The Widow and the Wastrel (5 page)

"Why are you living here, Liza?" Jed asked as she began clearing the dishes from the table. "I'm certain the deaths of Jeremy and my father must have left you very well provided for."

"They did," she acknowledged, not pausing in her task as she replied. "But this has been my home. And my name is Elizabeth."

"What about the house you and Jeremy had? Wasn't that your home?" He countered.

"We only lived here after we were married."

"Oh, my God!" he laughed in disbelief. "You actually lived here—with my parents, after you were married! That must have given you a lot of privacy and time to get to know each other, with Mother for ever organizing your lives!" he jeered.

"It was only a temporary arrangement!" His mockery stung her into retorting sharply in defiance. "We had bought a house, but the whole place needed to be redecorated and furnished and the kitchen remodeled. It would have been foolish to try to live in it when it was in such a disorganized state."

"Of course it never occurred to either of you to move into it and re-do the house in stages," Jed offered dryly.

"Jeremy couldn't see the point in prolonging it. It was his decision to do it all at once and I agreed with him," Elizabeth stated. "Besides, he was working very hard for your father. It was only natural for him to want to come home to an orderly house at night. What did you do all day?"

"If it's any of your business," her chin quivered in anger, "I was kept quite busy with the redecorating."

"Under Mother's supervision, right?" he mocked.

Her eyes brightened with volatile temper to a more vibrant shade of green, contrasting sharply with the rich blue of her caftan.

"I was seventeen at the time and too inexperienced to handle such a formidable job on my own. I was very glad of your mother's assistance!"

"So the house was never completed?"

"Yes." She turned away to the sink as she made the clipped response. "We were to move into it, but Jeremy was killed in that car crash and I simply…c-couldn't bring myself to live in the house that we were to share together."

"So you stayed on here," he said in a faintly accusing note.

"After I discovered I was pregnant with Amy, there was nowhere else for me to go. My aunt was in the hospital with a severe diabetes attack."

"And Mother offered her assistance again, is that it?" Jed mocked harshly. "When Amy was born, you were still young and inexperienced and knew nothing about babies, so you accepted her guidance again. You could have found a better teacher. In fact, you could have fumbled through on your own with the same results. A lot of women do, and without the benefit of the financial peace of mind you so luckily had."

"You're so strong and so arrogantly confident that you know exactly what's right," Elizabeth retaliated, "that you probably don't know what it's like to feel lost and alone and frightened. I doubt if you know what it's like to need the support of someone else. I doubt if you know what it's like to need anyone!"

"Believe me, I need!" His voice vibrated huskily. "If I didn't, I wouldn't have come home. Although it's some homecoming!"

"Don't blame me for that. You were the one who left! And three letters in nine years hardly sounds as if you were very homesick!"

"Do you want to know how many letters I received from my parents?" Jed flashed. "Exactly two! One telling me of Jeremy's death and the other of my father's. My effort to keep the lines of communication open was not encouraged. I felt as if I was batting my head against a brick wall ten feet thick!"

"Then why did you come back?" she lashed out, angry that he was taking his frustration out on her.

"I've been asking myself that question ever since I arrived. I should have realized the age of miracles is over. I had thought," the smile curving his mouth was turned inward in self-mockery, "if I came back willing to make peace, my mother would meet me halfway, accept the way I am. The only thing she can allow herself to acknowledge is success."

"That's a cruel accusation!" Elizabeth breathed in sharply.

His gaze glittered to her face, hard and unyielding like a topaz sapphire. "I love my mother deeply, but that doesn't make me blind to her faults."

"What's wrong with being ambitious? Or wanting to better yourself?" she demanded.

"You've climbed to the top of this small social ladder. What do you think of the view? Is it what you expected it to be?" Jed countered. "As fulfilling and rewarding as you thought?"

"Not fulfilling exactly, but that was a qualification Elizabeth made silently. "All the activities keep me busy," she defended. "And I enjoy the charity work. It's very rewarding helping deserving people."

"Deserving by whose standards? My mother's?" He punctuated the words with a short, derisive laugh.

"I think you've become harder and more cynical than she is," Elizabeth observed.

"What about you? Are you becoming like her? Don't you think you'll ever desire the warmth and companionship of a man's love?"

"I haven't thought about it." She was suddenly wary, not liking the subject change from his mother to her.

"Don't you think you would miss not having a man's arms around you again?" Jed continued his pursuit of the subject.

Her chin was raised upward to a defiant angle. "I doubt it," she replied. "I was raised by a maiden aunt. Jeremy was killed so soon after we were married that I never really became accustomed to a man's attention. I think I can get along quite well without one."

"Do you?" responded Jed with a faint challenge.

The instant he started walking toward her, Elizabeth backed away. Her defiant bravado was driven out by the sudden fear that he might try to test her assertion.

He stopped and chuckled softly. "I was just going to get myself another cup of coffee," he explained, letting his amusement show. "Did you think I was going to challenge your statement and demand physical proof?"

"Earlier—" she began to remind him, with mistrust flashing in her eyes.

"What happened earlier was a fleeting impulse." His expression was uncompromisingly hard. "I may have said that I found you desirable, Liza, but I don't desire you. There's a vast difference. So you don't need to fear any unwanted advance. I don't intend to touch you again."

Jed's statement was made so emphatically that Elizabeth was forced to believe him. His rejection of her as a woman was more of a blow to her self-esteem than she had thought. She should be rejoicing, but instead a strange depression was settling in.

"Don't you feel relieved, little sister?" His soft voice insinuated itself into her astonishment.

