The Night Remembers (24 page)

And he wasn't.

Even as he moved within her, even as he whispered soft, sexy words into the damp curve of her neck, she could feel him holding back some essential part of himself. Feel him hiding... something... behind the expertise of his loving. But she was too far gone to figure out what that something was. Her hips bucked beneath him, urging, hungry, out of control.

"That's it," he murmured into her mouth. "Let it go. Let it come," he urged, retaining his control, his awareness of self and place, to the end, holding back until she had cried out in mindless pleasure... once, twice. And then, deliberately, he let go, thrusting forward into her welcoming body with a fierce cry of his own.

It was wonderful. It was satisfying. It left her sated and replete. But it wasn't the same as if he, too, had gone beyond control, had forgotten himself, lost himself, in loving her.

They lay tangled together for a moment more, panting lightly into each others' necks, letting the world right itself around them, and then Adam levered himself up and off her and rolled over onto his back.

"I bet my coffee's gotten cold," he said, grinning at her out of the corner of his eye.

For just a moment, the space of a heartbeat only, Daphne contemplated grabbing the cup and pouring its contents over his head. That he could lie there looking so normal and natural and so... so
relaxed, dammit,
while she was still trembling inside from the strength of her response, made her want to scream.
How can you be so blasé about something so earth-shattering,
she wanted to shout at him.
Don't you care?

Instead, she calmly leaned over his supine body and stuck the tip of her index finger in the coffee cup. "Still warm," she said, drawing back with the cup in her hand. "Here." She set it down on his chest, waiting until he had put a steadying hand on it, and slithered off the bed. "Drink it. I'm going to take a shower."

"Coffee should be hot," he informed her, pulling himself up against the pillows. He took a quick sip and made a face. "Especially
your
coffee."

Daphne gave him a look over her shoulder. "It
was
hot," she said, and disappeared into the bathroom.

She came out twenty minutes later to find Adam still sprawled across the bed in all his naked glory, watching cartoons. The cats, with the exception of Mack who was probably still in the kitchen eating whatever the other two hadn't, were sprawled out beside him.

"Haven't we played this scene before?" she said whimsically, crossing his field of vision in all
her
naked glory on the way to the dresser.

"What scene?" Adam tried to watch Daphne as she bent over to open a drawer and keep his eye on the antics of Bugs Bunny and friends at the same time.

"Me coming out of the shower," Daphne said, stepping into a silky little bra with a brown and tan leopard-skin pattern. She adjusted the straps on her shoulders, bending over to make sure the cups held her breasts just so. The fine chains around her neck caught the light as she moved, the tiny star glittering at the base of her throat. "You watching cartoons."

"I'm not watching cartoons," Adam denied, and he wasn't—now. "I'm watching you."

"Well, stop watching me," Daphne chided, pretending disapproval. "It only gives you ideas."

Adam wiggled his eyebrows suggestively. "Aren'cha glad?"

Daphne laughed, shaking her head at him, and disappeared into the closet. She came out a few minutes later clad in slim jeans and her butterscotch sweater.

"You can watch one more cartoon," she said, watching him in the mirror as she fiddled with the cowl neck of the sweater. "Then you have to get up and get yourself into that shower."

"Are you going to come scrub my back?"

"No." She smiled at him in the mirror, head tilted as she inserted a large plain gold hoop in her earlobe. "I'm going to finish packing our picnic lunch." She inserted the other earring and then reached up, fluffing her hair. "And if you're not ready when I'm finished—" she turned toward the bed, an expression of mock sternness on her face "—I'm leaving without you. Is that clear?"

Adam threw a stiff salute, his body snapping to attention on the bed. "Yes, ma'am, perfectly clear."

Daphne struggled not to laugh. "One cartoon," she warned, shaking her finger at him as she left the bedroom.

The telephone rang while she was trying to fit a second bottle of wine into the picnic basket. She let it ring, some sixth sense telling her that it was the hospital. Adam, she knew, would answer it from the bedroom extension. He picked it up halfway through the third ring. Five minutes later he came bustling out to the kitchen, a worried look shadowing his handsome face.

Daphne had already put the wine back in the refrigerator and was unloading the picnic basket.

"That was the hospital," he said unnecessarily, shrugging into a his leather jacket as he spoke. "Tiffany Jenkins has developed an infection." The little girl had had her third skin graft operation less than a week ago. "I've got to go. I—" He caught sight of the picnic basket, the cellophane-wrapped sandwiches, the little plastic containers of olives and carrot sticks on the counter. A guilty flush stole over his face. "The picnic. Damn!" He ran a hand through his hair. "I'm sorry, Daffy, but this is important and I've got-"

"You've got to go to the hospital. I know." She lifted a plastic container of pickles out of the basket and laid it on the counter beside the rest of the food.

Adam stood there speechless, not knowing what to say.

"Hey, it's all right," she said, forcing a bright little smile past the lump of disappointment in her throat. "I understand."

Adam looked skeptical.

"Really, I do." She left off what she was doing and came to him, slipping her hands under the edges of his jacket to rest them on his chest. "Tiffany Jenkins has an infection. You're her doctor." Her palms rubbed lightly over his shirt in a quick nervous little gesture. "You have to go."

Adam put his hands on her shoulders, knees slightly bent as he tried to look into her face. "You sure you don't mind?"

"Of course I
mind,"
Daphne said, staring into his shirt front. "But I understand." Her eyes lifted for a moment, touching him, then dropped, lids fluttered as she struggled against the foolish childish tears of disappointment that threatened to overflow. "Really," she added, trying to convince them both that it was true.

"And you're not mad?" Adam's voice was still doubtful.

