This Calder Sky (31 page)

She stumbled, but his strong arm was around her to support and guide her into the privacy of the tack room. Maggie choked on the sobs she tried to swallow and wiped awkwardly at the few tears that slipped from her lashes. Phillip led her to the divan and set her on the cushions.

“I'm sorry.” She tried to get hold of herself. Phillip was sitting on the couch near her, leaning toward her with his elbows resting on his knees and his hands clasped in front of him. His patient gray eyes were watching her closely.

“There's no need to apologize,” he assured her. “The rope triggered some traumatic recall that your mind couldn't cope with, so you went a little crazy.” His faint smile seemed to say it was all perfectly
normal. His quiet understanding was too much for her. She breathed in sharply, wanting to cry. “Would you like to talk to me about it, Elizabeth?” Phillip suggested. “Sometimes that helps.”

Tears began to slide down her cheeks. “I wish my brother was here.” Maggie turned her head to the side. “I could talk to Culley.” A tear crept across her mouth, which she wiped with a trembling hand. “I didn't cry when they buried my father. I didn't even cry when it happened.”

“Were you there when the accident happened that killed your father?” He studied every nuance of her expression, guessing that he was close to the truth. Somehow this was tied in to the death of her father.

“It wasn't an accident.” Although she knew that was what her aunt, and everyone else here, had been led to believe. “He was murdered.”

Before she could stop herself or think about what she was saying, Maggie was pouring out the whole story to him—about the Calders, her affair with Chase, the cattle-rustling, and the hanging of her father. Through it all she cried as she had not been able to do before. At some point, Phillip sat on the edge of the divan and gathered her into his arms while she sobbed out her story.

It was a bizarre tale, farfetched and difficult for him to believe, yet her anguish and pain were very real and genuine. Even if there was an exaggeration of the truth, his questions concerning her reticence to talk about the past were answered. Half of what she had endured would have crushed a girl of average resilience.

His hand smoothed the black hair on her head as he cradled it against his shoulder. “You should have gone to the police and told them,” he stated grimly.

“They wouldn't have believed us.” She sobbed out a bitter laugh. “They probably would have thought we were crazy. Besides, they take their orders from Calder,
anyway. We had no proof except our word. And they would have asked what Calder's motive had been. What would have happened to us if we'd told them Pa was stealing his cattle and about our part in it? Culley could have gone to prison, and they would probably have sent me to a juvenile home.”

Phillip could see that they had been forced into silence in order to protect themselves. The one thing he found so difficult to accept was the continued existence of a vigilante style of justice. More objective than she could be, he recognized that both her father and Calder had some justification for the actions, however misguided they might be. Naturally, because of his own interest in her, his sympathy was on her side, but it didn't blind him to the other.

“They ruled his death was a suicide.” Her voice continued to waver with the flow of tears. “That's why I let Aunt Cathleen think it was an accident. I couldn't tell her about it—she's a devout Catholic. It wasn't suicide, anyway, although sometimes I think he must have subconsciously had a death wish.” She began to tremble violently, vibrating in his arms. “I hate them. I hate the Calders for what they did. I hope somebody destroys them someday.”

The depth of her passionate hatred shook Phillip. “Don't hate them, Elizabeth. Hate invariably destroys the one who hates. Put it behind you,” he urged. “Don't forget the father of your child is a Calder.”

“Ty will never know that,” she stated emphatically.

“Someday he'll ask you about his father.” Phillip attempted to reason with her.

“I'll never tell him who it is. I'll make up some story,” she vowed and began crying again.

He held her closer and pressed his lips against her temple in an attempt to comfort her the way a father would kiss a child to make the hurt go away. That's the way it started—with Phillip pressing light kisses over
her forehead and cheekbone and whispering soothing words to her tortured soul. She turned her face toward him, tilting her head back so he could continue this assuagement of her pain and grief.

