That Carolina Summer (North Carolina) (15 page)

“A lot of men would say it without meaning it, just to get you in their bed. I probably even did it when I was younger, but it ultimately creates too much hassle,” Josh told her with steady calm. “The minute you said that, I knew your father was right. Marriage was part of your plans for us."

Her fingers tugged at the recalcitrant zipper behind her back, trying to force it to close. Frustration brought a latent violence to her actions. She wanted to get dressed and get out of there. She was trembling from the combination of pain and anger.

“Let me do that before you break the zipper,” he volunteered roughly, and walked toward her.

At the touch of his hands, Annette jerked away from him. “I can do it.” Her gray eyes blazed with the reflected anger of deep hurt. “I don't need your help."

The grip of his hands was firmly insistent as he overpowered her objections and turned her back to him. “Just shut up and let me do it, Annette. It will be a lot faster this way,” he stated.

That was a very persuasive argument. She stood rigidly, fighting the sensation of his touch on her lower spine. Within seconds, the quiet sound of the closing zipper was traveling up her back.

“Do you want me to fasten the little hook at the top?” Josh asked.

“No.” She stepped away from him. The dress was secure without the benefit of that finishing touch. She looked around for her shoes.

“Be honest, Annette,” Josh challenged. “You were willing to go to bed with me because you thought I'd be so crazy about you, and so honored—” the inflection in his voice put a question mark at the end of that word"—to be the first that I would marry you. Isn't that how you planned for it to go?"

“Yes!” she hissed the bitter admission. She hated feeling the fool—naive and disgustingly sophomoric.

“You must have read too many romantic stories,” he decided.

“I must have,” she agreed coldly, and scooped her shoes off the carpeted floor.

Agitation seemed to steal her natural grace. When she tried to put her shoes on, she had to hop in an ungainly fashion to keep her balance. It was one more humiliating blot on the evening.

“I'm sorry it turned out this way, Annette,” Josh offered a grim apology.

“You should have told me you were scared of marriage,” she lashed out at him, wanting him to feel small the way she did.

“I'm not afraid of marriage.” A faintly indulgent smile touched the corners of his mouth, as if guessing what she was trying to do and regarding it as juvenile. “But when the day comes, it's going to be my choice. I'm not going to be maneuvered into it by some scheming little blonde."

“I got the message!” Annette snapped, not needing Josh to keep repeating it. “Besides, you can't maneuver anyone unless they are willing to he maneuvered."

“At least you know that much,” he murmured the taunt.

“Look!” she flared. “You've made it clear you aren't interested in me! You don't have to keep rubbing it in!"

“If you think that, I haven't made it clear.” His voice stayed level. “I am interested in you. I'd like you to stay here tonight. I'd like to make love to you,” he stated. “But what I'm not interested in is waking up tomorrow morning with a knock on the door and your father standing outside with a shotgun and a preacher, and you wailing that I've taken advantage of you. I can do without that scene."

“So can I!” she insisted, pride storming to the front.

“Good, then we can both be spared that.” A little hardness formed along his jaw, his eyes darkening. “And the next time a man asks you to go to bed with him, make sure you do it because it's what you want, and don't think because he takes your virginity that he wants to marry you."

“I'll remember that.” Annette was nearly spitting from the raw hurt raking her insides. “And you can bet your life that you won't be that man!"

A grim kind of anger tightened his mouth. “Am I supposed to feel deprived by that remark?” Josh demanded. “Are you trying to goad me into feeling possessive about you? You're still hoping to arouse some sort of declaration from me, aren't you?"

Was she? Annette didn't honestly know what she was trying to accomplish anymore. Except, maybe, she wanted him to feel some sense of loss, because she felt destroyed. It wasn't fair that she was the only one in the throes of pain.

“No!” She fiercely denied his claim. “I don't want anything from you! Not your kisses! Not your love! Nothing!” But even as she said it, she knew they were lies. All lies. And she hurt all the more.

His head moved to the side in a mild form of quiet exasperation. “As I said before, I'm sorry it turned out this way. Maybe we'll meet again sometime."

“Yes.” Her throat muscles constricted from the seething churning agony inside. “Maybe we will—after I've had a couple of affairs so we can meet on common ground."

“Annette—” his mouth thinned"—I'm letting you go—"

“You're not letting me go!” She choked with rage at the implication that he was allowing her to leave. “I'm walking out!"

It was the best exit line she'd had. Annette used it, whirling away to march from the bedroom. The blood was roaring in her ears. It was so loud that she couldn't hear if Josh was coming after her. She tried to pretend she didn't want him to. Another knife of pain was plunged into her heart when she reached the front door of his suite and realized Josh hadn't followed her.

Inside she felt ripped apart, shredded into pieces. The primitive rage of a wounded animal spread through her as she crossed the hotel grounds. She wanted to lash out, strike back, attack the person responsible for this.

Her irrational mind reminded her that her father had precipitated this whole incident with his visit to Josh. It was his fault it had all come to an abrupt end before she had a chance to make Josh love her. It could have worked.

The two men she cared the most about had hurt her. And Annette wanted to get back at them. The ever resurgent pain in her body insisted on it, blindly driving her into action without time to allow her to consider the lack of justification.

Reaching the door to her father's suite, Annette pounded on it with her fist. All the pent-up pain trembled violently through her. The hammering became an outlet of partial release. She kept it up even after she'd heard her father's muffled voice respond.

“Just a minute,” he called in vague irritation. Her fist hit the door one last time before it was swung open. Her burning eyes looked at her father's frowning expression as he paused in the midst of tying a knot in his robe's belt. Gray eyes, like hers, took in the whiteness of her complexion and the tremors that shook her.

