Читать книгу Snowflakes on the Sea - Linda Miller Lael - Страница 5

The bare semblance of a smile curved Nathan McKendrick’s taut lips as he stood at the living room windows looking down at the measured madness in the streets below. Cars fishtailed up and down the steep hills, and buses ground cautiously through the six inches of snow that, according to the doorman, had fallen since morning. The stuff was still coming down, in great lazy slow-motion flakes, like flour from a giant sifter.

Nathan sighed. The people of Seattle didn’t really believe in snow—though they were certainly acclimated to rain—and they were always caught off guard when it came. The timid closed down their businesses and cowered at home, while the more adventurous braved the elements.

He focused his dark gaze on the distance. The harbor was invisible, through the swirling storm and the cloak of night, except for a few flickering lights, and the rugged Olympic Mountains beyond were blotted out entirely. The Space Needle, a modern tower commemorating a past world’s fair, appeared as a patch of blue light in the gloom.

Depressed, Nathan turned from the scene and sighed again. The penthouse, sumptuously furnished in rich suedes and velvets, was close and confining that night, even though it occupied the entire top floor of the building and had been carefully designed to seem even more spacious than it was.

Where was Mallory? The question played in Nathan’s exhausted mind and stretched his waning patience thin. He began to pace the empty living room in long, fierce strides, expending energy he didn’t possess. A six-week concert tour, followed by the endless flight back from Sydney, had left him physically drained.

He paused, looking down at his travel-rumpled clothes—tailored gray slacks and a lightweight cream-colored turtleneck sweater—and grimaced. The garments felt scratchy against the lean, muscular length of his body, and the rough stubble of a new beard stood out on his face like tiny needles.

Though the penthouse boasted no less than four bathrooms, it hadn’t occurred to him until that moment to take the time to shower, shave and change his clothes; he’d been too frightened, too desperate to find Mallory. Oblivious to everything except the state of his wife’s health, he’d caught a cab at the airport and hurried to the hospital, where he’d been summarily informed that “Ms. O’Connor” had been treated and released.

The nurses had told him so little, and he hadn’t been able to reach Mallory’s doctor, Mallory herself or any of her friends. Finally, when he’d frantically dialed his sister’s number, he’d gotten a recorded voice telling him cheerily that Pat couldn’t come to the telephone at the moment.

Though he’d tried the penthouse number and gotten no answer, he had hurried there hoping that Mallory might have left a note.

Now, having made all the same fruitless calls again and left a rather direct message on his sister’s answering machine, he was nearly overwhelmed by weariness and frustration.

Softly, furiously, he cursed. Then, with consummate control, Nathan brought himself up short. Mallory was all right—Pat’s cable had said that much, at least, and with characteristic certainty. Pat was never wrong about anything.

He ground his teeth and went back to the window, only to turn away again and stride toward the master bedroom and the sumptuous bathroom beyond. There, he stripped and stepped into a pulsing, steaming shower.

By the time he’d finished scouring his tense flesh, shaved and gotten dressed again, he felt better. He tried Pat’s number once more and got the same mechanical spiel he’d heard before. Muttering a curse, he dialed the island house and was informed by a harried operator that the lines were down.

At that moment, the doorbell rang. Nathan bounded over the plush carpet and wrenched open one of the heavy double doors.

His sister stood impatiently in the hallway, glaring up at him. “You shouldn’t say things like that on the telephone, Nathan!”

He remembered the colorful message he’d left for Pat and laughed gruffly. “And you should be at home when I want to talk to you,” he retorted, arching one dark eyebrow.

Pat sighed, placated by his off-the-cuff comment. She looked tired as she ran one slender hand through the copper and gold strands of her long hair and blinked her wide cornflower blue eyes. “Could we start over here?” She smiled, stepping around her brother to enter the penthouse. And then, without waiting for an answer, she cleared her throat and began again. “Hello, handsome. Rough trip?”

Nathan shook his head distractedly. The grandfather clock in the living room chimed a soft reminder of the hour. “Pat, I’m going insane while you make small talk. What’s the matter with Mallory, and where the hell is she?”

Pat stood on tiptoe to kiss her brother’s freshly shaven chin. “Relax,” she said gently. “Mallory is okay. After they released her from the hospital, I took her out to the island so she could have some peace and quiet.”

He took his sister’s arm, ushered her somewhat roughly toward the living room. “Why was she in the hospital, damn it?” he snapped, impatient and scared.

