Sophie's Secret

Like he’d planned?

He’d wanted her to see the flowers first.

With nerves tensing his stomach, Duane strode to the front door, a smile of welcome on his lips—in his heart—and a full-carat solitaire diamond burning against his leg.

“Welcome ho—” His voice broke off as he saw the inexpensively dressed, fiftysomething man standing there with a warm smile spread across his face.

“Oh, sorry.” The man straightened, and Duane noticed the brown paper bag he’d just left next to the decorative stone beside Sophie’s front door. The stranger seemed surprised to see Duane there.

The feeling was mutual.

“I, um, left some welcome-home cookies. Chocolate chip.”

Sophie’s favorite. And how did this man know that?

For that matter, how did he know Sophie at all?

Intending to grill the stranger as though he were on trial, Duane affected the proper, intimidating pose, and intended to deliver his first put-the-witness-firmly-in-his-place question.

“You from around here?” he asked when his brain let him down.

“For now.”

What in the hell did that mean? He waited for the older man to expound. And wasn’t sure what to do when, instead, the man turned and walked to an older blue pickup parked opposite the house, climbed in, gunned the engine and drove off.

Without another glance at Duane.

As though Duane didn’t matter at all.

SHE’D MEANT TO DRIVE slowly, to use the hour between Phoenix and Shelter Valley as a calming time, a reconnection with personal peace and the self she’d come to know and love over the past eight years.

Instead of keeping her mind on the things she’d intended, all she could think about was getting home by seven. To be there when Duane arrived.

To feel his arms around her.

It had been a long two weeks.

Too long.

She’d missed him horribly.

And knew their days were numbered.

They couldn’t keep pretending that what they had was working.

Dressed in one of her nicer pairs of jeans, black suede boots and a black sweater that was a favorite of Duane’s, Sophie pushed her Ford Explorer Sport Trac as much past the speed limit as she dared without risking a ticket. She thought about stopping for Chinese takeout rather than going to a restaurant near Tucson as they’d planned. She didn’t want to share him with waitresses and other patrons tonight.

In isolation they were perfect together.

And reality was intruding. Making her ill.

Because reality was not a part of life she could avoid, because she knew her fantasy life with Duane had come to an end, Sophie drove straight home, watching for his car as she pulled off the highway, through town and toward the secluded street of custom homes not far from Matt and Phyllis’s place. Hers was the smallest house on the block, but it was all hers. She’d contracted it, chosen the floor plan and every single color and fixture inside. She’d spent evenings and weekends on-site, checking the progress, and even some days, watching the men work.

And right now, with Duane’s silver Mercedes parked out front, the small, stuccoed structure with its vibrantly colored landscaping had never looked better.

Even with things falling apart around them, she was glad he was here.

It was better to see him than to not see him. For the moment.

Sophie waited while the garage door rose, then pulled in. She’d never had anyone to come home to before. Never had anyone waiting.

“And don’t make too much of it, girl,” she mumbled aloud as she grabbed her purse and climbed out. Her luggage could wait.

Duane’s presence was a one-time thing—an occasional thing at most. She lived alone.

And when one lived alone, one came home to an empty house.

That’s just the way it was.

The way she wanted it to be. Most of the time. The way she needed it to be. Anything else made life messy.

And messy made her sick.

But that didn’t mean she had to ruin this moment, she reminded herself as she opened the door into the house.

Something smelled wonderful.

And not at all like the Chinese dinner she’d envisioned picking up on the way home.

The door hadn’t fully closed behind her before Duane appeared at the end of the hall, holding two glasses of champagne.

“Welcome home, babe.”

With knees gone uncharacteristically weak, Sophie managed the two steps to reach him, steadying herself, and him, with her hands atop his on the glasses, and leaned forward to kiss him.

Long.

And again.

Her mouth opened, her tongue met his, and she didn’t want to let go, to break away and face reality.

Time, society, ages, past mistakes and bulimia all faded away when Duane’s tongue was in her mouth.

