But too late. He was at her heels as she led the way to the side shed that housed her motorbike.
“You drive this yourself?” Ross asked, eyeing the small vehicle with something short of trust.
“Sure,” she said, praying that he not hear her breathlessness and guess its cause. “It’s great for the fresh air, uses practically no gas, and does much less by way of pollution than my car.” She paused. “Unless you’d feel safer-“
“No. No. I’m game. Don’t forget-of the two of us, I’m the original hippie.”
Chloe drove with Ross straddling the seat behind her, and it was totally traumatic. He was near, so near. His arms were locked about her waist, his body tucked against hers. Even the October breeze whipping by did nothing to relieve the intimacy of the trip. When he spoke, it was a nibble at her ear. A nibble? Had he really done that@r was it a product of her overworked imagination?
Indifference. Uh-huh.
The road they traveled was one she covered daily. Its sides were edged with maples and oaks, grown ripe and mellow now, on the verge of bursting into autumn flame. Fields sprawled to the right, wooded pastureland to the left. Ahead undulated a path to Sakonnet Point, the very tip of the finger of land on which Little Compton sat just across the bay from Newport.
If Ross was aware of the havoc his nearness wreaked on her, he kept his smugness in check. Once, in a gesture of soft intimacy, he released her waist to gather her hair together in his hands, twist the long fall once, and tuck it inside the back of her shirt.
“The better to see the town,” he murmured wickedly. He had to know that her neck tingled from the touch of those fingers, her ear from the brush of his breath, so much so that she was oblivious to much of their surroundings. When at last they reached the wharf, with its graceful fleet of pleasure craft, she was almost sorry. The intimacy had been nice. She was strangely torn.
Not so Ross. “Ah! There’s a place that looks like it’ll fit the bill. Can we eat there?”
The ultimate humiliation had to be being bested by a restaurant. Apparently the way to a man’s heart was through his stomach after all. But then, Chloe wanted no part of Ross’s heart. The restaurant could have him.
She smiled, pleased to have so neatly talked herself sane. “If you’re really hungry, this is the place to be.”
Ross was really hungry. He was game to sample most anything and everything, from clam fritters to little necks on the half shell to swordfish puffs, a specially of the house.
Chloe savored his enthusiasm, taking pride in pointing out the small groups of local fishermen on the pier arduously scraping barnacles off tall-stacked lobster traps. The bright yellow of their rubber overalls was a bit of sunshine stolen from the sky, adding a spark to the otherwise sleepy air of the harbor. It was, all in all, a peaceful lunch, filled with good food, thirst-quenching beer, and conversation that stuck to the more general, less personal topic of travels, foreign ports, and favorite hideaways.
“The ocean is beautiful,” Ross admitted at one point, “but I still prefer the mountains. There’s nothing more lovely than that feeling of seclusion you get in a small cabin tucked into a neat cleft, with stretches and stretches of piggybacked hills to keep the world at bay.”
“Then you’ve never been on the beach on a foggy morning,” Chloe returned softly. “It’s like being in a gentle white cocoon, with the solace of knowing that humanity is near, yet out of sight and sound for as long as the mist should choose.”
“You like New England.”
“do.”
“You’ll be staying here?”
“I will.”
He sighed good-naturedly. “Then we’d better get you to the market or you won’t make it through the week, much less the winter.”
On that comfortable note, they left the restaurant, spending leisurely moments wandering along the breakwater before returning to the bike.
“I’ll drive this time,” Ross said with an arched brow and a palm out for the keys. Chloe was only too glad to relinquish the responsibility. Seated comfortably behind Ross, she was more in control of her emotions.
What she hadn’t counted on was the broad expanse of his back, the sense of contentment that flowed through her as the wind rushed freely through her hair, the gentle fatigue that a night of little sleep, a morning of busy work, and a frill stomach had induced. Indifference had no place here. Without a care to the wisdom of the move, she wrapped her arms about his middle and laid her cheek against his back.
It was heaven, pure and simple. She didn’t have a care in the world. Ross was at the helm, competent and strong. Over the wind that sailed by came the steady beat of his heart, steadying her in turn. She didn’t know what it was about this particular man that affected her so deeply, nor did she care just then. It was enough to enjoy the respite from responsibility and to give herself up to his care, if only for the brief ride home.
