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“Well, hello there.” She ruffled his ears. “Where did you come from?”
“From two blocks down, at a dead run.” Panting, Brady walked out of the shadows. “I made the mistake of taking him to the office today. When I went to put him in the car, he decided to take a hike.” He paused in front of the glider. “Are you going to punch me again, or can I sit down?”
Vanessa continued to pet the dog. “I probably won’t hit you again.”
“That’ll have to do.” He dropped down on the glider and stretched out his legs. The dog immediately tried to climb in his lap. “Don’t try to make up,” Brady said, pushing the dog off again.
“He’s a pretty dog.”
“Don’t flatter him. He’s already got an inflated ego.”
“They say people and their pets develop similarities,” she commented. “What’s his name?”
“Kong. He was the biggest in his litter.” Hearing his name, Kong barked twice, then raced off to chase the shadows. “I spoiled him when he was a puppy, and now I’m paying the price.” Spreading his arms over the back of the glider, he let his fingers toy with the ends of her hair. “Joanie tells me you drove out to the farm today.”
“Yes.” Vanessa knocked his hand away. “She looks wonderful. And so happy.”
“She is happy.” Undaunted, he picked up her hand to play with her fingers. It was an old, familiar gesture. “You got to meet our godchild.”
“Yes.” Vanessa tugged her hand free. “Lara’s gorgeous.”
“Yeah.” He went back to her hair. “She looks like me.”
The laugh came too quickly to stop. “You’re still conceited. And will you keep your hands off me?”
“I never was able to.” He sighed, but shifted away an inch. “We used to sit here a lot, remember?”
“I remember.”
“I think the first time I kissed you, we were sitting here, just like this.”
“No.” She folded her arms across her chest.
“You’re right.” As he knew very well. “The first time was up at the park. You came to watch me shoot baskets.”
She brushed casually at the knee of her slacks. “I just happened to be walking through.”
“You came because I used to shoot without a shirt and you wanted to see my sweaty chest.”
She laughed again, because it was absolutely true. She turned to look at him in the shadowy light. He was smiling, relaxed. He’d always been able to relax, she remembered. And he’d always been able to make her laugh.
“It—meaning your sweaty chest—wasn’t such a big deal.”
“I’ve filled out some,” he said easily. “And I still shoot hoops.” This time she didn’t seem to notice when he stroked her hair. “I remember that day. It was at the end of the summer, before my senior year. In three months you’d gone from being that pesty little Sexton kid to Sexy Sexton with a yard of the most incredible chestnut hair, and these great-looking legs you used to show off in teeny little shorts. You were such a brat. And you made my mouth water.”
“You were always looking at Julie Newton.”
“No, I was pretending to look at Julie Newton while I looked at you. Then you just happened to stroll by the court that day. You’d been to Lester’s Store, because you had a bottle of soda. Grape soda.”
She lifted a brow. “That’s quite a memory you’ve got.”
“Hey, these are the turning points in our lives. You said, ‘Hi, Brady. You look awful hot. Want a sip?’” He grinned again. “I almost took a bite out of my basketball. Then you flirted with me.”
“I did not.”
“You batted your eyes.”
She struggled with a giggle. “I’ve never batted my eyes.”
“You batted them then.” He sighed at the memory. “It was great.”
“As I remember it, you were showing off, doing layups and hook shots or whatever. Macho stuff. Then you grabbed me.”
“I remember grabbing. You liked it.”
“You smelled like a gym locker.”
“I guess I did. It was still my most memorable first kiss.”
And hers, Vanessa thought. She hadn’t realized she was leaning back against his shoulder and smiling. “We were so young. Everything was so intense, and so uncomplicated.”
“Some things don’t have to be complicated.” But sitting there with her head feeling just right on his shoulder, he wasn’t so sure. “Friends?”
“I guess.”
“I haven’t had a chance to ask you how long you’re staying.”
“I haven’t had a chance to decide.”
“Your schedule must be packed.”
“I’ve taken a few months.” She moved restlessly. “I may go to Paris for a few weeks.”
He picked up her hand again, turning it over. Her hands had always fascinated him. Those long, tapering fingers, the baby-smooth palms, the short, practical nails. She wore no rings. He had given her one once—spent the money he’d earned mowing grass all summer on a gold ring with an incredibly small emerald. She’d kissed him senseless when he’d given it to her, and she’d sworn never to take it off.
Childhood promises were carelessly broken by adults. It was foolish to wish he could see it on her finger again.
“You know, I managed to see you play at Carnegie Hall a couple of years ago. It was overwhelming. You were overwhelming.” He surprised them both by bringing her fingers to his lips. Then hastily dropped them. “I’d hoped to see you while we were both in New York, but I guess you were busy.”
The jolt from her fingertips was still vibrating in her toes. “If you had called, I’d have managed it.”
“I did call.” His eyes remained on hers, searching, even as he shrugged it off. “It was then I fully realized how big you’d become. I never got past the first line of defense.”
“I’m sorry. Really.”
“It’s no big deal.”
“No, I would have liked to have seen you. Sometimes the people around me are too protective.”
“I think you’re right.” He put a hand under her chin. She was more beautiful than his memory of her, and more fragile. If he had met her in New York, in less sentimental surroundings, would he have felt so drawn to her? He wasn’t sure he wanted to know.
