Midnight Promises

“It’s wet,” she warned him, sliding to one side.

“I’m tough. I can take it.” His weight added another creak to the quiet night as the wooden swing settled under him. “That was quite a bombshell Jack dropped.”

“Wasn’t it, though.” Jack hadn’t hung around to deal with the aftermath of his revelation. He’d given Annie one more quick kiss and announced that he’d be seeing her soon. Ben, who’d had that “pound now, talk later” look showing in his eyes, had grabbed Jack. Fortunately, Charlie had shown up then and had stepped between the other two men.

Jack had told Charlie to keep an eye on her, and left.

“So,” Charlie said. “Which of your sins are you brooding over?”

“The sin of silence.”

“Ah. You know, I think I understand why you didn’t tell us you’d married Jack. It’s a stupid reason, mind you, and I’m still mad. But I can understand.”

“Really?” Annie gave a small, mirthless laugh. “Tell me, then, because I don’t understand myself anymore.”

“You hate to make mistakes. Either marrying Jack was a mistake, in which case you didn’t want to tell anyone until you fixed it by getting divorced. Or letting him go was the mistake, and you didn’t know how to fix that.” He pushed off with his foot, and they swayed gently. “Which was it?”

“Both. Neither.”

“You still don’t know, huh? Okay. How about telling me how you ended up marrying Jack Merriman in the first place, then?” He slanted her a glance. “According to that lame excuse for an explanation you gave us, Jack showed up unexpectedly at your Denver apartment one afternoon, and that night the two of you flew to Vegas and got married. He got a call from his boss about an emergency with some project of his, you panicked, the two of you argued, and the next day he flew to some godforsaken corner of the world and you flew back to Denver, where you finished packing and then came home to Highpoint.”

“That about sums it up.”

“I think you’re leaving a few things out,” he said dryly. “I can picture Jack deciding to get married at five o’clock and tying the knot at midnight, but you aren’t exactly the impetuous type.”

“If you think that’s funny, try this—it was more or less my idea.”

He dragged his foot on the porch, stopping the swing. “You’re kidding.”

She shrugged. “I was the one who mentioned rings. I just didn’t expect him to jump on the idea.” Annie had always found it easier to talk to Charlie than to Ben, but she couldn’t imagine explaining exactly how the subject of marriage had come up—with Jack’s hand on her breast and her mouth wet from his. “I wasn’t myself. I was still shaken from the assault, I’d just turned in my resignation, and when Jack showed up I was packing.”

“That’s another thing I don’t understand. Why aren’t you teaching?”

How could she explain what she didn’t understand herself? “I am teaching. The evening classes at the community college are enough while I figure out what I want to do. I don’t want to make another mistake.”

“So…you were confused when Jack showed up, and being confused naturally made you propose?”

She had to smile. “Not exactly. I indulged myself with the idea of fate. The timing seemed so…I mean, Jack wasn’t supposed to be back in the country for another two or three weeks, but suddenly, on almost my last day in the city, there he was. And there I was, newly unemployed.” She shook her head. “Fate seemed like a reasonable explanation at the time.”

“Seems like you’re still leaving out something pretty important. Like your feelings, and why you would jump to the conclusion that Jack Merriman was your fate.”

“Sheer, unadulterated stupidity?”

“You were infatuated with him when you were fifteen.”

“I’m not fifteen anymore.”

“No, you’re old enough to know the difference between infatuation and love. Which is it you feel for Jack?”

She didn’t want to say it. Not to Charlie, not to herself. So she pushed against the wooden floor of the porch with her toes, getting the swing moving again, and didn’t answer directly. “Did I mention that we were married by an Elvis impersonator?”

Charlie gave a bark of laughter. “An Elvis impersonator? Was he wearing one of those glittery costumes?”

“Complete with a cape and jet-black hair falling in a little curl on his forehead. And a potbelly.”

“How did you wind up getting married by Elvis?”