"No, I'm not mad," she denied.
For God's sake, Daphne, try to act like a reasonable adult. A canceled picnic isn't the end of the world. Reassure him.
She looked up, forcing a smile worthy of Donna Reed at her most wifely. "I'm disappointed, that's all." Her shoulders lifted in a little shrug as she twisted a button on his shirt front. "I was looking forward to spending the whole day with you. Just the two of us, alone, without any hospitals or fashion people or... anything."

"I know." Adam squeezed her shoulders. "I was looking forward to it, too," he said, but his words were perfunctory his mind already halfway to the hospital and the problem he would find there.

Daphne hooked her hands over the outside of his arms, sliding them up to rest on his where he touched her shoulders. "Maybe you won't be all day?" she asked hopefully.

"It's hard to say. Maybe. It depends on exactly what the problem is." His attention was focused inward, thinking about all the different things that could have caused his patient's setback. She could tell he was anxious to be off.

Her hands dropped from his. "You'd better get going," she said in a flat little voice, that wifely, reassuring little smile still plastered to her face.

Adam seemed to shake himself back to the here-and-now. "Yes, I guess I'd better." He squeezed her shoulders again, more warmly than before. "Don't dismantle the picnic completely. If I don't get back in time today, we can always use it tomorrow." He leaned down and pressed a quick distracted kiss on her lips. "And we'll go out for dinner tonight no matter what, okay?"

"Okay," Daphne echoed hollowly, following him to the front door. She opened it for him, both hands holding it as he went out.

He turned back suddenly, hesitating. "I really am sorry about this, Daffy. I—" he struggled with the words "—I wanted this day together as much as you did."

Daphne nodded, her head against the edge of the door. "I know," she said, trying to believe it.

He looked for a moment as if he wanted to say something more, something... important. Instead, he reached out, curling his hand around the back of her head, and lifted her into his kiss. It wasn't quick. It wasn't distracted. It was long and thorough and turned Daphne's knees to jelly. "I'll be home as soon as I can," he whispered against her lips. "Wait for me."

Her childish resentment melted away at his words. Oh, the disappointment was still there, but somehow, knowing Adam was disappointed, too, made it easier to bear.

She wandered back into the kitchen when her legs could finally support her again and finished dealing with the contents of the picnic basket. Remembering Adam's instructions, she merely transferred everything, still neatly wrapped, to a shelf in the refrigerator. She was skeptical that Adam would be back in time to make a picnic feasible that afternoon—once he got to the hospital he wouldn't be back for hours—but maybe tomorrow.

She went back into the bedroom then, intending to do a little light housekeeping. Mrs. Drecker wouldn't be in again until Monday, and a whole weekend of not picking up after herself would make Adam's lovely house look like the proverbial tornado had hit it.

"You guys can have it back in a minute," she told the cats, shooing them off so she could make the bed. The results weren't quite in league with Mrs. Drecker's, she decided when she'd finished, but at least it was made. And the cats didn't seem to care about the less-than-professional results. They clambered back up on the bed, settling in for their midmorning nap before she'd tucked the bedspread up over the pillows.

She picked her silk caftan up off the floor, smiling a little as she thought about the activities that had led to its less than pristine condition, and headed for the bathroom to clean up in there. The phone rang for the second time that morning, surprising her with yesterday's clothes bundled up in her arms. She came out of the bathroom, dropped the rumpled clothes on a convenient chair, and headed for the ringing phone.

"Hello?" She sat down on the bed as she spoke, her eyes flickering to the television that Adam had left on. A chocolate-flavored cereal was being advertised by a benign-looking Dracula. "Oh, hi, Sunny." She switched off the TV with the remote control. "What's up?"

Never one for idle chitchat, Sunny launched directly into the reason for her call. "We've arranged another little demonstration at the research center. I thought you might like to come with me."

"Two days in a row? Don't you ever give it a rest?"

"Nope. Do you want to come?"

"Well, I don't know," Daphne hedged. "Adam didn't seem too thrilled to see me on the news last night and—"

"You mean to tell me you're going to let Adam, a man you're not even married to, dictate your conscience? Daphne Granger, I'm surprised at you."

"He's not dictating my conscience," Daphne defended the absent Adam loyally. "Actually, he didn't say a word about it."

"He doesn't have to," Sunny interjected. "I know him, he probably just
looked
at you with those big blue eyes of his, all disapproving and everything."

"Well, you're wrong. He didn't even do that. Besides—now don't be furious with me—but I'm not even sure I, uh, agree with what you're doing."

"Not agree," Sunny was outraged. "How can you not agree that torturing innocent animals is wrong?"

"I don't know, Sunny. I mean, how else are doctors going to discover new cures?" she said, repeating the argument that both Brian and Adam had used. "They have to experiment somehow, don't they? And they certainly can't use people."

"So you wouldn't mind if they carved Mack up like a frog in biology class, is that what you're saying?"

Daphne sighed, exasperated. Sunny went right for the jugular when she was defending one of her causes. "Yes, of course I'd mind but that's not the point. Mack isn't going to end up in a research center like that. He—"

"How do you know? He could. What if he got lost and the pound picked him up?"

"I'd go down and get him."

"But what if you were out of town or something—" Sunny pressed on with single-minded zeal"—and couldn't get down there right away. Did you know that some pounds
sell
unclaimed animals to research labs?"

"No," Daphne said faintly. "I didn't know that."

"Well, there, you see," Sunny pointed out triumphantly. "It
could
happen to Mack."

"Yes, I guess it could," Daphne admitted.

"So, are you just going to sit home and do nothing?"

"Well, I..."

"Hundreds of people's pets, cats just like Mack, are being slaughtered."

"Yes, but..."
Oh, what the hell
, she thought.
I haven't got anything better to do today. And it'll make Sunny happy.
"Okay, sure, pick me up."