Miracle

  “Do you know this area of the state very well?” he asked, shifting gears as the road twisted above a panorama of sandy inlets and granite jutting into the ocean among white breakers.

  “We’re not far from Monterey.”

  “A fishing village?”

  “Only for fishermen who have lots of clams. It’s beautiful and expensive. Why?”

  “Would you like to spend the night there? We could finish the trip tomorrow in only a few hours.”

  The thought made her dizzy. She was ready to walk off the edge of the world if he asked, and it disturbed her. She had no idea what to expect from him. He could vanish tomorrow. Hadn’t she learned anything in the past ten years about self-defense?

  She lifted her chin and stared straight ahead. “That’d be fine. There are some terrific inns … old Victorian mansions. Would something like that suit you?”

  “Certainly. Would it suit you?”

  “Sure.” She slumped under the weight of deciphering the situation and asked bluntly, “Is this an indecent proposal? If it isn’t, I’m really embarrassed, but if it is, I’m not ready for it.”

  “I didn’t think so. I was going to suggest separate rooms.”

  Pleased, she laughed and patted his shoulder, loving the excuse to touch him. “I’m glad we got that settled. Miss Manners would be proud of me.”

  He took her hand and kissed it. “No need to be embarrassed. My indecent proposal will be waiting whenever you’d like it.”

  The storybook inn overlooking Monterey Bay was a romantic place, which taunted her anxieties and made her angry that they were necessary. The strain of being with Sebastien reduced the breathless exhilaration of the early hours to a brooding confusion that made her head hurt.

  She didn’t regret being with him, whether it was foolish or not. But she was exhausted from the emotional shock, and when she looked into his weary face she knew that he felt the same way. They didn’t talk much at dinner. The beautiful but formal Victorian dining room didn’t encourage intimate conversation. A wall of windows framed an ocean burnished with the sunset, which she examined to avoid looking at Sebastien.

  At twilight they took a walk along the narrow strip of rocky beach below the inn, still silent, side by side but not touching. She knew, though, that he was vividly aware of her, as she was of him, and when they returned to the inn she couldn’t help but take his face between her hands and kiss him lightly. “Good night.” It was absurdly inadequate, but she was too full of emotion to say more.

  He pulled her to him and held her for a long time, one hand stroking her hair. “I never forgot you, Miracle. Please believe that.”

  She stepped back from him, her head up, dignity building a wall between them. “I’m glad you’re here and we’re together. I’ve never regretted what happened between us ten years ago. It changed my whole life, and it was wonderful, and I never met any other man who made me feel the way you did. But I’m not going to let you hurt me again, if I can help it. Hell, I probably can’t help it, but I’ll try.”

  He lifted a hand to her face, touched her with his fingertips, dissolved her dignity. “Go and rest, now. I’m just happy that I found you. I can take care of your problems, in time.”

  “I’m not used to being taken care of.”

  He smiled, but there was challenge in his eyes. “You’ll learn.”

  They walked through the cool, empty rooms, and she thought how the stone cottage suited him with its mixture of warmth and aloofness. A huge window in the main room captured the hills covered in trellises. Everything had the new green color of spring. Beginnings.

  “I see why you love it,” she said.

  He stood beside her at the window, looking from the view to her. She liked the serenity she saw in his eyes. “It will never be a grand or self-important place,” he told her. “Just comfortable.”

  He showed her a spacious room with nothing but a bed, a nightstand, and a dresser. The bed was simply a large mattress and springs on a metal frame, with a plain quilt and white-cased pillows. “My guest bedroom. For you.” He glanced at the purse she carried, his expression droll. “Put your luggage wherever you like.”

  She studied the novels stacked on the nightstand and the bottle of cologne atop the dresser, plus the open closet door that revealed his suits. “I suspect, sir, that this is not only the guest bedroom, but the only bedroom.” They hadn’t discussed the arrangements before. They hadn’t even discussed how long she was going to stay. It was something they both knew, that she would stay.

  “I’ll sleep upstairs,” he said quickly. “There’s an attic room with an old couch in it.”

  “My guilt level just skyrocketed, Doc. For heaven’s sake, let me sleep on the musty, dirty, saggy old couch.” She put her hands on her hips. “That’s the polite thing to say, but I mean it, too. I insist.”

  “No. You sleep in my bed,” he ordered mildly.

  “Aw, Doc …”

  “That way you’ll think about me. If you sleep on the couch, you’ll think about bats.”

  “There are bats up there?”

  “Yes.”

  She tossed her purse on his bed. “My guilt just faded.” Smiling at him, she asked, “Is there any place around here to shop for clothes? I’d like to buy a second pair of panties and a cheap sundress.”

  “There’s a small town a few miles from here. I’ll take you—but only if you let me buy.”

  “I don’t want you to buy me a town.”

  He gave her a bewildered look, then caught the joke and smiled broadly. “It’s marvelous to have you here. I see why you’re making a good career as a comedienne.”

