Promises to Keep (14 page)

With a poor imitation of being uncommonly fatigued, Jessie and Dan excused themselves and went to their room shortly after supper that night, leaving Garth and Julie alone in the living room.

"I'm surprised they didn't take poor old Buck with them," Garth quipped when the dog claimed his customary place next to Julie, with his head resting in her lap.

"I'm sorry they were so obvious," Julie said.

"Don't be embarrassed, Julie. And for God's sake don't apologize for Dan and Jessie. I'll admit I don't need to be hit over the head with a club to know how they expect us to occupy ourselves tonight, but I like them—partly because they are so transparent. You're lucky to have such staunch allies in your corner."

He was standing by the hearth, looking down at her, and he couldn't miss seeing the color that suffused her cheeks. He laughed softly and indicated the logs in the fireplace.

"Let's at least try to live up to their romantic ideal," he suggested.

"It would be a shame to let a ready-made fire go to waste," she agreed happily.

Garth sat on his heels and touched a match to the newspaper cones that were heaped beneath the logs in the grate. Dropping down beside her to share the floor cushion, he watched as the flames spread and leaped and, with a sudden rushing sound, licked voraciously at the wood, setting it ablaze.

As Julie stared into the flames she experienced once again the dizzy, disorienting feeling of being trapped in a timewarp. Her feeling of contentment vanished, dispersed by anxiety that threatened to expand into panic of unbearable dimensions. Though she tried to keep them open, her eyes closed, and the pungent sweetness of wood smoke became acrid and eye-stinging. The gentle warmth on her face became intense heat that surrounded her and would soon consume her. The cheery hissing-popping noises made by the pitch igniting in the wood became a deafening, all-encompassing roar. More than anything else, it was the sound that frightened her.

She was sobbing, but her eyes were dry—for she was too terrified for tears. Somewhere glass was breaking and someone was shouting her name. The voice was familiar and yet, somehow it was different … younger, not as deep. She wanted to run toward the voice and discovered she was unable to move her feet. She wanted to answer the shouts, but she couldn't. Her throat was too sore, too irritated by smoke.

A scream tore at her vocal cords, and when she hastily opened her eyes, she was surprised to find that no sound had escaped her. Garth was holding her close in his arms and she was safe.

"Shhh, it's all right now, Julie," he murmured soothingly. She was shaking with fear, and he repeated, "It's all right."

"Yes," she replied dully. "It's gone now."

"Your parents died in a fire. Your house was completely destroyed. It was almost totally engulfed in flames before anyone even turned in the alarm."

"Someone rescued me," she said.

"Yes," he confirmed.

"Was it you, Garth?"

He nodded. "I managed to get to you by breaking in through your bedroom window just before—" He left the sentence unfinished but continued talking because it appeared to be having a calming effect.

"It was an odd coincidence, but the only reason I happened to know which room was yours was because I'd delivered some papers to your father that afternoon. You took quite a fancy to me. In fact you made such a pest of yourself that I finally joined you and your collection of dolls for a tea party to get you off my back. That was quite a blow to the macho image I tried to cultivate when I was sixteen. I had myself more than half convinced that I was twice that age and a ringer for Charles Bronson before you came along and ruined it all."

"Was I an awful nuisance?"

"Terrible," he said dryly.

Her trembling had ceased, and she lay limply against him with her head on his shoulder. He shifted his position slightly to cradle her more fully in his arms and pulled off the clasps that confined her hair. It reminded him of fine, dark silk as he ran his fingers through it to loosen it, and when he had finished, the soft fragrance of it clung to them—the scent of spring flowers.

"I'm sorry you had to remember the fire," he said. "It was a nightmare."

"Yes," she whispered. "Sometimes it's better not to remember."

His arms grew taut about her. "Why do you say that? Did you recall anything else today?"

She shook her head. "Only the way the sun sets behind the Tetons." His arms gradually relaxed, and she sighed deeply. "I wish I knew more about so many things."

"Such as?"

"My uncle. It's strange to know so little about my father's brother."

