Reflections of Yesterday (11 page)

“But he’s going to wonder why we’re celebrating. In all the time we’ve been going out, we’ve never taken Dad to a fancy restaurant. He’s expecting us to announce our engagement. What are we going to tell him?”

Glenn grinned suddenly. “We’ll simply have to make up something. Should I tell him you’re pregnant?”

“Glenn!”

“All right, you come up with something.”

In the end, they called it a belated Father’s Day gift, until a sober, disappointed Clay reminded Angie that she had already given him a shirt and tie.

Friday morning, Angie must have glanced at her wristwatch fifteen times between eleven and eleven-thirty.

“You’re doing your bullfrog routine again,” Donna mentioned casually. “You sure have been jumpy this week.”

Arguing with Donna would be useless, especially since she was right. In spite of herself, Angie glanced at her watch again. Simon had said he’d be by to pick her up for lunch between eleven and noon.

The door opened and Angie looked up. Her breath froze in her throat, nearly choking her. Simon’s smile was filled with a wealth of love. A slow, admiring grin crept across his face. He was dressed casually in an open-collared sport shirt and cotton slacks. Angie couldn’t recall him looking more devastatingly handsome. Her eyes were glued to him, and for the life of her she couldn’t speak or move.

Donna’s gaze swung from the immobile Angie to Simon and then back to Angie.

“Can I help you?” Donna intervened, obviously confused.

“I’ve come to take your employer to lunch.”

Angie’s fingers worked furiously with the satin ribbon she was forming into a huge bow. With a dexterity that came with years of practice, she wove the ribbon in and out of her fingers, twisted it with a thin wire, and set it aside for Donna to insert into a floral centerpiece.

“Are you ready?” Simon directed the question to her.

“Yes. Give me a minute.”

Donna’s face scrunched up with a frown. “You’re the man who called earlier this week.”

Simon’s gaze didn’t waver from Angie’s. “Yes.”

Flustered and eager to make her escape before Donna asked any more questions, Angie moved around to the front of the counter. “I’ll be back at two.”

“Make it three.” Simon’s gaze traveled to Donna as he flashed her a quick smile.

Once outside, Angie squinted in the sunlight. Simon strolled at a leisurely pace through the historic section of Charleston. Actually, Simon strolled and Angie followed, her arms crossed in front of her to convey her feelings about this arrangement. They drifted in and out of quaint shops along the way, browsing. Simon didn’t seem to be in a hurry, but Angie wanted this afternoon over with.

“Are you hungry?” he asked, after an hour.

Her stomach was in tight knots. “Not particularly.”

“You know, if you don’t loosen up, someone might mistake you for a wooden Indian.”

“Very funny.”

Reaching out, Simon pressed a forefinger to the curve of her cheek. “None of this is the least bit amusing. Let’s find someplace to sit and talk.”

Simon chose the restaurant. Angie was too wrapped up in her feelings to notice the name. The hostess directed them to a table in the sun and handed them large menus. Angie couldn’t have choked down soup, let alone an entire meal. This meeting was awkward and unpleasant. Yet Simon appeared oblivious to it all. With the least amount of encouragement, he looked as though he would pull her into his arms and kiss her senseless. Angie was determined that he wouldn’t get that opportunity.

Simon studied the menu without reading a word. This wasn’t going well. He had spent the morning finding out everything he could about Glenn Lambert. The man had a good reputation as a stockbroker and investor, and was coming up in the largest brokerage firm in Charleston.
More important was the fact that Glenn loved Angie. They both did. Under different circumstances, Simon would have liked the man. Lambert was an experienced gambler, but he was a fool to risk losing Angie. Now it was up to Simon to press that to his advantage. Too much was at stake to lose her again.

The waitress arrived, and Simon ordered the special of the day, not knowing what it was. Angie ordered the same. Maybe they would both be surprised, he thought.

“When did you cut your hair?” Simon didn’t know why he asked that, but anything was better than the tense silence between them.

Angie spread the starched linen napkin across her lap. It gave her something to do with her fingers as she composed her thoughts. She then lifted her gaze, looking directly into Simon’s eyes. “A long time ago. I don’t remember when.”

He acknowledged her answer with a brief nod.

