Читать книгу Snowflakes on the Sea - Linda Miller Lael - Страница 6

The telephone was ringing when Mallory awakened the next morning. She burrowed down under the covers with a groan, determined to ignore it. If she waited long enough, Nathan would answer it or the caller would give up.

But the ringing continued mercilessly, and Mallory realized that her husband wasn’t nestled between the smooth flannel sheets with her. Tossing back the bedclothes with a cry of mingled irritation and disappointment, she scrambled out of bed and reached automatically for her robe.

The house was pleasantly warm, and Mallory smiled, leaving the robe—and an aching recollection of Nathan’s rejection the night before—behind as she made her way into the kitchen and disengaged the old-fashioned earpiece from its hook on the side of the telephone. “Hello?” she spoke into the mouthpiece, idly scanning the neat kitchen for signs of Nathan. Except for the heat radiating from the big woodburning stove, there was nothing to indicate that he’d been around at all.

“Hello,” snapped Diane Vincent, Nathan’s press agent. “Is Nate there?”

Mallory frowned. Good question, she thought ruefully. And where the hell do you get off calling him “Nate”?

“Mallory?” Diane prodded.

“He was here,” Mallory answered, and hated herself for sounding so lame and uncertain.

Disdain crackled in Diane’s voice. “One night stopover, huh? Listen, if he happens to get in touch, tell him to call me. I’m staying at my sister’s place in Settle. He knows the number.”

Mallory was seething, and her knees felt weak. She reached out awkwardly for one of the kitchen chairs, drew it near and sat down. She despised Diane Vincent and, in some ways, even feared her. But she wasn’t about to let anything show. “I’ll relay your message,” she said evenly.

Diane sighed in irritation, and Mallory knew that she was wondering why a dynamic, vital man like Nathan McKendrick had to have such a sappy wife. “You do that, sugarplum—it’s important.”

Mallory forced a smile to her face. “Oh, I’m sure it is—dearest.”

Diane hung up.

Outside, in the pristine stillness of an island morning, Cinnamon’s joyful bark pierced the air. Mallory hung up the phone and went to stand at the window over the kitchen sink, a genuine smile displacing the frozen one she’d assumed for Diane Vincent. Nathan and the enormous red dog were frolicking in the snow, their breath forming silvery white plumes in the crisp chill of the day. Beyond them, the towering pine trees edging the unpaved driveway swayed softly in the wind, green and snow-burdened against the splotchy sky.

Mallory swallowed as bittersweet memories flooded her mind. For a moment, she slid back through the blurry channels of time to a cheerful memory….

“One of these days,” her father was saying, snowflakes melting on the shoulders of his checkered wool coat and water pooling on the freshly waxed floor around his feet, “I’m going to have to fell those pine trees, Janet, whether you and Mallory like it or not. If I don’t, one of them is sure to come down in a windstorm and crash right through the roof of this house.”

Mallory and her mother had only exchanged smiles, knowing that Paul O’Connor would never destroy those magnificent trees. They had already been giants when the island was settled, over a hundred years before, and that made them honored elders.

With reluctance, Mallory wrenched herself back to the eternal present and retreated into the bedroom. There would be time enough to tell Nathan that Diane wanted him to call, she thought, with uncharacteristic malice. Time enough.

Mallory crawled into bed, yawned and immediately sank into a sweet, sound, dreamless sleep.

When she awakened much later, the sun was high in the sky, and she could hear the sizzle of bacon frying and the low, caressing timbre of Nathan’s magical voice. Grinning, buoyed by the sounds and scents of morning, Mallory slid out of bed and crept to the kitchen doorway.

Nathan, clad in battered blue jeans and a bulky blue pullover sweater, stood with his back to her, the telephone’s earpiece propped precariously between his shoulder and his ear. While he listened to the person on the other end of the line, he was trying to turn the fragrant bacon and keep an eager Cinnamon at bay at the same time. Finally, using a meat fork, he lifted one crispy strip from the pan, allowed the hot fat to drip off and then let the morsel fall to the floor. “Careful, girl—that’s hot,” he muttered. And then he moved closer to the mouthpiece and snapped, “Very funny, Diane. I was talking to the dog.”