Pat settled herself on the suede sofa and crossed her shapely legs. “She collapsed on the set last night, Nathan, and they called an ambulance. Somebody from the show got in touch with me and I cabled you as soon as I’d seen Mallory and talked to the doctor and everything.”

Nathan stiffened, then leaned back against the long teakwood bar Mallory had bought in the Orient several years before, and folded his powerful arms in stubborn outrage. “I’ve been going out of my mind,” he growled. “They wouldn’t tell me anything at the hospital—”

Pat lowered her expressive blue eyes for a moment, regrouping, and then raised them intrepidly to her brother’s face again. “Mallory’s producer threatened them with mayhem if they gave out any information to anyone. Nathan, let it go.”

With a harsh motion of one hand, Nathan reclaimed the brown leather jacket he’d tossed into a chair earlier and slipped his arms into it. Mallory was his first concern—at the moment, his only concern.

As he turned to leave, Pat rose from the couch and caught his arm in one hand, gently but firmly. “Nathan, don’t hassle Mallory about the name thing or the soap opera, all right? She’s a wreck, frankly, and she doesn’t need it.”

“Right,” Nathan agreed crisply.

Pat reached up to touch his dark still-damp hair. “One more thing, love—stop worrying. Everything is okay.”

Nathan laughed, even though nothing in the whole damned world was funny, and walked away from his sister without looking back.

Mallory O’Connor loved the island house, though she didn’t get back to it much, now that she was working in Seattle. Often, the sturdy, simply furnished structure seemed to be the only real thing in her life. Now, standing in the huge old-fashioned kitchen, with snow drifting past the polished windows, she drew a deep breath and allowed herself to feel the sweet, singular embrace of the one place that was really home. Then, comforted, Mallory began selecting fragrant, splintery lengths of kindling from the box beside the big wood-burning stove to start a fire. She’d slept for a while after Pat had raced back to the city, and now she was pleasantly hungry.

Pride filled Mallory as the blaze caught and began to heat the spacious kitchen. Her mother had been right—there was a certain satisfaction in doing things the old way, a satisfaction she’d never found in the posh Seattle penthouse she and Nathan shared between his long and frequent absences.

Mallory sighed. She loved Nathan McKendrick with an intensity that had never abated in six tumultuous years of marriage, though she couldn’t have honestly said that she was happy. At twenty-seven, she was successful in her out-of-the-blue career, and Nathan, at thirty-four, was certainly successful in his. But there were elements missing from their relationship that caused Mallory to hunger even in the midst of opulence.

Money and recognition were pitiable substitutes for children, and the hectic pace most people considered glamorous only made Mallory’s heart cry out for simplicity and peace.

Outside, in the silent storm, Mallory’s Irish Setter, Cinnamon, began to howl for admission. Mallory smiled and went out onto the screened sun porch to welcome her furry and much-missed friend.

Cinnamon whimpered and squirmed in unabashed delight as Mallory greeted her with a pat on the head. “What do you say we just hide out here from now on, girl?” Mallory asked, only half in jest. “Nathan could go on with his concert tours—the darling of millions—and we’d exist on a diet of oysters and clams and wild blackberries.”

The dog abandoned its mistress to sniff and paw at a large, unopened sack of dog food leaning against the inside wall of the porch beside the screen door. Mallory began to pry at the stubborn stitching sealing the bag. “So much for living off the land,” she muttered.

While Cinnamon crunched happily away on the dried morsels wrested from that recalcitrant bag, Mallory heated canned chicken soup on the cookstove. There was very little in the house to eat, but shopping could wait until morning—Mallory would get her car out of the locked garage then, and drive to the small store on the other side of the island.

The wooden telephone on the kitchen wall, actually a modern replica of the old-fashioned crank phone, rang in pleasant tones, and Mallory left the soup simmering on the stove to answer. When she and Pat had arrived, there hadn’t been any phone service at all.

“Hello?”

Pleased feminine laughter sounded on the other end of the crackling line. “Mall, you are back!” cried Trish Demming, one of Mallory’s closest friends. “Thank heaven. I thought I’d fallen short in my dog-watching duties—I called Cinnamon until I was hoarse.”

Mallory smiled. “She’s here, Trish—safe and sound. I tried to call you, but the lines were dead.”

