The Best Way to Lose (3 page)

A vinyl-covered chair was in front of him and Trace lowered himself into it, stretching out his long legs and hooking his hat over the end of the armrest. It wasn’t easy to keep his eyes off her. His glance traveled up the shapely calf of her leg to the hem of the smoky blue skirt, then made a quick run to her face.

“I thought you’d want to know what happened.” There was something half angry about the curtness of her statement that seemed to challenge him for his lack of concern.

“Digger Jones gave me a ride to the hospital. He got the lowdown from Cassie and filled me in,” Trace explained and reached inside his jacket to the shirt pocket for his cigarettes. “Mind if I smoke?” A negative shake of her head gave him permission, then refused the one he shook from the pack to offer her. “And I spoke to the doctor in the hallway just before I came in.”

Another vinyl-covered chair was companionably angled toward his. Pilar sat down in it and leaned earnestly toward him, her dark eyes probing his expression. “What did he say?”

“Probably the same thing he told you.” He bent his head to the match flame and puffed
on the cigarette, then lifted his head while he shook out the match.

“Elliot’s going to recover. He told you that, didn’t he?” It was a demand.

As he lowered his hand to toss the burned-out match in an ashtray, Trace noticed that Pilar’s hands were clenched into fists on her lap, knuckles showing white. There was a moment when he debated whether to let her believe what she wished or to prepare her for the worst.

“It’s too soon to make that kind of judgment.” He opted for a middle road that would at least provide a cushion. “The first twenty-four hours after a massive coronary attack such as Elliot’s are critical. If he passes that crisis point without another attack, his chances improve. Three days afterward there’s another critical period. But either way”—Trace finally looked at her—“it’s likely some kind of heart surgery will be needed. Any operation involves risk.”

“He’ll make it.” She was staring at some unseen spot on the floor. “A lot of people have heart attacks and recover to lead normal lives. A year from now Elliot will be jogging again. Today will just seem like a bad dream.”

A nurse appeared in the doorway. “Mrs. Santee, your husband is conscious. I think he’d like to see you,” she said with a gentle, encouraging smile.

For an instant Pilar was motionless, then
she was squaring her shoulders to gracefully stand. Trace watched the way her lips came together in a smooth, straight line. It seemed to go against her nature to be so controlled.

“You are his son, aren’t you?” the nurse inquired. “Perhaps you should come now, too.”

H
e is extremely weak,” the nurse cautioned in a hushed tone as she escorted them into the room. “Don’t let him try to talk too much or exert himself. I’m afraid I can only allow you a very few moments.”

There was an absent nod of understanding by Pilar but the advice seemed to glide right out of her mind. Her whole attention was focused on the man in the bed, a grotesque copy of her husband. She walked slowly to the bed, trying to shut out the sight of all the apparatus around him.

His dark hair was all mussed. Hesitantly she reached out with tentative fingers to smooth it. There seemed to be more strands of silver present than she remembered. At the light touch of her hand his eyes opened.

“Hello, darling.” She bent down to press her lips to his cheek but his skin felt cool and odd.

There was fear lurking in his light blue eyes as they clung to her. His mouth moved and some nearly unintelligible sound came out of it. Pilar cast a panicked look at the nurse.

“He’s having trouble with his speech, but it’s nothing to be worried about now,” the nurse assured her.

“Ssh, don’t try to talk too much.” She managed to smile at him but she was inwardly struggling with this new vulnerability. Elliot had always seemed so indefatigable, invincible almost. Now he was helpless as a baby.

“I love you.” Each word was separately spoken. Although badly slurred, Pilar understood them. It reassured her.

“I love you, too, darling.” This time the smile came more easily to her.

But his glance was already leaving her and searching out his son, standing discreetly at the foot of the bed to give them a few minutes alone. He grunted out an “A” sound. Pilar had already followed the direction of his glance.

“I think he wants you,” she murmured a little resentfully and started to step back from the bed. Then she noticed the puny movement of Elliot’s fingers, clawing at the bedsheet in a grasping gesture. When she took hold of his hand, he tried to squeeze it.

