'You'd be welcome to kick me if you wanted to get to know me a little better, too,' offered Terry, Skip's partner and younger brother.
'No deal,' Rex warned him with a mock growl, Alexi flushed slightly. She liked the note of jealousy in his voice as much as she liked the ease of the teasing repartee. Were she and Rex really becoming a couple? The thought was so pleasant that it was frightening. They'd been a couple, of course. Very much a couple. They'd barely been apart since the night on the beach. She couldn't count the times that they had made love, and that part of it was very thrilling and exciting...but there seemed to be so much more. She liked times like these almost as much. She loved the way that she could set about a project and, if she wanted his opinion, ask for it. He would take the time to answer her--unless he was behind a closed door, and then she knew that he needed his concentration. But they'd been together--living together--all these days, and they didn't seem to encroach upon each other's space. Sometimes she was so afraid that she held her breath a bit. Then she was wondering when he would decide that Eden had been fun for a spell but a woman as more than a lover was like a brick around his neck. He wasn't a cruel or cold man--he was the opposite in every way. But Alexi knew how the scars of the past could eat into a soul. The longer she and Rex stayed together, the more domestic she came to feel.
Would he run from domesticity if it became too confining?
'Finish your pizza,' Skip told his brother. 'I think we're overstaying our welcome here.'
Alexi laughed. 'Don't be silly. You're welcome as long as you want to stay. I'm going to run down to the cellar, though, and feed the creatures. I'll be right back. You all sit and enjoy yourselves.'
She spun out of Rex's arms, thinking that it was nice, too, that their neighbors--Rex's friends and acquaintances from the mainland--all appeared to think it natural and romantic that the two of them were together.
Only Emily disapproved. Well, she didn't disapprove, but she seemed unhappy. Rex had told Alexi once that Emily didn't dislike her--Emily thought that she was simply too nice a girl for him. Alexi was amused--and touched. Few people would assume that she was too nice for anyone. She had made the front pages of too many gossip magazines.
The phone started to ring as soon as she reached the bottom step. She could hear Rex, Skip and Terry discussing the chances of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in the coming season.
'Rex! Get that, will you?' She needed an answering machine for the house, she decided. Rex seldom thought to answer a phone just because it was ringing.
'Rex!'
The phone kept ringing. Alexi dropped the fifty-pound bag of Samson's dog food with an oath. Samson barked at her; his tail thumped the floor, and he stared at her with huge, reproachful eyes.
She patted him on the head. 'I'll be right back, big guy.
I promise.'
She almost stepped on a kitten as she started up. 'I'll be back--I promise,' she said again.
Skip and Terry were at the table. Skip pointed toward the hallway. Alexi nodded her thanks and hurried toward the parlor.
Rex was saying something. He looked up and noticed that Alexi had come into the room. 'Hold on, will you? She's right here.' He covered the mouthpiece and handed the phone to Alexi. 'Your agent.'
'Oh.'
Alexi took the phone and greeted George Beattie with affection. George was great; five-three, stout, a very proper British chap with a heart of gold. Alexi didn't think that she'd have made it through the past year without him.
Rex knew he probably should have left the room, but he didn't. Alexi didn't really say much of anything; she listened mainly. She glanced at him, a little apologetically, and asked for a piece of paper and a pencil. She thanked him with a glance when he supplied them.
'September first... I don't know, George. I still don't know.' She paused to listen. 'I'll let you know by next week. Is that enough time?''
Rex knew he must have agreed. Alexi thanked him, asked after his wife and kids, told him to take care and hung up. She fingered the paper, then noted him standing there, watching her, his arms crossed over his chest. 'They want you back?' he asked. There was no emotion in his tone. Alexi shrugged.
'Oh, it was an offer from one of the clothing manufacturers. A new campaign.'
Rex took the paper from her and looked at the dates-- and the sums. 'That's the money involved?'
She nodded.
'Who is the photographer on the shoot? Not Vinto.'
“No, no. Once the Helen of Troy finished, George knew to make sure that such a thing couldn't happen again.'
'Well,' he breathed softly. 'You'd be a fool not to take it, wouldn't you?'
He handed the paper back, smiled stiffly and walked back to the kitchen. Alexi watched the set of his shoulders and felt as if her heart sank a little.
He didn't care. She was falling into domestic bliss, and he was definitely finding it all to be a brief affair--cut short conveniently by her work schedule.
She'd known; she had only herself to blame. He'd never made any promises, and she wasn't really entitled to any complaints. No man could have given her more.
She stood there, watching his broad back as he disappeared through the door to the kitchen. What was the matter with her? They were hardly strangers. All she had to do was waltz right after him and demand to know what he had meant by that. She could be frank. She could take her chances. Gene had always said that you were a loser from the beginning if you didn't even try.
She trembled suddenly, thinking how much it meant to her. This little bit of time here--these hours they had shared in his 'Eden'--they meant so much to her. They were everything she had always wanted, everything she had always searched for. She'd had to defy her family at first-- she'd been young. But she'd always been looking for this... this very special relationship. This quiet, far from the crowds. This life...with Rex.
She couldn't go in and accost him emotionally. Not when he and Skip and Terry were discussing football. They would all stare at her as if she had lost her senses.
Alexi exhaled a little sigh and sank back onto the sofa. She remembered that she hadn't finished feeding the animals, but decided that she didn't really have the energy to do so. Maybe if she stayed away from the kitchen for a minute, Skip and Terry would go home.
As she sat there, her chin in her hands, the phone started to ring again. Alexi idly reached over to answer it. 'Hello?'
She waited, not alarmed at first.
'Hello?' she said more impatiently.
She could hear breathing in the background. Harsh and heavy.
'Hello, dammit! Say something.'
She was just about to hang up when a voice said something at last.
'Hello, Alexi.'
She was startled by the power that voice still held over her. She had seen him almost daily for almost a year after it had all happened, and she had dragged up a facade of cool and cordial indifference--and she'd even managed to believe it herself. But now time had passed, and she was hearing his voice. It touched her spine and raked along it-- and she was afraid.
'Alexi?'
She almost hung up. But it seemed smarter to talk, to find out what he wanted.
'John. What do you want? How did you find me?'
'Oh, you were easy to find, sweets. And I just want to talk to you.'
'Why?'
'Don't sound so hostile, babe.'
'I am hostile.'
'Alexi, come on! Think of the good times.'
'I'm sorry. I can't remember any.'
'I've got to see you.'
