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Mallory nodded. “Diane,” she responded, already moving toward the stove. The kitchen was the heart of all island houses, and coffee was offered to every guest. Being a relative newcomer, Nathan had overlooked the gesture.
Diane seemed profoundly amused when Mallory raised the old-fashioned enamel coffeepot in question. “No, thanks,” she said in a soft but cutting voice, one manicured nail tapping expressively at the less provincial drink Mallory hadn’t noticed before. Diane’s gaze swung fondly to Nathan, moving over his impressive frame like a caress.
Nathan scowled and tossed a beleaguered look in Mallory’s direction that brought his earlier one-word appraisal of Diane swiftly to mind. Bitch.
Mallory smiled, and for a while at least, she was no longer afraid of this woman, no longer in awe of her beauty and her sophistication and her undeniable charm. “Nathan?” she asked, again indicating the coffeepot.
He nodded, and Mallory grinned as she filled his cup and set it before him.
“That’s bad for you!” Diane complained, frowning and reaching out to grasp Nathan’s arm.
Nathan pulled free, raised the cup to his lips and winked at his wife. “Allow me this one vice,” he said. “Since I’m temporarily denied my favorite.”
Mallory felt her face flush, but she didn’t look away. Nathan’s gaze lingered at her lips for a long moment, causing her a sweet, singular sort of discomfort.
“So,” Diane said, too cheerfully, “how is it that the notorious Ms. O’Connor isn’t cavorting before the cameras?”
Mallory felt strong and confident for the first time in weeks, though she couldn’t decide whether the quality had its roots in the long talk with Kate or the way Nathan was quietly making love to her with his eyes. Both, probably.
“The name is McKendrick,” she said pleasantly, with a slight lift of her chin.
Something changed in Nathan’s eyes; there was an earnest curiosity there, displacing the teasing hunger she’d noticed before.
Diane looked mildly upset. “I thought ‘O’Connor’ was your professional name,” she said in an argumentative tone.
“O’Connor was my maiden name,” Mallory replied sweetly, with a corresponding smile. “I am married, you know.”
Nathan raised one eyebrow, but he said nothing. He merely toyed with the handle of his coffee mug.
Diane was obviously at a loss, but she recovered quickly. Leveling her devastating blue eyes at Nathan, she seemed to forget that Mallory was even in the room. “What have you decided about that television special, Nathan? I think it would be great to go back to Australia again, don’t you? And the money is fantastic, even for you—”
Mallory suddenly felt bereft again, shut out. Those feelings intensified when she saw a sparkle in Nathan’s dark eyes. What was he remembering? The beautiful, awe-inspiring Australian countryside? Walks along moon-kissed beaches with a warm and willing Diane?
“The people are so friendly,” he mused aloud.
Especially the ones who wear Spandex jeans and lip gloss, Mallory thought bitterly.
Diane laughed with unrestrained glee and clapped her elegant hands together. Her whole face shone with appealing mischief as she smiled at Nathan. “I thought I would die when you were presented with that kangaroo!” she sang, and her voice rang like music in the simple, homey room.
Nathan grinned at the memory, but then his eyes strayed to Mallory, just briefly, and darkened with an emotion she couldn’t quite read.
“They gave you a kangaroo?” Mallory put in quickly, in an effort to join the conversation. “What did you do with it?”
He shrugged, and his gaze was fixed on some point just above Diane’s glowing head. “I gave it to the zoo.”
“And then there was that great Christmas Eve party,” Diane trilled, tossing a look of triumphant malice in Mallory’s direction. “My God, the sun was coming up before that broke up—”
Nathan frowned, clearly irritated by the mention of the holidays. Or was he warning Diane not to reveal too much? “Ho, ho, ho,” he grumbled.
Mallory lowered her eyes to her coffee cup. Her shooting schedule hadn’t permitted her to join Nathan at Christmas, and while they hadn’t discussed that fact in person, the subject had generated several scathing exchanges over long-distance telephone. She said nothing.
But Diane went mercilessly on. “You can’t imagine how odd it seemed, swimming outdoors on Christmas Day!” There followed a short, calculated pause. “What was it like here, Mallory!”
The shot hit dead center, and Mallory had to work up her courage before daring to glance at Nathan. His features were stiff with resentment, just as she’d feared.
“It was lonely,” she said in complete honesty.
Diane was on a roll, and she knew it. Cloaking her animosity in sweetness, she smiled indulgently. “Now, Mallory, don’t try to convince us that you sat at home and pined. Everybody knows what super parties Brad Ranner gives, and I read that you celebrated the holidays in a romantic ski lodge high in the Cascades.”
Mallory had forgotten the write-up she’d gotten in the supermarket scandal sheets over Christmas week. One had borne the headline, McKENDRICK MARRIAGE CRACKING, and linked Mallory to a country-and-western singer she’d never even met. Another had, just as Diane maintained, claimed that she had carried on an interesting intrigue in the mountains.
