Home Fires Page 9

  She shook her head. “There’s a quaintness here that’s delightful. And you’re right. It’s quiet”

  Just right for talking.” He paused, watching her closely.”That was interesting—what you said about excitement. Most people would think your life the epitome of excitement. You know—glamour, luxury.”

  The sadness in Deanna’s eyes was unmistakable and sincere. “The grass is always greener,” she murmured. “It’s too bad. I do like my life and I’m grateful for everything I’ve got.” She frowned as she tried to express her sentiment. “And I feel guilty at not being one-hundred-percent content But there are times … times when I wonder what it would be like to be self-sufficient. You know”—she looked up, almost shy—“to be able to take care of myself. To be independent.”

  Mark sat back more comfortably. “It has its rewards.”

  She suddenly saw how neatly he had directed his inquiries. And she was astonished at how easily she had opened up to him. But she was curious as well. It was one of the many reasons behind her decision to come out with him. “Tell me about you, Mark. Do I take it that you’re a self-made man?”

  “Self-sufficiency isn’t limited to the self-made man,” he chided her gently. “You could be self-sufficient if you wanted to be.” His gaze shifted to the newly arrived waiter and all conversation was momentarily tabled to allow them to order a selection of the northern-Italian offerings in which the small restaurant specialized.

  The break in the conversation gave Deanna time to ponder his words. She couldn’t be self-sufficient, could she? All her life she’d depended on others to provide services for which she was more than willing and able to pay. She simply didn’t know how to do half the things that other women did as a matter of course. And it bothered her.

  “Why so serious?” Mark asked, leaning forward and taking her hand. Quite unknowingly she curled her fingers tightly around his, needing the reassurance of their warmth.

  “I don’t know. I guess we all brood now and then.”

  Misinterpreting the cause of her anxiety, he took a different tack, one that was no less contemplative. “You’re not upset at being with me, are you?”

  “Oh, no! I wanted to come. I may be a fool for having done it, but I did want to come.”

  “And the other night—have you resolved that in your mind?”

  She had no doubt to which night he referred. When she tried to extricate her hand he tightened his around it “No,” she admitted in a more subdued voice. “I’m still having trouble there.”

  “Cart before the horse, eh?” He grinned and her heart flipflopped dangerously. Yet she couldn’t resist a smile.

  “Since we seem to be into cliches, yes. You could say that. We’re doing it backwards, aren’t we?” she asked softly.

  “It depends how you want to see it. There are many different kinds of relationships. There’s the physical. There’s the emotional. There’s the superficial … and the profound. Look at it this way. What we did was spontaneous, not to mention physically profound. If that wasn’t exciting enough for you, I give up.”

  “Now you’re making fun of me,” she teased him back, unable to sustain discomfort in the face of his good humor. If only he were more resistible, she mused, appreciating afresh the blatant quality of his masculinity. Even the dim lighting in the restaurant couldn’t hide his eyes’ spirited gleam.

  “No, just making a point. But I won’t dwell on it” He slanted her a look of suspicion. “You probably did that all weekend anyway … between those, uh, pleasant events you found so unexciting.”

  “You’re perceptive.” To say the least. “But what about you? How was your weekend?”

  “Busy. A lot of running around. And I did a lot of work. Drafting type of thing.”

  “You often spend the weekend working?”

  “When I’m doing something I enjoy as much as last weekend’s work.”

  Had Deanna’s mind not been stalled in one particular vein, she might have questioned him about that work. Instead she smiled almost timidly. “No … wild date?”

  His gaze leveled. “No. I had all I could handle thinking about tonight.”

  “And … if I hadn’t shown up?”

  “I’d have been crushed.”

  “You’re either very honest or … slightly off balance,” she joked; either way she felt disturbed herself. Reluctant to open that discussion again, she shot him a scolding glance and veered off in a different direction. “I meant what I said about the hospital plans. They’re wonderful.” He dipped his head in silent thanks and said nothing. Deanna had the strange sensation that there was a method behind his silence. “Will you tell me more about your work?” she prodded quietly, mindful of his earlier evasion.

