The Harder They Fall Page 3

  To begin with, she wasn’t at all what he had anticipated. He had been ready for some worldly, brassy number who knew the score, and instead here was this sweet, fragile, willowy type who blushed every time he looked at her. The innocence was all an act, of course, it had to be, but she was undoubtedly good at it. So good that he had forgotten it was a sham himself when he’d scooped her into his arms. He had wanted to carry her straight into his bedroom and he was afraid she knew it.

  He turned away from the lightening sky with a sober expression, his mouth a grim line. He could handle it. He would keep his distance during their visit and then they would be gone. He was used to being denied what he wanted, and if his desire for this girl had taken him by surprise, it wasn’t the first shock he’d endured. Not for the world would he disturb his brother’s plans. After long years of living without affection or purpose, his faith in human nature had been restored by Martin. Of all the people he knew, Martin most deserved to be happy. He, Chris, would be distant and matter-of-fact with Helene when he saw her, which wouldn’t be often; she would be living fifteen hundred miles away, after all. Martin would never have to know.

  Comforted by this resolve, Chris went down to the kitchen to make coffee.

  * * * *

  Chris had already finished eating and was out at the branding when Martin and Helene came down to breakfast. Maria de Salvo, the family housekeeper who had worked for Martin’s father, poured juice into glasses as she said to them, “That boy hardly ate a thing, I wonder if he’s coming down with something.” She smiled at Helene. “I’m so glad to meet you, it’s about time this one here settled down. Now if we could just find someone nice for Chris...”

  “These eggs are delicious,” Helene interjected quickly. “Did you put cheese in them?”

  “My secret recipe,” Maria said proudly.

  “Nothing like it,” Martin pronounced, through a mouthful. He glanced down at Helene’s leg. “How’s your foot?”

  “Much better,” Helene said.

  “What happened?” Maria asked.

  Helene gave her version of the incident and Maria said, “That Chris, he’s a good man to have around in a crisis.”

  Helene let that pass.

  They chatted through the meal and then Helene helped Maria clear the table. After the housekeeper had set the dishwasher churning she went off to do her other chores and Helene sat back at the table for a final cup of coffee with Martin.

  “So, what shall we do today?” Martin asked. “Chris will be back at noon—would you like a tour of the ranch?”

  “That would be lovely, of course, but...” Helene’s voice trailed off into silence.

  “What? What is it?”

  “Martin, maybe we shouldn’t stay as long as we planned,” Helene said flatly.

  “Why?”

  “Come on, Martin, don’t be obtuse. Chris doesn’t like me.”

  “Oh, honey, you just don’t understand him. I know he’s difficult, but once you get to know him better you’ll see that it’s all a smokescreen, just talk. He distrusts strangers and right now you fall into that category. Give him a chance.”

  “He acts like I’m about to bind and gag you and ravish you behind a potted palm.”

  Martin grinned. “Doesn’t sound like a bad idea.”

  “Martin, be serious. I don’t think we should force a touchy situation that could become explosive. You wanted me to meet Chris, I’ve met him. Let’s spend the rest of the day here and then go back East. I don’t want to come between you and your brother and I’m afraid that may happen if we stay.”

  Martin said nothing, but she could see that he was considering it, albeit reluctantly.

  “Isn’t it better to let him get used to the idea of our getting married gradually? Why press this now, when he’s obviously having a hard time with it?”

  Martin sat back in his chair, sighing. “All right. But I promise you if you give him a break you’ll be rewarded. He’s wary, and take my word for it, that’s perfectly understandable. If you’d had his experiences you would be too.”

  “I don’t doubt it,” Helene said, feeling her tension ease palpably. He was going to listen to her.

  “What can I tell him about why we’re leaving so soon?”

  “A white lie. I was planning to mail in the computer sheets for my final grade reports, but we can say I discovered an error and have to go back to correct it personally.”

  “I see you’ve already thought this out,” Martin observed.

  “I had plenty of time to think last night when I couldn’t sleep,” she replied.

  “All right,” Martin said, standing. “Let’s go find him.”

  Chris accepted the news of their imminent departure with such poorly concealed relief that Helene was glad she had suggested it. They went through with the formality of the ranch tour and somehow Helene was able to make the appropriate responses when Chris pointed out this or that improvement as they racketed around the dirt paths between the animal pens in his jeep. She admired the stainless-steel feeding trough and the mechanized drinking fountain, the cedar corral fence and the new turf in the lower paddock. She had never been on a livestock ranch before and had no idea what any of it was, but the thought that she would be escaping Chris’ disturbing presence very shortly sustained her. By the time they got back it was necessary to pack and head out to the airport. She wasn’t alone with Chris again until Martin took their baggage out to the car and she was left with his brother in the living room.

  “So,” Chris said evenly.

  Helene looked at him.

  “I guess I’ve driven you away.”

  “Not at all. Martin told you why I have to go back...”

  Chris waved his hand in dismissal, cutting off her explanation. “Please give me a little credit,” he said shortly. “I may not be a brain trust like my older brother, but even I know when I’m being subjected to a snow job.”