“When did you cut down the tree?” She had neither the time nor the patience to skirt around the issues.

His fingers tightened around the water glass. “Two years ago, June seventh.”

Their anniversary. In a flash, Angie knew. She knew! Her breath jammed in her lungs as the knowledge seared her mind. He’d chopped down the tree because he couldn’t endure the agony of having it in the clearing as mute witness to her betrayal.

She dropped her gaze, trying to find the words to comfort him, afraid that if she stated her true feelings it would complicate an already uncomfortable situation.

“I don’t think we need worry,” she murmured, drawing in a long, quavering breath. “Our divorce wasn’t any more legal than our marriage.”

A shadow of pain crossed his features. “It’s not that simple. I married you with my heart and discovered it was impossible to divorce you.”

They each grew silent then, trapped in the muddy undertow of pain-filled memories.

By the time their lunch arrived, Angie’s linen napkin was a mass of wrinkles from all the nervous twisting she had done. Simon had depleted his water glass twice.

Simon was annoyed with himself at being so unnerved by this encounter. Angie hadn’t left his mind from the moment he had found her in the clearing last weekend. All week he had carried a clear picture of her in his mind. Now they sat like strangers, not knowing what to say. It was obvious that she was uncomfortable. For that matter, so was he. Silently he prayed; he didn’t
want to lose her. She was everything he had always known she would be: sweet, fresh, vital. He adored her frankness, her spirit, her capacity to love.

“How long have you known Glenn?”

The question came at her from out of the blue, causing the tight line of her mouth to crack with the beginnings of a smile. They had come to bury the past, and Simon was already challenging the present.

“We met two years ago when I invested the capital from the Petal Pusher.”

“The what?”

Deliberately, she set the fork down beside the plate. “For three years I had two businesses. Clay Pots and another I called the Petal Pusher.”

“Petal Pusher? What was that?”

“I made weekly visits to restaurants, doctors’ offices, or anyplace else that needed someone to come in and make sure their plants were healthy. It seems surveys prove that patients who wait in a doctor’s office with dead and dying plants sitting in the corner lose confidence in their physicians.”

Simon was enthralled. The idea was a marvelous one. “What happened to the business?”

Angie didn’t hesitate. “I sold it for a tidy profit. I invested most of it and put aside the ten I owed you.”

“And that’s how you met Glenn.”

“Right.”

“You always were clever,” Simon said, and a thread of pride laced his words.

For the first time that afternoon, Angie lowered her defenses. “I prefer to be thought of as intelligent. I simply found a need and filled it.”

“Do you still play tennis?”

Simon had taught her the strenuous game and lived to regret it. Less than six months after he demonstrated the proper method of holding the racket, she was beating him at his own game. “Twice a week. What about you?”

“I’ve switched to racquetball. If you like, I’ll teach you that, too.”

Glenn already had, but Angie preferred tennis. “No, thanks.” She made a show of looking at her watch. “I should be getting back. A teenager comes in part-time on Friday afternoons, and Donna likes to leave early.”

“It’s barely two.” He studied Angie and made a conscious effort not to argue. “Will you have dinner with me tonight?”

“Simon,” Angie said, and groaned. “It isn’t going to do any good to continue to see me. We’re different people now, with nothing in common except a lot of pain. I’d rather we buried it and went on with our lives.”

“Fine. I want that, too, but I also want you in my life. Now and forever.”

Clenching her fist, Angie deposited her napkin on the table and pushed back her chair to stand.

“Tonight?”

Glenn’s words echoed in the chambers of her mind. Neither of them wanted the shadow of Simon looming between them. “All right,” she agreed reluctantly.

That evening, dressed in a Caribbean-blue linen suit, Angie nervously paced the living-room floor. She regretted having succumbed so easily to Simon’s wishes. Tonight was it, she argued silently with herself. She wouldn’t see him again. Every meeting was a strain-filled confrontation that left her facing nagging doubts she preferred to ignore. Yes, she agreed, Glenn was right to force her into doing this, but she hated it.

Nervously she glanced at the wall clock. Clay had a habit of sometimes dropping by unannounced on Friday nights. The last thing she needed was to have him find her with Simon Canfield.