Mallory stiffened. Suddenly, the peace, beauty and comfort of the day were gone. It was as though the island had been invaded by a hostile army.

She went back to the bedroom, now chilled despite the glowing warmth that filled the old house, and took brown corduroy slacks and a wooly white sweater from her suitcases. After dressing and generally making herself presentable, she again ventured into enemy territory.

Nathan was setting the table with Blue Willow dishes and everyday silver and humming one of his own tunes as he worked. Mallory looked at the dishes and remembered the grace of her mother’s hands as she’d performed the same task, the lilting softness of the songs she’d sung.

Missing both her parents keenly in that moment, she shut her eyes tight against the memory of their tragic deaths. She had so nearly died with them that terrible day, and she shuddered as her mind replayed the sound of splintering wood, the dreadful chill and smothering silence of the water closing over her face, the crippling fear.

“Mall?” Nathan queried in a low voice. “Babe?”

She forced herself to open her eyes, draw a deep, restorative breath. Janet and Paul O’Connor were gone, and there was no sense in reliving the brutal loss now. She tried to smile and failed miserably.

“Breakfast smells good,” she said.

Nathan could be very perceptive at times—it was a part, Mallory believed, of his mystique as a superstar. The quality came through in the songs he wrote and in the haunting way he sang them. “Could it be,” he began, raising one dark eyebrow and watching his wife with a sort of restrained sympathy, “that there are a few gentle and beloved ghosts among us this morning?”

Mallory nodded quickly and swallowed the tears that had been much too close to the surface of late. The horror of that boating accident, taking place only a few months after her marriage to Nathan, flashed through her mind once more in glaring technicolor. The Coast Guard had pulled her, unconscious, from the water, but it had been too late for Paul and Janet O’Connor.

Nathan moved to stand behind her, his hands solid and strong on her shoulders. It almost seemed that he was trying to draw the pain out of her spirit and into his own.

Mallory lifted her chin. “What did Diane want?” she asked, deliberately giving the words a sharp edge. If she didn’t distract Nathan somehow, she would end up dissolving before his very eyes, just as she’d done so many times during the wretched, agonizing days following the accident.

He sighed and released his soothing hold on her shoulders, then rounded the table and sank into his own chair, reaching out for the platter of fried bacon. “Nothing important,” he said, dropping another slice of the succulent meat into Cinnamon’s gaping mouth.

Mallory began to fill her own plate with the bacon, eggs and toast Nathan had prepared. “Diane is beautiful, isn’t she?”

Nathan glowered. “She’s a bitch,” he said flatly.

Mallory heartily agreed, in secret, of course, and it seemed wise to change the subject. “My contract with the soap is almost up,” she ventured carefully, longing for a response she knew Nathan wouldn’t give.

“Hmm,” he said, taking an irritating interest in the view framed by the big window over the sink. The dwarf cherry trees in the yard looked as though someone had trimmed their naked gray branches in glistening white lace.

Mallory bit into a slice of bacon, annoyed. Damn him, why doesn’t he say that he’s pleased to know I’ll have time for him again, that we should have a child now? “Well?” she snapped.

“Well, what?” he muttered, still avoiding her eyes.

Mallory ached inside. If she told him that she wanted to give up her career—it wasn’t even a career to her, really, but something she had stumbled into—it would seem that she was groveling, that she hadn’t been able to maintain her independence. “Nothing,” she replied with a defeated sigh. She looked at the food spread out on the table and suddenly realized that the makings of such a meal hadn’t been on hand when she arrived the night before. “You’ve been to the store.”