“You want me to stay here?” she asked to be sure she’d understood. His eyes slowly closed in an affirmative reply. It was frightening to
realize that even that seemed to be an effort to him.

“I’m here, Dad.” Trace stood close beside her, their shoulders almost brushing. The perfumed scent of her hair was a sweet incense in the room. “Don’t try to talk anymore.”

Pilar felt his attempt to lift the hand she held, so she did it for him. His gaze, however, continued to cling to his son’s face. “Take … care … of… her.”

The significance of his request escaped Pilar for the span of a few seconds. When the inherent finality in his words hit her, she threw an accusing look at his son, as if he were somehow to blame for Elliot giving up. There was a long moment when Trace neither looked at her nor responded to the request. Reluctance seemed to claim him as a muscle in his jaw flexed convulsively.

“I will,” he said finally and slid a half-screened look at her, measuring her reaction.

An angry protest seethed through her system. Tightly she held on to Elliot’s hand when it went limp. “Don’t be silly, Elliot.” Her chiding voice was falsely light and she had to force it through her teeth. “You’re going to get better. I’m not going to let you go, so you have no choice.”

There was an attempt at a smile as the corners of his mouth twitched weakly. “You … no … say.” Only three words could she understand, but the resignation that seemed to be in his expression was sufficient to make it clear. Elliot was conceding the outcome.

“You aren’t going to die!” The low pitch of her voice was taut and vibrating with forceful rejection. “Do you hear me, Elliot?” There was the smallest nod of his head for an answer, then the nurse was touching her arm and issuing a warning shake of her head.

“You’ll have to leave now so he can get some rest,” she advised them in a soft undertone.

Reluctantly Pilar let go of her husband’s hand and turned to plead with the nurse for compassion. “Please, may I just sit with him?” It was difficult to be humble when all her impulses wanted to make demands.

“I’m sorry, no.” The firm refusal was tempered with a gentle sympathy. “I’m afraid it’s doctor’s orders.”

Before Pilar could argue the unfairness of them, a pair of large hands fitted themselves to her shoulders. “We understand.” Trace Santee’s voice came quietly in response and undermined any argument she might have put forth.

The guiding pressure of his hands turned her away from the nurse toward the door. Pilar glanced over her shoulder for one last glimpse of Elliot. His eyes were closed but reassuring beeps were coming from the machines monitoring his vital signs.

Her shoulders were released but it was a mere shifting of contact as an arm curved itself to her back, his fingers lightly gripping the lower rib cage. The latent strength that seemed to emanate from his touch was
offensive to Pilar, a cruel and physical reminder of how pitifully weak her husband was. That Trace Santee was of Elliot’s flesh and blood made it even harder to bear.

The warmth of her flesh seemed to heat his hand, but the rigidity of her carriage was its own kind of rejection. Regardless of how distraught she might be about his father, her body signals discouraged any attempt at familiarity by him. It put his teeth on edge. In the hallway Trace let his arm slide away.

“He’ll rest for a while,” he announced, quietly inspecting her profile, so tense yet expressionless. “It’s a good time for us to go to the cafeteria and get a bite to eat. I don’t know about you, but I haven’t had anything since lunch.”

“No, thank you. You go ahead,” she refused and moved away from him to the waiting room.

For a long moment he watched the natural sway of her hips as she walked from him. It was a graceful movement, yet so subtly provocative. His jaw hardened as he tossed a half-glance over his shoulder at the hospital room door and cursed himself for allowing his thoughts to take that wayward direction. His father was lying in that room and he was standing out here coveting his wife. A bitter, black bile seemed to coat his tongue. Trace turned abruptly, long crisp strides carrying him away from the waiting room.

Twenty minutes later he returned with a cup of sweet, black coffee for his father’s wife.
A family acquaintance was with her. She thanked him for the coffee, but Trace noticed that she didn’t touch it.

Through the course of the early-evening hours several friends came by. None of them stayed long, speaking a few minutes with Pilar or himself and offering any assistance the Santees might need at this particular time.

By nine o’clock it was just the two of them again. Trace took his time crushing out a cigarette in the ashtray, half filled with smoked butts. When his glance ran to her, she stood up and restlessly paced to the window.

