“I know,” Will said tiredly. “You’re a scout from Eastern.”
“You knew?” Valerie said, dropping her arm from Will’s shoulders.
“Well, then, we can put our cards on the table,” Donald said. “I’ve just offered Ms. Borden a very generous contract, but she insists on giving you the opportunity to match it.”
Will looked at Valerie for a moment and men turned back to the table.
“She’s yours,” he said.
“Ouch,” Kate said, and even Jake winced a little.
“What?” Valerie said. She moved her hand to Will’s shoulder and pulled him back in his chair to face her.
“Go with my blessing,” Will said, patting her hand once and then prying it off his shoulder.
“What about us?” Valerie said, clenching her teem.
“What ‘us’?” Will said. “Hey, don’t think I’d stand in your way on something like this. I wish you all the luck in the world. Eastern is the big time. Go for it.” He turned back to Nancy and said, “So, do you agree with this ordering idea?”
“Absolutely,” Nancy said, keeping a wary eye on Valerie. “Do we need to sign anything?”
“Naw,” Will said. “We operate on trust around here.”
“Trust?” Valerie said, her voice rising to a shriek.
“Trust? Three lousy years, and all I get is ‘Good luck,’ and you call that trust?”
Will turned back to her. “Oh, come on, Valerie,” he began, and then she picked up his beer mug and threw the contents of it in his face.
“I thought so,” Nancy said and slipped out of her chair to get a towel.
“Hey,” Jake said, getting up, but Kate caught his arm and pulled him back down.
“Will’s a big boy, and he got himself into this,” she told him. “He can get himself out.”
“Don’t bother with two weeks’ notice,” Will was saying quietly to Valerie while he dripped on the floor. “Just leave me an address so I can forward your mail.”
“Just like that,” Valerie said.
“Val, it was always just like that,” Will said. He took the towel Nancy handed him and blotted the beer off his face. “I thought you knew that. You never asked for anything else.”
“What do you mean, ‘He got himself into this’?” Jake said to Kate.
“They lived together for three years,” Kate said. “Obviously there were expectations there.”
“Three years,” Valerie said with venom. “I thought—”
“No, you didn’t,” Will said. “I never told you I loved you, and you never told me. The one thing we had going for us was honesty. Don’t blow that now. Go off with Prescott and have the career you’ve always wanted. This place was too small for you, anyway. You’ve always hated it.”
“You won’t forget me,” Valerie said.
“That’s for sure,” Will said, and turned back to the table.
Valerie turned and walked away, with Donald Prescott trailing in her wake.
“Sorry about that,” Will said. “Now where were we?”
“What do you mean, ‘expectations’?” Jake asked Kate.
“Do you want to fight about this?” Kate said.
“Oh, hell,” Will said. “Don’t. It’s over. Why should you fight about it? Personally, I’m relieved.”
“I know you are,” Kate snapped. “It’s the worst thing I know about you.”
“Hey,” Jake said. “He didn’t ask for any of this.”
“Yes, he did,” Nancy said. “I’ve got no time for Valerie, but she got screwed on this.”
“Feel free to discuss my personal life,” Will said.
“You owed her more than ‘She’s yours’ after three years,” Kate said.
“He did not,” Jake said. “Stay out of this.”
“She’s hurt,” Kate said. She looked over at Will. “It wasn’t kind.”
“I don’t believe this,” Jake said angrily.
“Being kind to Valerie,” Will explained, “is a waste of time. She only hears what she wants to hear unless you’re so blunt that you’re rude.”
“Maybe,” Kate said. “But that was brutal.”
Will looked over at Nancy and she nodded.
“Okay,” Will sighed and stood. “I’ll apologize.”
“Are you out of your mind?” Jake said.
“I didn’t say I’d take her back,” Will said. “It won’t hurt me to say I was a jerk. Maybe I was. We were together for three years. Maybe she deserves a better goodbye.”