  “Oh, stop flattering me. You already paid for everything else on this jaunt, outfoxing me at the inn when we checked out this morning, grabbing restaurant checks. You’re slick, Doc, and I don’t approve. So thanks, but—”

  “Amy, when you’re with me, your money is no good. I know that you don’t have much, not if you’re paying for your father’s nursing care. I know what it costs to live in California, too. So we’ll go shopping for some clothes, something better than a cheap sundress. And I’ll pay.”

  She shook her fists at him and started to protest, but he cut her off. “I have money. I was born with it, and I’ll always have it. It’s not meant to impress or manipulate, only to make life easier. If you want to use my money, good. Enjoy it. I approve of noble independence, but not pointless sacrifice.”

  “You gave me money ten years ago because it was easier than giving yourself! That’s why I don’t want your money now!”

  He grasped her fists and pulled her off balance, then lifted her on tiptoe and kissed her until she was breathless. He set her back down and examined her confusion solemnly. “You can have me, but until you make up your mind about whether or not you like that prospect I think you’ll be happier just taking my money. Mon dieu! If I wanted to buy a woman’s affection I’d do it with a great deal more expense.” He hesitated, arching a dark brow mischievously. “Would you like a diamond necklace?”

  “A sundress. Panties. Read my lips.”

  “Hmmm. Later, when you’re less argumentative.”

  They went shopping. Because he was impossible to thwart, they returned with bags full of clothes, plus toothbrushes, deodorant, and all the other items a woman might need to stay indefinitely with a man who, it seemed, intended to keep her.

  It was so easy to talk to him about the unimportant subjects. Barefooted, wearing a blue chambray sundress with tiny straps at the shoulders, she felt like a happy peasant in his one respectably furnished room, the kitchen. She followed him around the quaint old place, among dried herbs, pots, pans, piles of vegetables, and the scent of chicken roasting for dinner.

  She made certain that it wasn’t obvious that she was following him; she was careful to find little chores to do that happened to be next to whatever he was doing. But she noticed, when she crossed the room for some reason, that he found tasks that moved them close together again. br />
  “Would you like a glass of wine?” he asked, going to a rack of bottles that covered one wall.

  She had already perused the rack enough to know that it held a mixture of local wines and de Savin vintages. “Have you got the de Savin Pinot Noir, 1987?”

  The look he gave her contained surprise, and then fascination. “You have studied the de Savin wines?”

  It was the kind of opportunity she’d imagined in her daydreams years before. Speaking in slow but excellent French, she gave a list of the best wines from his family’s label. Then she bowed.

  He came to her and cupped her face between his hands. “Did you learn all of this because of me?”

  She shivered with emotion; there was no point in playing games. “Yes. In school I studied French, and made good grades, and did everything else I could to make you proud of me.”

  “But why did you sell the Ferrari I gave you?” He looked at her somberly.

  “Who told you about that?”

  “Pio Beaucaire. You remember him, he managed the winery.”

  “But how would he know?”

  “He was spying on you.”

  “You told him to spy on me?”

  “No. He did it because … never mind why, right now.”

  Her shoulders slumped. “My folks needed money. That’s why I sold the car. I loved that car. I could feel you around me when I drove it.”

  “Miracle, I should have known. I apologize.”

  “You figured I wanted the money to play with, didn’t you?”

  “Pio made it sound like that, yes.”

  “And you believed him. You were angry at me.”

  “Yes, but you were young. And it was a gift without strings, I told myself.”

  “Young and backward, and who could expect a hick to appreciate such a gift, right?”

  He shook her lightly. “Stop it! I never thought of you as a hick! I don’t care what happened to the stupid car. One of the reasons I gave it to you was so you’d have it to sell if you needed the money.”

  “Okay, Doc, if you say so. Let’s change the subject.” She forced a smile. Hidden behind it was the dark realization that the past was catching up with the present, slowly but surely.

  She slept hard for a few hours, then woke in a sweat and bolted out of bed. Standing in the darkness of Sebastien’s bedroom, she gulped for air and finally recalled where she was. She stared at the ceiling, thinking of Sebastien, upstairs.

  Grabbing the bed’s quilt, she wrapped it around her T-shirt and panties; she padded down the hall and out a back door that opened onto the veranda. She loved the back veranda with its rough stone floor and weathered roof supports. Going to one of the posts, she leaned against it and gazed up at a half-moon high above the vineyard. She hugged herself and tried to calm down.

  “It won’t do any good,” Sebastien said behind her.

  She whipped around. He stood at the veranda’s far end. The moonlight showed that he was dressed in loose khaki trousers, and nothing else. “You have questions to ask. You can’t sleep. Neither can I.”

  “There’s so much we never knew about each other. And I don’t understand why you looked for me again. As if I’d meant a lot to you.”

  “I hate the unhappiness in your voice.”

  “Not unhappiness: shock. I haven’t had time to get my bearings.”

  “There’s all the time in the world. But the important thing is that you want to know more about me, as I want to know about you, and you came away with me without looking back. Ten years might never have passed. We had a bond immediately.”

  “It makes me feel like I’m eighteen again, hanging on every word you say, doing whatever you want, but I’m not eighteen, and I’m not naive … reckless and impulsive, yes, but naive, no.”

