Wintergreen

Chapter 7

The oak office chair had never quite felt comfortable to Lorna; she usually padded it with a pillow. Two if she was typing. At the moment, she was sitting on it crosswise, her legs slung over one arm, a blue pencil between her teeth and a red one stuck behind her ear.

It had been snowing outside since early that morning, though she’d barely noticed. Yellow legal-pad pages had been skimming off her lap and onto the gnarled walnut desk since first light. At one, she’d stopped reluctantly to eat a sandwich; it was now a little after two.

By working Sunday and the past three nights on her regular work, she’d made time for Anna’s manuscript. She was in love with it. With the red pencil she kept track of grammatical problems she would have to resolve in translating from Russian to English, while she used the blue pencil to mark passages where she had questions about the meaning. She would have to ask Anna Valicheck to explain those to her. There were dozens of marks, red and blue, throughout the yellow pages.

Lorna stopped her reading, shoved her reading glasses to the top of her head and rubbed her tired eyes. She badly needed a break but was too engrossed in the story to take one. Blinking hard, she stared restlessly out at the huge flakes of snow falling on the windowsill, then just as absently focused her gaze on the small hole in her thick gray socks. The matching gray wool slacks were old, baggy and maybe a little too well loved over the years. The oversized red flannel shirt fit loosely over her breasts. It was her favorite outfit for a dig-in winter workday. She stretched lazily to get the kinks out of her taut muscles, and heard the doorbell ring.

Frowning impatiently at the interruption, she padded around the desk to the front hall. Opening the door, she had to blink hard against the sudden brilliant glare of snow brightness, and felt the sharp edge of a cardboard box jab into her stomach for her trouble.

“It’s falling, Misha, watch it!”

“Matthew!” The box tumbled to the floor while she was staring at him. Somewhere above several other white cardboard boxes were his disarming dark eyes and a special mischievous smile that took her breath away. Snow glinted in his hair, was already layered on the shoulders of his coat. “What on earth-”

“We’re going for a walk. I told you,” he reminded her, coming inside and closing the door behind him, “but then, knowing you, I realized what a foolish idea that was. The snow’s six inches deep, and I’ve never seen you in anything but bare feet or ridiculously flimsy sandals.”

He straightened up after setting the boxes on the carpet. For a moment, Lorna almost thought he was nervous, the way he was chattering, but being Matthew…well, he just couldn’t be. She was the one whipping the glasses off her head, groping to extricate the red pencil from her hair. And suddenly Matthew was laughing, finding the blue pencil still stuck in her ponytail, releasing her hair from the taut rubber band, running his hands through the chestnut waves. “Before we go for a walk,” he teased, “maybe I’d better see a birth certificate. I don’t want to be arrested for statutory rape.”

“Matthew, I don’t want to tell you that you’re out of your mind,” she said, “but this is not exactly the day for a walk.”

“No,” he agreed. Before she realized what was happening, he’d gently tugged her hair back, tilting her face up to his. His lips swept over hers roughly, their texture freezing-cold and unbelievably soft. Ever so tenderly his palms cupped her face, lingering there. “It’s a day for curling up on a carpet in front of a fire,” he said huskily, and then his voice hardened. “We’re going for a walk. Hustle up and open the boxes.”

Inside she felt like melted butter, but she made a monumental effort not to show it. “It’s the middle of the afternoon. Aren’t you supposed to be working?” She remembered, I’m supposed to be working. Only a few moments earlier, she recalled, she’d been delightfully, wholeheartedly absorbed in Anna’s memoirs.

“See?” He bent down to toss the lid off one box, dredging up one heavily fur-lined boot. “I would have bought size six and a half, since that’s what you used to say you wore. But I got a seven and a half so there was a chance they’d fit.” He chuckled at the instant crimson flush on her cheeks, then trailed a soft white angora scarf around her neck, and reached in the third box for a matching angora hat. He put it on her head and tucked in her hair without the least concern for style.

His fingers, Lorna realized, were trembling. She stood, frozen, as he fitted a pair of fur-lined gloves on her hands. The gifts bewildered her; Matthew’s whirlwind arrival bewildered her. Even more disconcerting was the way he kept avoiding her eyes. When he turned, she saw that his profile was dark and intense… Matthew was nervous. Did he honestly believe she would turn him away?

“Matthew…”

But there was no trace of anxiety on his face when he finally looked at her. Just a slash of a smile and a rather bossy chin. “Come on, Misha. Put on the boots so you can fib and tell me how big they are.”

She did. “They’re huge,” she announced. Just the tiniest bit snug in one toe.

“We’ll leave that,” he said dryly. “Now I suppose it’s too much to expect that you own a warm coat.”

