Wild in the Field

Ten

It was over a week later that Camille awakened at daybreak with her heart pounding and her palms damp. Swiftly she climbed out of bed and headed into the kitchen.

The night before she’d left doors and windows open. For the second week in June, it was unreasonably, unfairly hot and humid.

As she fussed around the kitchen, she thought it was edgy weather. Stormy weather. Something-had-to-happen weather…and then almost jumped out of her skin when a gust of wind scraped a twig against the screened door.

She admitted to being nervous. Not because of the looming storm, but because of Pete.

With a mug of coffee in one hand, she started two pounds of ground round sizzling in a frying pan. She forked it around, breaking up the clumps. Her heart felt squeezed-tight and achy, as if it were beating under pressure. Building pressure. She simply couldn’t shake the panicked nerves.

It wasn’t as if she hadn’t seen Pete every single day in the past week. She had. But the boys were out of school now, and they’d been with him on every occasion. All three had pitched in to help her finish pruning and grooming the lavender. Pete hadn’t spoken about that wild morning at his pond. Neither had she, because there hadn’t been a chance-she kept telling herself.

Down deep, she knew perfectly well that if you sat on a train track and refused to budge, sooner or later there was going to be a train wreck.

Irritably she pushed her bangs off her forehead and reached for a spatula. “It’s done, but it has to cool for a couple minutes,” she said aloud, but when she turned around, no one was in sight, much less listening to her.

Granted, it was still the crack of dawn, but she still expected the smell of hamburger would at least waken Miss Priss. She scooped a huge portion into Killer’s bowl, a smaller version into the cat’s.

Like any sane person, she’d tried buying cat food, but Miss Hoity-toity Priss had turned up her nose at every brand she’d brought home, no matter how expensive. And obviously she couldn’t feed the derelict, no-account cat ground round and then try to give Killer ordinary dog food, so she was stuck cooking for both of them. If anyone found out she was cooking hamburger for the animals, she’d have to kill them, but really, what else was she supposed to do? Not care? Neglect them after all they’d been through?

“Breakfast,” she called out. No one answered. No bodies showed up in the doorway. The cottage was as quiet as a manless house. Peaceful. Still.

Lonely. She tromped around barefoot, searching in the usual sleeping spots. It wasn’t as if there were a thousand places to hide in the cottage. She found both of them, snoozing side by side on her bed. Again.

“You know you’re not supposed to be there,” Camille said irritably, and sank down between them. Although Miss Priss couldn’t be bothered to open her eyes, she immediately started purring. Damn cat purred every time she was stroked. She still looked like a pumpkin run over by a tar truck, but now she looked like a big, fluffy, well-brushed run-over pumpkin.

When Camille tried to stop petting her, those gold eyes opened and a small wet nose nuzzled into her palm again. Killer, finally realizing someone was getting attention-and it wasn’t him-rolled over and moaned. He expected his stomach rubbed, and he’d just moan and whine until he got his way.

So Camille rubbed and stroked, trying not to think about Pete, trying to just concentrate on the cat’s soft fur and the dog’s thumping happy tail…but then she caught a glimpse of herself in the old, wavy mirror over the bureau.

The damn cat looked as if she should be prancing in a cat show. The dog looked just as well tended. The only appalling reflection in the mirror was hers. Her chopped off hair had grown exuberantly for two months into a downright thatch; she’d slept in an old threadbare T-shirt; her nails hadn’t seen an emery board in weeks. She looked distinctly like a woman who didn’t give a damn about her appearance.

And of course, she hadn’t, weeks ago.

Pete’s words from that wild morning kept coming back to haunt her. Show me. Show me how much you don’t feel.

And for all these months, she’d honestly believed that she was dead emotionally. That she couldn’t feel again. That she’d somehow be disloyal if she felt something strong for anyone besides Robert. And all those worrisome beliefs had become painfully bigger since Pete, because she did feel things with him. Things she’d never felt with Robert. Things she’d never dreamed a woman could feel-that she could feel.

But now she took one last look at the mirror and jerked off the bed, away from that image. Killer and Miss Priss perked up, looking at her with alarm now.

“Breakfast is already in the kitchen, all cooled down. Killer, you know how to push open the screen door, and Miss Priss, you know where the litter box is. Quit giving me those guilty looks. Everything isn’t about you two. I have to be gone a few hours, that’s all.”

She pulled on clothes, grabbed a purse, and then hightailed it out to the car. Unfortunately, because she’d charged off so fast and impulsively, she reached town before businesses opened. Maybe that was just as well, because it gave her a few minutes to plot and plan.

At nine on the button, though, lights punched on and locks clicked open. By then Camille was primed. She hit a styling salon first, unsure if they’d take her without an appointment, but both stylists took one look and dragged her in. New Englanders, being practical by nature, tended to take people as they were. They regarded her as someone in desperate need of a massive overhaul.

