Until Spring (27 page)

He waited patiently. She finally got a grasp on the idea she was trying to get across, but that still didn't make it any easier to say the words.

"It's just that I don't feel right about—about—" Jane stammered.

"About making love when you don't know if you're free," Duncan said in a low voice.

She glanced up at him. "Yes," she replied.

He sighed and she glimpsed a trace of sadness in his eyes. "I knew you felt that way before we started out. The possibility of a hubby and a couple of kids waiting somewhere for you to come home and turn on the coffeepot is the reason you wanted to learn your true identity. So this isn't exactly news," he said with grim irony.

She realized that she was shivering. "We'd better go back to the Prairie Rose and tackle this. It's getting colder out here," she said.

He kept his arm around her shoulders as they walked past tattered remnants of snowdrifts in the park, and she thought,
Maybe I should throw caution to the wind and let our love take its natural course.
It would be so much easier to do that. She wanted to lie in his arms all night, to make love with him and to wake up where she would be the object of his first smile in the morning.

They had reached the motel, and he held the door open for her. They traipsed through the lobby under the bored eyes of the desk clerk, and when they reached their hall, Duncan pulled out his key. Jane dug deep into her pocket and found hers, too.

"So I guess it's separate rooms, right?" he said.

She offered him a shaky smile, painfully aware of her own strong need to be with him. But she knew that it would be harder to leave a lover than a friend if she found out that she was indeed part of another compelling life somewhere without him.

"Duncan," she began, feeling her uncertainty like a sharp pain in her heart. If only she could get all of it over with and be free of the weight of her forgotten past!

"I understand," he said heavily. He took her key from her and started to insert it into the keyhole in her door, but her hand stayed his.

"No," she said. "Is it possible—I mean, do you think—?"

"You mean, can we sleep together the way we did last night?" His eyes burned into her.

She caught her lower lip between her teeth and, her eyes never leaving his face, she nodded, once, twice. She remained perfectly still.

He closed his eyes and pulled her to him. Could he occupy the same room with her all night and not touch her? And if he touched her, if he needed her warmth and softness, could they restrain themselves from the ultimate act?

It was a chance they would have to take. He wanted to be with her for now and for always, and he would respect her decision in this matter as much as he respected Jane herself.

"Whatever you want," was all he said.

She pulled slightly away, and, her eyes never leaving his face, took his key from his hand. Then she led him across the hall to his own room and unlocked the door.

* * *

They opened out the couch bed, looked at each other over its expanse of white sheets and blanket, then without a word folded it back up again.

Jane went with him to the big bed, and he walked around to one side while she stood on the other. She felt confused. Overlaying her very real desire for him was a kind of constriction. It pinned her down, made her motionless. She didn't know how to go about this.

Duncan made it easy for her. He came around to her side of the bed and kissed her gently on the cheek. "Come to bed," he said softly, easing her down beside him and turning off the light.

They lay in the dark, both of them unwilling to move. Through the thin walls they could hear the occupants of the room next door moving about, conducting their bathroom ablutions, talking.

Duncan turned over and punched his pillow; Jane lay stiffly, staring up at the ceiling and thinking that this had been a mistake. Duncan muttered something, but she couldn't make out the words.

Time passed. It might have been minutes, it might have been hours. Jane had no idea how long it had been since they got into this bed together. She counted sheep, she named all the colors of the rainbow, she named all the cast members of
Luck of the Irish.
Still she did not sleep.

"Duncan?" she asked, her voice sounding higher and more timid than usual.

"I can't stand this," he observed abruptly, reaching out and yanking the chain that turned on the bedside lamp. The room was filled with light, and Jane pushed herself up on one elbow.

"I'd better leave," she said. "This isn't going to work. I can't sleep, you can't sleep, and it wasn't a very good idea. It's my fault."

"Don't be so quick to take the blame," Duncan said. "I agreed to the arrangement."

"I should have known better," she said, making as if to get up, but he reached for her and pulled her to him. She let herself be drawn toward him, resting against his chest.

"That's better," he said comfortably. The sounds from next door quieted, and Jane sighed. It was so pleasant to be close to Duncan this way, she thought, nestling into the warm curve of his body.

"I think what was wrong was that we were both trying too hard not to touch each other," Duncan said. "We both want to, but we're afraid that one thing will lead to another and that we wouldn't be able to stop."

"Exactly," said Jane, drawing the word out to its full length and growing drowsier as she said it.

"So let's not try too hard. I promise that nothing is going to happen until you want it to," he went on.

She shifted in his arms, intending to tell him to turn out the light, but suddenly they heard the rhythmic squeak of bedsprings from the room next door. Her eyes flew open.

Duncan groaned. So did someone on the other side of the wall, in a slightly different tone.

"Oh no, not that," Duncan said in disgust.

Jane started to laugh. She muffled her laughter against Duncan's chest, and the hair on his chest tickled her nose. Soon he was laughing, too, and they couldn't stop, no matter how hard they tried.

Finally the sounds next door subsided—and so did their laughter.

Jane ventured a look at Duncan. His face was red, but his eyes were bright.

"Duncan, I love you," she said.

"And I love you. Now can we please get some sleep?"