"You were never well acquainted with him, Julie."

"Because of the scandal?"

"No," he said thoughtfully. "I think it was mainly because of Charlotte. She's a very domineering woman and Rupert—well, Rupert is a good man, a kindhearted man, but he's no match for her."

"He's weak?"

"As far as his wife is concerned, yes, he is," Garth answered. "He's an easygoing guy, and Charlotte has raised bitchiness to the level of a fine art. Whenever she's thwarted, she goes straight for the jugular. I suppose, out of sheer self-preservation, Rupert no longer even tries to oppose her."

"Is that why Diane looks so unhappy in the wedding picture?"

"No," he said curtly.

"Then why—"

"She was recovering from an unhappy ending to a love affair at the time."

His arms still held her but he seemed remote.

When she moved a little away from him, he released her entirely and she felt lonely.

"Was her affair with you?" she asked tremulously.

"No!" For a moment he was taken aback. "What in God's name made you think that?"

"Diane is very lovely, but she looks so sad in the picture," Julie replied. His expression remained stony, and she added weakly, "I just thought she might have been in love with you."

"Well, you thought wrong," he emphasized coldly. "I won't try to kid you that I've been celibate. I haven't reached the age of thirty-four without having been involved with a few women. In the years before I took over Falconer Engineering, there were more than a few. But there has
never
been anything more than friendship between Diane and me."

Garth jumped to his feet and stalked the width of the room and back before he stopped, standing with one elbow propped on the mantel to glower down at her. A vein throbbed angrily in his temple.

"Dammit, Julie," he exploded. The side of his fist came down forcefully on the mantel. "Diane's like a sister to me!"

No sooner were the words out than his angry scowl was replaced by his boyish grin, and he relaxed, sitting on the hearth with his long legs sprawled out in front of him.

"Now I know how you must have felt when I accused you of being in love with Dan," he admitted sheepishly.

Julie's laughter was as carefree as if she'd been relieved of a huge burden, but when Buck's nap was disturbed by her fit of giggles, he lifted his head, got stiffly to his feet, and moved to Garth's side of the fireplace, where he showed his teeth in a conciliatory grin before he settled down again with his head on Garth's thigh. The bemused, vaguely disbelieving way Garth watched this transference of affection was touching.

"I may find it hard to sympathize with you, but apparently Buck doesn't," she teased. "If it's any comfort to you, he's a very discerning animal."

"So he is," Garth remarked, returning her smile. "I must say I admire his taste too!" He stroked the shepherd's grizzled head. "When I was a kid, I always wanted a dog."

"Do you have one now?"

"No. My work takes me away from home too much for that to be practical. Dogs need a closer companionship with their owners than I can provide."

"How long have you been in charge of your company?"

"About three years."

"Mrs. Jenkins said you'd taken control when your father died."

Garth nodded. "Things were in bad shape at that time. There'd been a sharp cutback in highway programs and other construction, and Dad had some archaic theories about how the business should be run. He hadn't kept up with the latest advances in design and engineering either. What really kept the firm afloat was the momentum my grandfather had provided."

"Do you find your work as absorbing as you'd hoped it would be?"

"So far," he replied, shrugging with a nonchalance that, like his earlier flippancy, seemed false. "I certainly can't complain that I'm not challenged by it. We've branched out considerably. We do more consulting for private industry now than for public agencies—pipelines, power plants, that kind of thing. The company is back on its feet financially. Your uncle, incidentally, has been very effective at scouting out new clients for our services."

For a time they were silent, each of them diverted by the dying glow of the fire. Garth's face was partially shadowed, and this accentuated the austerity of his features, the pride that was so essential a part of him. Garth continued to pet Buck, and the dog's expression was almost human. Buck looked as if he were inordinately pleased with himself.

"In your own way," Julie surmised, "I think you're every bit as committed to the preservation of certain traditions as your father was."

After considering this briefly, Garth said, "I suppose that's true."

"Then why do you try to disguise the way you feel about your family heritage, about the work you do?"

