Different Dreams (27 page)

Well, she had the daring today. Besides, since Cam
had expressed so much admiration for her legs, shouldn't he be entitled to see them? She hung the dress on the back of the bathroom door while she took a quick shower. Once bathed, powdered, and perfumed, Malou slid into the bold dress and went to view herself.

Yes, the legs, long and tanned, showed up to spectacular advantage. She ran her fingers through her hair and let the wet strands settle into curls to air-dry. Cam seemed to like it that way. She fumbled a bit with her eyeliner and mascara but was finally satisfied with the result. Now, she laughed to herself, remembering Cam's joke, if I only had a monkey to perch on my shoulder.

It was only on the drive to San Antonio that Malou's newfound courage began to desert her a bit. But she parried the doubts and second thoughts that assailed her as she zoomed down I-35 headed for San Antonio and Cameron Landell.

She couldn't hold them off entirely, though, once she was standing in front of Cam's receptionist asking if she might have a moment with him.

“He's in a conference right now,” the woman informed her, “and he's asked me to hold all calls and visitors. Would you care to wait?”

Malou nodded, wondering if the woman knew why she was there. She took a seat on a dove gray sectional. Her skirt hiked up to the middle of her thigh when she sat down. Malou tried to tug it down, but there wasn't
enough fabric to stretch. After the hot drive, the air-conditioning chilled her, raising goose bumps all along the expanses of exposed flesh. Malou suddenly yearned for a nice, concealing pair of khaki slacks. What had possessed her to wear this
scrap
?

With each moment, Malou's goose bumps and anxieties rose until she finally stood, ready to retreat. She went to the receptionist, who glanced up at her and kept on typing.

“Could you tell Mr. Landell . . .”

The receptionist kept staring.

“Never mind. Don't tell him anything. I can't wait any longer.”

The receptionist's eyes shifted from Malou's face. Malou followed them.

“Are you here to see me, Malou?”

Cam. He'd never looked better. For a moment his attention was diverted by the formalities of bidding farewell to the half dozen men who filed out of his office, their smiles indicating the completion of a successful meeting. How on earth, she wondered, could one man be so meltingly attractive while pumping a banker's hand? At last they were gone and he was staring at her again.

“Come in.” He stood back from his office door.

Malou straightened, swallowed hard, and went in. The door shut behind her.

“I understand from Professor Everitt that you're
planning to go to Kenya,” Cam said as he sank into the high-backed swivel chair behind the vast barricade of his desk.

Malou's heart sank as she took the chair he indicated. They might have been nothing more than distant acquaintances that business had thrown together for a time. He seemed supremely unconcerned whether she went to Kenya or the moon.

“Well, I did get a grant to do some research there,” she equivocated, hoping to wring a shred of emotion out of him.

“Congratulations,” he replied stiffly. “What was it you wanted to discuss with me?”

Was there absolutely no emotion to wring? Could he be as totally unaffected as he appeared to be? Malou found it staggering that a relationship that had completely unhinged her life and left it swinging open and empty could have meant nothing to him. But apparently it had. She scoured her mind for an excuse for why she'd come to see him.

“I wanted to . . .” She stumbled. He leaned forward ever so slightly. Did he seem to be listening a bit more intently? Had the chill in his eyes warmed the barest bit? But then he leaned away again. “I wanted to ask you about my replacement at Los Monos,” she finally blurted out.

“And that's why you drove all the way over here?”
he asked skeptically, continuing to stare at her. To be exact, he was staring at her mouth.

With a jolt Malou realized that she was gnawing away at her lower lip. Oh, what the hell! She had one chance at a life with passion and this was it. So the odds were a hundred to one that all she'd succeed in doing would be to make a complete fool of herself. She'd take them.

“No,” she stammered, “that's not why I came here at all.”

Cam's left eyebrow cocked slightly to indicate interest. Moderate, casual interest.

“I came to tell you that I'd made a mistake. I misjudged you. I'm sorry. I'll probably make a lot of other mistakes before I'm through, but I think the worst one I could make is to leave without telling you one thing.” Malou felt as if the floor were dropping away beneath her.

“What is that one thing?” Cam asked, not urgently but with a little more warmth—like the interest one friend takes in another.

Malou now openly chewed at her lower lip; she needed strength and would take it from any source available. She had never in her life felt so vulnerable. What was worse was that, if she answered Cam's question, she would increase that vulnerability a thousand times. She would strip herself bare in front of him. Malou felt herself perched on a thin wall. On one side was a potential abyss of humiliation.
On the other was Kenya and the linguist. She drew in a deep breath, then turned loose of her lip.

“I love you.”

