Waking Up (17 page)

Unseen by her, a look of weary anger quivered across his features, and he said shortly, “Actually, she called me.”

He was already walking away when she jerked around to stare at him. She looked and felt quite stricken.

The evening passed by as slowly as if it were a thousand years. Robbie slouched on the couch and answered any comments from her father in monosyllabic replies. Jason pulled out of his driveway at five forty-six, the rust-colored sports car gleaming clean and bright as it putted down the street. She knew the precise time. She’d been watching out of the front window.

Herb went to bed quite early as he had to work in the morning, and Robbie sat watching television program after program without taking any of it in. Her gaze strayed out of the window more and more as ten o’clock rolled by. She bit her nails. She fidgeted impatiently with her ankle bandage.

When midnight came, she finally rose from the couch and flipped off all the downstairs lights. There was no way anyone would be able to accuse her of waiting up until Jason got home. She would go upstairs and wait in darkness by her bedroom window.

When his car pulled into the cul-de-sac, headlights glaring, it was nearly two in the morning. Robbie sat curled into a compact bundle in a chair beside her window, staring dry-eyed into the shadowed night. The dull chest ache had died away long ago to a leaden, heavy feeling. Jason climbed out of his car, and with her window open she heard the slam of his door dearly. If she leaned her forehead against the wire screen, she could just make out his tall, blurred figure as he stood in his driveway. Her heart leaped and started an excited, frantic pounding. He turned and walked noiselessly across the lawn towards her house. But he stopped some distance away and stood still for a long, long moment before turning to walk back to his parents’ house. After watching until he disappeared from her sight, Robbie sat for several minutes just staring at the opposite wall until she finally stirred and dragged herself to bed, refusing to acknowledge that her original excitement had given way to a bitter disappointment.

By morning, after a sleepless night, she had come to a decision, and she called her doctor’s office for an appointment early in the day. Luck was with her for she had caught his office on a slow day, and she drove herself to the appointment gingerly, as it was the first time she had gone out since she had sprained her ankle. She was back home again by ten, her complexion pale, her expression set.

After pulling her car into the garage, she limped through the downstairs of the house absently, for once not even noticing her ungraceful stride. She threw off her skirt and blouse upstairs and slipped on her usual shorts and summer top while wondering uncertainly if she was doing the right thing. Her handbag sat on her dresser and inside was tucked her purchase from the doctor.

The conflict inside her had wearied her so that she had to give in to her longings. She couldn’t look ahead. She didn’t know what she expected in her life anymore. All she knew was that she wanted Jason more than anything else. She wanted to give and take a most precious gift with him, to share that first experience beyond all doubts and uncertainties, and she would have taken whatever consequences came her way.

Last night had shaken her badly. She had realized with a sharp suddenness that she had fallen into taking Jason’s presence for granted, as she had throughout their childhood. But Jason had left her once and gone away, showing her that such thinking was dangerously false. They both had separate working spheres, relationships and experiences to go through, different life decisions to make.

Having seen the brunette only once and never having met her, she could view Linda only as a woman whose looks far outshone her own, not as a personality to be liked or disliked. There were a lot of Lindas in the world who would be more than willing to share an adult, caring relationship with Jason. If he wanted her, he wouldn’t wait forever.

Having made such a momentous decision, Robbie fell into a quiet waiting attitude. For the life of her, she couldn’t and wouldn’t set up a seduction scene. She didn’t know how to seduce, and she refused to act so falsely with someone who knew her so well.

Quietly she busied herself with light housework and settled into her father’s armchair when her ankle began to hurt. The day trickled by far too slowly; she hadn’t realized how much she needed to work until she was forced to do without it. Outside; quite close, she could hear a lawnmower kicking to life, and she limped to the window to see Jason working in his parents’ front lawn in faded shorts and tennis shoes. His naked, golden back flexed with the strenuous exercise, the long, powerful leg muscles rippling sinuously with each swift stride.

About forty minutes later she heard the mower’s engine die, and impulsively she walked out of the back door to cross over the fence and knock on his.

The next moment it was thrown open. Jason stood in the shadows of the house, a damp towel in his hand. “Good morning,” he said, stepping back to let her enter. “How’s the ankle”!”

“Better, thanks.” She came into the kitchen and looked around absently. She had always liked the color scheme of greens and golds, and with a rich patterned tile setting off the decor nicely, the Morrows’ kitchen was a pleasant place to be. Jason’s gray eyes searched her face and figure questioningly while he rubbed his hot face and neck with the towel. She glanced at him quickly and tried to smile naturally. “Not much of your vacation left now.”

He dropped the towel on to a chair and replied cheerfully, “That’s right, only a week left and I haven’t done a blessed thing.”

“You should have taken a trip somewhere,” said Robbie, for that was what she would have done.

He shrugged and met her gaze with a curious smile. “I suppose I needed to learn to appreciate the home life more.”

Silence fell and stretched out between them. She bent her head and traced a pattern on the nearby counter, trying very hard to think of something to say without asking the burning question that preyed upon her mind. She longed to ask about his night with Linda but couldn’t bear to expose herself. Jason, that curious smile still curving his lips, circled the kitchen table slowly and approached. She pretended not to notice, but every muscle in her body screamed with awareness of him.

He stopped just beside her and reached up with one warm hand to touch at her hair, her neck. “Something on your mind, Rob?” he asked softly.

“I just wanted to know if you’d like to come over for supper since you were busy last night,” she said all in a rush, the thought having just occurred to her.

He moved closer. “Ah, yes. Last night. Did you think of me?” He was right at her back, and he bent his head to nuzzle lightly in her hair. She quivered at the sensation and her head felt suddenly too heavy to keep upright, falling back to his shoulder. She felt his hands, hard and heavy, on her waist and he slid them around to her flat stomach. Her heartbeat was going completely crazy, wildly, erratically thumping against the wall of her chest like a bird attempting to escape.