"Haven't you heard?" he drawled. "The most important thing of all is to keep your cool."

"What kind of answer is that!"

"It's the
only
kind you're going to get until you have some confidence of equal value that you want to barter for a better one."

For a moment she was dumbfounded. Then, ignoring her misgivings, she blurted heedlessly, "I already have something to tell you. But I'll only trade it for the truth." She forced herself to meet his eyes squarely. "Is it a deal?"

"Why not?" Garth grinned broadly and cautioned, "It had better be good though."

The warning was cause for second thoughts, but she had gone too far for a graceful retreat and she had no desire to provoke further dissension between them. She inhaled deeply and announced in a shaky voice, "I think I'm falling in love with you all over again."

Now it was Garth who was speechless. His face was stunned and dark with some emotion she could not define, and she averted her eyes. She was appalled by her foolishness and she wasn't sure she wanted to hear his response.

He stood up so rapidly that he alarmed Buck, and the dog skittered away from him in confusion. He patted the shepherd on the head and said evenly, "That's okay, fella."

In the same quiet tone he declared, "It's late. I'll put Buck out and take care of locking up while you get ready for bed."

Moving automatically, Julie rose and walked blindly toward the stairs only to be stopped by his hand on her shoulder when she reached them.

"Good night, Julie," he said firmly, making it painfully clear that he would not be joining her in bed for anything other than sleep. He gave her a chaste kiss on the forehead and when she couldn't resist the impulse to lift her mouth for a more satisfactory caress, his hold on her tightened punishingly.

"Damn," Garth muttered, and in the next instant his arm hooked around her neck to propel her roughly toward him while his free hand threaded through her hair, stopping to grasp a handful and crush it between his fingers. When the unexpectedly savage pressure of his mouth on hers forced her head back, it was securely wedged in the crook of his elbow.

He ground his lips into hers so fiercely that his beard grated her skin, and she went stiff with surprise at the first touch of his mouth but she sensed that his anger was directed as much at himself as at her; in spite of his roughness her lips softened to offer a timid response. And when her lips softened, so did Garth's, while becoming, at the same time, more demanding. Julie was hazily aware that she had only thought he'd kissed her before, for this time there was no holding back.

Garth's lips moved hungrily over hers, compelling her mouth to open for him. But no force was necessary. Her lips parted freely, wantonly. She was eager for the first heady contact of his tongue with hers, and when it came, his assault was softly insistent. Then he probed more intimately, and his ever-deepening invasion of her mouth assumed such a sweet urgency that she felt herself dissolving in the heat of his kiss and knew that nothing would ever be the same again. Surely she would be forever transformed in the fires generated by his passion.

Her arms were tightly linked around his waist and when his mouth left hers, she slid one hand upward over his chest to stroke his cheek with wonder; lightly tracing his earlobe, the spare angle of his jaw, the strongly defined arch of an eyebrow. His eyes were dark green with amber flames scintillating in their depths.

"You have the sexiest eyes," she murmured, and Garth's pupils expanded until they seemed to fill the whole iris. But when she tried to touch the curve of his mouth, he caught her hand with his to prevent her from doing so.

"Don't start anything you're not prepared to finish," he advised her huskily.

She jerked her hand away as if the feel of his skin had scorched her fingers.

"I—I'll try not to," she whispered breathlessly.

He put her away from him and gently turned her toward the stairs. Her knees were shaking so badly, they would barely support her, and she held tightly to the banister as she climbed. When she was halfway to the top, she glanced back over her shoulder and saw that Garth was standing as she'd left him, watching her. Her hand on the rail trembled with the strength of her need for him. She longed to hold out her hand to him, to invite him to come to bed with her—to make love to her.

They remained this way, motionless figures in an immutable tableau, as time stood still. Even her heart seemed to have stopped beating.

Only Buck's impatience ended it. He had grown tired of waiting to be let out for his nightly run and when he barked, the spell was broken.

Garth moved away from the stairs to open the door for the shepherd, and Julie was free to make her way to the bedroom. Yet she was not free, and she knew that she would never be truly free again.