“I missed you,” she said, finally pulling back far enough to reconnect with those deep chocolate eyes that could look at her with such warmth.

They weren’t letting her in. Not completely.

But then, it had been two weeks. And times were hard. Their struggles were not a secret.

“Here.” Duane held out her glass, the smile on his lips completely genuine. “Here’s to you coming home to me.” The softness in his voice made up for the slight distance in his gaze.

Their glasses clinked. Looking at each other, they sipped.

“Mmm, this is the good stuff.”

“Only the best for this…for you.”

Duane turned away, saying something about steaks as he set his glass on the counter and rummaged in the refrigerator. Chattering about marinade, he made his way out to the grill on the back patio.

Something was underfoot. The champagne. An apparently very nice dinner prepared. The beautiful rose-filled centerpiece on the table. And…her companion. The completely self-assured, argue-with-God-in-court-and-win Duane Koch was nervous.

And that made her nervous.

Sophie’s stomach clenched and there was no time for happy thoughts. For prevention. She barely made it to the bathroom before the champagne came back up on her.

LUCKILY, IT DIDN’T TAKE Sophie as long to tend to her illness as it did Duane to cook steaks. With too many years of practice she’d largely learned to hide her little forays into the darkness. Only Phyllis, Matt and Annie had ever caught her in the act.

And, on the side of preserving a moment, once she’d regurgitated, she always had an appetite.

Sitting with Duane at her kitchen table, her senses consumed with him, Sophie ate, took a few more sips of champagne. Laughed in the right places. Shared the highlights of this latest performance with him. Told him about meeting up with an old college friend—taking great care to stress that the friend was female.

And she caught up on the past two weeks of Duane’s life.

He’d won his party’s nomination for the senate seat.

Now she understood the celebration. And, most likely, the distance in his eyes, as well.

Her place in his life and his bid for office did not coincide. And the dichotomy was a symbol of all the other struggles their differences created. The ticking of their clock was growing louder.

So, tonight, this celebration was for Duane.

Tomorrow she was going straight to Phyllis.

The counselor, not the friend.

Chapter Five

THERE WERE SO MANY THINGS Duane had to say. And none of them were getting out beyond the inane, superficial conversation he and Sophie had fallen into—largely, he suspected, caused by him.

He reached for his napkin, and his knuckles scraped against that thin piece of metal resting against his thigh, and he took another sip of champagne.

The box was in the car because he’d wanted to surprise her, wasn’t it?

And not so that he could change his mind without her being any the wiser?

“My friend, the one I saw in Chicago, has a show in Phoenix later this spring at the Orpheum. I want you to meet her.”

Sophie’s sweet green eyes met his, an unusual pleading in their depths that had absolutely nothing to do with her friend, and Duane’s appetite receded.

“I’d like that,” he said. “Very much.” Sophie was an incredible woman. He wanted to know everything about her. Wanted to know everyone she knew, to have a chance to care about everyone she cared about. Yet his life had nothing in common with hers.

Her hand, so slim and delicate considering the ropes she wielded, the heavy travelers she pulled open and closed, the scrims and cycs she lowered, rested on the table next to her plate. Duane laid his palm over it.

“I…We need to talk,” he started, then issued a silent curse when he heard the ominous way that had come out—as though he had bad news. “I mean—”

“It’s okay.” Her smile was more sad than anything. She shifted her hand and reversed their positions. “I’ll make this easy for you.”

She knew? How could she have guessed? He hadn’t known himself, for sure, until today, when he’d actually picked up the ring. And he still wasn’t sure. How could she possibly make this easy?

“No.” He shook his head. “I’m going to get this right,” he said, focusing on what he knew. On the man he knew himself to be. Once he committed to doing something, he was in one hundred percent.

Get down, man. On your knee. You know the drill.

“I love you.” That seemed to say everything he was trying to get out.

Which didn’t explain the moisture in Sophie’s eyes. She wasn’t a crier.

“And I love you,” she said. “But that’s not going to be enough, is it?” Her whispered words were lost on him at first, caught up as he was in the haze of panic the moment wrought.