She was bundled up like a mummy before he was satisfied. They walked toward the university campus. Matthew kept his gloved hands in his pockets, never touching her. The snow continued to fall steadily, big pure flakes that coated their clothes and occasionally lingered on their eyelashes, their faces. Lorna could feel her cheeks turn crimson, and welcomed the crisp, cold air in her lungs.

“Are you cold?” he asked her once.

She shook her head, and they didn’t talk after that. The campus was crowded with kids milling around between classes, battling the snowy walks. They all looked alike, with their army jackets and jeans, ruddy cheeks and armloads of books. She and Matthew always appeared to be walking against the tide, no matter which direction they took. Everyone else seemed to be chattering and laughing, while she and Matthew just shared an occasional glance or spontaneous smile.

In the corner of the campus was an arboretum. In spring and summer, the wooded glen was lush and green, with a long, sloping meadow where students usually had to reserve spots for their blankets. Matthew lifted her over a snowbank. Breathing in deeply, she looked around as he vaulted up behind her. The meadow was a long, low carpet of white diamonds, without a single footprint to mar the treasure of a landscape. Stark black tree trunks rose in little secluded coves… It was like entering another world. If there were cars only a block away, she couldn’t hear them. They were no longer part of the city; there were no people, no other sounds.

Still they walked, until they reached a stand of trees. There, Matthew finally stopped, leaning back against a fat black walnut tree, his head resting against the bark. He wore no hat; his hair was damp, and his face had reddened with the cold, and his beautiful eyes were looking into hers.

She leaned back against an opposite tree and studied him, saying nothing. He had made her feel this way at the nightclub, and he was doing it now. Somehow just being with him gave her the feeling that there were only the two of them in the world. They were the only two who had really heard the seductive jazz, the only two who really took a walk together, the only two who really made love. Obviously, no one else had ever done these things. Poor world, she felt like saying.

She couldn’t imagine how this could be the same man she had known nine years ago. He had touched her life then, but never colored it. Whereas now…

“We’ve got to talk, Misha,” he said softly.

She nodded, starting to come toward him. “We have to talk,” she agreed. “Tell me what you were really supposed to be doing this afternoon?”

“Nothing that matters. Since Dad retired, I’ve taken on three new attorneys in the office. I’m thinking about hiring another. All I would have done this afternoon was sit in a chair with my feet up and read Field and Stream…”

So the Whitakers had been busy expanding, and Matthew was still working long hours…and he had nevertheless taken the time to come and see her. Lorna moved closer, pulling off her gloves and shoving them in her pockets. Finger by finger, she removed his then, before raising her arms to his shoulders. She had to go up on tiptoe to kiss him, irresistibly impelled to touch his cold cheeks, to rub her smooth, cold lips against his. They were both padded with clothes from the neck down, a chastity cushion teasingly forbidding them the kind of contact they both craved. A sudden swift breeze sent a light shower of snow cascading down onto their shoulders from the bare tree branches. It didn’t seem to matter. Lorna had never felt so warm.

Matthew stood very still, not responding to her kiss, though not drawing away. His eyes had darkened the moment she touched him. “I told my father I was seeing you.”

She stepped back abruptly, her troubled eyes seeking his, yet Matthew radiated no concern. It was something he wanted her to know, answering one of many questions for her before she had even asked it… Yet the subject no longer seemed of any interest to him. He reached out to cradle her throat with his palms, his thumbs caressing the cold, soft skin of her cheek. Gradually, his fingers pushed back her hat, letting her hair tumble to her shoulders, and suddenly his hands were lost in the luxuriant waves as he gathered her close. “Misha…” Her eyes closed as his mouth came down on hers.

The world obligingly decelerated to slow motion. The swift breeze slowed; a single snowflake lingered on her cheek. His lips warmed against hers; her fingers lazily memorized the texture of his hair. The leisurely intrusion of his tongue between her teeth was a sweet, searing invasion that lasted a very long time. Beneath the many layers of clothing she could feel her breasts gently swell, gradually tighten.

“Why is it so simple when I’m with you?” he whispered suddenly, his cheek grazing hers, his lips nuzzling in her hair. “You think I haven’t known other women over the years? I’ve loved, Misha. But not like this.”

Her lips met his again, all hunger, all sweetness. She thought fleetingly of his other women, and hoped there had been thousands. Millions. She hoped he had tried them all, every brilliant, beautiful woman who had ever existed, and that he had found none who made him ache as he did for her. All of her concentration was centered on inducing that darkened look in his eyes, on matching the increased pressure of his mouth. She heard the low, guttural sound in the back of his throat. She could taste that sound on her tongue, his wanting.

She drew back slowly, looking at him, unsmiling.

He bent down, picked up her hat and brushed the snow off it. Gradually, he fitted it on her head again, pushing her hair beneath it.

“You are,” she told him softly, “a very special man.”