  Mark’s smile was crooked, knowing. “You’re not afraid of learning about me now?”

  She hesitated, then feigned a scowl in admission of defeat. “It looks like I’m stuck with you, seeing as you’ve been chosen to design the hospital. Call it a business interest.”

  His eyes said he didn’t believe her for a minute, yet his words were almost accommodating. Almost. “I have to admit that I was surprised that you knew nothing of my involvement before last Thursday. Does Warner make every decision himself?”

  “He has a board of directors.”

  “And you? What’s your role in it all?”

  “I suppose I’m the most powerful … and the least. If I want to disagree with any decision, I have veto power. I’m the head of the foundation—nominally, at least. More practically speaking, Bob is in a better position to be able to make decisions. My knowledge of business is limited and I’m not even sure that I want to be that involved with the everyday workings of the whole thing. Bob assumes that I’ll see things his way.”

  “And do you?”

  “I’ve had no reason for doubt so far. He was wonderful when—” She faltered, hesitant to go on until the man across from her coaxed her silently. “Bob was wonderful when my husband died. He took over at a time when I didn’t know what was happening. It’s an overwhelming thought—being suddenly left at the helm of a multimillion-dollar setup.”

  “You’d never had any part in it before?” Mark asked.

  Deanna tried to shrug away her mild embarrassment. “In Larry’s mind women were to be pampered. He took pride in giving me things, in sheltering me from every worry in the world. It was almost as if his success was defined by the quality of my … my … protection.”

  The wine steward arrived and proceeded to present, uncork and pour their wine, so she fell silent It occurred to her that she’d never opened up to a person as she’d just done. Until this airing, her thoughts on the subject of Larry and her role in his life had been solely in her own mind, never shared. It was a frightening experience to hear them spill forth so freely.

  When they were alone once more she remained quiet, eyes and hands on her wineglass, brows gathered in the beginnings of a frown. But Mark was not about to let her brood. Lifting his glass he proposed a gentle toast

  “To the memory of the husband who very obviously adored you. And to you—the warm and giving woman he nurtured. May nothing stop your emergence from your cocoon into the exquisite butterfly I know you to be.”

  When he’d begun Deanna had lifted her glass quite innocently. As she’d heard the words, however, her hand had started to shake. Fearful of her unsteadiness, she put the glass down and lowered her suddenly tear-filled eyes. She was unaware that Mark had moved until he sat much closer, having deftly relocated his chair to the side of the table.

  “I’m sorry, Deanna,” he whispered, lifting his hand to her face as though to shield her emotion from the world. She felt his fingers inching from her cheek toward her ear and then into the thickness of the hair beyond her temple. On pure instinct she turned her face toward him. His lips were inches away. “I’m sorry, honey. I didn’t mean to upset you. Damn it, I seem to have a knack for doing that!”

  Hearing his self-reproach, she forced a whis
pered “I’m all right” But a single tear escaped her closed lids, and seeking shelter, she leaned forward to put her temple against his cheek. His own protective impulse had been stirred and she savored the comfort he offered as his hand slid down to lightly caress her neck.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispered again.

  But she felt the tenseness of his jaw and drew back to look at him. “It’s all right. What you said was … lovely. But scary. I feel … confused.”

  Her confusion had never been greater than at that moment, when his features were so close and, in their way, so very dear. Even the lingering moisture in her eyes couldn’t distort the vulnerability she saw again on his face. It was mixed with worry and a strange hint of fear and she only knew that she wanted to ease it

  Without stopping to consider what she was doing, she leaned forward and kissed him gently, offering her own form of solace. He was warm and fresh smelling beneath her touch and when he responded she found satisfaction. It was only the ghost of a bearded roughness on his cheek that alerted her to the fact that her lips had quite happily begun to wander.

  She drew back abruptly, fearful of what she might find. But the look she saw in Mark’s eyes held no ridicule. Rather she saw a smoldering desire that took her back in time to another night, his hotel room, his bed. Her entire body felt the heat of his gaze and she trembled with a longing she simply couldn’t deny.