“No, she doesn’t,” Jake said. “She’s a bitch. She tried to run Nancy out of business and you into marriage. She deserves exactly what she got.”
“Nobody deserves what she got,” Kate said.
Jake glared at her, and she glared back.
“Well, at the least the two of you are communicating,” Will said with a slow grin. “That’s more than Val and I ever did.”
“Communication like this, I don’t need,” Jake said, and pushed his chair back.
“Where are you going?” Kate asked.
“Away from you,” Jake said and stalked off toward the bar. Will shook his head and followed him, saying something to him and slapping him on the back before he went out the door to find Valerie.
“What’s wrong with Jake?” Nancy asked. “He never gets mad, and now he’s been tense all night.”
“We’ve had a bad day,” Kate said. “I’m leaving day after tomorrow, and we have a few things to work out. Such as whether we’re ever going to see each other again.”
“Day after tomorrow?” Nancy sat back in her chair. “So soon?”
“Well, I have this career,” Kate said. “It’s not much, but it keeps me in French Provincial furniture and Kentucky vacations.”
Nancy looked unhappy. “When are you coming back?”
Kate sighed. “From the looks of Jake at the moment, never.”
“He’s not that dumb,” Nancy said. “He’ll get over it.”
Kate looked over at Jake, hunched over the bar, his whole body still tense with anger. “Not any time soon,” she said. “Not unless I do something about it.”
“Well, do something about it,” Nancy said. “He may be a big enough fool to throw what you’ve got away, but you’re not.” When Kate didn’t answer, she stole a glance at her. “Are you?”
Kate stared at Jake’s back. “No,” she said. “I surely am not.”
At ten, Jake took Kate home in silence.
“Come down to the lake with me,” she said.
“I’m tired.”
“No, you’re not.” Kate could feel her temper rise. “You’re mad at me because of what Valerie did. That’s dumb. Come down to the lake with me.”
“No.” He kissed her on the cheek. “Good night.”
“Fine.” She got out of the car and slammed the door. “But I’m going. And when you find my poor drowned body in the morning, you’ll have no one but yourself to blame.”
She started down the path, and after a few moments she heard him behind her.
Damn right, she thought. I’ll teach you to sulk, buddy.
Kate kicked off her shoes and threw her hat on the shore, and then she pushed the boat into the water and climbed in. Jake caught the prow just as she picked up the oars.
“Where are you going?”
“The willow. I want to see it at night.”
He climbed in. “Give me the oars, or we’ll be out here all night.”
When they got there, Jake rested on the oars without tying the boat up. “How long do you need to look at the willow?”
“Not long.” She stood up in the boat and took off her vest.
“Oh, hell. Not now, Kate,” Jake said. “Sit down. You’re going to tip us over.”
“The thing is,” Kate said, ignoring him, “if I were a man I’d be straightforward about this and just say, ‘Jake, you’re being a real jerk about this because I am not and never have been either Valerie or Tiffany, and you have no right or rea
son to assume I ever will be.’”
She stripped off her tank top, and the motion made the boat rock a little.
“Very funny,” Jake said. “Sit down, damn it.” He reached up to pull her down and she stepped back, making the boat rock even more.
“Furthermore, you know as well as I do that Valerie had a point back there in the bar. You just don’t want to admit it. If I were a man, I’d point out that that makes you a duplicitous jerk.”
“Hey,” Jake said.
“But I’m not a man,” Kate continued. “I’m a woman. So instead of confronting you with the truth, I will manipulate you into a better mood by taking off my clothes and seducing you.”
She unzipped her skirt, pulled it up over her torso, and threw it in the bottom of the boat.
“Kate, it’s not going to work. I’m not in the mood.”
Then she stretched in the moonlight, dressed only in her black lace bra and bikini panties, and he gave up.
“That’s dangerous,” he said.
“Stretching in a boat?”
“That, too,” he said, and she knew she had him.
