Kern ignored her, snatching it up with his left hand, motioning her up the stairs. His features were taut, and she moved ahead of him, an absolute mess of confusion inside. What exactly
“There doesn’t seem to be much in this anyway.”
“One uncrushable dress and a nightgown. I didn’t need much for a day-and-a-half drive,” she said lightly.
The spare bedrooms were directly at the top of the stairs. At the far southern end of the house was the huge master bedroom that would have been theirs. She paused between the first two doors. “I don’t know where you’d like me to stay.”
“There’s a choice of three.” She didn’t at all appreciate the humorous tone in his voice. Still, he stepped ahead of her to switch on the light on the eastern bedroom and set her suitcase down on a chair. “Rhea will have put clean sheets in here. She stayed when I had the concussion.”
“Yes.” Trisha moved to the window, thinking of the other woman taking care of Kern when he was ill. Kern bent to switch on the lamp by the four-poster bed and then moved to the door to switch off the glaring overhead light.
“I’ll check on Mother.” In the shadows she could still see the outline of the scar on his forehead, the way he held his right arm up parallel to his waist as if it were still in the sling. “I’ll be downstairs for a while if you need anything else.”
“Thank you. I didn’t expect…”
His eyes homed in on her slim figure, the golden hair disheveled as much from his own fingers as from the wind. “What didn’t you expect?”
She took a breath. The word came out awkwardly, before she had the chance to think. “Kindness.”
“But then you never did, Tish,” he said evenly. “As I said, we’ll talk about it. But not now.”
She let out a breath when the door closed behind him. In a few minutes she moved, flicking on the light in the adjoining bath. She had a nighttime ritual, as most people did. Her outfit was folded meticulously and placed in the suitcase, the dress taken out for the morrow and hung up. Her face was washed, a violet wisp of a nightgown put on, her hair brushed smooth. Her personality these days demanded order. There would be no rest until everything was put in its place. An idiotic habit, perhaps, but then for a long time loneliness had created insomnia. As she switched off the lamp and curled under strange sheets in the strange room, the neatness habit mocked her. Kern had been messy as all hell at night, his clothes stripped and left wherever they landed when he had been in a hurry to join her in their bedroom.
She sighed, closing her exhausted eyes deliberately, curling her leg just so and her shoulder in a certain pattern to assure sleep. A lump was lodged in her throat, an anguished knot of too many memories in that other bedroom. One short embrace in the night didn’t change that. Only a fool would read something into a few simple kisses. She’d been exhausted, disoriented, not herself, she told herself wearily. Yet the question plagued her long into the night. Did he actually still want her?
At five minutes to six the next morning, Trisha tiptoed down the stairs, determined to have a cup of coffee in silence before either Kern or Julia woke up. Swinging from her hand was a pair of red sandals with ribbon-thin straps. The navy jersey she wore had red piping for trim and a slash of red belt that cinched in her narrow waist. The dress was an old favorite and she loved the way the material flowed softly around her knees when she walked; more relevant at the moment was that it was unbeatable to travel in. Going home was second on the list of priorities, directly after coffee.
She slipped on the sandals at the closed door to the kitchen and stifled a yawn. An early riser by nature when she was rested, she found it difficult to wake after a long, restless night. She pushed open the swinging door and two startled pair of eyes met each other.
Rhea had a huge coffee pot in her hand. She, too, wore red and navy, a red chamois shirt and a tight pair of navy jeans. Besides the colors there was no resemblance to be found between the two women. Rhea was the image of a country woman next to Trisha’s crisp city freshness. “I-good morning,” Rhea said hesitantly. “I was just making coffee.”
“Good morning.” The look of surprise was unmistakable in Rhea’s eyes. Kern evidently had neglected to mention he was having overnight guests. “I’ve been coming over to make Kern breakfast in the mornings. He hasn’t been able to do much for himself with his right wrist out of commission. If you want something…”
It was just six o’clock but the floor already looked scrubbed and the dishes in the dishwasher from the night before had been put away. Trisha felt relieved that she had decided to go home this day. The lady was a prize, a living composite of all the things Trisha had not been once upon a time-efficient, devoted, marvelously beddable.
“I asked if I could get you anything?” Rhea repeated.
“I-yes.” The bedroom-eyed brunette might even be nice, but every nerve in Trisha’s body tensed defensively. She had no right to Kern, not after five years, but a cup of coffee in solitude surely wasn’t too much to ask. She smiled stiffly at Rhea. “I’m leaving in a few hours with Kern’s mother. If you don’t mind, I can put on the pot of coffee myself. Mrs. Lowery is rather fussy and she hasn’t been well, so I’d have to make her breakfast anyway-”
“Oh, but this isn’t for-”
“I wouldn’t mind,” Trisha said with pleasant firmness.
“Well.” Rhea was a good six inches taller than Trisha, but she backed down like a lamb. With a little shrug of her shoulders she set down the coffee pot. “You can tell Kern I’ll see him later today.”
“I’ll be sure to do that.”
With a pleasant smile Trisha closed the door on the none-too-happy Rhea. At the moment she wasn’t too happy either and her smile faded as she turned back to the kitchen. The huge pot of coffee seemed an enormous amount for three people, but it was already started. Perhaps Kern had fallen into the habit of drinking coffee during the day.
Waiting for the coffee to finish perking, Trisha leaned on the counter, looking out the long low window over the sink. The sun was catching the dew from the grass and trees, glittering brightly on the exact spot where Kern had kissed her. The night had been full of that echoing image. She had barely slept. But in the morning light she had a sudden picture in her mind of Rhea and Kern in that same spot. Rhea, with her earthy looks and sleepy dark eyes, was a much more suitable mate for Kern than she had ever been.
She turned away when the pot finally finished perking and the steamy aroma pervaded the kitchen. She found a mug in the cupboard and was pouring herself a cup when the back door opened.
“Well, howdy, ma’am!”
The invader was a tall lanky Westerner with mustache and wide-brimmed hat which he hastily removed. He was followed by a blonde little wren of a woman, then two men with fishing gear propped at the door, a freckled and pigtailed sprite of a child, a teenager with lazy green eyes, an austerely handsome grandfatherly and banker type, and finally Kern.
The morning light gave his eyes a smoky cast as they surveyed her from head to toe and back again, taking in everything from the chignon and startled expression to the tailored dress. His eyes fixed for a moment on her shapely legs and longer yet on the curve of her hips. He moved so quickly toward her that she froze, his look so damned sexual that it made her feel stalked.
“Just sit down everyone,” he drawled lazily. “Have breakfast up in a minute. Nate, Barb, Robert, Ed, Mrs. Anther, little Georgia, Bill-this is Trisha. My wife.” One other man entered the kitchen; a stocky blond about her own age with a pair of puppy-soft brown eyes. “And this is Jack, who has been living and working at the camp for the last three months. He’s aiming toward a forestry degree.”
She was trying to attach names to faces when Kern’s hand brushed her shoulder. “Is the coffee ready? Where’s Rhea?”
She thought it odd that he had introduced her as his wife, when it was bound to raise questions for him when she was gone. At the moment she simply set down her coffee, understanding all too quickly that Rhea had been trying to tell her she was there for more reasons than just Kern’s coffee. “It didn’t take two of us to handle a little breakfast,” she murmured awkwardly.
“You mean she’s gone? Why on earth would she take off now when she knew there would be a group coming in?”