He wasn’t ready to lose her. But as much as he loved being here with her, he wasn’t sure he wanted her in Phoenix, too. Wasn’t sure he could trust himself to risk the life he’d built there.

He was forty-six years old. Reaching goals he’d spent his entire life seeking. Forty-six, not twenty-six. He didn’t have a lifetime stretching ahead to make something of himself.

Those years were streaming behind him. A path to where he was now. To what he might have to give up.

But that’s not going to be enough, is it? Her words finally reached him.

“What does that mean? It’s not enough?”

“We can be in love all we want, but love can’t change the facts. When we’re here, alone, you don’t have to worry about other men looking at me. About me talking with other men. And I don’t have to worry about how I appear to the people who matter in your life. Love isn’t going to make you look any less like those fifty-year-old guys who drive convertibles with the tops down in forty-degree weather when you’re with me. You’d lose credibility.”

Duane didn’t want to hear her.

“No one said it’s going to be easy,” he told her, “or that there wouldn’t be problems.”

He waited for her to help him out—mostly because he had no idea what to do here. She sat watching him, apparently waiting for more.

He wanted—needed—to give her more. But his mind seemed to be frozen. He’d come to propose. He had unresolved issues with proposing.

He cared about her a great deal.

“I know us being together won’t be easy.” He had to say something. They were both waiting on him. “But I can’t walk away from you, Soph. That’s it for me. My bottom line. I can’t walk away.”

Seconds passed. And then some more. God, he wished she’d say something. Anything. Give him some clue to what she was thinking behind that half frown and those tear-glazed eyes. But he made himself wait.

Made himself give her time.

Maybe the struggle wasn’t worth it to her. She was young. Had her whole life ahead of her. Didn’t need to settle for all the problems being with him brought her. Didn’t—

“I…guess I’m not ready to walk away, either,” she said.

Duane tried to tamp down the relief flooding through him. She was letting him off the hook. Again. But he had to be smart here. Responsible. Make sound decisions. “You don’t seem too happy about that.”

Sophie’s shrug said so much. He only wished he could decipher what.

They were at a standstill. Staring at each other. Waiting for something to happen.

Duane dropped to one knee.

“Sophie Curtis, will you marry me?” The words came out exactly as he’d said them every other time he’d asked.

But he’d never had a ring in his pocket.

“Duane, get up.” Sophie tugged on his hand. “You don’t have to do this.”

But their world was quickly crumbling. He had to do something.

“You’re twenty-eight, Soph. You’re going to be wanting kids. And if I don’t start having them soon, I’m going to be too old to play with them. Or even make it to their graduation.”

“You’re forty-six,” she said. “You’ve got a good forty years left in you. At least. I hardly think we have to worry about wheeling your chair to any graduation.”

She was splitting hairs. And so was he.

But he couldn’t stop the wheels from turning.

“Besides,” she continued, while he tried to catch up with the situation, “I’m not ready to have kids yet. Not until I’m at the point where I can consult on shows, but not have to be on-site and produce them. For now, I travel way too much.”

“So stop. Matt’s the production manager at Montford, but there are other universities in the state. Or what about the Orpheum? Or Symphony Hall? Or Gammage? What about Herberger or the Celebrity Theater? Or even Cricket Pavilion? Instead of working for everyone, you could work full-time for one theater. Run your own show at home.”

“It sounds as though you’ve considered my possibilities.” The little smile tilting her lips snagged his heart.

“Of course I have.” Duane leaned forward, grabbing both of her hands, that smile driving him in spite of his need to put on the brake. “I mean this, Sophie. I think we should get married.” He paused. “If you want your future to be with me.”

She was young and beautiful. What in the hell was he doing, thinking she’d want to tie herself to him permanently?

He’d lost his mind.

“Of course I want my future with you,” she said, though she didn’t sound any more sure than he felt. “You wouldn’t have a key to my home, or have ever been invited back after that night we met, if I didn’t want you in my life. Before you, I hadn’t dated in almost five years, Duane. That was my choice. Not because I didn’t want to marry and have a family, but because I wasn’t going to screw up again. I knew that when I met the man I wanted for keeps, I’d know it.”

