Texas rich (42 page)

{279}

Marriage certainly hadn't changed much in her hfe, she thought with a grimace. Agnes had controlled everything she did up until the day she'd married Moss—and she hadn't relinquished that hold yet. If anything, her mother had even more control because of her alliance with Seth. Her very existence was in their hands. Moss, dear, sweet Moss, trusted them to take care of her and that was exactly what they were doing.

A horrible realization dawned. If anything happened to Moss and Seth died, Agnes would be in total control—unless Billie had a son. The son would inherit, but she, Billie, would be the dowager queen. She would be in control of her son and safeguard everything until he came of age. She could see to it that Maggie and Susan received their rightful share. Gamblers had a phrase for it—an ace in the hole. The ticket to everything. She needed a son. It was that simple.

Perhaps it was time to become a little selfish. Or, to put it another way, perhaps it was time to grow up and face reality, with the rest of the Colemans.

Moss woke, feeling vaguely disoriented. He gazed about

the strange room. So many rooms lately, places where he'd slept, none of them secure and familiar. He suddenly yearned for his old room at Sunbridge, for old, familiar things, for things that he could hold and feel, that would give him a sense of his past and offer a promise for his fumre. A muted sound from, down the hall brought a grin to his face. He had something better: he had two little girls, his own flesh and blood!

He noticed Billie sleeping on the chaise. She was beautiful. He lay quietly and watched her for a long time. She was so young to be the mother of two children. Twenty years old, not even old enough to graduate college or to vote, and here she was a wife and a mother. She hadn't fooled him with her letters that made light of what she'd endured with the pregnancies. He'd seen her that Christmas when she'd been carrying Maggie, swollen and worn and frightened. He decided he wouldn't put Billie through that again, no matter what Pap said or wanted. Two little girls were enough for him and if it didn't suit Pap, too damn bad.

It was time for Billie to enjoy life. Time for her to enjoy the girls and watch them grow. Maybe later, when the war was over, they'd take time out of their lives to try for a son. He was confident his luck would hold—the war hadn't gotten him so far and it would never get him. He was too smart, too quick.

{280}

He was a Coleman. Death was nowhere on his horizon. There would be time for a son. He would think of Billie now. Two children in two years was more than enough to ask of any woman.

Billie wasn't the same giri he'd met in Philadelphia and married. He could see it and feel it. He recognized she was growing up. She wasn't a girl any longer, but a beautiful, desirable woman. She was learning every day. She'd stood up to Seth. And, when she really became Billie Coleman, a woman in her own right, she would be formidable. He smiled. Billie. Dear, loving Billie.

Carefully, Moss inched himself from the bed. First stop, the nursery. He stood in the doorway for a few minutes watching the girls. Maggie was building a stack of blocks and he held his breath while one chubby hand added another and another. His eyes were drawn to Susan, playing quietly with a stuffed teddy, mangling its ear with her two bottom teeth. She looked up curiously from her playpen and Moss watched her apprehensively. Would she scream again? But evidently she felt safe behind the bars. Moss grinned because she looked so much like a fat little monkey in a cage.

Miss Jenkins was not present, and the grandmotherly nanny followed Moss's suggestion that she leave him alone with his daughters.

Maggie's brightly colored tower of blocks toppled to the floor. Maneuvering her plump little bottom and getting up on her haunches, the rosy-cheeked, dark-haired toddler looked around for nanny. But there was only Moss. She pointed a pudgy little finger at him and said seriously, "You did that. Pap."

Moss threw back his dark head that was so like Maggie's and laughed. By God, if someone had to be blamed, why not him? "I'll tell you what," he said, hunkering down, "I'll build you a castle. Would you like that, Maggie?"

The toddler jabbered like a magpie as Moss added block upon block. "Susy wants out. Get Susy, Pap!"

"Is that allowed? Would nanny like that?"

Maggie hung her head, her cheeks flushing just like her mother's. "No."

"Good. Then let's do it."

"Nurse will- holler," Maggie warned precociously.

"Pap will take care of things. I think Susy wants to build with blocks, too. We can pretend she's the princess."

{281}

"WTio am I, Pap?"

