Fletcher's Woman (32 page)

Athena closed her eyes and gripped the steamboat's railing desperately. Griffin would never forgive her, never. And yet, somehow she must find a way to win him back.

Perhaps because she could not function without it, some of Athena's native self-confidence began to return. She was still one of the most beautiful women this miserable territory on the outskirts of nowhere had ever seen, she reminded herself. And Griffin's need of her had been a consuming, fathomless one.

Surely, by making an intelligent effort to stir those feelings in him again, she could win out over his fierce, boundless pride.

Athena drew a deep breath and opened her eyes. Believing that all beauty centered in her, she took no notice of the primitive, indomitable splendor of the land and water and trees and mountains all around her. Instead, she saw the party she would persuade her mother to give, the fine new clothes she would buy, the renewed passion she would somehow ignite in Griffin Fletcher.

The morning was almost gone when the
Olympia
docked in Seattle, and though Athena felt gritty and rumpled from the long journey, she felt hopeful, too. A bath, a change of clothes, maybe something to eat, and she would be her unconquerable self again.

On the waterfront, as they had in New York and Paris, London and Rome, Athena's silver blond hair and soul-jarring smile stood her in good stead. It was easy to secure a carriage, even in the modest rush, and to persuade the driver to hurry.

Certain now of a warm welcome, Athena was anxious for the care and comfort of her mother, the grumbling devotion of her father. Like Griffin, they were constants, and while they were probably still vastly annoyed, their love for her was fundamental to their natures, unchangeable by even the most flagrant of scandals.

Settled into the carriage seat, Athena smiled. They would be the same; Mama and Papa were always the same. Joanna, heiress to a vast fortune, would be busy with her eternal, boring charity work, unconcerned with the fact that life in San Francisco or New York was infinitely more exciting. John, the sweet, plodding darling, would still be treating his ungrateful, half-educated patients, never minding that his efforts seldom brought in anything tangible.

Constants. Again, Athena smiled. Hadn't she said it often herself, that Griffin Fletcher was so inflexible that he might as well have been carved out of granite? If he was, then the love
he'd born her, the sweeping passion, was still there, inside him, in spite of his outrage and his wounded pride.

After all, the love had been there first.

In front of the stately brick house—only a cottage in comparison to the Parisian villa she had shared with André Bordeau—Athena paid the driver and then stood on the street for a moment, savoring the sturdy, practical beauty of her parents' house.

As the carriage rumbled away, its driver bent on securing her many trunks and satchels from the steamboat landing, Athena opened the gate and started up the walk.

She was never certain what drew her attention to the garden lining the eastern wall of the house. Certainly, she heard no sound beyond the buzzing of bees and the early summer songs of the birds.

No, it was a mystical pull of some sort—a feeling that tugged her off course and made her round the corner of the house and pass beneath the arbor of pink primroses to enter the sunny sanction of the garden.

Athena's first sight of the girl was alarming on some fundamental level, and worse, it was unaccountably painful.

Head bent over an open book, the girl sat on a stone bench, her feet tucked beneath her. Her sable ebony hair streamed down, gleaming, over her back and shoulders, and curled in fetching little tendrils around her face. Her eyes, Athena noted with strange apprehension, were wide and thickly lashed and just the color of wild violets. There was a look of innocent wonder about her that undoubtedly enthralled unwary men, and her skin was as perfect as Athena's own, if a little pallorous.

Athena cleared her throat in a ladylike fashion and felt oddly reassured as the nymph looked up from her book, lavender eyes widening with unmistakable horror.

“Athena?”

Athena felt a sort of sweeping triumph, as though she had been challenged to some vital struggle and then emerged the winner. “You have me at a disadvantage,” she smiled, taking a seat on the stone bench facing the girl's.

“Rachel,” the snippet whispered miserably. “My name is Rachel McKinnon.”

With a theatrical sigh, Athena removed her bonnet to reveal the full glory of her soft, platinum hair. Jonas had always said it was like moonlight trapped in a silver dish, her hair, not meant for the look or touch of ordinary men. Griffin, on the other
hand, had not been so poetic; Athena doubted, even now, that he had ever really appreciated the distinctive shade of her hair.