Neither claim was true, of course, but she still felt defensive and annoyed. Why did people buy those awful newspapers, anyway? If they wanted fiction, books were a better bet.
Diane giggled prettily. “No comment, huh? Is that what you told the reporters?”
Mallory clasped her hands together in her lap, felt the color drain from her face as she glared defiantly at Diane. She did not dare to look at Nathan. “I didn’t talk to any reporters,” she said stiffly, hating herself for explaining anything to this woman. Inwardly, she realized that she was actually explaining, left-handedly, the facts to her husband. “Those stories were utter lies, and you damned well know it, Diane.”
Diane sat back in her chair, apparently relaxed and unchallenged by Mallory’s words. She shrugged. “Sometimes they get lucky and print the truth,” she threw out.
Nathan’s voice was an icy, sudden rumble. “Shut up, Diane,” he said. “None of this is any of your business.”
A smile quirked one side of Diane’s glistening pink mouth. “They should have been watching you, shouldn’t they? I can just see the headlines now: ROCK STAR CAVORTS DOWN UNDER.”
Mallory flinched and bit her lower lip. She could feel Nathan’s rage rising in the room like lava swelling a volcano. Any minute, the eruption would come, and they’d all be buried in ash.
“How about this one?” he drawled, leaning toward Diane with ominous leisure. “PRESS AGENT FIRED.”
For the first time, Diane backed down. A girlish blush rose to pinken her classic cheekbones, and real tears gathered in her eyes. “I was only teasing,” she said. “Where did you spend Christmas, Mallory?”
“In Outer Slobovia, Diane,” Mallory replied acidly. “With fourteen midgets and a camel.”
Nathan roared with laughter, but Diane looked affronted. “We could get along if we tried, you know,” she scolded in a tone that implied crushing pain.
“I seriously doubt that,” Mallory retorted. “Why don’t you leave now?”
“Good idea,” Nathan said.
Diane bristled. “Nathan!”
Nathan smiled and stood up, gesturing for silence with both hands. “Now, now, Diane—no more gossip. After all, the camel isn’t here to defend itself.”
Diane flung one scorching look at Mallory and stormed out, slamming the kitchen door behind her. A moment later, the outer door slammed, too.
“Thank you,” Mallory whispered.
“Anytime,” Nathan said, sitting down again.
“Those stories about me—”
He reached out, cupped her chin in one hand. “I know, Mall. Forget it.”
Mallory couldn’t “forget it”; there was too much that needed to be said. “I was here, Nathan—right here, on the island. I spent Christmas Eve with Trish and Alex, and the next day with Kate Sheridan. I—”
His index finger moved to rest on her lips. “It’s all right, Mallory.”
She drew back from him, more stung by some of the things Diane had implied than she would have admitted. “What did you do over Christmas, Nathan?”
He looked away. “I drank a lot.”
“No Christmas tree?”
“No Christmas tree.”
Mallory sighed wistfully. “I didn’t put one up, either. But Trish had a lovely one—”
Suddenly, Nathan was staring at her. She knew he was thinking of the beautiful tree ornaments she’d collected in every part of the world, of the way she shopped and fussed for weeks before Christmas every year, of the way she always threw herself into the celebration with the unbridled enthusiasm of a child. “No tree?” he echoed in a stunned voice that was only part mockery. “No presents?”
Mallory had received a number of gifts—a silk blouse from Kate, books from Trish and Alex, a gold chain from Nathan’s sister Pat—but she saw no point in listing them aloud. The package Nathan had sent was still stored in a guest room closet at the Seattle penthouse, unopened.
She lifted her coffee cup in a sort of listless toast. “Just call me Scrooge,” she said.
3
Fortunately, Nathan dropped the touchy subject of that Christmas just past—the first Christmas since their marriage that the McKendricks had spent apart—and said instead, “Your turn to cook, woman.”
Mallory glanced at the small electric clock hanging on the wall near the telephone, and started guiltily. Lunchtime was long past. “And cook I will,” she replied.
In the next few minutes, Mallory discovered that her husband had done a remarkable job grocery shopping; the cupboards were full. She was humming as she assembled sandwiches and heated soup, regardless of the fact that she had absolutely no appetite.
While Mallory labored over that simple midday repast, Nathan fidgeted at the table. He looked almost relieved when the telephone rang, and moved to answer it with a swiftness that injured his wife. Was it so hard for him to talk to her that he was grateful for any excuse to avoid it?
“Hello,” he muttered, and then, as Mallory watched, she saw him turn his back to her, saw the powerful muscles stiffen beneath his shirt. “Yes, Mrs. Jeffries,” he said in a low voice. “Yes, Diane is supposed to stay there. The band is coming, too—they’ll all be there before nightfall, I suppose. No, get extra help if you need it—”
Mallory set the sandwich plates down on the table with an eloquent thunk and whirled angrily to ladle hot soup into two bowls. Nathan was talking to his housekeeper, giving her orders to make Diane Vincent and the others comfortable in the sprawling Spanish-style villa on the other side of the island. His villa.