Kate grinned at him. “I knew you’d come around. We women always get our men by manipulation.” She unhooked the front clasp of her bra and started to pull it open, but then she stopped. “No,” she said virtuously. “This is wrong. It’s wrong to manipulate men, even if they are behaving like morons.” She hooked her bra again.
“Kate,” Jake began.
“No, I’m going to handle this the right way,” she said, her hands on her hips, looking down at him sternly, “The manly way. I’m just going to tell you frankly and honestly that you’re a jerk and make you row me back to shore.”
“Right,” Jake said, and grabbed her arm, jerking her down on top of him. The boat rocked wildly, and she shrieked and held on to him.
He ran his hands up her back. “You didn’t really want to go back to shore, did you?” he asked.
“Of course not,” Kate said. “I’m not the moron in this boat.” She relaxed as the boat stopped rocking and began to bite him on the earlobe.
“I’ve been wondering how you were going to kill me,” he said conversationally as she straddled him and unbuttoned his shirt. “The other guys got pushed over cliffs and kicked by horses. Me, you’re going to kill with sex.”
She moved down to unzip his jeans and pull them off, and he ran his hands along her sides as she balanced above him.
“Where do you get all this fancy underwear?” He ran his fingertips across the lace. “Do you belong to some kind of club?”
She bent to kiss his chest, and he unhooked her bra, pulling it down over her arms and then running his fingers lightly over her skin, cupping her breasts.
Kate eased away from him, her tongue moving slowly down across his stomach, feeling his muscles there tense under her lips.
“Kate?”
She dug her fingernails into his sides and moved her mouth between his legs, stroking her tongue across him and nibbling on his thighs. “Kate!” He laced his fingers in her hair as she took him in her mouth. She heard him gasp and felt his fingers tighten in her hair, and then she thought only of him, moving against her tongue, growing hard in her mouth. She forgot the moonlight and the lake and everything but Jake.
A few minutes later, she felt his hands reaching down to drag her, gasping, across his body.
“Oh, God, Kate,” he said, drawing a ragged breath.
“You still complaining?” she whispered.
“Me? No.” He pulled her pants down over her thighs and stroked her until she moaned. She pulled away from him and kicked her pants off, and then eased herself down onto him, straddling his body in the moonlight, crying out a little as he thrust up to meet her. She swayed, and he braced her hips with his hands to keep her erect so he could watch her, and she moved over him until the rocking of the boat against the water blended with the rocking of her against him.
“You’re silver in the moonlight.” He ran his hands across her skin. “I’m going to remember you forever like this. You’re burned in my brain.”
She looked down at him, and she swelled with so much heat and love for him that she was dizzy. I’m going to love him until I die, she thought Who have I been kidding? The hell with a plan. This is all there is.
“Come down here.” His hands were hard on her as he urged her down. “Come down to me before you lose control and hurt yourself.”
She shook her head. “I’m not ready yet.”
“Want to bet?” He shifted his hips, rolling against her, over and over until she gasped as the first wave of her orgasm hit her. He arched up to catch her as she fell against him, holding her tightly to him as the spasms took her, pulsing up into her to keep her moaning his name, until she was finally quiet in his arms.
Then, holding her hips against his, he rolled over and moved into her as if he were part of her, finding the rhythm of her blood, and she felt herself drowning again, felt the tension build and her muscles clench as he moved with deliberate slowness inside her. The pressure made her blood pound, and she moved to ease the need, only to burn with more. He slammed his hips against hers, moving faster and faster, plunging into her until she thought she’d break. “Don’t stop,” she cried, but he was beyond her voice now, and when she writhed under him as she came, he whispered her name and thrust hard into her one last time. From far away she heard a sharp crack, and then he moved against her again and shuddered in her arms, and she wrapped her arms tighter around him and held him as he fought for his breath.
“I’ve never had anything like this, Jake,” she whispered. “Not like this that I have with you.”
