“No, but I only just did.”
“I thought women feared age more than men.”
“Depends on the woman. Crawford, this is a generous gift. I’ll regard it as a thoughtful birthday present.”
“I sent you a dozen roses for your birthday. I almost sent forty but then I thought, ‘Maybe not.’ ”
“How’s the farm?” She changed the subject.
“Good, although I’m afraid the water will jump the banks again. If that bridge goes down, I’m building a suspension bridge out of steel girders.”
“You’ll rebuild what is already there because it’s utterly perfect. You have an incredible eye.” She laughed low. “Your strip malls look prettier than anyone else’s.”
“Do you ever regret leaving Indiana and moving here with me?”
“No. It’s magical here. I only regret our marriage blew up like a grenade.”
“My fault.”
“I’d like to think that but maybe I’ve had to learn a few things myself. I thought I was inadequate. Then I thought you were inadequate. I’m not using the words I used at the time.” He tipped his head to one side as she continued. “I was raised to believe my task was to complete you andthat you would complete me. But I lived through you. When we were young that must have made you feel quite manly, I suppose. But as we jostled along in years, it must have been a burden. And face it, the sex wears off. No one wants to admit it. God knows, the bookstores are filled with remedies about how to keep the fire in your marriage. Perhaps some people can, but we didn’t. I understand your chorus girl.” Using the words “chorus girl” was the only hint she gave of a trace of bitterness. “So you see, it wasn’t exactly your fault. You acted on your feelings. I didn’t.”
“You were bored, too?” He felt so incredibly relieved that she wasn’t swinging the wronged-and-superior-woman cudgel.
“Constricted.” Her hand reached for her throat.
They stopped the conversation while the waitress, the same one he usually had at the club, brought her eggs and his waffles. She refilled their coffee cups, then retreated.
“I went into therapy, you know.”
“I did, too.” She giggled. “I’m still going.”
“Me, too. No one knows but you. Doesn’t look good for a man to be, well, you know.”
“I know.” She told the truth. The double standard cut both ways.
“You won’t rat on me?”
“No.”
“Martha, do you think we could date? Get to know one another again on a better footing?”
She lifted her eyes to his.“Crawford, I never stopped loving you. I stopped trusting you. Perhaps we should take it slow.”
“Tuesday nights?”
“Why don’t we hunt together in the morning first, provided you don’t run Fontaine into any more jumps.”
A sly smile betrayed his glee.“Still mad, is he?”
“Fontaine has an endless capacity for revenge. Underneath that priapic exterior lies something darker than I realized.”
“He has to one-up every other man he meets. Like you once said to me, it’s ‘testosterone poisoning.’ I have a fair amount of the stuff myself.” He poured more maple syrup on his waffles, which were so light they might have flown away.
She leaned closer.“Maybe it’s a deep anger because he’ll never be the man his grandfather was. People say Nathaniel Buruss crushed people underfoot.”
“It’s hard to become rich in business without crushing others. I thought that was a good sermon. Thigpin is quite good. When Tom Farley retired I worried for Saint Luke’s but I think Thigpin is tough, good tough.”
“Me, too. Back to Fontaine. I mean it. Don’t run him into another jump. He’s a pretty good rider. You were lucky this time but I’d stay behind him in the hunt field if I were you.”
“I hate that you work for him.”
“I’m learning a lot and much as you dislike him, he’s been very good to me. Only good to me and a gentleman … and I’d like to open my own landscaping business someday. I really love it.”
“The only reason he’s a gentleman to you is I’d kill him if he weren’t.”
“Craw, in the beginning you didn’t care. You were happy to be rid of me and he truly helped me through that awful first year. It was awful. If I learned nothing else, I learned that divorce lawyers have everything to gain by fanning the flames. They don’t want to settle. They don’t want people to work it out. My lawyer was as reprehensible as your lawyer, except he preyed on my being a woman. He was ‘taking care’ of me and I fell for it.”
“A plague on both their houses. I should have given you all the money I paid that bastard. Well, it’s over. We’re going to go on. I’m a different man, Martha. I truly am.”
“Parts of the old one were quite wonderful, you know.” She smiled flirtatiously and suddenly looked like the beautiful Kappa Kappa Gamma he’d met at Indiana University all those years ago.
He smiled magnanimously.“I owe you a great deal. You believed in me when I was young, and I wouldn’t be foxhunting had it not been for you. You got me up on a horse and I will always be grateful for that.”
“At first I didn’t know if you’d stick it out. If you’d learn to ride. When you did, well, I think it made me love you more than I could ever imagine. You did it for me.”
“Yes.” He folded his hands together. “Now I can’t imagine not hunting. I’ve put a lot of myself into the club, you know. I hope it pays off.”
Crawford couldn’t give to give. There had to be a payback.
“Sister visited Fontaine… .” Realizing she might be betraying a confidence, she quickly shut up.
Crawford tensed.“There’s no reason for her to visit him unless it’s about the mastership.”
Fumbling, Martha finally squealed,“Maybe not. He has to fix the coop he smashed.”
“He didn’t say?”
“No.”
“How long was she there?”
“Oh, twenty minutes.”
He cracked his knuckles.“Damn! Fontaine is such a lightweight.”
“Well, we were kind of talking about that. There’s this part of Fontaine that wants to prove he’s not. He’s been cooking up some business deal he won’t discuss. I only know it because I see the name Gordon Smith penciled in on his daybook occasionally.” Gordon Smith was a commercial contractor building large office buildings in northern Virginia, especially around Dulles airport. Wealthy, highly intelligent, and driven, he lived in Upperville. “I also saw Peter Wheeler’s name penciled in last week.”
“Fontaine doesn’t know the first thing about commercial real estate.” He thought a moment. “Why would Gordon Smith waste his time with Fontaine? Peter Wheeler, though, that is bad news. I’d better get over there to see him.”
“Don’t underestimate Fontaine.”
He grimaced, then smiled indulgently.“You’re fond of him. He protected you when I was at my worst. I suppose I should be grateful to him. I’m not sure I’ve evolved that much. Just once I’d like to knock his fucking block off. I want to hear his teeth rattle across the floor.”
“That’s graphic.”
“Sorry.” He drained his cup. “I can’t help it. I hate that bastard.”
“And you want to be joint-master.”
Downcast, he said,“Sister hasn’t paid a call to me.”
“Sister is full of surprises.”
CHAPTER 9
Sister was full of surprises. She walked out into the Sunday drizzle just as Cody Jean Franklin pulled into the kennels. Cody was furious about Doug dumping her at her door. She’d had a whole night to get even more angry.
“Cody,” Sister called out, Raleigh at her heels.
Cody turned, her baseball cap low over her eyes. She pushed the cap back.“Good morning. You must have gone to church early this morning.”
“Six-thirty service. I get claustrophobic sitting there with the eight o’clock rush. Where are you working now?”
“Freelancing. I catch a ride in the mornings and work at Shear Power in the afternoons. I quit waiting on tables.”