He laughed at this astute observation, and at last he allowed his dark, brooding eyes to make contact with her green ones. “My dear,” he imparted loftily, “some of us don’t lounge about in our beds half the day with absolutely no concern for the nutritional needs of the human body. Which reminds me—” His wooden chair scraped along the floor as he stood up and reached out for a bulky paper bag resting on the kitchen counter. From it, he took six enormous bottles containing vitamin supplements. Ignoring his own rapidly cooling breakfast, Nathan began to shake pills from each of the bottles and place them neatly beside Mallory’s orange juice. Finally, when there was a colorful mountain of capsules and tablets sitting on the tablecloth, he commanded sternly, “Start swallowing.”

Mallory gulped, eyeing what amounted to a small meal all on its own. “But—”

Nathan merely leaned forward and raised his eyebrows in firm instruction, daring her to defy him.

Dutifully, his wife swallowed the vitamins, one by one. When the arduous task had been completed, Mallory had no appetite left for the food remaining on her plate, but she ate it anyway. Clearly Nathan meant to press the point if she didn’t.

Once the meal was over, they washed and dried the dishes together, talking cautiously about things that didn’t matter. As Mallory put the last piece of silverware into the appropriate drawer, however, she bluntly asked a question that had been tormenting her all along.

“Nathan, why didn’t you make love to me last night?”

He looked at her, and their eyes held for a moment, but Mallory saw the hardening of Nathan’s jawline and the tightening of his fine lips. He broke away from her gaze and once again took a consuming interest in the cherry trees outside.

“I was tired,” he said after a long pause. “Jet lag, I guess.”

Mallory was not sure whether what she felt was courage or just plain foolishness. “Are you having an affair, Nathan?”

He whirled, all his attention suddenly focused on Mallory’s face. “No,” he bit out, plainly insulted at the suggestion. “And in case you’re wondering, I still find you as desirable as ever, last night notwithstanding, even if you are a touch too bony for my taste.”

“Then what is it?” Mallory pressed, crumpling the damp dish towel between her hands. “We haven’t been together in six weeks and—”

Nathan pried the cloth out of her hands, tossed it aside and drew Mallory very close. The encounter of their two bodies, his, hard and commanding, hers, gently rounded and very willing, set off an intangible, electric response in them both. “You don’t need to remind me how long we’ve been apart, pumpkin,” he muttered, his lips warm and soft at her temple. “This last tour was torture.”

Mallory throbbed with the dreadful, ancient need of him. “Make love to me now, Nathan,” she whispered.

But he stiffened and held her away, and the only contact remaining was the weight of his hands on her shoulders. “No,” he said firmly. “You’re tired and sick…. I don’t know what your doctor’s orders were, but I’m sure they didn’t include a sexual marathon.”

Mallory’s chin trembled slightly. Was he really concerned for her health? Or was he fulfilling his needs in someone else’s bed? He’d denied having an affair, but it didn’t seem likely that he would admit to anything of that sort when he knew his wife had been hospitalized only a few days before.

Taking no apparent notice of her silence, Nathan kissed Mallory’s forehead in a brotherly manner and released his hold on her shoulders. “There’s a nice fire going in the living room,” he said, sounding determinedly cheerful. “Why don’t you curl up on the couch and read or something?”

Mallory had several “or somethings” in mind for the living room sofa, but they certainly didn’t include reading. With a proud lift of her chin, she turned and marched out of the kitchen without a word.

The living room was a warm and welcoming place, however, with its window seats and sweeping view of Puget Sound. Mallory couldn’t help feeling soothed as she entered. She stood still for a long time, looking out at the water and the snowy orchard that had been her father’s pride. When he wasn’t piloting or repairing his charter fishing boat, Paul O’Connor had spent every free moment among those trees, pruning and spraying and rejoicing in the sweet fruit they bore.

Presently, the snow began to fall again. Mallory took a childlike pleasure in the beauty of it, longing to rush outside and catch the huge, iridescent flakes on her tongue. Too tired for the moment to pursue the yearning, she perched instead on a window seat, her knees sinking deep in its bright polka-dot cushions, and let her forehead rest against the cool dampness of the window glass.

She sensed Nathan’s presence long before he approached to stand behind her, disturbingly close.

“I’ve got some business to take care of, pumpkin,” he said quietly. “I’ll be back later.”

