Rapture

From the Mortlake he phoned the Hilton and was able to get a room for that night. He checked in within the hour. Georgianne had asked if he'd like to stay with them, but he had declined. It was tempting, so very tempting, but too risky. Being with her all the time, but with her husband and daughter around too ... Jeff was not sure he could handle it. And it would require much more of an effort to keep up the Union Carbide charade. No, the offer delighted him, but he was right to turn it down.

After unpacking, he surrendered to a nap. The meal and drinks had made him drowsy, but he drifted in and out of sleep, as if his mind couldn't quite let go. He kept seeing Georgianne, her face at this angle or that, her hair catching the sun, her eyes shining in the dark interior of the cocktail lounge. Her neck and throat were so elegant, showing no signs of age. Her body looked as firm and gorgeous as ever, from the glimpses he'd had of her legs to the way her breasts filled out that snug knit top.

What was it about Georgianne, he wondered dreamily.

She had grown up into a perfectly ordinary woman, it seemed. A wife and mother, bright but not too brainy. You didn't have to compete with her to make simple conversation-no small pleasure in itself. And she appeared to be content with her life. Jeff envied her that. Few people managed it, from what he knew.

But she still had that-that air of magic, or whatever it was. He couldn't put his finger on it, but it didn't really matter. There was something special about her. You wanted to be with her. You liked to listen to that clear, true voice, regardless of what it was saying, simply because it was so clear and true. Most of all, you wanted to feel that charge she gave off, the electricity of life--everyday life, as you should be able to live it.

There was more, but Jeff hadn't figured it out yet. Something to do with the future, the past. But for now he was happy to have found her, and he felt younger and more alive than he had in years. Georgianne had matured into a beautiful, still-young woman who outdazzled the high-school image in his memory. That in itself seemed proof enough that he was on the right track.

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CHAPTER SEVEN

Sean Corcoran was friendly but quiet. Jeff wanted to like the man, but had a hard time getting a fix on him. He had a sly sense of humor, which Jeff might have appreciated if he hadn't thought it was at his expense. When Sean had something to say, he glanced up at you, but most of the time he kept his eyes on his wife or his drink. Maybe he just felt uncomfortable being the odd person at this private reunion, but that didn't make it any easier to like him.

"Georgianne tells me the two of you double-dated all the time but never actually dated each other," Sean said. His fingers absently traced lines in the condensation on the side of his beer glass, and now he looked across the table at Jeff, eyes mischievous. "How did that happen?"

He never asked me," Georgianne said promptly. She was sitting in the middle of the banquette, between the two men.

"She had a steady boyfriend," Jeff replied. "Hasn't she ever told you?" Then, to Georgianne, "Mike Rollins, in case you don't remember."

"Would rather not remember," she corrected.

"And you've been in California all this time?"

"Just about," Jeff said.

"Do you jog?"

Jeff laughed. "No. I smoke cigarettes."

"So I see," Sean said. "I thought it was against the law not to jog in California."

Jeff smiled but didn't bother to respond. This man was no threat, he told himself. The wonder was that he'd ever managed to marry Georgianne in the first place. He might have been handsome, and he still wasn't bad-looking-dark curly hair and a lean, wiry build; just under six feet tall. And he might be a capable, even clever man, in his own way, but he seemed all wrong for Georgianne.

"And you're designing some kind of monster computer," Sean went on. "Is that right?"

Again Jeff smiled politely. "Not quite," he said. He was going to say something else, but let it go, deciding instead to concentrate his gaze on Georgianne.

"I'm all in favor of computers," Sean said, in a way that made it clear he was not.

"I understand you designed and built your own house," Jeff said, just to change the subject.

"Now, that's true," Sean replied. "The height of my creativity, and I must tell you that ninety percent of it came from other people's plans."

"That doesn't matter," Jeff said. "A house is a house, and it's a hell of a job to build one on your own."

The American dream," Sean agreed. "And do you know what holds it together? Yugoslavian nails."

Georgianne groaned. "He loves to tell people that."