"You're the queen, Maggie darling."

Maggie pondered her father's words. "The queen is bigger!" She stretched her pink arms upward. "So big!"

"I think you mean better, don't you? Yes, the queen is bigger and better." Moss was grinning. SibUng rivahy akeady. "But just a shade better. Princesses are important, too."

"Yes! Get Susy!"

"I thought you'd see it my way." Moss took it slow and easy bending over his youngest daughter. He hesitated before touching her, afraid she'd begin to cry and upset Maggie, too. When his httle girl wrapped her sweet arms around his neck and squealed not with fright but with deUghtful anticipation. Moss felt his heart melt.

Billie woke an hour later to laughter. She listened for a moment. The booming laugh came again, unmistakably Moss's. He must be with the children, she thought, and tiptoed down the hall. At the door to the nursery she clapped her hand to her mouth to prevent her own laughter from shattering the moment. Moss was sitting on the floor with Susan between his legs. She was busy peeling the paper from Maggie's crayons, and Maggie was drawing squiggly lines on his shoulder cast, telling him it was her name, Mommy's name, and Grandmam's name.

"Where's my name?" Moss complained. "Don't you know how to spell Pap?"

Maggie considered the question for a moment. Then she brightened. Her eyes flashed with mischief and a sudden girlish giggle erupted from her pouting mouth as she grabbed a deep purple crayon and drew a long bold line. Sitting back on her heels, she added another flourish and proudly announced, "Pap!"

It was Billie who insisted, despite Seth's objection, that Moss retire early. Her husband's face was ashen when he climbed the stairs to their rooms. He didn't object when Billie helped him undress, and he was asleep almost before his head touched the pillow.

Billie was satisfied just to have Moss here, in their bed. As long as he was near, within touching distance, she could be happy.

There would be other days, other nights. Clearly, her indestructible husband had overdone it today. It was the strain of coming home, dealing with the pain, playing with the girls—

{282}

and of being torn between his loyalties to his wife and to his father. But she would always remember this afternoon when her husband and their babies had shared wonderful hours together. If a son had been there, would it have been different?

She leaned over and brushed her lips across his brow. Quietly she undressed and climbed into bed beside him. How good it felt—and how lonely and empty her bed had been without him all these months. ,

It worried her that Moss was so eager to get himself back into the action. If only, just once. Moss would want her more than he wanted anything else. WTiy couldn't she and the girls be enough? As she turned toward him and slipped her arm around his waist to nestle close, she knew her decision was a good one. If his wife and daughters weren't quite enough, a son would be. A son.

iUHUH CHAPTER EIGHTEEN ))))}}}>}

The days in San Diego passed swiftly and smoothly. They were busy—Billie saw to that. Overnight, she had seemed to take charge. Family breakfast on the terrace included the girls. Then some time for play in the nurser\', with Bilhe watching from the sidelines. After that, an hour or so for Moss to read the papers and maybe for a casual talk over a second cup of coffee. Lunch was on the terrace, too, and then the girls went down for their naps and Moss left for his physical therapy session at the naval hospital. When he came home from the hospital he was always exhausted and she made sure he had at least an hour of rest. Billie generously shared Moss with Seth at dinner and for an hour afterward. Then he was hers. If Seth didn't like the arrangements, he kept his opinions to himself.

One warm evening, as a gentle breeze stirred the lace curtains at the French doors and Billie and Moss lay quietly together listening to soft music on the radio, Billie said, "I want another baby. Moss."

She felt him tense. "Just like that? No. No more. Not now."

{283}

"Just like that," Billie repeated. She traced a long, deUcate line down his chest and stopped just short of the rough patch of hair at the base of his stomach. "Lx)ok at me, Moss. Do I look sick? I'm young; I'm healthy. I take care of myself. And I'll do what the doctors say—I always do. Susan arrived safely and almost exactly on time. This baby will, too."

"You make it sound like it's already a fact." Moss pretended to glower. He was a man after all, and flattered that this beautiful young woman wanted to bear him yet another child.

"Isn't it?"