“What time are you planning to go home?” Trace studied her through eyes that were half closed to mask the closeness of his interest.

“I’m not.” There was nothing to see beyond the darkened window and Pilar turned away from it, absently rubbing the stiff muscles in her neck, knotted with tension. “You can leave whenever you like. Cassie will be there to let you in. I’m going to stay here tonight.”

“Why?”

Her dark gaze shot to him, irritation simmering in their black brilliance. “So I can be here in case … Elliot calls for me.”

The question hardly warranted an answer. She avoided the lazy probe of those gray eyes, too rawly conscious of the unreasoning dislike that had sprung up for the healthy son of her dangerously ill husband. There was a vague, nagging wish that he was the one in that
hospital bed instead of Elliot, which only added to her feelings of guilt.

“You need a good night’s rest as much as he does.” His head was tipped slightly back, its angle suggesting a challenge that his voice hadn’t carried.

“If I get tired, I’ll curl up in one of the chairs,” Pilar retorted. “I know Elliot asked you to take care of me, but I’m more than capable of taking care of myself. There’s no need for you to be concerned about my wellbeing.” That bedside request had only added to her building resentment of this son of Elliot’s.

He rolled to his feet in a leisurely slow fashion and ambled across the room to stand in front of her, his thumbs hooked in the hip pockets of his smooth-fitting denim pants. All that lazy male indolence made her bristle. She ached inside, hurting so much that lashing out in anger seemed her only means of vocalizing this pain and fear.

“Maybe you’d like to explain how long you’ll be able to function on sheer nerve alone,” he murmured. “That’s all that’s keeping you going now. No food today. No sleep tonight.”

“I think that’s my problem.” Her chin lifted a fraction higher, exposing more of the magnolia-smooth curve of her throat.

“Are you trying to impress someone with a devoted-wife act?” He cocked his head to the side, measuring her with a dry glance. “No one but the hospital staff is going to witness
your all-night vigil. All of Elliot’s friends are home. Or are you doing it because you think it proves you love him?”

“I’m not staying for anyone’s benefit except my own,” she flared with indignation. “I want to be close by him.”

“Staying here tonight won’t do him any good—or you any good,” he countered, unmoved by the cutting edge of her voice. “If he recovers from this attack, there will come a time when he’ll need every bit of your strength. Exhausting yourself now won’t help him later.”

It was very difficult to argue with his logic. Pilar wavered indecisively, a darkly troubled glance straying in the direction of Elliot’s room, blocked from her view by intervening hospital walls.

No matter how superstitious it sounded, she couldn’t help wondering if Elliot might not have suffered that attack if she’d gone with him to play tennis. And it was a different face of that same superstition that insisted she stay at the hospital if she didn’t want something else to happen to Elliot. In the light of his son’s argument her reason sounded crazy and childish.

“The hospital will call if there is any change in his condition.” Trace added a further argument while he watched her struggling to make up her mind.

“All right.” Pilar gave in, refusing to be ruled by ridiculous superstition.

*   *   *

The imposing two-and-a-half-story house was a white blue in the night’s darkness, surrounded by gardened lawns shaded by live oaks draped with ghostly Spanish moss. Its architecture was generally considered as fairly typical of the southern planter style, with a porch circumventing the house on three sides and supporting a balcony above it, protected by the wide overhang of the house’s slanting roof.

In its history it had gone by many names. The first Mrs. Santee had resurrected the name of Dragon Walk, given to it by one of its previous owners, an amateur archaeologist. The chain of steep loess hills, which stretched northward from Natchez to Vicksburg, were fossil-rich in the skeletal remains of mastodons and giant sloths, mammoth prehistoric beasts upon which the dragon myth was based. The old plantation home was located in these hills on the northern edge of Natchez, hence its colorful name, Dragon Walk.

When the car turned into the carriage-wide driveway, the front porchlight came on. It was a welcoming touch and Pilar experienced a moment’s relief that she wasn’t going home to an empty house. Cassie Douglas was there to fill the large, rambling home with her warmth. Pilar stopped the car at the head of the circular drive and reached for her purse in the middle of the front seat.