Two hours later she left that shop, and started for the clothing stores and boutiques with her credit card in hand. By then, her heart was thumping like an alarm clock under water, a loud thud thud thud that she couldn’t ignore. She was well aware she didn’t have an immediate way to pay for all this-except with savings she could ill afford, while she was still out of work. But sometimes a woman had to invest in her future.

She’d failed to do that before, she realized.

She had one more stop to make before driving to Pete’s house, and it was something that had to be well thought out and couldn’t be rushed. Then, all her clothes and purchases had to be stashed in the trunk to make room for the ninety-pound present parked in the back seat. It wasn’t a present she would have chosen for just anyone. In fact, it wasn’t a present she’d normally give to her worst enemy. But these were unique circumstances.

As she drove the final mile to Pete’s house, she had to swallow every few seconds because her throat kept drying up. It wasn’t that easy to build up her courage. She kept thinking of all the messages he’d given her that she’d been too self-centered to hear. He thought she’d only wanted him for sex. He had no idea how much she valued him-no idea what she felt for him at all.

Now-when it was obvious, and could be too late-she realized that’s what a man would think whose ex-wife had cheated on him.

It’s not that she’d only cared about herself. From the start, she’d worried herself sick about his sons-especially that they were having a hard time trusting a woman because of their mother’s behavior. But somehow she’d failed to include Pete in that worry. He was so damned strong that it was hard to think of him as vulnerable, but he was the one who assumed a woman would walk on him, not be there for him. Not stay.

When she pulled into his driveway, she’d gotten over the first case of hiccups, but there was no one in sight. Naturally, fresh after lunch, everyone was likely to be outside doing something. Since the far barn doors were gaping open, she suspected at least someone was close by.

Hopefully, Pete. Please, let it be Pete and let it not be too late.

She climbed out of the car and then slowly, carefully opened up the back door. The bloodhound stretched out took almost the entire back seat. She was young. Barely two years. And although she opened her sad, mournful eyes when Camille bent down in front of her, she showed no inclination to budge.

“Hey, Camille!” Simon, loping out of the far barn, suddenly spotted her and came galloping over. Then stopped dead. “Oh, my God. Oh, my God. What happened to you?”

“Um…”

Simon had always been the more sensitive twin. Immediately he looked stricken that he might have hurt her feelings. “Look, Cam. Don’t be feeling bad. It’ll grow. You won’t always look like this. It’ll be okay.” Tentatively he patted her on the back. “Really, I know how you feel. That first haircut Dad makes us get before going back to school-it’s always a killer. You feel like a complete dork. Not that you look like a dork,” he said swiftly, reassuringly. “I’m just saying- I can still tell that it’s really you.”

“Um…”

“And look. Just because you look like a woman and all…that’s not the worst thing, you know? I mean, you could have leprosy. You could have mange. Think about it. Looking like a woman isn’t the worst thing.”

She touched two fingers to her temples. Possibly this was proof that her transformation had been successful, but conversations like this with the boys still tended to leave her speechless. “Um-”

Simon suddenly noticed the open car door and chanced to glance in. “Holy cow. Who’s that?”

She took a breath. “Where’s your dad?”

“He and Sean are at this horse place that sells Morgans. They’ll be back before dinner. And Gramps is in town, because this is the afternoon he has his blood pressure checked.”

“Okay.” Sometimes even desperate plans took some rolling readjustments. If she couldn’t immediately see Pete, she had to do something. Perhaps she’d start with taking Simon into her confidence a bit. “This is Hortense, Simon. She’s depressed.”

“Yow. I can see that.”

“Well, actually, I think all bloodhounds look depressed. But this one really is. She lost her owner about a month ago-Jerry Abrahams, you know, the cop? He adored her. She adored him. And she just can’t seem to stop grieving. Can’t seem to get her life together. Can’t seem to find the get-up-and-go to, um, get out of the back seat.”

“Yeah?” Simon reached in, and petted the dog’s floppy ears. Hortense opened her eyes and let out a gusty, soulful sigh, but didn’t move. “She is so cool.”

“I think your dad needs this dog.”

“Huh?” Simon’s jaw dropped, but then he stood up and looked at her. “Oh, I get it. Revenge.”

“No, no. I’d never put an innocent animal between me and revenge,” she assured him. “This is an honest thing. I was at the vet’s a couple days ago to get Miss Priss her shots. That’s how I heard about Hortense. But it was late this morning when I called the vet again and was thinking of your dad. The thing is, this dog is running out of chances. She’s losing strength, losing heart. Either she finds someone to help her get over her grief, or she just might not make it. And your dad, Simon… Maybe no one in the universe is better at helping someone like that than your dad.”