She stood by the window of the second-story apartment and gazed to the lot below. From her position, she viewed Simon’s Mercedes pull into the parking lot. The vehicle looked incongruous with the cheaper models that filled the spaces. Unfolding his long, powerful legs, he climbed from behind the steering wheel, paused, and leaned over to retrieve a small box. Even from this distance, Angie recognized what it was. She should—she had seen others like it often enough. Simon—dear, wonderful, Simon—was bringing her a corsage. No one but him would think to do that for someone who owned a flower shop.

Opening the apartment door, she stared at him, hardly able to believe what she saw and felt. Simon, who could afford to give her the most expensive orchids, had brought her a corsage of white roses and blue carnations, made in the very shape and color of the one he had given her for the junior-senior prom.

Their eyes met in silent communication as he walked into the apartment.

“Hello again,” he said, handing her the plastic container.

Unshed tears glistened in her eyes. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” His look was full of warmth. “A boy remembers things, too.”

Her fingers fumbled with the opening as she struggled to avoid his gaze.

“There are a lot of other things I remember, including this.” He reached for her and slowly bent his head toward hers. She knew he was going to kiss her, but instead of pushing away, she lifted her face and met him halfway, seeking the proof that she needed. She loved Glenn, and what she had shared with Simon was over. His kiss would confirm that.

Simon’s mouth caressed hers in a long, tender exploration, and Angie’s theory went soaring into space. Deepening the kiss, Simon shaped and molded her lips to his own. Angie realized that with the least resistance he would let her pull away at any time. Part of her was demanding that she do exactly that. Instead, she dropped the corsage and slipped her arms up and over his shoulders, her fingers seeking the patch of hair that grew at his nape.

“Angie.” He groaned, weaving his fingers into the thick length of her hair. Then his hands cupped her face as he studied the doubtful, almost accusing light in her eyes. His slow smile was followed with equally unhurried, lingering kisses that caused her world to orbit crazily. Alternately, he tormented and teased her until she was only too happy to oblige him. His kisses became a sensuous attack that left her trembling uncontrollably and clinging to him with an unaccustomed helplessness. Sensation shot through her as he repeated the assault. His hands roamed her back while he intimately explored her mouth. Her mouth broke from his. “No more,” she pleaded.

In response he crushed her tightly to the hard length of his body. At the same moment his mouth came down on hers, silencing the forming protest.

Simon groaned again, louder, his lips leaving hers to explore her earlobe before blazing a path across her cheek, then covering her lips again. His hands released her and moved to the front of her, searing her flesh with every intimate brushing against the scented hollow of her throat. This newest intrusion penetrated Angie’s senses, and drugged with passion, she battled desperately for reality by jerking free. Immediately Simon relaxed his hold and Angie went stumbling backward.

Expertly, Simon caught her in his arms and hauled her back into his embrace. “Okay,
love, we’ll stop.” His voice was little more than a throbbing whisper as he rubbed his chin across the top of her head until their labored breathing had returned to normal. Color invaded her face.

Simon took in a deep breath. “Do you have anything to drink here?”

She answered him with a slow nod. His gaze followed hers into the minuscule kitchen.

“Sit down, I’ll bring us both something.” She brought down the bourbon, and he poured them each a drink.

Angie marveled at his control.

“What does all this tell you, Angie?” he asked, as he sat beside her and handed her a drink. She stared at the ice cubes floating in the amber liquid. Bourbon. Oh no, bourbon reminded her of Glenn. She was engaged to Glenn and had allowed Simon to kiss her like that. She could have wept with shame.

“Angie?”

“It tells me,” she answered forcefully, “that I was a fool to let Glenn talk me into seeing you. I don’t want this.” Surging to her feet, she stormed across the room to the kitchen and dumped the contents of the drink in the sink. More than at any other time in her life she needed her wits. Being with Simon was enough to cloud her perception without adding alcohol. She thought she saw Simon’s mouth twitch, but when she narrowed her eyes and searched his face, he willingly met her gaze.

“Something is funny?” she challenged.

“I find it amusing that your attitude toward alcohol remains the same. As I recall, you were never angrier with me than the night Cal and I got drunk on moonshine.”