His smile was lazy. He hooked an arm around her neck, and they started walking out of the arboretum. Matthew broke pace only long enough to brush a single kiss near her ear. “You know I chose a walk so I could prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that I could keep my hands off you. Now look what happened…”

“It was your fault.”

They talked nonsense the entire way home. Lorna thought, If I breathe just right, if I don’t step on any sidewalk cracks, this isn’t going to end.

It should have ended when they got back to her place. Johnny and Brian arrived less than ten minutes later from their respective school buses, almost before Lorna had a chance to take off her coat. The boys concurred that it was absolutely essential that they build a snowman immediately. She agreed, supervising the chaos of gathering up mittens and hats and scarves, afraid to look at Matthew for fear she would see that his expression had changed with Johnny’s arrival.

But it hadn’t. He was chuckling, having somehow found the ingredients for hot chocolate while she was getting the kids ready to go out. When she finally closed the door on the boys, he was stirring the pot on the stove. “If I had that much energy, I’d patent it,” he remarked.

She grinned. “They’re exhausted after a full day in school. You should see them when they’re fresh.”

“I don’t wake up that fresh first thing in the morning.”

“Actually,” she said thoughtfully, “I’ll bet you do wake up fresh. Not as in wide awake, but as in hot-blooded and ready.”

“Misha.” He affected a schoolmaster’s scold, and then chuckled when she put both palms to her flaming cheeks.

“I don’t believe I said that,” she groaned.

The hot chocolate was steaming. She put two mugs next to him and he poured. “You’re going to Quebec with me the first of the year, right?”

“Pardon?”

“Quebec. Their winter carnival. Ice sculptures and the Château Frontenac and two weeks alone together. Can you work it?”

She closed her gaping mouth, and then opened it enough to take in a sip of scalding cocoa. Her still-freezing hands curled around the cup; she decided for a minute that the cold walk had actually addled her brain. Certainly on general principles she had always been opposed to exercise. Look what the walk had done for her. All her good sense had flown out the window; her heart was convinced they didn’t have a single problem to solve, and she could have sworn Matthew had just asked her to go on a two-week vacation with him.

“There’s more snow due tonight,” she said politely.

“Misha. I want you to come with me.”

She set down the cup. There was no point in spilling the contents all over the floor. Chocolate stains were terrible to clean up. Her mind went blank. She thought, I’m getting high blood pressure already. The thudding in her chest was definitely erratic. “Matthew. I…Johnny…”

She met his eyes and was instantly drawn into a dark whirlpool. Yet the warmth in his gaze didn’t quite match the sudden tension in his face, the tightness around his jaw. He leaned back against the counter, watching her. “What about Johnny?” he asked, very quietly.

“I’m not free to go away just anytime. I can’t leave him-”

He nodded. “I know that. And I’ll make arrangements for someone reliable to take care of him for a couple of weeks.” His eyes refused to release hers, as if he could hold her gaze and propel her emotions any way he wanted. “Of course your son’s important to you, Misha, but that’s just the point. Let’s make sure the two of us know what we’re doing before we bring anyone else into it.”

He was right, she thought. Rationally, she believed that, too-that the two of them needed time together before Johnny got involved, and before Richard, Sr., came into it for that matter. Two weeks alone together should tell both of them whether they were building a relationship on fantasy or reality. Her eyelashes fluttered down, and she picked up the cocoa cup again. A sudden sensation of fullness in her throat made it difficult to swallow.

The doorbell rang; it was absolutely the last thing she wanted to hear. She got up from the kitchen chair, giving Matthew one last searching glance. She knew she was going to say yes. But she wished she could tell by looking at him if he wanted an affair or a future. She didn’t need a written declaration to know she would bring him more problems than she was worth in the long term. Johnny. The senior Whitaker. The past that infringed on both of them.

Once he was out of sight and she was striding down the hall, she changed her mind and decided she would have to say no to the trip. She knew that once he was near her again she would vacillate once more. You’re a Ping-Pong ball, she told herself disgustedly as she opened the door.

Stan Valicheck took one look at her violent scowl and raised his eyebrows. “Have I come at a bad time? I thought we said four.”

Four. Wednesday. About translating his mother’s story. “Of course you haven’t, Stan. I was waiting for you,” Lorna lied brightly, dredging up a smile of welcome as she encouraged him to come in. She took his coat and propelled him toward her office, wondering vaguely if she could lock Stan in there and then lock Matthew in the kitchen. Not likely.

“I’ll be back in two seconds,” she told Stan. “Just make yourself comfortable…” She gave him a warm smile as he eyed her flight out the door with eyebrows raised in bewilderment.