He kissed her slowly. “You’re a miracle.” His lips moved over her, tasting her. “You’re going to kill me, but you’re a miracle just the same.”
She laughed weakly, exhausted to the marrow of her bones.
“You’re such a wimp,” she said from beneath him, her voice muffled in his shoulder. He felt so good on top of her that she didn’t want to ever move.
“Tell my mother I thought of her at the end,” Jake said into her hair.
“You thought of your mother just now?”
“I meant at the end of my life. Don’t tell her we were doing this.”
“You’re not dying, you big baby.” She rolled her head back and realized that they weren’t under the willow anymore. Jake hadn’t tied the boat up, and they’d drifted to the middle of the lake.
“This is pretty,” she said. “Look at the moon.”
Gradually she realized there was something wrong.
“Jake, have you noticed the wet spot is bigger than usual?”
“Hmm.”
“Jake, I’m all wet.”
“I don’t care,” he said into her neck. “I’m not making love to you again tonight. I have to be able to walk around tomorrow.”
“Not that kind of wet.” She pushed him off her and sat up. “The boat is leaking.”
“What?” He put his hand between the cushions where her hip had been. The boat was filling with water. “I knew I heard something crack a while back. I thought it was my spine. Thank God, it’s just the boat.”
“Just the boat?” Kate grabbed her tank top and pulled it on over her head.
“I was wrong.” He lay back against the cushions, exhausted and happy. “You’re not going to kill me with sex. You’re going to drown me.”
“Jake, the boat is going down.”
“So did you.” He smiled at her in the moonlight. “Have I mentioned that was great?”
She grabbed the front of his shirt and shook him. “Jake!”
He sat up slowly. “What do you want me to do? Sing ‘Nearer, My God, to Thee’?”
“You, fool,” she said and started to laugh. “Where’s my underwear? It cost a fortune.”
There was a good two inches of water in the boat now and it was sinking faster. Jake fished around and handed her underpants and bra to her.
“Here. I do
n’t know where your skirt is.”
“I can’t swim in it anyway.” Kate grabbed for her vest. “I don’t believe this.”
He reached for his pants. “It was a good old boat. I’m going to miss it.”
“You’re going to go down with it if we don’t get out of here.” Kate rolled over the side of the boat and into the water.
“I found your skirt,” he said.
“Jake!”
“Will you relax?” He rolled over the side to join her, holding a bundle of his pants and her skirt. He still had his cowboy hat on, she noticed.
I’m in love with a lunatic, she thought. Boy, am I in love.
By the time they swam to shore, the boat was gone.
She wondered if that was symbolic of their relationship, and shivered. The timing was definitely right. Because great sex notwithstanding, she could feel a sense of impending doom. It hadn’t been pretty in the bar tonight. And they still hadn’t talked about the future.
Maybe because they didn’t have one.
She looked over at Jake, who was staring out at the lake where his boat had died. She didn’t want to talk about it tonight. She knew it was cowardly of her, but she wanted one more warm night with him before they faced reality.
He glanced over and saw her staring at him. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” she said and put on her underpants.
“You killed my boat,” Jake said, putting on his. His jeans were wet so he threw them over his shoulder with her skirt.
“I’m not the one who pounded on the boards until they broke,” Kate said. “In fact, I feel a deep kinship with that boat. I know just how it feels.”
“Well, it died in a good cause.” Jake put his arm around her. “Let’s go back to the cabin before somebody catches us out here in our underwear.”
Mark and Penny were sitting on the cabin steps when they got back.
“You’re probably wondering about the underwear,” Jake said.
“Not me,” Mark said, looking at Kate’s legs as she went past him into the cabin.
“I am,” Penny said, and Mark put his hand over her mouth.
“No, she isn’t,” he said.
“You get a raise, kid,” Jake said, and followed Kate inside. “Mark and Penny?” he asked her when the door was closed and they’d stripped off their wet clothing.