a town like this,” she said, trying hard to keep her voice rational and calm. She stood up and reached for her towel. “Why on earth would you think I’d ever,
ever
in a million years, want to come back?”
“Then let’s pick someplace else,” Cooper said. “The Caribbean. My parents are thinking about selling their house on St. John. Why don’t we go down there, spend a month or two, see if we want to stay . . . ?”
“Cooper, no.” Josie finished drying herself and slipped on her bathrobe.
“Why not?” He grabbed her, pulling her down onto his lap. He nuzzled her neck, inhaling deeply. She smelled so good—so clean and sweet.
With a sigh, she settled against him, resting her head against his. “Because they need me back at work,” she said.
“That’s
your
perception,” Cooper said. “Mine is that with just a subtle hint, David would be in your office, trying on your chair for size.”
Josie was silent, staring down at the tile on the bathroom floor, her eyes slightly unfocused.
“Hey,” Cooper said, and she looked up at him. “I’m going to ask you a question, and I want you to answer it honestly.”
She nodded. A stray strand of hair had come free from his ponytail, and she pushed it behind his ear.
“Do you really like what you’re doing?” Cooper asked. “Do you
like
working fourteen, fifteen, sixteen-hour days, with all that pressure you put on yourself? And I’m not saying that’s a bad thing,” he added hastily. “If you
really
like running the business, if you
really
like feeling irreplaceable, that’s fine. But it’s different from what you’ve led me to believe these past few years. I’ve always gotten the impression that you work the hours you do, that you expend the energy you do, because you think that you
need
to. Need is different from want, babe. If you
want
to be doing what you’re doing, then you’ve arrived, you should be happy, and that’s fine. I can’t argue with that, and I sure as hell won’t try to take that away from you. But if you’re working so hard because you’re afraid that if you don’t you’re going to lose everything . . .”
Josie met his eyes. “Then what?” she asked. “Because you’re right. I am afraid. I’d
love
to be able to say, yeah, let’s go down to St. John, yeah, let’s spend the next two months lying on the beach, but I
can’t.
These past two weeks have been the hardest two weeks of my life, Cooper. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about work. I’ve
lived
for those three phone calls to New York each day. I’ve been scared to death that something’s going to happen at work, and I won’t be there to fix it. Heck, I was scared I wouldn’t even be
told.”
With a sigh, she stood up and went out into the bedroom. Cooper followed.
“If the world were perfect,” he said, “would you even work at all?”
“Yeah,” she said. “I really like working with computers.”
“Would you want to work such long hours?” he asked. “And if the answer is yes, be honest and say yes.”
But Josie shook her head. “No. Why would I willingly want to work until I’m exhausted?” she said. “Why would I want to make myself sick?”
“Good questions,” he said. “Especially since you
are
doing that willingly.”
She turned away. “That’s what you think.”
“That’s what I
know,”
Cooper said.
“You don’t understand.”
“Then make me understand, Josie,” he said.
“We’ve been through all this before,” she said tightly. “You don’t understand because you didn’t grow up the way I did. You don’t know what it’s like to go to bed hungry.”
“And somehow
you
can’t seem to understand that no matter what happens, you will never go to bed hungry again,” Cooper said. “I won’t let it happen. You’ve got to believe that.”
“It’s not that easy.”
“Yeah, it is,” Cooper said. “Look, Joze, maybe it’s time you got some professional help.”
She looked up at him sharply. “What?”
He smiled wryly. “No offense, babe, but I think you’re, well, nuts,” he said. “You’re only thirty years old, you’ve got more money than most people make in a lifetime, and you’re worried about starving to death. Sounds crazy to me. I think you should get your head shrunk.”
She stared at him, her eyes wide with disbelief. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”
“Dead serious.”
“I don’t have time for that kind of bullshit.” She turned away, subject closed, conversation over.
But Cooper wasn’t ready to be dismissed. “It’s not bullshit, and you’re going to have to make time, Josie. You’ve had two ulcers in two years—all because you’re worried about something that doesn’t exist.”
Her temper flared. “That it doesn’t exist is
your
perception,” she said, tossing his own words angrily back at him.
“I think you’d find it’s the perception of most of the rest of the world, too,” he said gently. “You’ve got a problem that needs fixing. Things have got to change.”
“You want change?” she said hotly, irrationally. “Fine. I’ll go back to New York, and you can stay here. Is that change enough for you?”
As soon as the words were out of her mouth, Josie regretted saying them. She watched Cooper recoil as if she had hit him with a two-by-four.
For one dreadful moment, as he gazed at her, his eyes brittle with cold anger, Josie thought that he was actually considering staying behind, without her.
“I didn’t mean that,” she whispered, and he nodded.
“Watch out what you ask for,” he said softly. “You just might get it.”