When his mouth brushed her lips and he felt them yielding softly in response, it all changed. His senses signaled an awareness of firm breasts thrust against his chest and the soft contours of her slender body curved against him. She was wholly desirable and she was in his arms. His mouth came back to seek the sweet taste of her lips beneath their salty covering of tears. Her body warmth ignited the desire that simmered below the surface whenever he was around her. Somewhere he'd lost the reason to control it. Passion flamed through his kiss and she returned it, her lips moving against his in the same spontaneous reaction. He hungrily deepened the kiss and felt her yield to him.

Suddenly her hands were pushing against his chest and she was wildly breaking free from his kiss to stare at him with green eyes that seemed to see a stranger. His hands started to reach for her, but she recoiled from him.

“Don't touch me,” she warned and managed to scramble to her feet, backing away from him.

“Elizabeth, I—” He searched for the words to apologize for his behavior—for taking advantage of her when she had been in such a vulnerable state.

She rushed to the open door, pausing just long enough to get her bearings before she sped across the yard to the apartment above the garage. Phillip watched her from the stable doors.

Someone was climbing the flight of stairs outside the garage. Maggie could hear the footsteps, but she pretended she didn't and continued to spoon-feed Ty in the high chair. Ty tried to grab the spoon, so she held his hand down and held the spoon to his closed mouth. He regarded her for several seconds with steadfast brown eyes, then shook his head.

“Come on, Ty. Just one more bite,” Maggie coaxed at the same instant there was a knock on the apartment door. She glanced at her aunt, who was scraping the plates from the evening meal before washing them.

“I'll answer it.” Her aunt smiled at the young mother and child.

While Maggie's attention was distracted, Ty grabbed the spoon with his free hand. Strained apricots squished through his little fingers and dripped onto the high-chair tray. Releasing an exasperated breath, Maggie reached for the damp washcloth kept nearby for just such emergencies. After prying the spoon out of his strong grasp, she wiped his hands and mouth, then her
own and the tray. It had been the last spoonful of apricot sauce from the jar, so she untied the stained bib protecting his T-shirt. His legs kicked the chair while he cooed with delight.

“You want to get down to play, do you?” Maggie teased him while part of her listened to Phillip greeting her aunt. She had guessed he would come see her after what happened that afternoon. She wanted to panic, but that was against her nature.

“May I speak to Elizabeth alone?” she heard Phillip ask.

There was a split-second hesitation before her aunt agreed to the request. “Of course. I was just going to take the garbage out, anyway.”

Maggie had never known her aunt to ask personal questions, and she hadn't this afternoon when Maggie had dashed to their apartment above the garage. Cathleen hadn't even delved into the reason Maggie had passed out, except to ask if she felt better. That consideration afforded Maggie the privacy she needed.

“Elizabeth, Dr. Phillip is here to see you.” The influence of the Gordons had prompted her aunt to stop using her given name of Mary Frances. Maggie was beginning to believe that was the name of another person. She looked up to acknowledge the statement and met the level glance of his gray eyes. Then her aunt was gathering the garbage sack to carry it downstairs and leave them alone.

Ty was becoming impatient with Maggie for being so slow in unlatching his high-chair tray and sliding it back. When she lifted him out of the chair, she didn't put him on the floor as he wanted. Holding him gave her a convenient distraction, an excuse to avoid Phillip's eyes.

“Elizabeth, I came to apologize for my actions this afternoon,” Phillip said.

“There's no need,” she denied stiffly while Ty squirmed in her arms.

“I'm afraid there is every need,” he insisted. “I can't excuse what I did. The only explanation is that I discovered a beautiful woman in my arms and I did what any normal man would do in my place—I kissed her. I never intended to frighten you.”

The last statement made her lift her gaze. She finally looked at him and saw all the things she had been trying not to notice these last seven months. He was handsome and lean, suntanned and vigorous. His hair was the color of steel, but his eyes were a warm gray velvet. Where Chase Calder had been composed of all rough, unfinished edges and aggressively male, Phillip Gordon was the smooth, final product of manhood, suave and charming, always immaculately dressed. A true gentleman.