Simon stuck his hands in his jeans pocket. “That’s a lot of horse manure,” he said admiringly. “You’re really gonna stick my dad with that dog?”

“I am. With your help. I’d like to get her inside, where it’s cool, and get her a bowl of water.”

“Sure.”

She gulped. “Maybe this was impulsive. But I think it’s a good idea. To be honest, I thought it was a great idea. But I’ll listen to you, Simon. If you and Sean think I’m out of my mind…”

Simon quickly shook his head. “No, no. Hey, Cam, I’m totally on your side. So will Sean be. This is the coolest idea on the planet. He’s going to love Hortense. And so are we. And we’ll all help get her heart back, you know? God. Sean’s going to be over the moon. You can’t imagine how happy this is going to make him. And Dad…”

“On your dad,” she interrupted carefully, “if he has any problem with this, you can tell him to bring me back the dog. In fact, if you wouldn’t mind leaving a message for me…tell him I’ll be having dinner around seven. He doesn’t have to come. But just tell him that I’ll set an extra plate if he wants to talk.”

As she drove back home, her heart seemed to be beating harder than a shaky drum, yet she told herself nothing had gone that badly. She hadn’t seen Pete directly, but there was no immediate help for that. She’d set some things in motion that had to be. And there was one other good thing, because Simon had been totally disgusted with how she looked. That was a good sign, wasn’t it? And if Simon thought she looked bad, Sean would think she looked worse. So that was extra heartening.

Back at the cottage, she put up with Killer and Miss Priss whining about her absence, but after petting them, she immediately headed for the house. Thankfully Violet was knee-deep in customers in the Herb Haven, so there was nothing stopping her from raiding the house. She carted two armloads of goodies back to the cottage. In the kitchen, she started a simmering French stew with a dash of lavender, baby carrots, sauterne and pearl onions. It was a little too early to make a fresh salad, but she put together a chocolate dip with fresh strawberries.

The clock seemed to be ticking so fast. She dragged the table outside, where it’d be cool and shady in the early evening. She whisked on a blue-and-white tablecloth, then two settings of her mother’s silverware and her grandmother’s silver candlesticks. Last, she added white lilacs, setting them in jars in the kitchen and living room and on the table.

She checked on the food, glanced at the clock, then ran for the bath. Both animals seemed to think she wanted company in the bathroom. They supervised her entire bath, from the face mask to the shaving legs routine. They fled a safe distance during the pedicure and manicure, but homed back in while she was choosing clothes from her shopping expedition. Last came makeup-and there was a time she’d been pretty darn good with face paints.

By then Miss Priss had leaped up on the sink to insure she didn’t miss any of the exciting action, whereas Killer had dropped down to all fours and was snoring from boredom.

“He may not come,” she told the cat.

Miss Priss batted at the mascara, tipping it off onto the floor.

She picked it up. “I don’t know if he’ll understand the message, about the dog. She was like me. Grieving so hard that she stopped living, stopped wanting to live. It’s Pete who shook me out of that, you know. Not all the people who were so kind. Pete. Who wasn’t kind.”

Miss Priss found the lip liner, and jumped down from the sink with her prize between her teeth-at least until Camille caught up with her. “No,” she said.

Unimpressed, the cat zoomed back on the sink and searched for more things of interest. Such as the blush brush.

“I wasn’t coping,” she told the cat. “Pete didn’t cope for me. He didn’t do anything for me. Instead, he pushed me into doing things. And by pushing me, he forced me to see that I was capable of doing things. I get all that now. But you know what I didn’t realize?”

Looking straight at her, the cat batted the brush on the floor.

Camille picked it up. “I didn’t realize that he was grieving, too. He’s hardheaded, just like me. Too stubborn to realize that getting over the hurt his ex-wife dealt him was terribly hard to do. Moving past any hurt that big is hard. But there comes a point where you have to make a choice.”

The cat deserted her. Which left Camille completely alone-except for her reflection in the mirror. The woman staring back at her looked almost-almost-like a Camille. Her legs were bare, shown off by the sassy red sundress. Her lips were glossed with a scarlet shine, her dark hair pulled back with two jet pins. She was slim. Way slimmer than she used to be, but her figure was starting to come back, and the dress accented what she had. Its fabric draped over her body perfectly. It made a woman feel like a woman, look like a woman, move like a woman.

The old Camille wasn’t back. She’d never again be the young Camille that she used to be.

She’d grown up since then.

This Camille, though, had more depth. More potential. And more, of course, to risk losing.

Her eyes looked sultry with the hint of shadow and mascara, her lashes as soft as velvet against her cheeks. But there was fear in those eyes. Not fear of losing. Fear that she’d already failed to love Pete the way he needed to be loved. And now it was too late.