Mallory’s shoulders tensed painfully, and she did not turn around to look at her husband. She had a pretty good idea of what kind of “business” he had in mind, but she would have died before calling him on it. If she was losing her husband, she could at least lose him with dignity and grace.

But she was entirely unprepared for the warm, moving touch of his lips on the side of her neck. A shiver of delightful passion went through her, and she was about to turn all her concentration on seducing Nathan then and there when he suddenly turned and strode out of the room.

Mallory closed her eyes and didn’t open them again until she’d heard the distant click of the back door closing behind him. She cried silently for several minutes, and then marched into the bathroom and splashed cold water on her face until the tears had been banished.

On the back porch, Mallory exchanged her sneakers for sturdy boots and pulled on one of the oversize woolen coats that hung on pegs along the inside wall. The garment was heavy, and it smelled comfortingly of pine sap, salt water and tobacco. Wearing it brought her father so near that Mallory almost thought she might turn around and see him standing in the doorway, grinning his infectious grin.

Outside, the tracks in the deep, crusted snow indicated that Nathan had brought his Porsche to the island the night before. The car was gone now, and so was Cinnamon.

Mallory crammed her gloveless hands into the pockets of her father’s coat and frowned. “Rat fink dog,” she muttered.

A stiff wind was blowing in from the Sound, churning the lazy flakes of snow that were still falling in furious white swirls. Mallory turned her back to the wind and started toward the wooded area that was the center of the island.

Here, there were towering pine trees, and more of the Douglas fir that lined Mallory’s driveway, but there were cedars and elms and madronas, too. Under the ever-thickening pelt of snow, she knew, were the primitive wild ferns, with their big, scalloped fronds.

Privately, Mallory thought that the ferns were remnants of the murky time before the great ice age, when the area might well have been a jungle. It was easy to picture dinosaurs and other vanished beasts munching on the plants while volcanoes erupted angrily in the background.

Mallory marched on. The mountains were minding their manners now, with the exception of one, but who knew when they might awaken again, alive with fiery violence? Unnerved by Mount Saint Helens, many scientists were pondering Mount Rainier now, along with the rest of the Cascade range.

As Mallory made her way through the thick underbrush, a blackberry vine caught at her sleeve, eliciting from her a small gasp of irritation and then a reluctant smile. How many times had she ventured here as a child, armed with an empty coffee can or a shortening tin, to pluck the tart late-summer berries from their wicked, thorny bushes?

The thought made Mallory miss her mother desperately, and she hurried on. The motion did nothing, though, to allay the loneliness she felt, or banish persistent memories of Janet’s warm praise at the gathering of “so many very, very fine blackberries.” After the fruit had been thoroughly washed under cold water, Mallory’s mother had cooked jams and jellies and mouth-watering pies.

At last, Mallory emerged on the other side of the island’s dense green yoke, and Kate Sheridan’s A-frame house came into view. She should have called before dropping in on this busy woman who had been her mother’s dearest friend for so many years, she realized, but it was too late to consider manners now. Kate was standing on the deck at the back of the house, smiling as she watched Mallory’s approach.

She waved in her exuberant fashion, this trim, sturdy woman, and called out, “I knew I was right to wrench myself away from that wretched typewriter and brew some coffee!”

Mallory was warmed by this enthusiastic greeting, but she was chagrined, too. Kate Sheridan was the author of a series of children’s mystery novels, all set in the Puget Sound area, and her time was valuable indeed. Pausing at the base of the snowy path, Mallory deliberated. “I could come back another time,” she offered.

“Nonsense!” Kate cried, beaming. “I wouldn’t dream of letting an interesting guest like you escape. But I warn you, Mallory—I intend to pump you for information about the things that nasty character you play is planning!”

Mallory assumed a stubborn look as she tromped up the wooden stairway leading to Kate’s deck, but she knew that her eyes were sparkling. Her friend’s undisguised interest in the plot line of the soap opera amused her deeply.

“My lips are sealed,” Mallory said with appropriate drama, knowing all the while that she would tell Kate everything if pressed.

