Interior Designs (5 page)

He didn't like it, the way she knew how to freeze at will. His hands fell into emptiness, but not touching her was better than feeling the frost beneath his fingers.

"When can I see you again?" He wanted to sound tender, but instead the words were desperate. What he wanted was a meeting of two like minds before they proceeded, and her rejection stung.

"I don't think that would be a good idea," she replied primly, drawing the armor of aloofness around her. Avoiding his eyes, she slipped into the crowded beach club, leaving Drew stricken as he stared after her. For a moment he wished she'd been a figment of his imagination rather than a vital, breathing woman whose flesh had come to life against his, and who, for no reason that he could think of, had quickly turned and run away.

Damn,
he thought, watching the fragment of a moon disappear beneath an enveloping cloud. He could have sworn he'd touched a chord in Cathryn and that they'd shared something special, even if it had only been for a few moments. He sensed a potential in her and a depth that he'd found in no other woman since his divorce. Having found it, he wanted more than anything in the world to explore it. Why was Cathryn Mulqueen so hard to reach? What did she have against him, anyway?

Inside, alone in the ladies' lounge, staring at her windblown reflection in the mirror and wondering if the wild-eyed and voluptuous creature gazing back at her was her prim and proper well-behaved self, Cathryn fairly gasped with the effort of pulling herself away from Drew. The attraction—she'd never felt such a magnetic pull with anyone, anywhere.

She'd known her share of shallow men, and she wanted no more of them. But, oh, the complexities, the structure of this man's mind, the shifting colors she sensed inside him. Now, in the aftermath, she thought perhaps she should have let him take her home—to talk with him until the pearl-gray of the sky heralded sunrise, to inhabit the space of him for a few hours or even more. He would stop his pursuit of her now. She was sure that she had lost her chance.

She had also lost her ride. The unreliable Susannah was nowhere to be found. She'd probably decamped with Burl Cosworth, her steady boyfriend in eleventh grade. He'd been following her around the room before Cathryn left to go outside.

Cathryn did see Drew once more before she left the reunion. He waved at her jauntily from his bronze Porsche as she was maneuvering her full and flimsy skirt into the taxi.

Chapter 3

"His name is Avery Clark, and actually, it's pretty serious, I guess," said Susannah, nibbling at a morsel of Florida lobster dripping with butter. She paused dramatically. "We might get married." She lowered turquoise-painted eyelids.

"But what about Burl? You've seen seeing him every night since the reunion," said Cathryn. The two of them were indulging themselves at a farewell lunch for Susannah.

"Oh, Burl." Susannah dismissed him with a careless wave of her hand. "He hasn't changed a bit. He's still a sloppy kisser."

"Susannah!"

"Good heavens, Cathryn, don't act so shocked. For an intelligent woman, you seem awfully out of it sometimes. Surely you can't be as conservative as all that. After all, you've been playing the field all your adult life, haven't you?" Susannah frowned impatiently and, seizing the bottle of white wine she'd ordered, splashed some into her glass. "More wine?"

"No," said Cathryn, waving the bottle away. "Wine only makes me sleepy if I drink it in the daytime. And I have to get back to work."

Susannah cocked her head. "Judy was right. You
do
work all the time. I couldn't stand it. Fortunately, since one of my husbands left me so well-to-do, I don't have to support myself." She frowned. "It was either number two or number three. Can't recall just which."

Cathryn sighed. "Then what do you do all day?" She couldn't imagine not having a mission and a purpose.

"I shop, play computer games, visit my friends, and look for available men. The good ones get scarcer every year, have you noticed? That's why Avery is such a prize. He's got black hair with these wings of silver at the sides, just like that guy with the winged hat in the Roman myths, Jupiter or somebody."

"It was Mercury," Cathryn said patiently.

"Okay, Mercury. And Avery has only been married once, and his kids are grown, which suits me fine because, you know, I can't picture myself being a stepmommy again, especially after my eye-opening experience with number two's little princess. Heather Marie. Lord, what a rotten kid she was. Insisted on sleeping at the foot of our bed on our honeymoon, and he
let
her, can you imagine? That's when I knew it wouldn't last."

"You were telling me about Avery."

"Avery has a house in Connecticut. A mausoleum, actually. It looks like his ex-wife, all dusty brocades and heavy furniture right out of King Arthur's court. If we get married, Cathryn, promise you'll come redecorate it for me."

"Sure," said Cathryn, figuring that the chances of ever actually redesigning the interior of the Connecticut mausoleum were nil. By next week, in all probability, Susannah would have found someone else.

"So how about you? Have you heard from Drew Sedgwick?"

Cathryn blinked. "What do you know about Drew?" She hadn't mentioned him or their encounter at the reunion.

"What I read in
Palm Beach Parade
," said Susannah, pulling a copy from her purse. She flipped through the pages.

Cathryn was horrified to see herself gazing raptly into the eyes of Drew Sedgwick on page 12.

"Ziff Bucholz," she murmured. "He snapped that photo in the lounge right before we left."

"Nice picture," commented Susannah before stuffing the magazine back in her purse. "Anyway," she went on, "I went to haul you out of the ladies' room that night after I figured Donny wasn't going to throw anyone else in the pool, and when I couldn't find you, I looked outside and there you were standing by the seawall and holding a very earnest conversation with Drew."

"Well, I had a drink with him, as you already know, thanks to Ziff. And that's all."

"How do you feel about him?"

"My, you do plunge right to the heart of matters, don't you?" hedged Cathryn, poking at a piece of parsley at the edge of her plate.