“It was Jack’s idea, of course. We landed in Vegas about nine, and it took a while to get the license.” Long enough for Annie’s common sense to wake from the sensual daze caused by Jack’s kisses, but every time she’d been about to change her mind, he’d kissed her again. Jack had swept her to the altar—or in front of a caped Elvis—on a tide of hormones, humor and muddled misgivings. “We drove around a long time, arguing about where to do the deed. It was nearly midnight when he spotted the Elvis chapel and that was it for him—the perfect place to tie the knot.”

It had been so tacky. And so much fun. In spite of the nerves that had made her half-sick by the time they spoke their vows, she’d giggled when the King’s look-alike had drawled out the ceremony. “My favorite part was when ‘Elvis’ crooned, ‘Do you promise to love this man tender, love him true, in sickness and in health…”’ She grinned, remembering.

“But you stopped laughing at some point.”

Not long after the promises she’d made that midnight, in fact. Annie looked away, turning her face into the wind. The cold air made her eyes sting. “We were in the hotel elevator on our way up to the honeymoon suite when I found the courage to ask what I should have asked before we left Denver.”

“What was that?”

“I asked him if he loved me.” She closed her eyes. She could see the expression on his face as clearly as if it had happened only seconds ago. “He looked at me as if I’d suddenly started speaking Martian. Then he gave me one of those lopsided grins and said, ‘Sure. Of course I do.”’

That’s when Annie had known herself for a fool. It would have hurt less if he had been upset or angry, because then she would have known that the words meant something to him. Instead, it had been painfully obvious that he’d said what he thought she wanted to hear.

Charlie spoke quietly. “A man couldn’t ask for a better friend than Jack. But for a woman…well, he doesn’t mean to be hard on the women in his life, but he often is.” He paused. “Do you remember his senior prom? He had three dates that year.”

She sighed. “He ended up going with Ellen Baxter.”

“The weird thing is that none of them hated him afterward.”

“Weird, but not surprising.” Part of Jack’s charm was his kindness. He could be impulsive, thickheaded, careless enough to end up with three dates to the senior prom—yet he hated to 1 hurt a woman’s feelings. He’d taken Ellen because he’d known that the other two girls would be able to replace him easily—and they had. But Ellen had been new in town, and shy. Jack had worried aloud to Annie that Ellen would end up staying home if he didn’t take her. That was why he’d asked her, in spite of the fact that he was slightly overbooked for the occasion. He hadn’t treated Ellen like a pity date that night, either. He’d done everything he could to make her feel special.

Then he’d never asked her out again.

Annie doubted that Jack had any idea how much poor Ellen had hoped that he would want to see her again. And because she knew Jack, she couldn’t help wondering…had he had married Annie because he’d guessed how she felt about him? Because he’d felt sorry for her?

It was possible. Oh, yes, it was only too possible. You want to feel safe, he had said, and I want to make you safe.

Charlie stood. The swing groaned, swaying from the sudden loss of his weight. “You’ve gotten yourself in one hell of a mess, half pint. I don’t think you’ll be able to straighten it out until you figure out what you want.” His footsteps were quiet as he headed for the door.

“I know what I want. I just don’t think I can have it.”

Charlie’s voice was gentle. “What, then?”

“I want to have Jack back.” She swallowed the quick stab of pain. “I want things to be easy and comfortable between us the way they used to be. I want us to be friends again.”

“Then why are you still married to him? Seems like you would have changed that at some point in the last two months if you really wanted to just be friends.” Her brother opened the door without waiting for an answer. Light spilled onto the porch, then was swallowed up by the night once more as the door closed behind him.

It was the third thud that did it.

Normally Jack could sleep anywhere. He’d slept in shacks, sheds, hotels, tents and palaces; on feather beds, cots, couches and a pile of smelly hides tossed on the earthen floor of a herder’s hut. But he’d had trouble falling asleep last night.