"No, Bilhe, it isn't. I don't want you taking chances. You've got to be strong for the two children we already have. When the war is over and I'm here with you, that's the time to think of another child. Unless, of course, you've got your doubts about my coming out of this one in one piece." His gaze was sharp, keen, piercing Billie.

"I don't think that at all. I know nothing will happen to you. That's another reason—I want to have a son for you when you return. Please, Moss. Darhng?"

"Billie, I never willingly refuse you anything, but I think we should wait. The girls are wonderful, they're beautiful and charming, and they are more than I ever imagined daughters could be. I don't need a son."

Lie. Lie through your teeth, Coleman. Make it sound like the truth. Need. Want. There was a difference. He had said he didn't need a son. Change it, Coleman, before it's too late.

"I don't want a son right now, Billie," he said. "I'm content with Maggie and Susy."

Diversion. That's how some battles were won. "Billie, have you written Thad lately?"

It took Billie a moment to adjust to the sudden change in the conversation. "No, I haven't. Do you want me to write to him?"

"I think it might be a good idea. He only gets mail from his mother. He likes you, Billie, and I know he'd appreciate it. You could give him all the lowdown about how the girls are growing. When I tell it, it sounds like bragging."

Well, if he could do an about-face in the conversation, so could she. "Lieutenant, how would you like me to make love to you, Billie Coleman style?" The finger that traced the length of his torso insidiously invaded private property.

"Is there a difference from the Moss Coleman style?" he

{284}

asked, shifting to present himself to her hands and lips.

"Considerable,.. however, I'm not certain you're up to it," Billie teased as she nibbled his ear.

"I'm up to it and you know it!" He seized her hand and pressed it against him.

"Darned if you aren't!" She laughed, a soft, womanly sound, deep and husky with the knowledge of the pleasure to come. It was a sound that ripened his interest, that made him ache to caress her body and to lose himself in her. "If you promise me you won't go away, I'll be right back."

"In this condition? Where would I go? Billie, don't forget to—"

"Use the diaphragm," she finished for him. After Moss had been released from the naval hospital, he'd talked intimately with her about taking measures to prevent another pregnancy and made her promise to see a doctor in San Diego. He'd been so concerned, so sincere, that she could not deny him. She would use the diaphragm tonight, but she would also remove it whenever she felt like, even too early. She didn't think of herself as devious; she was just giving the odds a little boost. If it was meant to be, she would conceive another child. Her conscience didn't prick her, but her image in the bathroom mirror was bitter.

When Billie slipped beneath the silken sheets against Moss's warm, vital body, her face was warm and glowing. "Are you ready. Lieutenant Coleman?"

"Mrs. Coleman, when I see you like this, I'm always ready." The timbre of his voice sent a tingling ripple down her spine.

"No more talking. Lieutenant. I want you to just lie there. You're not to do a thing, understand?"

"Aye-aye, ma'am." His hands reached for the ashen fall of silky hair that fell about her face. He held it to one side and found her mouth with his own.

Billie let all thoughts evaporate. She was a woman, receptive only to loving sensations—the way her thighs felt between his hard, muscular ones; the way the tips of her breasts brushed against his furred chest. Her fingers found the planes and hollows of his body, knowing them more intimately than she knew her own. And as she traced moist patterns with her lips from the base of his throat to the flatness of his belly, she was attuned to his intake of breath, the little gasp of desire that quickened her pulses with a sense of her female power. She seduced him

{285}

with her hands, her lips, the motions of her body upon him. And when she straddled him and took him into herself, there was victory in her cries of pleasure.

Billie lived in a dream world, surrounded by her children and her husband. It was an idyll, something she'd craved and needed and had never had. Even Seth smiled at her these days, and Agnes was complimentary about everything Billie did. Billie's sense of security grew, and she looked forward to Christmas. This year there would be two perfect little girls under the Christmas tree and Moss would be there, with that look of love and admiration in his eyes.

On the afternoon of December 31 Moss came bounding into the house on La Cienega Boulevard. His face was beaming with excitement. His sunmier-blue eyes twinkled.

"Look!" he told Billie, opening his jacket. She saw that the' last of the bandages and the brace had been removed. "Good as new, fit as a fiddle. I leave to rejoin my squadron on the fifth!"