Ronnie thought for a moment. “ ‘Thanks, Tom, that was great’?” she ventured with a flickering smile.
He grinned. “That was good, I have to admit, but not quite what I had in mind.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“So what do you want me to say?”
“Try ‘I love you, Tom.’ ”
“Oh.” A smile touched her lips and warmed her eyes. She looked up at his lean, handsome face. His hard jaw was dark with stubble, and there were shadows under his eyes, as if he’d been sleeping about as well as she had. In the spill of moonlight in which they lay his hair looked silver, and his eyes gleamed deeply blue. He was smiling at her tenderly.
“I love you, Tom,” she said, and meant it.
“Ah.” He kissed her, his lips gentle. “I love you, too, Ronnie.”
This time it was her turn to kiss him. It was a slow, leisurely kiss, and before it was done, he was hard again. She could feel the hot length of him prodding the outside of her thigh.
“Oh, no, you don’t,” she said, when he made a movement as though to cover her body with his own. “There’s a bed up there, mister.”
Tom paused, poised above her with his straightened
arms keeping his weight off of her, and glanced from her to the bed, which was approximately two feet to the right.
“You have a real thing for beds, don’t you?” he asked, and grinned.
“Let’s see you lie here and get rug burn on your backside.”
“Rug burn?” His grin widened. “I’m sorry.”
“You don’t
look
sorry. You don’t sound sorry either. You look like you think it’s funny.”
“Darlin’, nothing that causes you pain is funny to me.”
Because he sounded like he meant that, she kissed him. He kissed her back thoroughly, then entered her and rolled with her at the same time, so that this time he was the one who got rug burn on his backside.
After that they finally made it into bed.
He left before dawn. She was dozing when he slipped his arms from around her and tried to sneak away.
“Tom,” she protested drowsily.
“I’ve got to go.”
She knew he did. “I love you.”
“I love you too.” He kissed her mouth briefly, dressed, and was gone. Ronnie curled into the warm spot he had left in the bed, and finally, for the first time since Lewis’s death, fell deeply, dreamlessly asleep.
Chapter
43
September 19th
11:45
A.M
.
“R
ONNIE, DEAR
, I hate to say this, but I think you’d better either duck out the back door or run upstairs. We’ve got company.” Alerted by the sound of a car pulling into the gravel driveway, Sally was looking out the kitchen window as she spoke. The two of them were sitting in perfect harmony at the round oak table. Ronnie was breaking snap beans into a pot, and Sally was peeling apples for a pie. There was going to be a potluck that night at the church Sally attended. Notable cook that she was, Sally had been asked to bring several dishes.
“Oh, my,” Sally added, still looking out the window.
Ronnie looked out, too, and saw Mark slamming the door of Tom’s car and stalking toward the house.
“I’d say he and his dad have had a fight,” Sally said with grim humor. Ronnie ran for the back door like a scalded cat. She let herself out the back just as Mark slammed in through the front.
“Grandma! Grandma, where are you? You won’t believe …”
Listening to Mark’s bellowed summons, Ronnie remembered the night in Tom’s apartment and had to smile. Apparently yelling at the top of his lungs when he entered a dwelling was part of Mark’s style.
An hour later Ronnie was sitting in a patch of dappled shade on the crest of a small rise not far from the house. Dangling her toes in the cool water of the shallow creek that ran through the farm, she leaned her back against an elm’s smooth trunk and kept a weather eye on Tom’s car. From her vantage point she could see it clearly, parked in the driveway of the farmhouse. It hadn’t moved, and there had been no activity at the house that she could see.
It was early afternoon, and there was lots of time yet before she really had to start getting worried. But it did occur to Ronnie to wonder what she would do if Mark planned to spend the night.
Suddenly she had the uncomfortable sensation that she was being watched, and she glanced around. Mark was coming up the hill about a hundred yards to her left, and closing fast. He must have gone out the back door, as she had, and somehow she had missed his progress across the field. Heck, it wasn’t that surprising; she had been daydreaming, and watching the car.
Ronnie considered getting to her feet, but decided against it. It was absurd to feel nervous, she scolded herself. After all, he was only a kid. But then she thought,
Tom’s kid
, and realized why her throat felt dry: His opinion mattered to Tom.