His heart pounding, Duane still felt something settle within him. Something good.

Until he started thinking again. “And did you know it? When we first met?”

“No.”

He tried not to let the disappointment crush him.

“I knew it the morning after, when I woke up with you and didn’t hate myself for being in bed with you. Being with you felt so right.”

No wonder he hadn’t wanted to get out of bed that morning. And why something about her had been calling him back ever since.

“Then it’s time to get married.”

“If it were time to get married, you wouldn’t be having such a hard time getting through this.”

Oh, he loved this woman. Loved how well she knew him.

And was scared as hell by it, too.

“I’m having a hard time because I know how important it is that we do this. I know how much is resting on it.”

“What’s that mean?”

“I’ve agreed to run for state office. You’re right. People are going to be watching me. Judging me. Looking for smut. I don’t care so much for myself, but I care for you. If we don’t get married, we’d have to quit seeing each other, because it’s unlikely we’d be blessed with a miracle and be able to keep our liaison secret. You’d be found out and called my whore.”

“Your midlife crisis.”

“Right.”

“Which would hurt your chances of getting elected.”

“Yes.” And that bothered him.

“But maybe we aren’t ready for scrutiny yet.” Sophie paused, frowning. “Or maybe there’s more that needs to happen in our individual lives before we can settle into being a generational couple.”

Could she mean she had more seeds to sow?

A vision he’d been blocking for the past couple of hours haunted Duane, sending shards of dread through him all over again.

A simple brown bag on her front porch.

“If I promise to understand that this time you mean your proposal, and that you’re serious about us getting married soon, can we postpone this conversation for a day or two? Let me have some time to settle in and think?”

Relief had been understandable half an hour ago, when he’d found out she still cared. It wasn’t so forgivable now—not when she was postponing something he should want more than anything else on earth.

“Of course.” He relented before she could change her mind. “I’ve been thinking about this since you left,” he told her. “I’m a bit ahead of you.”

“You’re always ahead of me,” she said with a chuckle. “I’ve never met anyone as clear thinking as you are. That’s one of the things I love so much about you—your ability to see through the muck to what’s really there.”

“To cut to the chase,” he murmured, recognizing what she was telling him about himself. He’d been praised for the talent many times in his legal profession.

So why, when it came to Sophie, were his thoughts anything but clear?

Sophie slid to her knees, the heels of her boots visible behind her. “Counselor, could you please give me a recess, just until tomorrow morning so that we can go into the bedroom and have recess for real?”

He recognized what she was doing. Diverting them, returning them to the world where they were perfect—alone, just the two of them.

Their fantasy.

It was what they always did when reality intervened. Retreated.

But the fantasy wasn’t working anymore.

Sophie’s hand on his thigh was. He was already hard. Anticipating. When it came to sex, she never failed to arouse him. Not ever.

“Please take me to bed, babe.” Sophie’s voice took on a note of quiet desperation. “Hold me and make the world’s craziness go away. Long enough for me to get some rest?”

“You haven’t been sleeping well?” She hadn’t said anything. And he’d called her every single night she’d been gone.

“Honestly?”

“Of course.”

“I never sleep well when you aren’t with me.”

She did have a way with words. Or, more precisely, her words had a way with him.

“Another reason why we should get married,” he said, even when he knew he didn’t want to push the point.

“I know.”

But she still didn’t say yes. And he wasn’t any more sure he was ready for her to do so.

For tonight he needed to feel her skin against his, to lose himself in her scent, in her arms, in her center, and visit once again the heaven that had been created for the two of them.

Fifteen minutes later, after cleaning up, retrieving her luggage and turning off the lights, Duane walked hand in hand with Sophie down the hall to the master suite, thinking only of getting her warm body as close to his as he could.