Trish’s voice was warm. “No problem. Actually, I should have looked at your house in the first place. Even when you’re gone, Cinnamon is always dashing over there. What’s going on, anyway? I thought you were all involved in taping that soap—er—daytime drama of yours, Mall.”

Mallory sighed. “I’m having an enforced vacation, Trish. Brad isn’t going to let me back on the set until I have a doctor’s permission.” She didn’t add that she was relieved to have a respite from the crazy schedule; Trish wouldn’t have understood.

There was a short silence while Trish considered the implications of Mallory’s statement. “Honey,” she said finally, concern ringing in her voice, “you’re not sick, are you? I mean, you must be, but is it serious?”

Mallory touched the top of the yellow-enameled wainscoting reaching halfway up the kitchen wall and frowned at the smudge of dust that lingered on her fingertip. “I’m just tired,” she assured her friend, glad that Trish couldn’t see the dark splotches of fatigue under her eyes or the telltale thinness of her already slender figure.

For a while, the two women discussed the plot line of “Tender Days, Savage Nights,” the first soap opera ever to be produced in Seattle. Brad Ranner, the show’s dynamic creator and chief stockholder, had brought it out from New York a year before, partly because of lower production costs and partly because of a desire to use more outdoor scenes. The spectacular vista of sea and mountains and lush woodlands gave the program unique appeal.

Most of the original cast had balked at leaving New York, however, and open auditions had been held in Seattle. On a whim, Mallory had gone, along with a horde of other applicants, to read for a part. Anxious to accomplish something strictly on her own, she had given her maiden name and prayed that no one would recognize her as the wife of a world famous rock singer.

No one had, and furthermore, Mallory had been selected, despite an embarrassing lack of acting experience, to play the role of Tracy Ballard, a troubled young woman who devoted boundless energy to destroying long-term marriages. The part had been a small one at first, but Mallory had played it with a verve that pleased sponsors and viewers alike. Her character on the show took on interesting dimensions, and suddenly, Mallory O’Connor McKendrick was a success in her own right.

And how empty it was.

She promised to visit Trish soon and rang off, frowning. Her hand lingered for a moment on the telephone receiver. Mallory was rich now and, in her own way, even famous, if “famous” was the proper word for a notoriety that caused strange women to confront her in supermarkets and department stores and even libraries, demanding that she stop interfering in this or that fictional marriage.

Nibbling at her lukewarm soup, Mallory considered her life and, for perhaps the ten-thousandth time, wished that it could all be different. Her hard-won teaching certificate had never seen a day’s use, and she longed for a child of her own to love and nurture.

She was rinsing out her empty bowl and placing it in the orange plastic drainer beside the sink when a pair of headlights swung into the yard, their golden light speckled with glistening flakes of snow. Mallory leaned close to the cool, damp window, trying to recognize the car.

When that proved impossible due to the storm, she ran her hands down the worn red-and-blue-plaid flannel of her shirtfront and hurried out onto the screened porch. Cinnamon danced at her heels and then wriggled gleefully against the legs of her jeans.

The slam of a car door echoed, mingling with the nightsong of the tide, and Cinnamon’s magnificent tawny head shot up, suddenly alert. Before Mallory could grasp her collar, the dog propelled herself through the outside screen door and bounded into the ever-deepening snow, yipping hysterically.

Nathan laughed and reached down to greet Cinnamon with the customary pat-and-rub motion that made her ears flop about in comical disarray. “Hello, you worthless mutt,” he said.

Mallory stood in the doorway, her mouth open, just staring. Would she never get over feeling as though she’d just been punched in the solar plexis whenever Nathan McKendrick came striding back into her life?

Standing in the stream of light coming from the kitchen, Nathan forgot the dog and raised his eyes to Mallory. They made their way over her trim, rounded hips, her small waistline, her high, firm breasts to settle at last on her face.

Mallory fell against the doorframe, watching him in stricken silence. Snow glistened in his unruly ebony hair and on the straining shoulders of his jacket, and he put his hands onto his narrow, powerful hips and stared back.

There was a charged silence between them for a long moment, threatening to melt the snow and raise steam from the buried earth. Mallory’s traitorous heart caught in her throat. She’d known that he would come, known that Pat, ever the loyal sister, would contact him, alert him to the fact that his wife had been hospitalized. And yet she had hoped for more time, even as she had longed to be near him again.

Nathan executed a mocking bow. “Good evening—Ms. O’Connor,” he said in a sardonic drawl.