Kate laughed and hugged her, but there was a brief flicker of concern in her intelligent hazel eyes. “You look tuckered out, Mallory,” she observed in her direct way.

Mallory only nodded and was infinitely grateful when Kate let the subject drop there and pulled her inside the comfortable house.

Kate Sheridan’s home was a lovely place, though small. The opposite wall of the living room was all glass and presented a staggering view of the Sound. At night, the lights of Seattle were often visible, dancing in the misty distance like a mirage.

There was a small fireplace on the back wall near the sliding glass doors that opened onto the deck, and a crackling fire danced on the hearth. The furniture was as simple and appealing as Kate herself; the chairs and sofa were shiny brown wicker, set off by colorful patchwork-patterned cushions. Kate’s large metal desk and ancient typewriter looked out over the water, an indulgence the gifted woman often bemoaned but never altered. She was fond of saying that she spent more time gazing at the scenery than working.

Of course, her success belied that assertion; Kate’s writing obviously did not suffer for her devotion to the magnificent view. If anything, it was enhanced.

“Sit down,” Kate ordered crisply as she took Mallory’s bulky coat and hung it from a hook on the brass coat tree near the sliding doors. “Heavens, I haven’t seen you since Christmas. It’s about time you had some time off.”

Mallory, settling into one of the wicker chairs, didn’t point out that not even a month had passed since Christmas. She was comforted by the presence of things that were dear and familiar, and she watched Kate with overt affection as the woman strode purposefully into the tiny kitchenette to pour the promised coffee, looking terrific in her gray flannel slacks, white blouse and wispy upswept hairdo. The maroon sweater draped over her shoulders, its sleeves tied loosely in front, gave her a sporty look that suited her well.

“How is the new book coming?” Mallory called out, over the refined clatter of china and silver.

Kate’s scrubbed face was shining as she carried two cups of coffee into the living room, placed them on the round coffee table and sat down in the chair facing Mallory’s. “Splendidly, if I do say so myself. But tell me about you—why aren’t you working?”

Mallory lowered her eyes. “They decided I was too tired.”

Kate sat back in her chair and crossed legs that were still trim and strong, probably because of her penchant for walking all over the island. “You do look some the worse for wear, as I said before. Is it serious?”

Mallory shook her head quickly. “I’m all right, Kate,” she promised in firm tones.

The older, quietly elegant woman took a thoughtful sip from her coffee cup, watching Mallory all the while. “I don’t think you are,” she argued kindly. “You look about as unhappy as anybody I’ve ever seen. Mallory, what in heaven’s name is wrong?”

Suddenly, Mallory’s throat ached and her eyes burned with unshed tears. She lifted her chin. “Everything,” she confessed, in a small, broken voice.

Kate raised a speculative eyebrow. “Nathan?”

“Partly,” Mallory admitted, setting her own cup down on the coffee table and entwining her fingers. “Oh, Kate, our marriage is such a joke! Nathan is always away on tour or recording or something, and I’m working twelve- and fourteen-hour days on that stupid soap—”

“Stupid?” Kate asked, with no indication of opinion one way or the other.

Mallory’s chin quivered. “I’m afraid I’m not very liberated, Kate,” she confessed. “I wanted to prove that I could have a career, and that I could be important as someone other than the wife of a famous man. Now I’ve done that, I guess, but it isn’t at all the way I thought it would be.” She paused, reaching for her cup. It rattled ominously in its saucer, and she set it down again. “I’m so miserable!”

“I can see that,” Kate replied calmly, resting her chin in her hands in a characteristic gesture. “What do you really want, Mallory?”

Mallory turned her head, not quite able to meet her friend’s wise, discerning eyes, and examined the familiar scene in front of Kate’s house. The beach looked strange under its blanket of snow, and the waters of the Sound were choppy. “I want to be a wife and a mother,” she muttered. “And, maybe, someday, use my teaching certificate—”

“Rash thing!” cried Kate, with humorous, feigned outrage. “You want to be a card-carrying woman!”

Mallory was gaping at her friend, speechless.