  Fortunately Mark seemed to come to his senses. Clearing his throat, he shook his head as though to free himself of a daze and reached for his wineglass once more. “To whatever the future holds,” he whispered hoarsely, took a sip, then offered his own glass to her. Deanna put her lips where his had been seconds before and sealed the toast. Then, as though on cue, their dinner arrived.

  The air between them never quite cooled, though. For one thing, Mark stayed where he was by Deanna’s side, leaning back in his seat while the waiter relaid his setting, holding her hand beneath the table all the while. For another, the smoldering light never totally left his eyes—nor hers, for that matter. Her senses seemed fine-tuned to everything about him, reacting to the shape of his hand, the pulse in his throat, the rakish fall of hair across his forehead. And his thigh rubbing against hers on occasion drove her to distraction. She remembered all too well its bare form, leanly muscled, hair-roughened, tanned and strong, and the memory heated her blood.

  He took pity on her, however, and opened up about his work, though one small sly part of her suspected he did it in defense against his own desires as much as for her information. She sensed that he would have been content to sit and stare at her, hold her hand, touch her leg—do whatever else was possible within the confines of the small restaurant. But they were relatively hamstrung —he reluctantly, she gratefully. Again she feared the force of her feelings and the future to which he had so poignantly toasted.

  “I suppose you could say I’m a self-made man,” he began with a modest shrug. “I built the firm from scratch. It’s taken over twelve years, but we’re proud of the name we’ve established.”

  “From the look of those hospital plans you’ve got every right to be proud. But tell me—why Savannah?”

  His smile was innocent “I like it. It’s a beautiful city. This entire area—the South—appealed to me. When I was first setting up shop there seemed to be a lot of opportunities here for an aspiring architect That’s proven to be the case.”

  “You had no ties elsewhere?”

  “Family? No. I grew up in Delaware, but my parents are gone. My only brother is a professor at UCLA.”

  “You have a brother?” she asked, excited. “Older or younger?”

  “Older by nine years. My parents married late in life, had my brother, then I came along even later. It was hard on them. We weren’t the quietest of kids.”

  “Few are.”

  “Were you?”

  “Quiet?” She grinned. “Oh, yes. The perfect lady.”

  “Even as a child?”

  “Even then,” she quipped, but the grin died suddenly.

  As always Mark drove to the crux of the issue. “Why, Deanna? Why such a docile child? No rebellion? No spoiled-brat syndrome? It’s unusual.”

  She took a deep breath and thought back on those childhood days. “I learned a sad lesson early in life,” she whispered. Mark held her gaze. When she would have ended there his silent demand brought out the story. “I had a brother too.” The softness of her voice held years of pain. “He was ten years my senior. I idolized him. Of course, he pampered me much as everyone else did.” A trace of self-derision tinged her words in passing but vanished quickly. “Patrick was the rebel in the family, though. It got worse as he got older.” She frowned. “I still can’t understand why he had to make a point of defying everyone and everything.”

  “What happened?” Mark’s low voice cut into her brooding. She looked up sharply, needing an instant to readjust.

  “He was killed in a boating accident. Carelessness. Bad weather. He’d taken it upon himself to sail a thirty-three-foot ketch from Maine to Virginia. Don’t ask me why—lord knows he didn’t need the money. I guess it was a lark. He was twenty at the time and an experienced sailor. But the girl he brought along—his only crew—had no experience. The boat was ill equipped and Pat wasn’t particularly interested in life jackets at all. He’d defy anything. Unfortunately he didn’t have a chance when they hit the shoals. He lost his balance and banged his head. The Coast Guard assumed he was unconscious before he hit the sea. His girl had no idea what to do to help him. It was foggy and rough …”

  Mark took her hand and tucked it between his own, stroking her fingers while the silence worked as a buffer between past and present. “Life is so fragile,” he whispered, lost in his own thoughts for a minute.