"O-of course." She turned away, running a nervous hand through her ebony curls, pushing them behind her ear as she sought for her cool poise. "Immensely so."

"That's what I thought you'd say," he murmured.

"Help yourself to the coffee. I have some work to do." She avoided looking directly at him as she made her exit, from the kitchen, grateful that she had the excuse of reading the plays to be alone for a while.

Chapter Three

"PUT the roast at the head of the table, Elizabeth," Rebecca instructed. "Since Jed is here, he can carve it."

As she started to transfer the platter of meat to the opposite end of the table, Jed appeared in the dining room archway. He was wearing the same white shirt and brown slacks as before.

"I'm honored, Mother, that you've put me at the head of the table," he commented in a faintly derogatory tone, letting them know that he had overheard their conversation from the hallway.

"The eldest male Carrel always sits at the head of the table," Rebecca responded curtly. "In this case, it happens to be the only male Carrel." Her dark gaze ran over his casual attire. "We can delay serving for a few minutes while you change. I'm sure you must have forgotten that we always dress for dinner."

"I hadn't forgotten." Jed continued into the room, drawing the end chair where Elizabeth stood away from the table. "Unfortunately I couldn't fit my white tie and tails into my duffle bag."

"Don't exaggerate," his mother snapped. "A simple suit is sufficient."

"There wasn't room for one of those either. You’ll have to take me the way I am," Jed stated, reaching for the carving knife and fork that Elizabeth had placed near the platter.

Rebecca pursed her tips together in displeasure, but said nothing in response. Waving an imperious hand at Elizabeth and Amy to be seated, she took the chair at the opposite end of the table from Jed.

"By the way," he laid a perfectly sliced cut of meat on to Amy's plate, "where's Maggie? Is this her day off?"

Maggie Connor had been a cook-housekeeper to the Carrel family for years, an almost permanent fixture in the house when Elizabeth had married Jeremy.

"She has retired. After your father died," his mother explained. "We no longer entertained, so there was no point in retaining her for just the three of us. Your father provided a generous annuity for her in his will and I let her go."

"This meal looks very tasty," Jed observed. "Who does the cooking now? You, Mother?"

"Elizabeth does for the most part, although I occasionally lend a helping hand."

Only Elizabeth knew how rare that helping hand was. Not that she objected. She preferred having the kitchen to herself.

"A Carrel who cooks?" The tawny gaze slid mockingly to her, dancing over her face when she quickly averted her green eyes. "How did you learn such a skill, Liza?"

Elizabeth found it was difficult to respond naturally. She felt on the defensive and she didn't know whether to blame his taunting mockery or the hated abbreviation of her name. Perhaps it was simply an inability to feel at ease in Jed's presence.

"Actually I learned to cook as a child," she answered stiffly. "My aunt thought it was essential for me to learn, so I fixed a great many of our meals. After Jeremy and I were married, I naturally helped Maggie in the kitchen so I could learn how to prepare his favorite dishes. Later I simply helped out."

"Maggie's age was beginning to show at last," Rebecca inserted. "She was becoming increasingly slow and haphazard in her work. It was best that she retired when she did."

"Wasn't Maggie a year or two younger than you, Mother?" questioned Jed, a sharp glitter in his eyes.

"I really don't have any idea," his mother bridled visibly.

"Do you do the housework too, Elizabeth?"

The faint emphasis he placed on her proper name made it even more difficult to tolerate than the nickname. "Not all of it, no."

"We have a young girl come in two or three times a week to take care of the general cleaning and the washing," Rebecca explained.

"I like Mary," Amy spoke up, adding in a faintly adult note. "She's very nice."

"Do the Reisners still own the farm down the road?" Jed asked.

"Yes, they do. You went to school with Kurt, didn't you?" His mother glanced up to receive his answering nod. "He's taken over the farm from his father and his parents have moved into town. Why?"

"I thought I would stop over to see them tonight, that is,' there was a falsely courteous inclination of his tobacco brown head toward his mother, "if you'll let me use the car."

"There's a set of spare keys in the china cabinet," she agreed.

Elizabeth had to restrain herself from audibly sighing in relief. She hadn't been looking forward to an evening of stilted conversation. Despite the appearance of polite discussion, the atmosphere between mother and son was decidedly hostile. Her own inclination was to avoid Jed as much as she could. He had delved too deeply into her personal life, asking questions that were none of his business and laughing at her answers. Arm's length was not a far-enough distance.

The instant the evening meal was over, Jed excused himself and left to visit their neighbors, the Reisners. He hadn't returned by the time Elizabeth went to bed some time after ten o'clock. Although she lay awake in the double bed for nearly an hour, she didn't hear him come back.

The next morning Elizabeth discovered the coffee was already made when she entered the kitchen. Breakfast dishes for one were washed and sitting in the draining board beside the sink. Rebecca didn't get up that early in the morning, so the dishes could only be Jed's. But there was no sign of him in the house nor in the yard surrounding the house.

Not until she returned to the kitchen to fix toast and juice for herself did Elizabeth find the note he had left under the bowl of fruit on the small dinette table. Her fingers crossed in a fervent wish that Jed had decided to leave as abruptly as he had arrived. The boldly firm handwriting informed her that he would not be back for lunch, but made no mention of where he would be in the interim.

If he had gone visiting, the only logical place he could have gone at this early hour of the morning was to the Reisner farm again, Elizabeth decided. She wasn't aware that he and Kurt had been close friends, but if they had gone to school together, it was possible. The few times she had seen Kurt, he had made no mention of it, although most of the townspeople had been reluctant to introduce Jed's name into a conversation.