  Helene met his eyes, then looked away, feeling naked under his penetrating gaze.

  “I’m just not as easy to fool as he is, am I?” he said quietly, insinuatingly, and then he turned away as Martin bustled back into the room.

  They said their goodbyes at the house, as Martin was going to drive back to the airport and leave the rental car there. Helene avoided Chris’ glance as he clasped her hand in farewell and she didn’t look at him again until she was safely in the car and he was standing at the front door watching them leave. Why did she feel such an overwhelming sense of flight from doom, as if she had narrowly avoided a disaster?

  As was usually the case with travel, the journey back seemed shorter than the trip out. When they circled Newark Airport preparing for landing Helene relaxed for the first time since she had met Chris Murdock.

  She was far away from him. Everything would certainly be all right now.

  * * * *

  Everything was not all right. The memory of Chris’ embrace haunted her. Why didn’t she feel that same sinking, languorous sensation when Martin touched her? Something was wrong. If she had suspected it before she met Chris, she knew it now. It wasn’t long before Helene had convinced herself that what was lacking was a physical relationship with her fiancé. Surely if she made love with Martin, all her doubts would be swept aside. They were to be married shortly anyway, what difference would it make if they got a head start on the honeymoon? She would forget those stolen seconds in Chris’ arms in his brother’s bed.

  They had only been back from Wyoming for a few days when Helene cooked a special dinner for Martin in his apartment. While they were relaxing afterward she said, “I’ve been thinking.”

  “Oh, oh,” Martin replied, looking at her over his newspaper.

  “Maybe I should stay the night,” she said, smiling.

  Martin set the paper aside carefully. “Does that mean what I think it means?”

  “It does.”

  He rose and came to her side, sitting on the arm of her chair. “What brought this on? As I recall, you we
re the one who wanted to wait. You said it would make the marriage ceremony more special if...”

  “I know what I said,” Helene replied, interrupting him as she suppressed a surge of irritation. “I thought it was a woman’s prerogative to change her mind. After all, we’re both adults and it seems silly of me to cling to such a quaint, old fashioned notion.” She stopped. Was she quoting Chris Murdock?

  Martin leaned over to kiss her warmly. “I thought it was a charming notion, but of course if you really have changed your mind...” He started to laugh.

  “I have,” she said.

  He got up and extended his hand. Helene rose and took it and Martin led the way to his bedroom.

  * * * *

  Ninety minutes later Martin was asleep and Helene was sitting in the living room, staring unseeingly at a television sitcom and nursing a cup of tea. Martin’s flannel robe was wrapped around her and the scent of him imbedded in the cloth brought to mind her sexual initiation, which had just taken place.

  Well, she had gotten what she wanted. And Martin had been wonderful, really. Sweet, tender, understanding. No virgin could have had a more compassionate lover. So then why did she feel like crying?

  Helene bit her lip resolutely. No more tears. She was not going to turn into a quivering wreck over an immature infatuation with her husband’s brother, a man who clearly couldn’t stand her. So what if her first experience with Martin had not driven him from her mind? Everyone said these things took time. Women who expected fireworks during defloration were always disappointed.

  Helene took a sip of her drink, tracing the healing cut on her bare foot with her finger. She had to silence the nagging whisper that said the problem was not her lack of experience but her choice of men. The truth was she had been more excited by a few seconds of closeness with Chris than an hour in bed with Martin. And, of course, it was possible that she was just a spoiled child who only wanted what she knew she couldn’t have. She sighed. Neither prospect presented her with an appealing picture of herself.

  Helene stood up briskly and walked into Martin’s kitchen, dumping the rest of her drink down the drain.

  Time would pass, she would make a life with Martin, she would forget his brother.

  That’s all there was to it.

  * * * *

  Six weeks later Helene was painting a wall in Martin’s apartment, readying the place for her upcoming wedding, when the telephone rang. She climbed down off the ladder and set the roller in the tray on the floor, paused on her way past the air conditioning control to lower the temperature, then lifted the receiver.

  “Hello?” she said.

  “Helene?” a man responded.

  Helene froze. She had only met him once, but she knew his voice. It was Martin’s brother.

  “Helene, are you there? This is Chris.”

  Helene leaned against the wall and closed her eyes. “Yes?” she replied weakly.

  “Helene, I have bad news,” he said flatly.

  She straightened, alert. “What is it?”

  “Martin is dead.”

  Helene stared blankly at Martin’s white refrigerator. “What?” she whispered.

  “I said Martin is dead. He was killed in a car accident early this morning.”

  “What are you talking about—? He’s on a business trip to Atlanta. I just spoke to him last night.”

  “He was on his way to that law firm down there for a breakfast meeting when his car collided with a truck. Everybody in the car was killed.” He paused. “I’m sorry,” he added curtly.

  The room seemed to be spinning around her. She sat down hard at the kitchen table.

  “Are you there?” Chris said.

  Helene cleared her throat. “Yes.” She thought a moment. “Are you calling from Wyoming?”

  “Yes. I just heard from the hospital about ten minutes ago,” he replied.