  “So you vowed that you wouldn’t follow in his footsteps?”

  “It wasn’t his footsteps that frightened me as much as the pain in those he left behind. My parents were devastated. I was ten at the time, old enough to understand and share their agony. I guess I decided that nothing was worth that. So”—she inhaled slowly—“I behaved myself.”

  Needing a bit of humor, Mark grinned. “Is that the past tense I hear?”

  “Is that wishful thinking I hear?” she shot right back, clutching at humor as a way of distancing the past It was so comfortable being with Mark, talking with him. Again she’d told him things she’d never told another. And yet again she felt herself nearing shaky ground. A change of subject seemed the safest course. “Does your work take you traveling often?”

  His gaze narrowed. “Sneaky …”

  “Does it?” She could also be persistent. “Bob mentioned the work you’ve done in West Virginia.”

  “West Virginia, Oklahoma, Missouri, Iowa, Michigan … it’s spread out more than I’d expected when I chose Savannah as my home. It sometimes seems that I’m never there.”

  “Does it bother you to travel?”

  “Sometimes. Hotel rooms can be pretty cold—yours excepted, naturally.”

  “Naturally.” She grinned, then sobered. “But I’d think the excitement of your work would overshadow the drawbacks of traveling.”

  Mark chuckled. “Excitement. That word again. Yes, it’s exciting. The traveling does get lonely though.” His gaze grew pointed. “It would be nice to have someone with me every so often. For that matter, if there were someone waiting at home I’d cut down on the traveling at this stage.”

  “Why isn’t there?” she blurted out spontaneously.

  “Someone waiting?” He arched a brow and she ached to trace its commanding line with her finger. Instead she made a fist and nodded silently. Mark sighed. “It’s been a long haul up the ladder, Deanna. We self-made men don’t get much help at the start. It’s a cutthroat world out there. To get the best jobs one not only has to be a skilled architect but an endless worker. It doesn’t leave much time for relationships.” Suddenly he seemed to be the one whose need to express himself superseded the need for reserve and
he elaborated readily. “I’ve known women over the years. I haven’t stayed alone, lonely, for want of companionship. But you can be with a woman … and then you can be with a woman. The first is detached, the second involved. For the first time in my life, now I want the latter.”

  Fresh coffee was set before them and Deanna sipped slowly. “What do you want, Mark? How do you envision your future?” She asked him outwardly as a friend, all the while trying to ignore the inner naggings that went far beyond simple friendship.

  Mark’s abrupt intensity was a direct assault on her emotions. His eyes—deep, rich chocolate, a shade darker than her own—spoke with that same quiet need she’d heard before. “My future? Ideally?” He leaned closer and spoke more softly, but no less urgently. “With my profession established now, I want to build a home.”

  “Surely you’ve got one in Savannah—”

  “No, Deanna. I’m not talking about the physical fact of a place to live. You’re right. I’ve got that—a house in Savannah, land in the mountains north of here. But I don’t have a home that a woman makes, a home to come to, one to stay in. Perhaps I’m old-fashioned, but I want a woman there to greet me. I want a family. Children. I’m not getting any younger and there is that … void. Professional success has its limits.”

  A wife. Family. Children. The pain that ripped through her was as harsh as any Deanna had ever had to bear. Once more she was engulfed by a swell of inadequacy. Mark needed all the things she couldn’t give him. It was all so unfair. Despite the force of their physical attraction for one another and the further compatibility this evening had evidenced, Deanna knew she was out of the running. He wanted a wife totally devoted to him, yet she couldn’t even cook a meal. And he wanted children. Nine years of marriage to Larry and she’d never conceived. Larry hadn’t pushed the issue, had discouraged her from having tests on the grounds that being a father didn’t matter to him. As a result of his vehemence she had steadfastly denied the fact that being a mother did matter to her. But then Larry had died and it had become a moot point. All the mourning in the world couldn’t provide her with a child to love after the fact Larry had loved her, limitations and all. She couldn’t possibly ask Mark to do the same. Not when those things meant so much to him …