But this girl had. Her violet eyes were taking it in, and she looked stricken.

Again, without knowing why, Athena felt a delicious sense of hard-won victory. “Do you work for Mama and Papa?” she asked, idly, even though her curiosity was a deep and wary one.

A bright peach tint glowed suddenly in the too-pale, too-thin cheeks. “I am a guest,” Rachel said, with tremulous dignity.

“I see,” replied Athena, settling back on the bench with another sigh, drawing her eyes over the girl's soft amethyst morning gown. “That is, I believe, my dress.”

The orchid eyes were steadfast and fierce upon Athena's face. “Is it? Would you like me to take it off?”

Athena smiled a patronizing, wounding little smile. “Of course I wouldn't want to wear it—now.”

Tears of outrage and pride glistened in the devastatingly beautiful eyes, gathered in the thick, dark lashes. But before Rachel could frame a retort, a third voice broke in with dry disapproval.

“Athena, that was an unconscionable thing to say. You will apologize immediately.”

Athena looked up, surprised, to see her mother standing at the back gate, watching her with eyes that had, since the beginning, seen to much. “Mother!” she cried, a nervous little smile rising to her lips. She sprang from the bench, flung her arms around her mother, and babbled, “Oh, Mama, André was so terrible to me! He was so heartless and selfish.”

Athena felt the usual cold distance between herself and this woman, even as they held each other.

“Heartless and selfish,” Joanna repeated, thoughtfully. “Perhaps there is, after all, some justice in this wicked world.”

Truly stunned, Athena drew back in her mother's stiff embrace. “I know I was terrible, Mama,” she said, in a small, pleading voice that was not wholly false. “But you won't turn me away, will you? André has divorced me, and I haven't any money left, or any friends. . . .”

But her mother's weary blue eyes had moved to Rachel, and softened. “We'll talk in private, Athena. And the dress Rachel is wearing is her own, not yours.”

Athena had no choice but to nod apologetically.

•   •   •

Rachel remained in the garden for a long time after Athena and her mother had gone into the house, arm in arm. Even the premonition she'd had hadn't prepared her for a disaster so sweeping as this one.

Unable to continue reading, she thrust the book aside, pulled her knees up under her chin, and let the full scope of the situation come cascading down on her in a crushing torrent.

She had seen the portrait and known that Athena was beautiful, but now she knew that the painter had not even begun to capture the splendor and grace of her. He had not caught the glow of her skin, the softness of her eyes, the incredible impact of her personality.

Rachel thought of Griffin's impending return to Seattle with almost unbearable dread, rather than the delight she had felt before her encounter with the woman who had almost become his wife.

While it was possible that Athena had no lingering interest in him, it seemed improbable. He was, for all his shortcomings, not the kind of man a woman loved and then forgot about.

Feeling desolate, Rachel looked down at the bracelet shining on her wrist.
He told me he loved me,
she reminded herself, in firm desperation.
And Joanna said his promises could be accepted as truth
.

Rachel's throat closed over a sob as she tilted her head back, closed her eyes, and remembered the sweet intensity of his lovemaking, the glorious demands his body had made of hers.

She was now completely confused.

•   •   •

Athena drank her tea slowly, watching her mother's face over the rim of her cup. She had recounted the horrible death pangs of her marriage, embellished the details she particularly hoped would incline Joanna toward sympathy, and shed a number of wistful tears.

“You should have written,” Joanna scolded, even though there was a flash of the old, selfless love in her blue eyes.

Athena executed a rather tragic sigh. “I didn't see any point in alarming you, Mama. You were so far away—you and Papa would have worried.”

Joanna shook her head. “If there is one ability you have never lacked, Athena, it is that of looking after yourself.”

Stung, Athena thrust aside her cup and saucer and tried to block the angry words that were rising, like steam, within her.
She was only partially successful. “Who is that young woman, Mother? Why is she staying here?”

Joanna's voice was annoyingly fond. “Rachel is Griffin's friend. And I think he has very serious intentions toward her.”