Chapter Six

WIDE-AWAKE, Sophie stared at the ceiling—or what she could see of it in the moonlight. Her body was completely sated, satisfied, loved. She’d been consumed by Duane’s lovemaking like never before. In tune with his every touch, she’d felt precious, powerful, the most beautiful woman in the world.

Then, with their hips pressed up against each other, they’d drifted off to sleep.

Problem was, she’d woken up. And with Duane’s head resting on her shoulder, his hand still covering her breast, she didn’t want to move and disturb him. She wanted him right where he was—needed him there. Where no one could see them. Disturb them.

Challenge them.

In bed with Duane, alone with him, she knew she’d never have to sabotage herself again. Never have to subconsciously prove her inner strength through carefully mastering of base appetites. She’d never have to fight feelings of emotional scarcity.

But she couldn’t live her life in bed with Duane.

Tomorrow would come—as it always did. To shine light on things that went unnoticed in the darkness.

And while Duane was always an incredible lover, part of him had been more distant tonight. He was pulling away from her.

She knew that. Understood it.

And maybe he was withholding from himself, as well. Pushing himself into something he wasn’t sure was right.

If he’d really wanted to marry her, they’d be married by now.

Wouldn’t they?

She listened to Duane’s even breathing. Counted the beats of his heart against her side.

Every instinct she had told her that for them to marry under pressure—because, with his nomination, they either had to marry or split—would be a recipe for disaster.

She couldn’t afford another personal disaster. You could only bankrupt your heart so many times before it gave out on you. Or gave up on you.

“What are you thinking about?” His voice was strong, steady. Not sleepy at all.

He hadn’t moved. And neither did she.

“How long have you been awake?”

“Most of the night.”

The fact that he wasn’t resting any easier than she was scared her. Duane was usually out as soon as he lay down. And slept all night. He kept a schedule that would challenge a man half his age. He needed his rest.

He’d asked what she was thinking about. If she brought up the problems between them, would she lose him?

Was she ready to do that?

No. She wanted to bury her head in the sand. Be on vacation. Pretend. Live for the moment.

She couldn’t run from her doubts. They’d only catch up with her. They always did. At far too high a price.

Running her fingers through his hair, she said, “I’ve been lying here trying to figure out what’s different about you tonight.”

“Different how?”

“I’m not sure. It feels like you’re holding back. And yet I can’t give you any evidence to support the feeling.”

The hand on her breast slid away. “Feelings are the one fallacy of the factual system,” he said, rolling over until his head rested on the pillow right beside hers, touching hers. “So much of the time, they don’t make sense.”

“So I’m right. You’re holding back.”

“No. I don’t think so. At all.” The protest, though a little too forced, was at least something to clutch on to.

Her stomach, which had been working its way into a small frenzy, relaxed a bit.

“But I’m sensing something?”

“Nothing more than the confusion of having what I want be at odds with what I need.”

She didn’t ask which she was—the want or the need. Or if she was even what he was talking about.

A year ago, she would have been positive she knew both—his wants and needs. A year ago, when there’d been no visible cracks in their idyllic hideaway life, his wants and needs hadn’t been a threat.

“We shouldn’t have to work so hard to make this work.”

“Relationships, even the best of them, are hard work. Always.”

“You sound awfully certain about that for a man who’s lived alone most of his life.”

“I had the very best teacher.”

“Who?” She had no idea because, outside of her home, she knew very little about him.

“Will Parsons.”

“What does Will have to do with us?”

“You weren’t in Shelter Valley yet when Becca got pregnant, were you?”

“No.” But she’d come to know the couple well enough through Matt and Phyllis, and had been accepted into their peripheral family circle, in spite of her past.

“Anybody ever tell you their story?”

“I know the basics—high school sweethearts who married and weren’t blessed with children until Becca was in her forties.”

“That’s the public version.”

“It’s not true?”

“Of course it is. Every bit of it. But there’s more.”

There always was, wasn’t there? But what could there possibly be in that story that would emulate her with Duane? Becca and Will were obviously meant for each other. And everyone, including them, had known that from the time they were still practically kids.