“You didn't frighten me.” When Ty started to squeal in anger, she put him on the floor. He crawled hurriedly to his toys in the middle of the living room. Maggie turned to him to finish explaining her answer. “It was me.” She stopped trying to hide her feelings. “You see, I wanted you to kiss me. I wanted you to touch me. More than that.” She grew bolder with returning confidence. “I wanted you to make love to me. I didn't think a man could make me feel like that again. I didn't think it would ever be like that.”

“Elizabeth.” He took an involuntary step toward her, desire shining in his eyes. It was there for a fleeting second; then it was gone when he stopped short and shook his head. “You don't know what you're saying.”

“Yes, I do, Phillip.” Of her own accord, she dropped the professional title that usually preceded his name when she addressed him.

“You are seventeen and I just turned forty-one. I'm old enough to be your father,” he explained gently.

“I'm not pretending that it's right to want you to make love to me, but I can't deny that it's the way I feel,” she stated, effectively throwing his logic out the window with her counterpoint of the truth.

“It's only because I'm the most likely male around, and you're a naturally loving young girl. I'm not going to let you get involved with me. You have too much going for you, Elizabeth.” He stroked a finger across her cheek in a reluctant caress. “You're intelligent, determined, and ambitious. The last thing you need is an affair with an old man.”

“You aren't old, Phillip.”

“I suppose you think all this gray hair is just a form of camouflage,” he mocked.

“It makes you look distinguished,” she insisted.

“Which is just another way of saying ‘old.'” He shook his head and smiled. “This fall, when you start college, you'll be surrounded with lots of handsome young men. You'll be happier with someone closer to your own age.”

“Like Chase Calder!” Maggie hurled the name, her temper surfacing. “I don't remember that experience as a happy one.”

“Chase Calder was just one man. You can't judge all other men by your experience with him. You can only learn from it.”

“Chase was always teaching me something,” she remembered bitterly. “Unfortunately, it was about sex instead of love.”

“You have a lot to learn about a lot of things.”

“And I'm going to learn about everything I can.” From what she had learned so far, Maggie knew there was a great deal that went into making a lady besides fine clothes and fancy homes. There was the whole cultural world to be absorbed. “I want to know about art and music, the theater and the classics. I want to
speak other languages fluently and—” She stopped because her list had become endless the more she became exposed to different things. She looked up to see the benevolent twinkle in Phillip's eyes.

“And you want to travel and see places for yourself.” He perceptively added another item from her long list. “There isn't room for an old man in your young life. You have too much growing up to do.”

“Phillip—” She attempted a protest.

But he interrupted. “I'm flattered that you find me attractive, Elizabeth. I'm at the age where I would like to kick up my heels and recapture my lost youth with someone like you. Please don't tempt me. I'd like to be spared the indignity of making a fool of myself over you.”

“I would never make you look the fool. I know how that hurts.”

He cupped her cheek in his hand. “Let's make a pact. When you finish college, we'll see if you still feel the same way toward me or if you've acquired a taste for the young, adventurous type.”

She turned her face into his hand, closing her eyes in silent enjoyment for the feel of his smooth hand against her skin. With a clear-eyed certainty, she met his gaze. “We'll see what happens when I finish college,” she agreed, because she sensed the wisdom of his suggestion and because she was somehow certain her feelings wouldn't change. They had grown slowly, not flared up suddenly.

“In the meantime, I'll see what I can do about broadening your cultural horizons.” This one simple sentence hinted at the things to come.

On a late afternoon early in June, Maggie climbed the steps to the apartment over the garage. She had been with Pamela Gordon, viewing a traveling art
exhibit at a local gallery. Each month they visited a different art gallery in the Los Angeles area as a fulfillment of Phillip's promise to educate her in the arts. In addition, Pamela and Phillip—always the two of them together—had taken Maggie to several symphonies, and to a ballet and the opera.