As quickly as that, the strange spell was broken. Mallory lifted her chin in answer to his challenge and replied, “Good evening, Mr. McKendrick.”

Nathan’s jawline tightened with immediate annoyance, and some unreadable emotion glittered in his dark eyes as he strode toward her. Before Mallory could move, he had lifted her out of the doorway and over the two snow-laden steps beneath it.

Her insides rioted with involuntary need as he held her, suspended, his face between her ripe, inviting breasts. Even through the heavy flannel of her shirt, she could feel the warmth of his breath.

Slowly, he lowered her, so that the throbbing fullness of her chest was crushed against the hard expanse of his own. Then, his hands cupping the roundness of her bottom, he pressed her to him, to the ready demand of his manhood and the granitelike wall of his thighs.

Good Lord, Mallory thought with remorse. I’m as bad as any groupie—if he wanted to take me right here in the snow, I’d let him!

Nathan must have known what havoc he was wreaking on her straining senses, but he said nothing. His mouth came down on hers in a kiss that was at once gentle and demanding. Deftly, his lips parted hers for the sweet invasion and searing exploration of his tongue. Mallory responded with hungry abandon, shivering violently in the force of her need.

Then suddenly, Nathan was thrusting her away, holding her at arm’s length. His eyes glowed as they touched her lips and trailed, like the touch of a warm finger, to the pulsing hollow at the base of her throat. He turned her around and propelled her toward the house.

Mallory’s face was hot as she turned to watch her husband enter behind her, Cinnamon rollicking exuberantly at his side.

Nathan closed the door quietly, his eyes working their singular magic again as they moved idly over Mallory’s body, assessing her, stirring primitive reactions as they passed. “I’ve missed you, lady,” he said in a low voice.

Crimson color stained Mallory’s cheeks, and her pride caused her to thrust her head back, so that her dark taffy hair flew over her shoulders in glossy profusion. Her round, thickly lashed eyes flashed with sea green fury born of his ability to inflame her so easily, and she did her best to scowl.

He laughed. “You are an actress, pumpkin,” he allowed, approaching her slowly. One of Nathan’s hands cupped Mallory’s breast, the thumb stroking the bare nipple beneath her old shirt to hard and undeniable response. “Your body betrays you,” he said hoarsely. “You don’t hate me nearly as much as you’d like me to believe.”

Of course I don’t hate you! Mallory wanted to scream, but her pride wouldn’t allow that, so she lifted her chin in stubborn, wordless defiance. But a small cry escaped her as Nathan’s hand released her breast to undo one of her shirt buttons, and then another. Her entire body pinkened as he bared the rounded sweetness of her to his lazy inspection.

Mallory abandoned her act when her husband lowered his lips to one waiting nipple to nip at it, ever so gently, with his teeth. She moaned aloud and arched her back slightly so that he could feast upon her.

He chuckled in gruff triumph and flicked the rosy, pulsing center of her breast with the tip of his tongue, teasing. His hand slid between Mallory’s legs to caress the taut, womanly secrets of her inner thighs.

“Bastard,” she whispered, but there was a catch in her voice and a caress in the word itself. Her hands entangled themselves, without conscious instruction from Mallory, in the thick richness of his dark hair, pressing him closer. With sudden hunger, he devoured the freely offered breast, answering Mallory’s groan of ancient pleasure with one of his own.

Presently, he turned to sample the other breast, again teasing and nibbling, again driving Mallory nearly insane with the need of him. She would not beg him—she would not—but even as she made this decision, desperate pleas were aching in her throat.

At last, Nathan pressed her against the wainscoting lining the wall, and the lean, inescapable hardness of his body joining hers revealed the force of his desire. He stood back only long enough to divest Mallory of her flannel shirt and kiss her flat, soft stomach in a tantalizing promise of further kisses that would drive her beyond passion into the paradise they had visited so many times.

He unsnapped her jeans, and she felt the zipper give way, the fabric slide down over her hips. She shivered as her panties, too, were lowered. Lips parted, she awaited loving that always bordered on the deliciously unendurable.

Nathan nuzzled the silken shelter of her womanhood; the warm promise of his breath and his searching lips made her tremble. One plea broke past her resolve, and it took the shape of his name.