  She told herself that she had no right to be upset, since he’d never promised her anything when he left ten years ago and had, in fact, been exceptionally wonderful to her, except, of course, for not loving her. But she was angry at him for not loving her then, and for acting now as though he had loved her.

  “I’ve brought a lot of complications into your life,” he said, looking troubled. “And there are questions we must ask each other, very honestly, about the past. They shouldn’t be allowed to spoil the present.”

  “I don’t want to talk tonight. I’m not sure I want to hear the answers yet.”

  “I’m not anxious to hear them myself. But it’s necessary. Come. We’ll take a walk and—”

  “No. Please. I’m afraid I’d say the wrong thing.”

  “I remember when you would say exactly how you felt to me. I liked the openness.”

  “I had nothing to lose. I knew you didn’t love me the way I loved you. I never thought I was worthy of being loved so much. But I am.”

  “I know. I’ve always known, even when you didn’t.”

  She made a ragged sound. “It nearly killed me when you left for West Africa. I used to pray you’d write to me, or call me sometimes, even just to see if I was wasting the money you’d given me. But you never did. Why not, if you cared about me so much?”

  “I was a fool. I wanted you to be strong and independent, and I feared that I’d hurt you if I let you depend on me at all, even in the small ways. I was so full of pride, and so certain I knew what was best for both of us.” He stepped forward. The moonlight showed the restraint in his expression.

  Sebastien took her in his arms, then held her with his head bent close to hers while his hands moved swiftly over her, stroking, soothing. She felt his chest moving in a harsh rhythm against her cheek. And when he whispered in her ear, his voice was filled with anguish. “Because of my pride, other people were able to come between us. I’m sorry, Miracle.” His embrace became a fierce hold.

  Did he learn about Jeff and me? she wondered suddenly. Oh, God, if that surfaced now to hurt her and Sebastien, she’d never forgive herself. She struggled to think calmly. Perhaps he meant Marie. “It wasn’t your fault,” she offered in a careful voice. “Maybe it was just too soon for us to be together. I made mistakes, too.”

  “It was so long ago. What I remember now are the joys, the way you made me laugh … and cry. It was good to cry.”

  Sorrow burst from her with a soft exclamation. “Oh, how much I’ve missed you over the years, and thought about you, and tried to be the kind of person you could love—”

  “And you saved my life, more than once. Look. Look, Amy.” He put a hand into his pants pocket and withdrew a necklace that caught the silver of the light.

  She stared at the long silver chain he held up. From it dangled a battered silver coin of some kind. “What is it?”

  “Remember the day I saw you perform magic tricks at a festival in the mountains? And you used a video-game token to show me—”

  “You kept it? This is it?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you wore it?”

  “Yes. I need to tell you about it.”

  She sank into a wooden chair. He settled by her feet on the veranda’s edge and looked up at her steadily as he talked. She listened in stunned silence as he told her how the token had saved him from a knife wound in Africa, how he’d kept it in the years afterward, how he’d tried to throw it away, and how, finally, it had turned up at the moment that he needed the memory of her most. She was crying softly when he finished.

  He stood up and pulled her up with him. “When I was in Africa I planned to come back to the States and see you. Except for wounded pride, I would have. It was very hard for me to appreciate the kind of emotions you made me feel. It was easier to repress them. I wasn’t capable of showing or accepting love. Now I’m trying very hard to change that.”

  Tremors ran through her, through them both. “You were planning to come back for me?”

  “Yes. I swear it. If I’d been open about my feelings for you, you would have known, then no one would have been able to take you away.”

  Jeff. He had found out about her and Jeff, that one terrible n
ight they’d spent together. Had it angered him so much that he’d decided not to come back for her? The question tormented Amy, but she was afraid to ask it.

  “Forgive me,” he whispered.

  Amy looked up at him in wonder. “For what?”

  “I had trained myself to be callous, and I lost you because of it.” He searched her face for answers. She saw the quiet desperation in his. “I hope that I didn’t lose you forever, Amy. I know we have a lot to learn about each other, but being with you feels so right, so necessary.”

  She let her question about Jeff dissolve. Why dredge that up? A fierce sense of protectiveness surged through her. Nothing mattered except that Sebastien had wanted to find her again, that he’d kept the old video token as if it were sacred, and that he’d never forgotten her. She put her arms around him and struggled to speak. Mended dreams were filling her throat. “You didn’t lose me, Doc. I was just misplaced.”

  His slow caresses wound through her veins like a river of silk, sinking her into the bed because her muscles had become heavy with desire. He was patient as he conquered each small kingdom of her body with his fingertips and the languid exploration of his hands.

  She tilted her head back on the pillow, strained gently upward into each caress, felt her breasts aching, swollen, waiting to receive his hands again, his mouth again, as every other part of her had already been blessed. The rhythmic throbbing between her legs became fiercer as he returned there.

  Reaching for him, she sang for him with her body, a fine instrument responding to a virtuoso’s care, now stretching to its peak, the crescendo welling into his mouth as he kissed her and drank her moans. Her welcome brought hard words of devotion from him, tormented words straight from whatever hell had trapped them until now. She took him, held him with tears on her face, hugged him with her legs both to comfort and invite.