Lorna’s smile died when she left him. Pushing her hair back distractedly, she headed for the kitchen again, only to find another pair of raised eyebrows waiting for her there. “I have a client,” she said unhappily. “I’m sorry, Matthew, but I’d forgotten I made an appointment for four today. It shouldn’t take more than fifteen minutes…”

“I’ll keep an eye out for Johnny. There’s no problem, Misha.”

She agreed. There wasn’t any, or there shouldn’t be. Yet she felt a tugging anxiety that he would make something out of her client being a man. “I’ll make dinner after this, if you want to stay,” she said hesitantly.

“If you end up working a long time, I’ll take Johnny and go out for some fast food.”

“I won’t be long,” she insisted.

His eyes seared hers for a second, as if dissecting her strange tension. “Go talk to your client,” he advised finally.

So she did, closing the door to the office as she sat down at the desk across from Stan. It worked, closing the door. Her office and the manuscript and the brown-haired man with soft dark eyes in front of her honestly diverted her attention. She settled back, tried to relax, and once she began talking, the tensions dissolved like ice crystals in warm water.

Stan didn’t even know, she realized, what the manuscript was about. Fifteen minutes slid to twenty, then to a half hour. She had to explain the different kinds of translating problems she would encounter and the hesitation she felt in doing something of this nature. Anna would have to make the decision whether she wanted Lorna to deliver a word-for-word translation or render the story less literally but with the flavor and texture of the original. A too-free translation could destroy a manuscript, change its meaning and distort its tone, and yet word-for-word translations could do the same thing, because of the subtle nuances of language, the different idioms and mind-sets of separate cultures. “It wouldn’t matter, Stan, if this were going to be something just for you and your family. But I had no idea your mother was such a literate woman. I think she’s terrific. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. But if she wants to sell the story-”

“I don’t see that there’s any problem,” Stan said frankly. “Lorna, I trust you. There’s no question that my mother feels the same way.”

Lorna hesitated. “That’s kind of you, but you hardly know me.”

“We spent four hours with you last Saturday. I don’t consider myself a poor judge of character. And from everything you’ve been saying, I would guess you’ll be conscientious to a fault.”

She shook her head. “All I’m suggesting is that I give the manuscript to someone else-one of the professors at the U of M whom my father used to know-to get his advice. Then, if he agrees with what I think, I could bring that viewpoint back to your mother.”

The half hour became a full hour before Lorna eventually stood up. Despite the success of the conference, her nerves were on edge. On the one hand, Stan was a living ego boost. He had shown the slightest hesitation at her disheveled appearance, then he gave a faint smile as if he accepted her choice of working attire. He seemed to think that everything she said was fine. Yet to be so thoroughly accepted… Well, it was impossible to feel uncomfortable around him, but to some extent she felt a little irritated. A man of forty should not have such faith in a total stranger, and he’d worked awfully hard to give the impression that they were friends idly mulling over a problem together, rather than two people working out a business arrangement. Finally, Lorna opened the door and ushered him out of her office.

“All right, then,” Stan said easily. “You talk to your friend about the manuscript, and come to dinner on Saturday night.”

“That would be fine,” she agreed. Her smile radiated all the relief she felt at having coaxed him into a more professional judgment of her work. Her smile hovered, though, as she spotted Matthew and Johnny coming in the front door. Matthew was carrying a large, flat white box; the aroma of pizza wafted to Lorna’s nostrils. Matthew glanced up, his eyes stopping first on her, then on Stan, and the muscle in his cheek suddenly worked like a tiny little pulse.

“I’ll be looking forward to seeing you again, Lorna. Should we say seven, or would you rather make it earlier?” Stan was smiling, putting on his coat. Then he turned around as if he just realized there was someone else there. His eyes went first to Matthew and then back to Lorna.

“Stan, this is Matthew Whitaker. Matthew, Stan Valicheck. And this is Johnny.” Lorna rested her hands on her son’s shoulders.

Stan relaxed the moment he heard Matthew’s last name. Lorna could imagine the wheels turning in his head; visiting rights for estranged fathers were common in today’s society. Awkward, perhaps, but a different problem entirely than if he’d judged Matthew competition. He acknowledged Matthew with a nod, but didn’t hesitate to offer a hand to Johnny. “Your mother was telling me about you. And I was telling her that we have horses. I told her you’re welcome to come with her, if you think you’d like to see the stables.”

“Gee, I sure would,” Johnny breathed, his eyes sparkling as he silently questioned his mother.

“We may, sometime,” Lorna hedged.

“Well, fine, then.” Stan grabbed his coat and put his hand on the doorknob. “Seven on Saturday then, Lorna?”

“Yes.”

As the door closed, Lorna pasted a brilliant smile on her face, pretended Matthew’s eyes weren’t boring into hers in brooding silence and picked up the flat white box. “You brought pizza, you darlings! I haven’t been this hungry in an age. Thank you, Matthew!”