Slowly, he revealed the small, yearning nubbin. In desperation, Mallory caught his head in both hands and thrust him to her. “Oh, God,” she breathed, mindless now in her wanting. “Oh, God, Nathan, please—”

At the invitation he had purposely forced from her, Nathan partook hungrily of her, and his tender greed brought her to swift and searing release. She shuddered reflexively, her fingers moving in his hair, and moaned as he nibbled at her at his leisure, demanding a fiery encore to the performance just past.

Bared to him, and so deliciously vulnerable, Mallory whispered words of gentle, desperate encouragement as he tormented the bit of quivering flesh with soft kisses. She writhed, gasped with delight, when he took his pleasure yet again, bringing his tongue into play this time, sampling her and then suckling as though to draw some sweet nectar from her. “Don’t—stop—” she pleaded, her wanting now as naked as her hips and her thighs and her stomach.

He drew back, just slightly. “Sweet,” he whispered in a ragged voice, and then he enjoyed her in long, warm, delicious strokes of his tongue. Savage pleasure convulsed Mallory, and her triumph came in a cry that was half shout, half sob.

It was then that, in the snowy silence outside, an engine roared. One car door slammed, and then another.

Nathan swore harshly and straightened, while Mallory, cheeks burning, frantically righted her clothes. Feet were stomping heavily on the porch outside, and Cinnamon began to bark in somewhat belated alarm.

“Just a minute!” Nathan growled, closing his eyes in an obvious effort to control his roiling emotions and frustrated need.

As embarrassed as though the visitors had seen the impromptu love scene staged in the McKendrick kitchen, Mallory turned to the stove to hide her flaming face and occupy her hands with the task of brewing fresh coffee. After another moment of preparation, Nathan answered the door.

“Oops!” Trish Demming blushed, sizing up the situation with her usual gentle shrewdness. “Alex, I think we interrupted something.”

Trish’s good-natured, bespectacled husband pretended to rush for the door. He was Nathan’s accountant and one of his closest friends.

“Sit down,” Nathan ordered humorlessly, and Mallory felt his hot gaze touch her rigid back. Out of the corner of one eye, she saw Trish set a covered baking dish down on the counter.

It was several minutes before Mallory gathered enough composure to join the others at the kitchen table, and, even when she did, it was clear that Nathan wasn’t going to give her an easy time of it. His dark eyes seared her breasts whenever the opportunity afforded itself, and lingered on her lips until she thought she’d shout with frustration.

Still, it was pleasant to spend time with dear friends, and Mallory genuinely enjoyed the lively conversation touching on everything from Nathan’s last concert tour to the ban on gathering oysters along the island’s rocky shores. Trish had brought one of her highly acclaimed peach cobblers, and they all ate a hefty slice with their coffee, Trish and Mallory bemoaning the astronomical calorie count.

Mallory was fairly trembling with hidden exhaustion and anticipation when Trish began to make sincere noises about leaving. Good-byes were said, and the Demmings bundled up in their practical island coats and braved the snow piling up between the house and their car.

Mallory and Nathan exchanged a look of resignation when they heard the car’s motor grind halfheartedly, and then die. Nathan’s eyes moved over Mallory’s body in a sweep of hungry promise, and then he swatted her gently on the bottom and bent his head to nibble briefly at her earlobe. “I’ll be back soon,” he said, and strode out onto the sun porch, rummaging through the collection of battered coats that had belonged to her father.

Mallory needed to sink languidly into a warm, scented bath and go to bed. She was so tired that sleep would come easily, but not before she and Nathan had reached the breathless heights of love they always scaled after they’d been apart.

And we’re apart so much, she thought, her weariness reaching new and aching depths.

A moment later, there was a stomping sound on the porch, and Trish reappeared, looking embarrassed and apologetic. “Nathan and Alex are trying to get the car started,” she mumbled, unconsciously rubbing her chilled hands together. “Ace mechanics they’re not.”

Mallory grinned at her friend and firmly ushered her closer to the stove. “It’s all right, Trish,” she cajoled. “There’s still plenty of coffee, if you’d like more.”

Trish shook her head, and her soft blond hair moved delicately with the motion. “We shouldn’t have barged in here like that,” she said ruefully, and then her blue eyes moved to Mallory’s face. “I’m so sorry, Mall—it’s just that I was worried about you, and, of course, we had no idea that Nathan was home.”

Mallory hugged Trish warmly. “You were being thoughtful, as always. So stop apologizing.”