  “Why did they call you instead of me?’‘

  “He had a next-of-kin card in his wallet, an old one he’d filled out years ago, and it named me. Maybe he meant to change it when he got married, I don’t know,” Chris answered.

  “It doesn’t matter.” Her thoughts were tumbling over themselves. “What should we do?”

  “That’s what I wanted to ask you. Should I have the body flown up to New Jersey? Do you want to have the funeral there?”

  The body. He was talking about Martin. Oh, God. She was silent for so long that Chris thought she had hung up.

  “I think he would want to be buried on the ranch,” Helene said softly. “Go back to his roots, you know?”

  “I thought that too, but his colleagues are there by you, the people he worked with for years. He lived in the East for a long time.”

  “We’ll send out notices to the people here, maybe have a chapel service, whatever you think best. But he would want to be buried with his father.”

  There was a long pause, and then Chris said, “I agree.” Was there a catch in his voice?

  “What do you want me to do?” Helene asked.

  “I’ll call Atlanta and make the arrangements to bring Martin home,” Chris said. “When can you get here?”

  “I’ll catch the first available plane.”

  “Let me know,” Chris said shortly, and hung up with a resounding click.

  Helene slumped in her chair. Maybe she was having a nightmare. Maybe Martin wasn’t dead. If she could just wake up...

  Pull yourself together, she told herself sternly. You have to think of Martin, to do everything the way he would have wanted it done.

  She picked up the phone again to book a flight.

  * * * *

  The funeral took place on a burning August day. It seemed forever before the people who gathered at the house afterward dispersed and went their various ways. Helene helped Maria put away the leftover food and bag the trash. Then at dusk Maria went back to her family in town and Helene wandered into the living room to find Chris sitting in the same chair he had occupied the night she broke the glass. How long ago that seemed. She dropped onto the loveseat opposite him and they sat in silence for a while before Chris said, “Well, I guess it’s all over for you now, isn’t it?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The gravy train has left without you. Too bad Martin didn’t die after the wedding—you would have come into quite a bit.”

  Helene stood up and began to walk out.

  “Oh, leave, that’s right,” Chris called after her. “You don’t have to put up with me now, there’s nothing to be gained by it.”

  Helene turned on her heel and marched resolutely over to him. “Do you have to make this day more difficult than it’s already been?” she demanded.

  “Why not? Why not get it all out in the open now? We’ve been tiptoeing around one another long enough.”

  “I don’t have to listen to this. My connection with you is over. Your brother is dead and after today I never plan to see you again.”

  “Not even to collect the money for your family’s trust?” Chris said meanly, standing to face her.

  Helene stared at him.

  “He wrote it to survive him, didn’t you know? Your mother and sister get a monthly stipend. That doesn’t change, but guess what? Nothing for you. You were supposed to marry him, of course, but now that seems to be off, so what next? Beating the bushes for bachelor number two? You’d better step lively, that skinny savings account of yours won’t hold out for long.”

  Helene stared at him, her mouth agape. “What do you know about my savings account?”

  He folded his arms and regarded her levelly. “I had you investigated after you were out here last time.”

  Helene was shocked into silence. She couldn’t believe it.

  “I had every right to protect my brother. He was too trusting for his own good,” Chris said defensively.

  “And what did you find, mastermind?” Helene countered. “That I was an agent of a foreign power, that I was drugging Martin to get him under my spell, that he had
signed over all his worldly goods to me? You found exactly nothing, that’s what, or you would have told Martin all about it back then.”

  Chris made no reply.

  “As I’m sure you discovered from your expensive private investigation, my interest in your brother was not financial. I do have a job, you know, and I will keep it. I was marrying your brother because he was a fine man who...”

  “I know he was a fine man. I also know you didn’t love him,” Chris said expressionlessly.

  “How dare you say that?”

  “Because it’s true. You were very nice to him. I date say you liked him and you undoubtedly liked his money a lot more, but you didn’t love him. He was a way out of your troubles, that’s all.”

  “I would have made him a wonderful wife!”

  “Oh, I’m sure you would have been dutiful. Especially in bed. I mean, you would have seen it as your duty to please him, but you would have been as enthusiastic about it as a whore servicing her most important customer.”

  Helene slapped him as hard as she could.

  “Truth hurts, huh?” he said, raising his hand to touch his cheek, which turned white, then scarlet.

  They stared at one another, the atmosphere so charged it could have presaged an electrical storm. Why did he always have to look so good, Helene wondered miserably? Even now, when she wanted to kill him, she wanted to caress him still more, and the knowledge of her own weakness fueled her anger.

  “From the moment you met me you’ve done nothing but bait me and treat me abominably,” she whispered finally. “Why?”

  “I don’t like phonies.”

  “Why are you so certain I am one?”

  “Women who pretend to be in love in order to solve their financial problems are phonies.”

  “You just keep repeating the same insults—do you have to convince yourself of this garbage in order to justify your treatment of me? You’re disgusting.”

  “I’m disgusting? You were planning to marry a man for whom you felt not an iota of desire or passion and I’m disgusting?”

  “You can’t know what I felt,” Helene said, turning away from him.