“Annette!” His exclamation of concern quickly turned to a building anger. “What happened? What did he try to do?” His hands reached out to pull her inside the suite of rooms. “So help me God, I'll—"

With a violent shrug of her arms, Annette flung aside his hands. “How dare you!” she stormed. “Who gave you the right to talk to Josh about me?"

His head lifted at the attack, stiffening. “I'm your father. That gives me every right."

“No, it doesn't! You had no business interfering in my personal life!” Annette raged at him. “It has nothing to do with you! Don't you ever do it again!"

“You are my daughter,” he began, as Kathleen hurried anxiously to his side.

“And don't think I'm not sorry about that! I wish I'd never been born! You're to blame for that, too!” She tried to ease her hurt by saying every cruel thing she could think of. Hot tears were finally spilling from her eyes and running down her cheeks.

“Keep your voices down, both of you,” Kathleen ordered. “You're going to wake up Robby."

“I don't care!” Annette insisted, not attempting to lower the volume of her voice. “It's time he found out what kind of a father he has!"

“Young lady, you better watch your tongue,” her father warned.

THE HOTEL WALL that separated the suite from Marsha's and Annette's room was not thick enough to silence the raised voices. Marsha was propped in a sitting position by the pillows on her bed, listening to them, the paperback novel in her hands forgotten.

She didn't understand why every time her sister and father argued that it had to turn into a shouting match. Her shoulders hunched at all that anger coming through the wall. Robby started crying to add to the furor.

Some loud remark from Annette was punctuated by the slamming of a door. A sudden silence followed. The argument was over and Marsha trembled with relief. Angry footsteps approached the door; a key rattled in the lock. Marsha started to get out of bed to open the door for her sister, but it was swinging in.

Annette swept in on a wave of temper and banged the door shut. She didn't say a word. She didn't even look at Marsha as she crossed the room and began undressing with jerky agitated movements.

This brooding silence always followed blistering arguments. Marsha had learned it was better to leave her sister alone if she didn't want to receive the broadside of her temper. Quietly she walked to the door and relocked it for the night.

Under the covers again, Marsha picked up her book and pretended to read it while she listened to Annette going through the motions of getting ready for bed. When Annette crawled into the twin to her bed, Marsha glanced hesitantly in her direction.

“Would you like me to turn off the light?” she asked.

“I don't care,” Annette answered coldly.

Sighing her futile concern, Marsha set her book aside and switched off the lamp by the bed. For a long time she lay there trying to piece together the fragments of the argument she'd heard. It had been something about their father talking to Josh.

There were times when she envied Annette's bold confidence and thirst for adventure. But she was very glad she wasn't Annette right now. Rolling onto her side, Marsha closed her eyes.

Chapter Nine

ALL THE WHILE Marsha dressed the next morning, Annette lay in bed with her hands pillowed under her head, staring at the ceiling. There was no expression on her face, but Marsha wasn't deceived. There was raw pain in her sister's eyes and a glittering of anger. Those busy wheels in Annette's mind were turning, and Marsha was leery of all that implied.

She couldn't take the silence anymore. “Aren't you going jogging this morning?” she asked.

“No.” The line of her jaw was hard and decisive.

Marsha hesitated, biting at her inner lip. “Do you want to talk about it?” She eyed her sister, feeling certain that Annette shouldn't keep it all bottled up inside like that.

“No, I don't want to talk about it.” Not once did her gaze stray from the textured pattern of the ceiling.

There was a knock at the door and Marsha went to answer it. Kathleen was standing outside when she opened the door. She smiled and glanced past Marsha, spying Annette in the bed.

“We're on our way to breakfast,” Kathleen said. “If you're ready, we might as well walk together."

“'I haven't brushed my hair yet,” Marsha answered. “I'll be a few more minutes.” She glanced over her shoulder toward Annette, who was still in the same position.

“Aren't you coming, Annette?” Kathleen asked.

“No.” The answer was flat, allowing no opening for a discussion.

“Annette, I know how you feel—” Kathleen began, the warmth of understanding mixing with a firmness in her voice.

“No, you don't know how I feel.” Annette cut across her words with a hard incisive stroke.

There was a trace of impatience in Kathleen's eyes as she glanced at Marsha. “She'll be all right,” Marsha murmured the assurance. “She just needs a little time."

“Maybe we all do,” Kathleen responded in an equally subdued tone.

“Go ahead to breakfast,” Marsha urged. “I'll join you as soon as I'm ready."

Kathleen nodded a silent agreement and turned away. Quietly Marsha closed the door and turned to walk back toward the beds.

“You really should have some breakfast, Annette,” she advised.

“Marsha, please,” her sister flashed in exasperation. “I don't need any lectures from you about diet or exercise. Just go."

“I just thought you might feel better if you had something to eat,” Marsha retorted with a little trace of anger at the undeserved snap.

“I'll eat later.” Annette was less abrupt this time, retreating into her thoughts and shutting Marsha out.

There was the consolation that sooner or later Annette would talk to her, but it was the only consolation Marsha had as she entered the bathroom to brush her hair.

DARK SUNGLASSES SHIELDED HER EYES from the glare of the afternoon sun as Annette lazed in a lounge chair by the pool. Her indolent pose was a farce. She continued to seethe inside, a churning caldron of pain and anger and revenge.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw someone approaching her chair. She turned to watch Craig walking toward her. Dressed in his waiter's uniform, he had a stiff look of reserve in his expression, polite and nothing more. She wasn't really surprised by his lack of friendliness, considering the way she had ignored him lately because of Josh. That was something she had to overcome.

He stopped beside her chair. “Jack said you asked to see me.” Jack was the other waiter who had been on duty at the poolside.