Now and Forever (16 page)

“It's all right,” she managed in a calm voice. “Like you said, it was just…physical. Good night, Russell.”

“God in heaven! Tish!” he called after her.

But she was out the door and running, and she didn't stop until she got to the head of the stairs.

 

Life in the dorm was chaotic, but Tish shuffled back into the routine with a brittle fervor. And if her eyes looked haunted or her thinness gave away the sleepless nights, her friends put it down to the pressure of hard work.

Lillian wanted to know all about Frank, all about the farm, all about the vacation, and Tish answered her petite blue-eyed roommate with quiet enthusiasm.

Lillian had a new boyfriend who played the bagpipes in a band and worked at a restaurant off campus. It made Tish even lonelier at night when she studied while Lillian was out. Even the friendly banter of the other girls and the nonsense that was constantly being carried on didn't soothe her lacerated feelings.

She could still see Russell the way he'd looked when she left that morning: dark-eyed, quiet, vaguely angry. She hadn't met his eyes. That hadn't been possible. She said the conventional words, ignored Lisa's tears as she hugged the child, and rode away toward the airport in a fog of pain.

Baker, Mindy, and Eileen seemed to sense that something was very wrong between her and Russell, but they were kind enough not to pump her.

The weeks had passed quickly, despite the killing hunger that hadn't given her a day's peace. Mindy wrote, but her letters conspic
uously didn't mention Russell. And when Tish wrote back, she didn't, either. She hadn't given any indication that living without him was like walking around dead, although it felt like it. If only she could forget…!

“There's somebody downstairs,” Lillian broke into her thoughts.

“What?” Tish asked, looking up from her English composition book.

“A man,” Lillian said excitedly. “And what a man! Tish, you've been holding out on me! If I'd known Frank Tyler was
that
good looking, I'd have gone to the coast with you!”

Frank? Here? With a dejected sigh, Tish closed the book, pulled off her gown and threw on a pair of slacks and a white sweater. She paused to run a brush through her long hair, leaving her face bare of makeup, and went downstairs. She couldn't imagine why Frank would come all this way, unless he was in town on business and just dropped by to…

Her gasp was audible. She was at the foot of the stairs, and he was the only one in the
living room. But he wasn't Frank. He was too tall, and his shoulders were too broad, and his hair was too black.

He turned and looked with eyes she could barely meet, so brown and dark and strange that they made her heart run away.

She forced her feet to move and joined him in the spacious living room, stopping several feet away. “Hello, Russell,” she said in a tight, polite voice. “How nice to see you.”

His eyes studied her wan face and grew narrower by the minute. He looked older, himself. And different, somehow. Lonely…

“Lisa misses you,” he said quietly.

“I miss her, too.” She swallowed nervously. “Would you like to sit down…”

“Oh, God, Tish,” he whispered huskily, “come here!”

His arms caught her roughly, slamming her against his hard body, his head bending to hers, “Tish…”

His mouth opened on hers, hurting, bruising, his arms cruel as he stilled her feeble struggles, his mouth demanding, devouring as he kissed her with a need that made him
tremble, made his heart shake her with its heavy beat. A sob broke from her lips at the intensity of emotion that was transferred from him to her as the nature of the fiery kiss changed suddenly, became searching and tender, asking, exploring, seeking answers that she was yielding up tremulously as her mouth betrayed her and told him how lonely the weeks had been, how empty.

He drew back a breath, his eyes dark and sensuous, his hair mussed by her fingers, his mouth firm and hard as it poised over hers.

“Your lips are telling me things you never would,” he said huskily. “Miss me?”

She nodded, shaken by the suddenness of it all.

“Little girl, don't you think I know what a damned, pigheaded fool I've been?” he asked quietly. “Do you know how many nights I've lain awake remembering the feel of you in my arms, the taste of tears on your mouth when I kissed you…? My God, Tish, do you know that life has been a waking nightmare since I let you walk out that door? I never knew how empty the world could be,
how colorless, until I tried to live in it without you.”

Her mind whirled at the emotion in his voice. “But you…”

“Do you remember that night in the kitchen,” he whispered, “when I started up the stairs with you? Do you know what I meant to do?”

She blushed. “You said it wasn't the reason I thought.”

He pulled a tiny box out of his jacket pocket. “I had this in my chest of drawers,” he said deeply. “I was going to give it to you. I bought it in New York last summer on a business trip, just after the incident in the beach house…”

She opened it, and found a perfect ruby surrounded by tiny diamonds—an engagement ring! Her eyes met his and everything she felt was in them.

“I love you like hell on fire, Tish,” he whispered as his mouth brushed against hers. “I've been fighting it ever since I held you in my arms in that beach house and felt your mouth tremble under mine. I'm not fighting it anymore. We'll get married, and
I'll worry about those fifteen years in my spare time…”

“Spare time?” she murmured against his hard mouth.

“In between our first son, and our next daughter…” he breathed. “Pack your bag. I left the Cessna running at the airport.”

“I don't need to take anything with me,” she said, her eyes bright with love, with paradise at her fingertips. “I've got my world right here.”