The brief ride home, however, grew longer and longer. Peering around Ross’s shoulder, Chloe saw that they were on a different road entirely. “Do you know where we are?” she called.
“Roughly. Where’s your market?”
He followed her pointing finger, turning this way, then that, until the town common came into view. Typically New England, it had a white steepled church at its hub and a variety of rural shops and boutiques. Chloe found everything she needed at the grocery store, reluctantly took Ross’s suggestion that the plants be saved for another trip, then climbed behind him onto the bike to return to the house. Not one wrong turn later she was on her own front steps.
The moment of reckoning was at hand. “Will you be returning to New York now?” she asked.
He had finished stowing the bike in its proper spot and advanced on her with a grin. Relieving her of the large brown bag she’d been carrying, he took her elbow and guided her toward the house. “Not yet.”
“You’re going back to Lee’s?”
“Not yet.”
“Then what are you going to do?”
He held the door open for her to pass, and followed her into the kitchen, where he began to unload and store the groceries as though the place were his. “I want to make a few phone calls.” He glanced at his watch. “Then wash the car, catch the end of the Giants game, shower and shave, and take you out to dinner.”
His recitation was so nonchalant that Chloe would have guessed he spent every October Saturday this way, at least as far as the first part went. As for taking her out to dinner, it had certainly never happened before.
“It’s unnecessary,” she said.
“Which part-the calls, the car, the game, or the shower?”
“The dinner! Lunch was enough to even us up. There’s no need for anything more.”
A muscle worked in Ross’s jaw. “It’s not tit-foretat, Chloe. I’d like to take you out to dinner.”
“I appreciate the thought, but-“
“No buts. We’re going out for dinner. Period.”
“What if I have other plans?”
He arched a dark brow. “Do you?”
“I could just as well,” she hedged, “for the way you just assume I’m free.”
“Well, are you?”
It wasn’t that she didn’t want to go to dinner with Ross. On the contrary. She liked being with him. She just didn’t want to get used to it.
“Chloe?”
“Yes,” she said, sighing. “I’m free.”
:”Good. Say, about eight?”
,:But-“
Eight it is. And Chloe?”
She felt totally helpless. “What?”
“How about if we dress up?”
“Dress up? I haven’t ‘dressed up’ in months. Things here are very casual. There’s nowhere-“
“There is,” he argued gently. “Leave that to me.”
Chloe lowered her eyes and studied the floor, then slowly shook her head. “Ross, I’d really rather-“
“For old times’ sake?” he dared ask. “Today we played ‘far out.’ Tonight, let’s play in.’ Come on. How about it? Just this once?”
The odd note of pleading in his voice brought Chloe’s head slowly up. He looked so innocent, so hopeful, that she couldn’t turn him down. “Just this once,” she gave in softly, forcing the semblance of a smile to ;Minerable lips.
There was no semblance of anything in Ross’s smile. It was blatantly broad and open, relieved and pleased. It warmed her, reassured her, amused her. And it most definitely excited her.
That terrified her.
Before she could back out, though, he said, “It’s a date. See you at eight.”
He turned and made for the phone, leaving Chloe to gather the pieces of her fast-splintering resolve and struggle with makeshift repairs before evening rolled around.
It wasn’t an easy task. Ross seemed to be everywhere she turned. He used her office to make his calls, lounging back in her chair, legs long and straight, crossed lazily at the ankles, propped on the corner of her desk.
His presence filled the room so that it took a conscious effort on Chloe’s part to quietly creep in and steal her own work. He followed her every move with interest, though he was at the same time maddeningly capable of carrying on his end of what was obviously a business discussion.
After retreating to the back porch to bask in the rays of the westward sun, she put her best effort into organizing the papers on her lap. But her best effort was sadly lacking. Her mind wandered. Then Ross appeared in the flesh to ask about a bucket, a sponge, and some old towels. He was right on schedule, his self-satisfied air announced. He vanished, then reappeared and deposited the car-wash gear on the sandy grass beside the very same porch on which she sat.
Would he do it here? she wondered. The smooth hum of his car’s engine as he pulled the vehicle close by the side of the house was her answer.