She'd said it. She wanted medals for bravery, bouquets, fireworks, and champagne toasts, but most of all she wanted Cam's arms around her. But none of that happened. Cam sat, unmoved and unmoving. Malou drew herself up and repeated one word over and over in her mind: dignity. She would not cry. Would not say another word. She had said all she possibly could and it hadn't been enough. She'd tried for that one chance in a hundred and had lost. She was thankful now that she hadn't done anything so rash as to turn Kenya down. She longed to be there at that very moment. Longed to be miles and years away from the humiliation starting to burn along her spine and up into her cheeks. She stood stiffly, pivoted, and walked on wooden legs toward the door.

Her hand was on the doorknob when Cam caught her, covering her hand with his to stop it. To keep her from opening the door. He whirled her around in his arms. Tears leaked from Malou's downcast eyes, and her face from hairline to neck flamed with embarrassment.

“You love me?” he asked haltingly.

His hands were warm and gentle on her bare arms, but Malou could not look up. “You probably already knew that,” Malou mumbled.

“How would I have known that?” Cam demanded, his
hands tightening on her. “What were my clues? That you thought I was a monkey murderer? That you're planning to run off to Kenya? These things are supposed to tell me that you love me? God, Malou, I'd hate to be around when you were trying to tell someone you didn't like him.”

“Well, I'm not,” Malou shot back, prickled now at having to endure his scrutiny. “I'm trying to tell someone that I love him, but if he doesn't care to hear it, I'll take the first plane to Kenya.” With that, Malou whirled back around to open the door.

“If you really, really feel that way,” Cam said, grabbing her again, “you're not going anywhere.”

Then Malou felt her feet being whisked away from under her as Cam scooped her into his arms and carried her from the door. He sat them both down in an overstuffed chair with Malou firmly trapped on his lap.

“I've wanted to hear that for a long time,” he said quietly. Malou stopped squirming, trying to get away, when she saw the truth of what he said written in his face. For beneath the veneer of cool formality lay a pool of misery. Malou knew it as the very same one she had been drowning in for the past weeks. She held up a hand as tentative as any the young monkeys had ever held up to her and touched his face. He captured her seeking hand and, closing his eyes, nestled a kiss against her palm.

“Oh, Malou, I love you. I've loved you from that first moment you came over to the gate and tried to one-up
me in your little khaki shorts with your hair shining in the sun.”

“Cam.”

It was all Malou could say before they found other, more gratifying ways to occupy their lips. Their kiss echoed and confirmed all they had each said, finally convincing them both that it was real. Cam leaned back and laughed. It was a joyous, exultant cry of jubilation and release.

“So what do we do now, Mary Louise? I love you. You love me. And one of us is packing off to the other side of the world.”

Malou cut a saucy glance Cam's way. “Maybe we could work out a deal here.”

“A deal?” Cam echoed. “And just what sort of proposition might you have in mind, Ms. Sanders?”

“Possibly something along the lines of an assistant to whomever you've found to replace me at Los Monos.”

“You mean the Landell Monkey Sanctuary? Well now, there might be the possibility of an opening there, Ms. Sanders. Particularly since I haven't as yet come up with a suitable replacement.”

“You haven't? Why?” Malou asked, astounded. “Didn't anyone want it? I can't believe that there's a single person over in the anthro department who would turn the job down.”

“There may be; I don't know,” Cam admitted. “I never
asked. I couldn't bring myself to think of Los Monos without you, so I kept putting off finding another manager. Jorge's been pinch-hitting so far, but his complaints about being a monkeyboy instead of a cowboy keep getting louder, so I suppose I'll have to find someone who's a bit fonder of the beasts. Any candidates?” Cam teased with a smile.

“When do I start?”

“You mean you'd turn down Kenya for south Texas?”

“In an instant. Provided you're part of the trade.”

“What's the Landell Monkey Sanctuary without Landell, I'd like to know!” Cam asked. “I'm yours, Malou, for just as long as you'll have me.”

An unearthly sense of happiness wafted over Malou as she cuddled up against Cam's chest and lay there for several utterly contented moments listening to his heart beat strong and steady against her ear.

“You know, I never really wanted to go to Kenya,” she murmured. “Besides wanting to be with you, the research at Los Monos would be more interesting. There's still so much work that needs to be done on the troop's adaptation. I mean, I've only just begun to scratch the surface. There's still years, decades, more research to be done.”

“That makes me happy, Malou,” Cam said softly. “I always want you to have whatever it is that your heart desires most.” A gentle chuckle rumbled against Malou's
ear. “And, naturally, I want the same for myself. Just like I have right now with you in my arms.”

Malou snuggled a bit closer. “You know, I could get to like making these deals.”

“I should hope you could. After all, you learned from the master.”

Then Cam stretched a long arm across his desk to buzz the receptionist. He told her to hold all his calls for a long time. A
very
long time.

A
LSO BY
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