Friends was what he’d asked of her. He struggled to want no more.
“You look very tired, Van. Your color could be better.”
“It’s been a hectic year.”
“Are you sleeping all right?”
Half-amused, she brushed his hand aside. “Don’t start playing doctor with me, Brady.”
“At the moment I can’t think of anything I’d enjoy more, but I’m serious. You’re run-down.”
“I’m not run-down, just a little tired. Which is why I’m taking a break.”
But he wasn’t satisfied. “Why don’t you come into the office for a physical?”
“Is that your new line? It used to be ‘Let’s go parking down at Molly’s Hole.’”
“I’ll get to that. Dad can take a look at you.”
“I don’t need a doctor.” Kong came lumbering back, and she reached down for him. “I’m never sick. In almost ten years of concerts, I’ve never had to cancel one for health reasons.” She buried her face in the dog’s fur when her stomach clenched. “I’m not going to say it hasn’t been a strain coming back here, but I’m dealing with it.”
She’d always been hardheaded, he thought. Maybe it would be best if he simply kept an eye—a medical eye—on her for a few days. “Dad would still like to see you—personally, if not professionally.”
“I’m going to drop by.” Still bent over the dog, she turned her head. In the growing dark, he caught the familiar gleam in her eye. “Joanie says you’ve got your hands full with women patients. I imagine the same holds true of your father, if he’s as handsome as I remember.”
“He’s had a few…interesting offers. But they’ve eased off since he and your mother hooked up.”
Dumbfounded, Vanessa sat up straight. “Hooked up? My mother? Your father?”
“It’s the hottest romance in town.” He flicked her hair behind her shoulder. “So far.”
“My mother?” she repeated.
“She’s an attractive woman in her prime, Van. Why shouldn’t she enjoy herself?”
Pressing a hand against her stomach, she rose. “I’m going in.”
“What’s the problem?”
“No problem. I’m going in. I’m cold.”
He took her by the shoulders. It was another gesture that brought a flood of memories. “Why don’t you give her a break?” Brady asked. “God knows she’s been punished enough.”
“You don’t know anything about it.”
“More than you think.” He gave her a quick, impatient shake. “Let go, Van. These old resentments are going to eat you from the inside out.”
“It’s easy for you.” The bitterness poured out before she could control it. “It’s always been easy for you, with your nice happy family. You always knew they loved you, no matter what you did or didn’t do. No one ever sent you away.”
“She didn’t send you away, Van.”
“She let me go,” she said quietly. “What’s the difference?”
“Why don’t you ask her?”
With a shake of her head, she pulled away. “I stopped being her little girl twelve years ago. I stopped being a lot of things.” She turned and walked into the house.
Chapter 3
Vanessa had slept only in snatches. There had been pain. But she was used to pain. She masked it by coating her stomach with liquid antacids, by downing the pills that had been prescribed for her occasional blinding headaches. But most of all, she masked it by using her will to ignore.
Twice she had nearly walked down the hall to her mother’s room. A third time she had gotten as far as her mother’s door, with her hand raised to knock, before she had retreated to her own room and her own thoughts.
She had no right to resent the fact that her mother had a relationship with another man. Yet she did. In all the years Vanessa had spent with her father, he had never turned to another woman. Or, if he had, he had been much too discreet for her to notice.
And what did it matter? she asked herself as she dressed the next morning. They had always lived their own lives, separate, despite the fact that they shared a house.
But it did matter. It mattered that her mother had been content all these years to live in this same house without contact with her only child. It mattered that she had been able to start a life, a new life, that had no place for her own daughter.
It was time, Vanessa told herself. It was time to ask why.
She caught the scent of coffee and fragrant bread as she reached the bottom landing. In the kitchen she saw her mother standing by the sink, rinsing a cup. Loretta was dressed in a pretty blue suit, pearls at her ears and around her throat. The radio was on low, and she was humming even as she turned and saw her daughter.
“Oh, you’re up.” Loretta smiled, hoping it didn’t look forced. “I wasn’t sure I’d see you this morning before I left.”
“Left?”
“I have to go to work. There’re some muffins, and the coffee’s still hot.”
“To work?” Vanessa repeated. “Where?”
“At the shop.” To busy her nervous hands, she poured Vanessa a cup of coffee. “The antique shop. I bought it about six years ago. The Hopkinses’ place, you might remember. I went to work for them when—some time ago. When they decided to retire, I bought them out.”
Vanessa shook her head to clear it of the grogginess. “You run an antique shop?”
“Just a small one.” She set the coffee on the table. The moment they were free, her hands began to tug at her pearl necklace. “I call it Loretta’s Attic. Silly, I suppose, but it does nicely. I closed it for a couple of days, but… I can keep it closed another day or so if you’d like.”
Vanessa studied her mother thoughtfully, trying to imagine her owning a business, worrying about inventory and book-keeping. Antiques? Had she ever mentioned an interest in them?
“No.” It seemed that talk would have to wait. “Go ahead.”
“If you like, you can run down later and take a look.” Loretta began to fiddle with a button on her jacket. “It’s small, but I have a lot of interesting pieces.”
“We’ll see.”
“Are you sure you’ll be all right here alone?”