Trish’s pretty aquamarine eyes were pensive now, seeing too much. “Mall, you really look beat. Are you okay?”

Suddenly, Mallory had to look away; she couldn’t sustain eye contact with this friend she’d known all her life and say what she meant to say. “I’m fine,” she insisted after a short pause.

The tone of Trish’s voice betrayed the fact that she was neither convinced nor mollified, but she spared Mallory her questions and gave her a gentle shove in the direction of the bathroom. “Go and take a nice hot bath and get yourself into bed, Mrs. McKendrick. I can look after myself until the men get our car going again.”

Mrs. McKendrick. Mallory blanched, unwittingly giving away something she hadn’t meant to reveal. She longed to be known by her married name again, and yet, it sounded strange to her, as though she had no right to resume it.

Trish laid a comforting hand on her shoulder. “Get some rest, Mall. We’ll have a good, long talk when you’re up to it.”

There was much that Mallory needed to confide, but this was neither the time nor the place. “I—If you’re sure you won’t feel slighted—”

Trish’s eyes were sparkling with warmth and controlled concern. “Just go, will you? I’m not such an air head that I can’t entertain myself for a few minutes!”

Mallory laughed, but the sound was raw and mirthless. Reluctantly, she left her friend to her own devices and stumbled into the bathroom, where she started running hot water in the tub.

While it ran, Mallory hurried through the doorway that joined that room to the master bedroom and began to search wearily through the suitcases Pat had packed for her earlier at the penthouse. There were jeans and sweaters, always necessary for winter visits to the island, but nothing even remotely glamorous had been included. Mallory thought of all the silken lingerie left behind in Seattle and sighed. She had so wanted to look especially attractive for Nathan, but Pat had either not foreseen that contingency or not considered it important.

With resolve, Mallory ferreted out her least virginal flannel nightgown and carried it into the steam-clouded bathroom. Over the roar of the water, she heard Trish and Alex’s car start up.

Smiling to herself, Mallory stripped and climbed into the tub. The warmth of the scented water was heaven to her tired muscles, and she sank into it up to her chin, giving a soft sigh of contentment as total relaxation came at last.

Home, she thought happily. I am home.

The heavy enameled door of the bathroom squeaked open then, and, suddenly, Nathan was there, his dark eyes taking in the slender, heat-pinkened length of her body. Beneath the suntan he’d undoubtedly acquired in Australia, where it was now the height of summer, he paled.

“My God, Mallory,” he swore. “How much weight have you lost?”

Mallory shrugged as she averted her eyes. “Maybe five pounds,” she said.

Nathan was leaning against the chipped pedestal sink now, his arms folded, watching her. “More like fifteen,” he argued, his voice sharpened to a lethal edge. “You were too thin when I left, but now—”

Mallory squeezed her eyes closed, hoping to press back the sudden and unaccountable tears that burned there. Was he saying that he didn’t want her anymore, didn’t find her physically attractive?

She felt his presence in the steamy bathroom, heard him kneel on the linoleum floor. When Mallory opened her eyes, she was not surprised to find him beside her, the knuckles of his powerful, gifted hands white with the force of his grasp on the curved edge of the bathtub.

“Mallory, talk to me,” he pleaded hoarsely. “Tell me what to do—how to change things—how to make you really happy again.”

One traitorous tear escaped, trickling down Mallory’s slender cheek and falling into the bathwater. “I am happy, Nathan,” she lied.

Nathan made a harsh, disgusted sound low in his throat. His eyes burned like ebony fire. “No,” he countered. “Something is chewing you up alive, and the hell of it is, I can’t do a damned thing about it if you won’t trust me enough to be honest.”

Mallory’s voice was small and shaky with dread. “Do you want a divorce, Nathan?”

He was on his feet in an instant, turning his back on Mallory, shutting her out. His broad shoulders were taut under the soft gray fabric of his shirt.

Unable to bear the oppressive silence placidly, Mallory reached out and grasped the big sponge resting in an inside corner of the tub. Fiercely, she lathered it with soap and began to scrub herself so hard that her flesh tingled.

“I would understand,” she said, when she dared speak.

Nathan whirled suddenly, startling her so badly that she dropped the sponge and stared at him, openmouthed. His face was rigid with suppressed fury and something very much like pain. He folded his arms in a gesture that, with him, signaled stubborn determination.