“Damn!” she muttered. She should have known that there would be no private time for the McKendricks—Diane and the band would see to that.
“Right,” Nathan said, turning to scowl at Mallory, as though reading her inhospitable thoughts. “Hell, I don’t care. Whatever’s in the freezer—”
“What?” Mallory grumbled. “No lobster? No filet mignon?”
“Shut up!” Nathan rasped, and then he colored comically and glared at Mallory. “No, Mrs. Jeffries,” he said into the telephone receiver, “I wasn’t talking to you. Well, they usually bring their wives, don’t they?”
“Whip out the satin sheets!” Mallory said, gesturing wildly with a soup spoon in one hand and a tuna fish sandwich in the other.
Nathan gave his wife an evil look and then grinned. “Oh, and one more thing, Mrs. Jeffries—put satin sheets on all the beds.”
Mallory stuck out her tongue and sank into her chair at the table with as much visible trauma as she could manage.
Clearly, Nathan was enjoying her tantrum. She knew that she was behaving like a child but couldn’t seem to stop. He ended the conversation with an additional order, meant to make his wife seethe. “We’ll need lots of towels for the hot tub, too.”
“We’ll need lots of towels for the hot tub, too!” Mallory mimicked sourly. “God forbid that Diane Vincent should have to drip-dry!”
Nathan was chuckling as he bid his housekeeper farewell and hung up. “Mellow out, Mall,” he teased, grasping the back of his own chair in both hands and tilting his magnificent head to one side in a mischievous manner. “I’m not planning an orgy, you know.”
“Why should you?” Mallory shot back. “The stage is already set for one!”
Nathan’s eyes darkened, and the mischief faded from their depths, displaced by impatience. His voice was a sardonic drawl, and he made no move to sit down and share the lunch he’d all but ordered Mallory to prepare. “This is enlightening. I didn’t think you gave a damn what went on at Angel Cove. You so rarely condescend to put in an appearance!”
Mallory swallowed miserably, all her saucy defiance gone. It was true that she avoided the magnificent house at Angel Cove—there were always too many people there, and there was always too much noise. “Sit down and eat,” she said in a small voice.
Surprisingly, Nathan sat down. There was a short, awkward pause while he assessed the canned soup and slap-dash sandwiches. The fare was no doubt much more appetizing at Angel Cove.
Mallory mourned, feeling wearier than ever, as she dragged her spoon listlessly through her soup. She felt Nathan’s gaze touch her, and involuntarily looked up.
“You didn’t decorate a Christmas tree?” he asked incredulously.
There was no point in trying to skirt the issue; she had known it would come up again. She swallowed the pain that still lingered from that lonely holiday and answered the question honestly. “No.”
“You?” Nathan pressed, no trace of his earlier irritation showing in his handsome, sensitive features.
Mallory nodded. “As far as I’m concerned, Christmas just didn’t happen this year.”
His eyes searched her face. “What about the things I sent? Did you get the package?”
Mallory managed a stiff smile. “I put them in one of the guest rooms, in a closet,” she said, thinking of the large parcel she hadn’t had the heart to open. “You got your gifts, didn’t you? I mailed early—”
“Good Lord,” Nathan breathed, shaking his head. It was clear that he either hadn’t heard her question about the carefully chosen gifts she’d sent to him or didn’t mean to answer. “Which closet?”
Mallory shrugged, though nonchalance was the last thing she felt. “You are a man of many closets,” she remarked lamely.
“Mallory.”
She frowned at him. “The room Pat sleeps in when she stays at the penthouse.”
Nathan looked thoughtful, and a long silence followed. Finally, when both husband and wife had finished pretending to eat, he stood up, scraping his chair against the linoleum floor as he moved. “I don’t think you’re up to greeting the band,” he said in a voice that was gruff and tender at the same time. “Not tonight, at least.”
I’ll bet you were counting on that, Mallory thought, but she only nodded, relieved that she could deposit the remains of her lunch in Cinnamon’s bowl and spend some time gathering her scattered thoughts and emotions. “Say hello for me,” she mumbled, holding back tears as Nathan bent to brush her cheek briefly with his lips.
When he was gone, Mallory ambled aimlessly into the living room where she went through the contents of several bookshelves and found nothing she wanted to read. She was being stubborn and stupid, and she knew it. Damn, anybody with any guts at all would have gone over to the villa on the other side of the island and—
And what?
Mallory flung out her arms and cried out with self-mocking drama, “God, I’m so depressed!”
There was no answer, of course, but Mallory’s gaze fell on the video recorder hooked up to her portable television set, and she remembered her favorite remedy for depression—old Jimmie Stewart movies.
Five minutes later, she was curled up on the sofa, immersed in the opening, snowy scenes of It’s a Wonderful Life.