She said weakly, “I don’t know what you mean.”

That made him laugh. “Maybe you don’t at that.” His hands slid up in a long, slow, smooth motion that had her whole body trembling, as he cupped her breasts. She made a sound and flushed hot, her mind racing in disconcerted circles. The only thing she understood was that he had broken through his intention to treat her platonically, and it sent her to a near panic.

The whole caress couldn’t have lasted more than a few moments. In the next instant everything had changed, and suddenly he gripped her roughly by the hipbones and held her tightly back against him, his mouth driving hungrily down to trace the angle of her jaw, the line of her neck. She felt his lips tremble. His body was hard, rock-hard, tense and hot and eager. Her hand came up and she touched his brow, his cheekbone, sliding up to cup the back of his head.

Then he took her by the shoulders and held her between his hands until she thought he might snap her in two. His strong arms shook with effort, and suddenly he pushed her away from him in a violent movement. She stumbled in shock, and then whirled to face him. His head was hanging low, his lips bloodless over clenched teeth, his hands gripping the edge of the counter so that the knuckles showed red and white.

“Get out of here,” he whispered.

That hurt. She licked her dry lips and asked quaveringly, “But what’s wrong?” There was a dark, mottled flush across his cheekbones, and a muscle jerked spasmodically in his jaw. He was a stranger, a clenched, dangerous stranger.

“Just get out.”

Earlier she would have. She was confronted once again by the unknown in him. But she was tired of inexplicabilities and the unknown. Though she was honestly unsure of what he would do, she drew close to his side and put her hand on his bare, rigid shoulder. He drew in a harsh, deep breath. “I don’t understand. Talk to me.”

“You fool,” he rasped. “I can’t take much more of this. Don’t you understand what touching you and yet not making love is doing to me? I was about to rip off your clothes.”

She flinched violently at his bald statement, which sent a dark look of self-mockery twisting his features. Never in all her imaginings had she comprehended actual, immediate reality. This was the real moment of decision, not when she had so easily made the trip to the doctor’s. She had never made love before and all her senses told her that here was a male animal barely held in check. But this was Jason. Her hand slid down his back in a long stroke, and he closed his eyes and swallowed hard.

“If you’d give me just a moment, I could take them off instead,” she whispered.

It took a moment for the enormity of what she had suggested to sink in. His head snapped up, and he stared at her with dilated eyes, flaring nostrils. One hand left the counter to cup her cheek. His voice shook. “Robbie—”

There was a look of naked apprehension in her eyes. He pulled away from the counter to take her gently into his arms. Suddenly her fear dissolved at the human touch, and she held on to him for a long, wordless hug. She knew him again.

He breathed as though laboring under some kind of physical strain. A film of sweat broke out over his slim, powerfully taut body. She sensed something seeming to snap inside him, a long-checked emotion released, an overwhelming urge unleashed. He pulled her face up to his and ravished her lips so that she felt almost as though she were being eaten alive. His hungry passion ignited hers, and she held the back of his head with trembling hands. Then he picked her up and strode quickly through the house to his bedroom, his expression full of such raw purpose that she had to hide her face in his neck.

He laid her on his bed tenderly. Her emotions and senses were heightened to a fever pitch. Her eyes overflowed with tears at the reverent way he stroked her slight breasts. At that, he bent over her and kissed her lips, her wet cheeks, her eyes. Her hands ran over his body with greediness, touching his thighs, his flat stomach, his shoulders. They undressed in the shadowed, summer-warmed room and took each other’s virginity with at first painful, touching awkwardness and then hot, eager excitement. It was the most profound moment she’d ever experienced, and afterward she held his head to her breast. His sobbing, panting breath eased, and his body sweat, which had seared her to the core, gradually cooled. Then she knew that he, too, had found the experience profound, for a few tickling wet drops slid sneakily down the side of her rib cage. This, from someone whom she had never known to cry in his life.

By unspoken, mutual consent, they went through the rest of the day with an appearance of normality. It was a thin veneer, however, and she thought the changes in both herself and Jason must be screamingly obvious to even the most casual of observers, though Herb didn’t appear to notice a thing. Jason treated her with a deep, tender consideration, and whenever she found his eyes on her, they were filled with a light she’d never seen from him before. In turn, she was oddly exhausted and languidly, intensely, sensually aware of his every movement. Every part of his body was beautiful, filled with a fluidity that was sheer male grace.

Late the next morning, her doorbell rang and she strode to answer it with an increasingly graceful movement of her own. Her ankle was much better and she could move it almost as freely as she could before she had sprained it.

She threw the door wide open and then stared without moving for several long moments at the uniformed man in front of her. She wasn’t able to look straight at him, though, for he was obscured by the huge, ribboned box he held. “Roberta Fisher?” he asked.

“Yes, that’s me,” she said, ungrammatically. He thrust a clipboard into her hands.

“Sign, please.” She complied bemusedly, and he gave her the box in exchange for the clipboard and flashed her a toothy grin. “Have a good day.”

She murmured something in reply and then slammed the door shut and raced for the couch where she tore off the ribbon and box top to stare down amazedly at the largest bunch of long-stemmed red roses she’d ever seen. “Oh, my,” she said weakly to the empty room. Nobody had ever sent her roses before. She started to count them, remembered she hadn’t looked for a card, and searched the thin green wrapping paper. There was none. She went back to her counting and found three-dozen flowers nestling in the huge box.

Jason had left her last night after Herb had gone to bed, giving her a long, wordless look, a gentle kiss and a smile. There had been a strange significance in his gaze, and the memory of it came to her as she stared at her roses, a sweet, luscious scent filling the living room.