The Chocolate Book Bandit (22 page)

He turned toward me and added his second arm to the one he already had around me. “And that’s all, Lee. All we did was eat.”

I laughed. “I never doubted that, Joe. Somehow I’ve never been afraid that you’d go to bed with Meg. I’ve always been afraid that you were still in love with her.”

“No! Lee, you don’t have to worry about that! At this point I’m pretty sure I’ve never been in love with her. Not even when I was sixteen. In fact, I’ve spent the past three days trying to figure out why I agreed even to speak to her. And I think I finally came up with an explanation.”

“You don’t have to explain anything.”

“After all this thought and analysis? I may write a paper on it.”

After we’d laughed, I took his hand. “Okay. Let’s hear this historic explanation.”

“I wanted to get even with her.”

“And giving her dinner did this? The food must have been awful.”

Joe kissed my cheek. “Be serious when I’m sharing my inmost feelings, please!”

“Sorry.”

“After a lot of deep thought, I realized that I was still mad at Meg because she dropped me—nearly twenty years ago. What I was doing was building her up for the big push. To get even.”

“And did you?”

“Well, no. I didn’t drop her the way she dropped me. But yesterday I told her I was going to be really busy, so I was turning her case over to Susan Gilson.”

“Susan does family law anyway, doesn’t she?”

“We all do. But I’m pretty much ashamed of myself.”

“Why? It sounds as if you handled it fine.”

“The end result may have been the same, but admitting that my main motive was revenge . . . it doesn’t make me proud of myself.”

“What about all this stuff you handed out about how
good
women like your mother—and me!—just wouldn’t give Meg a chance?”

“That’s what I kept telling myself. That it wasn’t Meg’s fault.”

“What wasn’t Meg’s fault?”

“Her character, I guess. The way she uses people. Uses her . . . her appeal to get her way. Look at poor old Trey. She went for him because he came from a prominent family. The poor guy was putty in her hands. When she found out his family was prominent, but not rich, well, that relationship was doomed.”

Joe squeezed me. “Anyway, I’m over Meg for good. You and my mother can relax.”

“I never doubted that you’d come to your senses. And you figured all this out the day I was on pain pills?”

“You told me all your secrets, too.”

“Oh.” That’s what I said out loud. What I was thinking was, Gosh! I hope I didn’t tell
all
of them.

“Yeah,” Joe said. “And, by the way, maybe you should turn down that appointment to the library board.”

I gasped. Darn! He knew how I felt about Butch Cassidy.

I felt his body shake, and I realized he was laughing. At me.

“You rat!” I gave Joe a huge shove, and he fell over backward, landing with his head off the edge of the towel.

I leaned over, glaring at him. “Here I was, having these massive attacks of guilt, and you thought it was funny.” Then I had to laugh, too.

Joe gently tugged me down on top of him. “That was the day I discovered that any time I need to know what’s going on in that beautiful blond head, all I have to do is sock a little codeine to you. It’s just like truth serum.” He gave me a long kiss. “Don’t worry. Even when you were rambling around in La-La Land, I could tell it was just a daydream.” Another kiss. Or several.

Finally he spoke again. “Anyway, I can see that Butch is an attractive guy. Like you always tell me, I don’t want you to lose interest.” He gave me a serious kiss. “And I promise to hold all future business conferences in the office.” Another kiss. “And I have complete confidence in your behavior. But in the future, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t explore old basements. You might stumble across some temptation there.”

“I already promised that, Joe. At the same time you did.” I didn’t have to mention our wedding date.

After a little more necking, I sat up. “We’d better quit this. After all, this is a public beach. And we’ve missed the sunset.”

“There’ll be another one tomorrow.” Joe climbed to his feet. “Let’s go home, Lee.”