"Turn out the light," she said, and when he did she swiveled her head and kissed him.

That night she slept fitfully, her back against his, bracing herself against him the way she would against a strong, solid tree trunk.

Chapter 14

Waking up the next morning with Duncan beside her should have been heartening. Jane should have felt supported and strengthened by their declaration of love, but in truth all it did was worry her. If her past life required it, how would she find the strength to leave him? She loved him, and she should have been happy. Instead she lay beside him in the gray morning light, not merely listening to his breathing but feeling him breathe. That was the difference between friendship and love—with friendship, you merely listened. With love, you felt.

She didn't want to feel this love, not on this particular morning when she was so tired and worn out by the uncertainty of her life. She would have liked to be free of it and relieved of the doubt, fear and vulnerability. Instead she must get up and smile at Duncan and be the receptacle for the caring and compassion that he heaped upon her, unable for the sake of their love to express her negative thoughts. This morning all she could feel was the awesome responsibility of love.

After breakfast she sat on the bed in the motel room while Duncan called Detective Schmidt and learned that he had been able to uncover no news about a van in relation to Jane's appearance in the ditch.

"Ollie Jones seems to be the only person around town who saw a blue van that night," Schmidt offered in an apologetic tone.

"But I remember a blue van, too!" Jane said when Duncan related the conversation to her. "Doesn't that count for something?" She was so disappointed. She'd been sure that the blue van was an important clue.

Duncan shook his head. "I guess not, Jane. I'm sorry." They both knew that her brief memory of the blue van meant nothing unless Jane somehow managed to recall something more about it.

Jane nibbled on a thumbnail and stared into space. A blue van. What did it have to do with anything, anyway? What did it mean? Who had been in the van with her? She reached into the far recesses of memory and came up with—zip—zilch—nothing.

Duncan interrupted her thoughts. "Well, Jane," he said. "It looks like we're stymied. What do you want to do now?"

"I'm packed," Jane said abruptly. "Let's leave Tyree."

"Is that what you really want to do?"

"Why not?" she replied, her tone sharp.

He wavered for a moment, not sure if leaving was a good idea. Jane seemed very much on edge this morning, but, considering the circumstances, he supposed that this wasn't surprising. "I guess there's no reason to stay," he admitted. "It's just that I was hoping we'd learn more while we were here."

"So was I," Jane said. She had begun to take on the air that he recognized as her stubborn look, the one where she got a mulish glint in her eyes like Quixote when he got his dander up. If she hadn't been so strung out this morning, he would have taken her in his arms and attempted to kiss the mood away.

Later,
he promised himself as he gathered up his shaving gear and tucked it into a corner of his suitcase.
Later.

"Let me get that," Duncan was quick to say when they stepped outside the motel carrying their luggage, but as usual, Jane refused his help, marching ahead of him across the icy parking lot with an air of determination.

From where he stood, he spotted the slick patch of ice, and he cried out at almost the same time as she stepped on it. And then, heart in mouth, he watched helplessly as her feet flew out from under her and she lost her balance, landing on her back.

Heedless of his own safety on the icy asphalt, Duncan set off at a run and reached her in a matter of seconds, his pulse pounding in his ears. He thought he would never forget his fear as he stared down at her motionless body.

Jane,
he thought, and bent swiftly to touch her, to wipe the spot of dirt from her pale cheek, praying that she was not hurt.

A man who had seen her fall rushed across the street.

"Everything okay?" he asked anxiously.

Jane forced herself up on her elbows. She felt nothing; her whole body was numb. And then feeling began to seep into her limbs, bringing with it a huge buzzing that filled her ears, and she couldn't hear what anyone in the small gathering crowd was saying. She had eyes only for Duncan, whose stricken face expressed all his love and caring. Her head—how it hurt!—but she had to let Duncan know that she was all right, and so she tried to speak, tried to get the words out, but none would come.

"She's had the wind knocked out of her," she heard someone say, and with that she realized that the buzzing in her ears was receding. Her elbow ached, and she'd probably have a big bruise there. She thought she was fine otherwise.

Duncan's hand was supporting the back of her neck, brushing her cheek, and when at last she could speak, she said with more confidence than she felt, "I'm okay. Really," and warmed to the relief in Duncan's eyes.

"Can you get up?" he asked, and she surprised him by sitting up and taking hold of his arm, hanging on to it as someone gave her a boost from the back.

"I'm all right," she repeated, and the man who had run across the street left, and the woman who had stopped her car nearby got back into it and drove away, spewing plumes of exhaust in her wake.

They were alone in the parking lot, Duncan's arm encircling her waist. She leaned on him for a moment, glad to have him for a protector.

"Do you want to check back into the motel? You may be sore later," Duncan said. He was still concerned and he detected a kind of glazed look about her.

"I'm ready to leave Tyree," she said, summoning the strength to speak firmly. "I may have a bruise or two, but there's no serious damage. Honestly," she added when she saw how disbelieving he looked.

Duncan reluctantly settled Jane in the passenger seat of the car. She leaned her head back against the headrest while Duncan was stowing their suitcases in the trunk. What an awful fall it had been! She had hit the back of her head on the pavement. She was sure that the fall wouldn't have happened had it not been for her ragged nerves and too little sleep.