He wanted an audience, the rat.
She should have gotten up and left, but she sat right there in the large wood-slatted porch chair, watching while he put his best effort into washing, drying, and polishing his sporty brown BMW As he stretched to soap the roof, the muscles of his shoulders bunched. When he squatted to scrub the whitewalls, the muscles of his thighs swelled. When he reached across the front windshield, his shirt separated from his jeans, giving fleeting, devastating glimpses of a flat, hard belly. And through it all was the sight of hands and forearms at work, lightly tanned, softly haired.
When Chloe had taken as much as she could, she stacked her papers into a pie, left the chair, and, without a word to explain her sudden departure, went into the house. To clean? She hated to clean! How else, though, to expend some of the nervous energy that had gathered inside?
She swept the floors and vacuumed the carpets, all at doublespeed, all with every bit of elbow grease she could muster. Tables, chairs, countertops, and shelves met similar fates beneath her dustcloth. Perspiration beaded on her upper lip. She barely noticed.
The football game offered a different torment, but one that was no less agonizing. She was polishing the aged oak banister halfway to the second floor when the familiar sound waited up, and she sank down on the homey wool runner in defeat. The football game-what memories it brought. That sound-the excited roar of the crowd, the babble of color commentators, the endless streams of kickoffs and passes, punts and first downs, fumbles, tumbles, and pileups-brought back the days in New Orleans when the men of the family gathered for their weekly fix. Her brother sit had been so long since she’d seen them. Were they watching this same game? And how was her father feeling? He wasn’t young anymore. Should she make the effort to go back before … ?
“Chloe? Are you all right?”
It wasn’t until Ross spoke that she realized he’d even approached. Nor had she been aware of the tears in her eyes. With a hard swallow and a feeble smile, she willed the sadness away. “I’m fine. I think I’ll go for a run.”
Leaving Ross where he stood, she pensively covered the last of the steps to the top landing, disappeared into her room to change into running wear, then went back down the stairs and outside. Her sneakers beat rhythmically down the beach toward the far end of the bay, much as they had done at roughly the same time the day before. Had it only been twenty-four hours since Ross had shown up? Already he seemed so at home here. Worse, at odd times it seemed natural to have him here.
The questions kept pace with her jog. Was it only that Ross was a face from her past? Was he a link to those people who had once meant so much to her? Did she crave the warmth of her family? Was Ross, by association, an extension of them?
Without answers, she paced herself for another ten minutes before turning around. When she reached the house she didn’t bother to stop at the door. An easy lope carried her into the kitchen, through to the living room, and up the stairs. No sign of Ross-so much the better. Jogging in place with the last of her precious energy, she piled her arms with fresh towels from a surprisingly low stack in the linen closet and went to her room for a robe. There she stopped dead in her tracks.
Where an open expanse of pale lavender quilt had been when she had left, was a landscape of mate artifacts. And clothes. His clothes. He had made himself perfectly at home. This was the limit.
A fit of fury took her to the bathroom door. Better judgment stopped her on the threshold. The sink taps were running. If she barged in, what would she find? The tremble that snaked through her had nothing to do with fear. Rather, she conjured up the image of Ross shaving, a coat of white lather covering his jaw, a towel-her towel over his loins, and nothing, nothing else, covering or covered.
As she stood rooted there, the shower went on, the curtain clattered back on its hooks, and … her mind’s eye saw it all. The towel fell away. With total nonchalance, he stepped into the shower.
Mercifully, he couldn’t hear her low cry as she whirled back toward her bedroom, cursing both Ross and her imagination all the way. But she couldn’t curb her curiosity entirely. Approaching the bed with an odd shyness, she studied his things. There was the leather duffel she had seen earlier, plus a larger, flatter suit bag, unzipped to reveal a pair of gray-blue tweed lapels. There was the smaller canvas case that had contained his shaving gear, if the travel-sized bottle of cologne left behind was any indication. There was a shirt-white, freshly laundered, lightly starched. There were a tie, clean socks, shorts “Oh, Lord!” she exclaimed softly. If every stitch of the clothing he intended to put on was here on her bed, exactly what did he plan to wear for the trip from the bathroom?