When Mark was only a couple of yards away, he stopped, thrusting his hands into the front pockets of his jeans and scowling at her.
His expression and posture made him look so uncannily like Tom that involuntarily Ronnie smiled.
“Hi, Mark,” she said.
“My dad’s a total shit,” he said.
Ronnie lifted her eyebrows at him. “Oh?” As a response it was carefully noncommittal.
“
He
had all the fun, and now he wants me to pay for it.”
Ronnie drew her toes out of the water, wrapped her arms around her knees, and looked at him consideringly.
“Oh?” she said again.
“Do you have any idea what kind of grief I’ve been getting at school these last couple of days? And he’s gonna make me go back.”
“Ah,” Ronnie said, as the source of the problem became clear to her.
“I want you to talk to him,” Mark said, glaring at her.
“About what?”
“About not making me go back to school. He’ll listen to you.”
“I don’t think he will, Mark. Not about something like that.”
“If you don’t talk him out of it, I’m going to call the newspapers and tell them where you are. Grandma said it’s a big secret.”
Ronnie shook her head at him reproachfully. “Blackmail’s an ugly thing.”
“Not as ugly as what you and my dad did.”
“We fell in love.”
Mark made a jeering sound, “Is
that
what you call it?”
“Can we talk about this? Why don’t you come over here and sit down?”
Mark gave her an angry look. He seemed to hesitate. Then he walked a few paces closer and flopped to the ground. He sat Indian-style, his elbows resting on his knees, about two feet away from her at the very edge of her patch of shade.
“So talk.”
Ronnie picked her words carefully. “I’m sorry you’ve had a bad time because of the things they printed in the newspapers. A lot of it wasn’t true.”
“The
pictures
were true enough.”
“Yeah, they were,” Ronnie admitted. “They were pretty raunchy, weren’t they? I was really embarrassed when I saw them, and I know your dad was too. But the point is, we didn’t know there were any pictures. Somebody spied on us and took them when we thought we were alone. How would you like it if pictures of everything you and your girlfriend did were plastered all over the newspapers? Every little personal thing?”
Mark seemed to be much struck by that.
“You were married.” It was an accusation, delivered after a momentary pause. “You and my dad were having an affair.”
Ronnie met his gaze. She hesitated, wondering whether she ought to proceed, or back off and leave the handling of his son to Tom.
In the end she decided to go ahead. “Look, Mark, you’re seventeen, aren’t you?”
“Yeah. My birthday was two weeks ago.”
“Your dad will probably want to skin me, but I’m going to tell you the truth about what happened so
that you’ll understand. First, yes, I was married, but my husband and I hadn’t been intimate—you understand what I mean—for a long time, more than a year, when I met your dad. And your dad was the most honorable person in the world. He didn’t want to get involved with me. He resisted and resisted. Finally we fell in love and he just couldn’t resist anymore. I was going to ask my husband for a divorce. My husband’s family doesn’t like me—he has children older than I am—and they hired a private detective to take pictures of anything bad I did. The only bad thing I did was fall in love with your dad. And I don’t think that was so bad, really. He’s a great guy.”
“Sometimes.” He gave her a level look. “They’re saying you murdered your husband.”
“I didn’t. I give you my word, Mark, I didn’t.”
“Some people are even saying my dad murdered your husband.”
“He didn’t either. He couldn’t have. He was in California at the time.”
“That’s what he said.”
“You really ought to give him a break, Mark. The only thing he did wrong was fall in love with me, and that wasn’t really his fault.”
Mark slid a glance over her, from the top of her red hair, which she had pulled into a ponytail, to her slender body in lime-green cotton T-shirt and jeans, to her bare toes. “No, I can see where he might not have been able to help it.”
Ronnie smiled at him. “Thanks. I think.”
“Okay, so maybe what you and he did wasn’t as bad as everybody is saying. But I still don’t want to go
back to school and have pictures of my dad’s naked butt waved in my face.”
Ronnie winced. “I don’t blame you for that. You notice I’m hiding out at your grandmother’s.”
“My dad didn’t even tell me you were here.”
“It’s a secret.”
“That’s what Grandma said. She said the press is hunting for you high and low.”