“Understand this,” he said in a low and dangerous tone. “You are my wife and you will remain my wife. I don’t intend to let you go, ever. And you will warm no one else’s bed, my love—not Brad Ranner’s, not anyone’s.”

Mallory felt the words strike her like stones, and it was all she could do not to flinch with the pain. “What?” she whispered finally, in shock.

Nathan’s face was desolate now, but it was hard, too. “You’ve been wasting away ever since you signed on with that damned soap opera, Mallory. And there has to be a reason.”

Mallory lifted her chin. There were reasons, all right, but Brad Ranner wasn’t among them, nor was any other man.

“I’ve been faithful to you,” she said stiffly. And it was true—she had never even been tempted to become intimate with another man, and she had come to Nathan’s bed as a virgin. She couldn’t bring herself to ask if he’d been as loyal; she was too afraid of the answer.

Nathan sighed, the sound broken, heavy. “I know, Mallory—I’m sorry.”

Sorry for what? Mallory wondered silently, sick with the anguish of loving a man who belonged to so many. Sorry for accusing me like you did or sorry that you have a number of nubile groupies to occupy your many nights away from home?

“I’m very tired,” she said instead.

“I see. You weren’t tired in the kitchen tonight, were you?”

The sarcasm in his voice made Mallory’s cheeks burn bright pink. “That was a long time ago,” she snapped, not daring to meet his eyes.

“At least an hour,” Nathan retorted.

“Leave me alone!”

“Gladly,” he snapped. Then, slowly, Nathan turned and left the room. When the door closed behind him, Mallory dissolved in silent tears of exhaustion and grief.

Nathan stood at the bedroom window, looking out. There wasn’t much to see in the darkness, but the storm had stopped anyway. That was something. Behind him, Mallory slept. The soft meter of her breathing drew him, and he turned back to look at her.

The dim glow of the hallway light made her fine cheekbones look gaunt and turned the smudges of fatigue beneath her eyes to deep shadows. She looked so vulnerable lying there, all her grief openly revealed in the involuntary honesty of sleep.

Nathan drew a ragged breath. How could he have urged her to surrender her body the way he had, when she was so obviously ill? And what had possessed him to imply that she was attracted to Brad Ranner, knowing, as he did, that that kind of deceit was foreign to her nature?

Quietly, he approached the bed and pulled the covers up around her thin shoulders. She stirred in her uneasy sleep and moaned softly, intensifying the merciless ache that had wrenched at Nathan’s midsection since the moment his press agent, Diane Vincent, had thrust Pat’s cable into his hands after the last concert in Sydney.

The night was bitterly cold. Nathan slid back into bed beside his wife and held himself at a careful distance. Even now, the wanting of her, the needing of her, was almost more than he could bear. Raising himself onto one elbow, Nathan watched Mallory for a long time, trying to analyze the things that had gone wrong between them.

He loved her fiercely and had since the moment he’d seen her, some six and a half years ago. Prior to that stunning day, he’d prided himself on his freedom, on the fact that he’d needed no other person. Now, in the darkness of the bedroom, beneath the warmth of the electric blanket, he sighed. If he lost Mallory—and he was grimly convinced that he was losing her, day by hectic day—nothing else in his life would matter. Nothing.

She stirred beside him. Nathan wanted her with every fiber of his being and knew that he would always want her. But there was one thing greater than his consuming desire, and that was his love. He fell back on his pillows, his hands cupped behind his head, his eyes fixed on the shadowed ceiling.

Her hand came to his chest, warm and searching, her fingers entangling themselves in the thick matting of hair covering muscle and bone. “Nathan?” she whispered in a sleepy voice.

Despite the pain inside him, he laughed. “Who else?” he whispered back. “Sleep, babe.”

But Mallory snuggled against him, soft and vulnerable. “I don’t want to sleep,” she retorted petulantly. “Make love to me.”

“No.”

Her hand coursed downward over his chest, over his hard abdomen, urging him, teasing. “Yes,” she argued.

Nathan was impatient. “Will you stop it?” he said tightly. “I’m trying to be noble here, damn it.”

“Mmm,” Mallory purred, and her tantalizing exploration continued. “Noble.”

“Mallory.”

She raised herself onto one elbow and then bent her head to sample one masculine nipple with a teasing tongue.

Nathan groaned, but he remembered her thinness, her collapse on the set in Seattle, the hollow ache visible in her green eyes. And he turned away, as if in anger, and ignored her until she withdrew.