The news came as a brutal shock to Athena; while she had felt an immediate dislike for Rachel, she had never dreamed that the naive thing could be any kind of threat. “That isn't possible,” she protested, in a harsh whisper, her cheeks warm with sudden color.

But Joanna was nodding. “Yes, Athena, it is possible. He's coming back for her on Thursday or Friday, in fact—in spite of Jonas Wilkes, Griffin plans to take Rachel to Providence with him.”

Athena felt doubly wounded. “Why would that concern Jonas?” she dared, after a long, groping silence.

Joanna sat back in her chair and folded her arms. The brown silk of her blouse gleamed in the afternoon sunshine streaming in through the dining-room windows. “Griffin tells me that Jonas fancies himself in love with Rachel—as if Jonas Wilkes could possibly love anyone.”

Athena's throat worked spasmodically for a moment, before she managed to bring herself under rigid control. “That's it, then—you know Griffin opposes anything Jonas wants. They're like oil and fire, those two. If Griffin has declared some affection for this Rachel person, it is only because he loves to nettle Jonas!”

Joanna's spoon clattered as she stirred lemon into her second cup of tea. “Nonsense. Griffin's feelings were clear to anyone who took the trouble to look. Both your father and I knew immediately that he adored Rachel.”

“No,” said Athena, shaking her head once in feverish denial.

But Joanna surveyed her without pity. “Don't tell me you've come all the way home from Paris just to chase after Griffin Fletcher; if you have, you're letting yourself in for a nasty shock. I do believe he hates you.”

Athena grappled for the bright hopes she had nursed all these weeks just past, but they were suddenly elusive. “I want Griffin, Mother,” she said, as a headache began at the nape of her neck and climbed, pounding, to her temples. “And I will have him.”

Joanna raised her teacup in a toasting gesture that bordered on mockery. “So the sheep woos the raging panther. Or is it the other way around, Athena?”

Athena leaned forward, her lower lip trembling, her hands clenched together in her lap. “You hate me, don't you, Mother? You hate me because I disgraced your precious good name!”

Without warning, Joanna's hand lashed out, made sharp contact with Athena's face. The cold silence that followed found Athena reeling, inwardly, in shock. Never, even during the worst of times, had her mother struck her.

She was just recovering when Joanna went ruthlessly on. “You disgraced yourself, Athena—not your father and I, not Griffin.
Yourself
. Furthermore, you know that I do not hate you—you are my only living child and, God help me, I love you very much. All the same, it would behoove you to remember that I, unlike some people, see through your theatrics and your simpering witchery, Athena.”

“Mother!”

But Joanna's face was hard, implacable. “Tread lightly, Athena. Sooner or later, we are always compensated for the things we've done, and in kind. Your compensation might be evil indeed, my dear, because Griffin Fletcher had done nothing to deserve your cruelty. Nothing but swim against the tide of your formidable will.”

“Y-You almost sound as though you hope I'll be destroyed,” Athena whispered, aghast.

“On the contrary, I hope you will be spared. But I don't think that's very likely. I must admit, you have met your match in Miss Rachel McKinnon, my dear.”

Athena was considering this almost inconceivable possibility when Rachel herself appeared, looking small and frightened and hopelessly untutored in the ways of the world. Her bright purple eyes were fixed on Joanna's face.

“I-I think perhaps I should go back to Miss Cunningham's—”

Before her mother could speak, Athena floated to her feet, all gracious solicitude, and smiled winningly. “Of course you won't leave, Rachel! Tomorrow is my birthday, and there's bound to be a party. You wouldn't want to miss
that
would you?”

The wretch's confusion was balm to Athena's chafed spirit.
Oh, Griffin, you magnificent idiot,
she thought.
What you feel for this orchid-eyed woman-child is pity, not love.

Joanna spoke suddenly, her tone sharp. “There will be no party, Athena.”

But there would; Athena knew it for a certainty. Never, in all
her life, had she ever been denied a single desire—and the party would be no exception.

Calmly, Athena turned and swept out of the room to prepare. Once people had been invited, there would be nothing her mother could do except be gracious.