“Yeah.”
Mark looked glum. “Dad’s gonna be really mad at me. I took his car.”
Ronnie’s lips quivered. Though she tried her best not to, she had to smile. The image of Tom being left stranded somewhere was irresistible.
“Where was he?”
“At my mom’s.” Suddenly he sounded grim again. “She called him when I wouldn’t go to school this morning. He came over to ‘handle’ me.”
Ronnie stared at him, surprised. “Is that what he does to you too? ‘Handle’ you?”
“Yeah.”
“I
hate
that,” Ronnie said with conviction.
“He tries to handle
you?
” Mark sounded astonished.
“Oh, yeah. From the first minute I met him. When I know he’s doing it, it makes me want to do the exact opposite of whatever he’s trying to get me to do.”
“Me too.”
They regarded each other with a large degree of fellow feeling. Then Ronnie, who could still look beyond Mark at the farmhouse driveway, saw something that widened her eyes.
“I hate to tell you this, Mark,” she said softly, although
her own heartbeat was speeding up with anticipation, “but your dad’s here.”
“Shit.” Mark glanced over his shoulder, and they both watched in silence as Tom, a small figure at that distance, ran up the steps of the house and disappeared through the door. The car he had arrived in, a properous-looking champagne-colored sedan, was parked in the driveway behind his own.
“Whose car?” Ronnie asked, interested.
“My mom’s.” Mark grimaced. “She’s mad at me too. She hates it when she has to call Dad over to deal with me.”
At that moment Tom emerged from the house and stood looking around.
“You want to stand up and wave, or shall I?” Ronnie asked.
“Don’t bother.” Mark sounded gloomy. “He’ll spot you any second. You’re easy to see, with that bright-colored T-shirt against the bark of the tree.”
Sure enough, Tom’s steady scanning of the surrounding countryside halted as it reached her. Ronnie didn’t even bother to wave, because as soon as his gaze found her, he was already coming across the driveway. Instead of going around as she and Mark did, he deftly climbed the board fence separating the yard from the field and came straight toward them.
“He looks
pissed,
” Mark said apprehensively.
“Yeah.” If pace and demeanor were anything to judge by, Mark’s assessment was right on target. Tom’s long strides were eating up the field, and the very swing of his body radiated anger.
“You ever seen my dad when he’s really pissed off?” Mark asked.
“Once or twice. I think.”
“Get ready for number three.”
“What exactly did you say to him before you took his car, anyway?”
Mark shot her a look that was almost shamefaced, and shook his head. “Never mind.”
“Something nasty about me, huh?” she guessed.
“Maybe.”
“That’s okay, Mark. Whatever it was, I totally forgive you. I understand where you were coming from. How’s Loren, by the way?”
“I’m dating Amy Ruebens now.”
“Great.”
There wasn’t time for anything more. Tom was halfway up the hill, and climbing fast. Ronnie hadn’t seen him by daylight since the morning in Dan Osborn’s office, though he had visited her bedroom for the last three nights. Ronnie was starting to think of him as her own personal vampire. He would arrive after midnight and leave before dawn, and while
she
would then sleep blissfully for several hours, she had a feeling he didn’t. Watching his hell-bent-for-leather approach, she wondered if the effects of sleeplessness were making him cranky. She also wondered if Sally knew about her son’s nocturnal visits. If she did, she had said nothing about them to Ronnie.
The creek stood between them and him. The sound of its green water gurgling over the brown pebbles in its bed filled the air. Overhead the breeze stirred the broad leaves of the elm, adding a hushed rustling harmony to the stream’s song. The day was warm and bright. The mugginess of August was past. The elm’s leaves were just starting to yellow.
Within a matter of minutes Tom reached the top of the rise and slowed, sending a hard-eyed glance from Ronnie to Mark and back as he came toward them. His mouth was tight, his jaw was hard, and he looked
mad
.
“Hi, Tom,” Ronnie offered.
Mark scowled, but didn’t offer a greeting. Tom stopped on the opposite bank of the creek at the very top of the oasis of shade provided by the tree. His gaze raked Ronnie once before moving on to his son. For a moment the two pairs of blue eyes, so alike, locked in silent battle.