"The heart of matters. Of course," said Susannah, showing pearly-white teeth capped to perfection. "Oh, Cathryn, it's just that I think you need variety in your life."

"Like you have?" Cathryn couldn't help tossing off that remark, and Susannah just grinned.

"Not like that. You're different from me, we both know it. But you can't go on like this. You need a personal life, someone to share your emotions with."

Susannah could get serious once in a while. Cathryn had forgotten.

"Look, Cathryn, give the man a chance. From what Judy says, he's a nice guy."

"If he's so nice, why did his wife leave?" retorted Cathryn, but she immediately felt like a traitor. It wasn't fair to judge Drew by his ex-wife's actions.

"There could be any number of reasons. The point is, why not give him a chance? I saw the way he looked at you when you were having your little chat outside. He was absolutely mesmerized. There was no doubt that he was hitting on you. Anyone could see that."

Cathryn reached for the check.

"No, let me get that," said Susannah, but Cathryn held it out of her friend's reach.

"I should make you pay, just for having to listen to your lecture," she chided. "But I consider this business."

"Business? That's stretching it a bit, isn't it?"

"You asked me to redecorate that big old mausoleum of prospective husband number four's, didn't you?"

"His name, my dear, is Avery."

Cathryn laughed. "It's no use, Susannah. I can't keep your husbands straight any better than you can. I've converted to your numerical system, too."

As they strolled outside into the bright sunshine, Cathryn was touched when Susannah hugged her impulsively before ducking into her rented Cadillac.

"I meant what I said, Cathryn," Susannah said, her eyes dark and serious again. "Give Drew Sedgwick—or somebody—a chance. Promise."

Amazingly, surprisingly, Cathryn felt her own eyes fill with hot, unexpected tears. "But—"

"Cathryn, what's wrong? I haven't hurt your feelings, have I?" Susannah was aghast.

"No, no, I just—"

"Don't explain. Just promise you won't turn him down again."

Numbly, Cathryn nodded, too embarrassed to do anything else.

"Are you okay, Cathryn? Honestly? I hate to leave you like this."

"I'm all right. I was just thinking that I'll miss you when you're gone, you idjit."

Susannah brightened. "You always did call me an idjit," she said fondly. "And I always let you. Take care of yourself, okay?" Susannah settled into the seat of the Cadillac, her body sleek against the supple leather. "I'll phone and let you know about Avery and me," she called out the open window as she backed the car out of its space in the parking lot, and again Cathryn nodded. She smiled—bleakly, she knew—and waved as Susannah disappeared down the street.

What in the world had come over her? Why had she been overwhelmed by such sudden tears? Was it that Susannah, one of her oldest friends, sensed her loneliness and pitied her for it? Whatever Susannah had made of her own life, she was certainly not lonely.

Cathryn hadn't thought
she
was lonely. She'd always had her career, and it had been enough. But if it was, why did she feel so sad when she thought about her life in comparison with Susannah's and Judy's and almost everyone's?

It was the reunion, she thought, resolutely heading back to her studio, where she was determined to arrive promptly to consult with new clients about the redecoration of their home on Everglades Island.

Or maybe she shouldn't blame it on the reunion. In all actuality, her present state of churning emotions dated back to the night she had first seen Drew Sedgwick outside her Design Boutique, lounging ever so casually against a pillar in the shadows.

* * *

Drew bided his time. He didn't call her, and he forced himself to stay away from her boutique in his Caloosa Mall store. Instead, he embarked on an extended trip to Houston, hoping that business would help him push the image of her blonde hair and green-gold eyes from his thoughts. It didn't help. He found himself thinking of her in the middle of important meetings, and he saw her in every platinum blonde who crossed his path.

He even asked one of them out because her hair reminded him of Cathryn's. But compared to her, this woman lacked charm and luster. By the time he arrived back in Palm Beach, he could wait no longer. When he disembarked from the airplane late Friday afternoon, he already had a plan. It was a little wacky, perhaps, but it was a plan nonetheless.

* * *

The design boutique at the mall was a raging success, both in terms of dollars and new contacts. Because her assistants managed it capably and well, Cathryn herself didn't have to spend much time there. In the month or so since the boutique had opened, it had netted her four big jobs. Two of them, houses in West Palm Beach, Cathryn turned over to Natalie Bell and Zohra Vlast, designers who worked for her. The third, an office for an architect who could send plenty of business her way if he liked her work, Cathryn would handle herself. The other was a "handyman special" house on Barton Avenue, a run-down place that Cathryn would enjoy refurbishing and designing to the tastes of a young family.

Cathryn usually spent Friday afternoons at the boutique, where she checked receipts, approved orders, and phoned customers who had specifically requested to speak with her. On this Friday she lingered at the store until well after six o'clock, telling herself that the reason she stayed was that certain things required her attention. But deep in her heart she knew that wasn't the real reason. She kept hoping, Friday after Friday, that she'd catch a glimpse of Drew Sedgwick. But she never did, and finally today, just before she left, she heard two clerks from the store office talking about Drew's trip and wondering aloud when he would return.

Downplaying her disappointment, she let them step off the elevator ahead of her.
So,
she told herself ruefully,
you've been hanging around here every week waiting for Drew Sedgwick to show up, and he hasn't even been in town.
She felt like a fool. She'd lost her chance with him, just as she'd thought the night of the reunion. Her promise to Susannah, that she'd give Drew a chance, was worth nothing if the man wasn't interested.