Kate laughed. “You were right before, Mallory—you aren’t very liberated. Liberation, you see, is the freedom to do what you really want to do, not some immovable directive requiring every woman on earth to carry a briefcase or wield a jackhammer!”

Mallory was still staring, but something very much like hope was beginning to flicker inside her. Kate Sheridan was the most “liberated” woman she’d ever known, and here she was, saying that wanting to make a home with the man you love was all right. “I thought—”

“I know what you thought,” Kate broke in with good-natured irritation. “You thought it was your duty as a modern, intelligent young woman to set aside your real inclinations and devote all your energy to something that doesn’t begin to please you.”

Mallory reached for her coffee cup, this time successfully. Her thoughts were in a pleasant tangle, and she didn’t try to talk.

Kate bent toward her, balancing her own cup and saucer on her knees. “Mallory McKendrick, you march to your own drumbeat,” she ordered. “Your life won’t be worth a damned thing if you don’t.”

Mallory laughed softly in relief; it felt so good to be addressed by her married name again. “I love you, Kate.”

“I love you, too,” the woman replied briskly. “But there have been times when I wanted to shake you. You do a creditable job as an actress, Mallory, but you weren’t born to it. I’ve always seen you as a crackerjack mother, myself.”

“Are you just saying that because you know it’s what I want to hear?” Mallory challenged, grinning.

Kate laughed. “My dear, you know me better than that. Hot air belongs in balloons, not conversations between people who care about each other.”

Mallory was pensive again. All right, she’d decided that she wanted a more settled life, children, maybe a chance to teach, when the time was right. But how would Nathan react to all this? They hadn’t discussed any of the options, really, and they had grown apart since Mallory stopped accompanying him on tour to pursue a career of her own.

Kate’s hand rested on Mallory’s. “These things generally work out,” she said with uncanny insight. “Talk to Nathan. He loves you, Mallory.”

The two women chatted about less pressing things after that, and, when the snowstorm began to show signs of becoming really nasty, Mallory reluctantly took her leave. She was on automatic pilot during the walk home, her mind absorbed in all the things she needed to say to Nathan.

But as she came out of the woods and onto her own property, Mallory was jolted. Beside Nathan’s silver Porsche sat Diane Vincent’s bright red MG roadster.

Mallory paused, alarmed on some instinctive level that defied reason. All her assurances to herself that she was being silly blew away on the winter wind. After drawing a deep breath, she made her way purposefully across the yard and onto the screened porch, where she was met by a delighted Cinnamon.

“Don’t tell me how glad you are to see me!” she admonished the squirming dog, even as she reached down to ruffle her lustrous, rusty coat. “You traitor!”

The back door squeaked open as Mallory was hanging her father’s woolen coat. Nathan appeared in the doorway, his eyes even darker than usual, and snapping with challenge and controlled fury. “Where the hell have you been?” he demanded.

It seemed now that the sensible, reassuring conversation with Kate Sheridan had taken place in another lifetime. Mallory thrust out her chin. “I’ve been walking,” she retorted.

“In this blizzard?” Nathan’s jaw tightened in annoyance.

Mallory pressed her lips together, unable to shake the unsettling idea that Nathan’s obnoxious mood had something to do with Diane Vincent’s presence. Was he having an attack of conscience?

“Kate’s house isn’t that far away,” she said. “And blizzard or no blizzard, Nathan McKendrick, I’ll go wherever I want, whenever I want.”

His granitelike features softened a little, and he even managed a halfhearted grin. “I’m sorry, Mallory—I was worried, that’s all. Next time, will you at least leave a note or something?”

Too busy bracing herself for another encounter with Diane Vincent to answer him, Mallory simply brushed past her husband and entered the kitchen.

Diane looked sensational in her tailored pale blue slacks, white silk blouse and navy blazer. Her long, blond hair, so pale that it was almost silver, shimmered on her shoulders in a fetching profusion of curls, and her clear blue eyes assessed Mallory in a way that was at once polite and disdainful.

“Hello, Mallory,” she said sweetly.

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.