Lifelines: Kate's Story Read Online Free PDF Page A

no limp and let him
urge her into a chair. He took a cigarette package from his pocket, tailor
made, not home rolls like hers. She watched as he lit his lighter for her, his
face earnest as she puffed until the coals glowed at the end of her cigarette.
    “Eve,
share some of your wisdom with me. I don’t know what to do.”
    She
wondered if he would sense her sympathy if she put her hand on his arm, or if
he might think she intended some intimacy.
    “What’s
wrong?” She hoped the words sounded sympathetic and wise. He believed her wise
and warm, so she tried to make her words match.

    J ennifer
Taylor paced the room. Nine o’clock and Alain had promised to come by
eight. Too late now for the slow, romantic dancing she’d planned.
    She
burst into the bathroom, slammed the door closed, then glared at her image in
the mirror. She’d begun at five with a perfumed bubble bath. Then she’d creamed
herself all over and painted fingernails and toenails.
    She
picked up a lip brush now and carefully repaired the color on her lower lip.
She mustn’t let herself bite her lips tonight. She tilted her head back and
examined the line of her throat. Was Wendy beautiful, or ordinary? Jennifer had
driven to the school where Alain’s wife taught today, had parked outside and
waited over an hour to see Wendy, but although the doors opened again and
again, no wheelchair appeared.
    Jennifer
backed away from the mirror and stepped up on the edge of the bathtub where she
could see her own silk-clad legs. She had good legs and a smooth, young throat.
The top two buttons of her bodice revealed feminine curves enhanced by
expensive black lace. She turned her head until black hair slid over her
shoulders.
    Alain
loved her long hair.
    She
trailed her finger down between the open lapels of her bodice. The dress was
worth every dollar, worth lying to her mother about the car. Alain would
notice, and after being late he would feel guilty. After all, tomorrow was her
birthday.
    Finally,
she heard his car through the open window.
    She
picked up her handbag and slipped out her door and down the stairs in time to
shake her head at Sandra, who’d already gripped the doorknob. When Sandra
shrugged and melted away, Jennifer waited for Alain to knock again.
    She
wanted him to worry. He was so late, she might have left already. After all,
there were other men. When she finally opened the door, she feigned surprise
well enough she could see the confusion in his eyes.
    “Alain,
I thought you weren’t coming.”

    R achel
Hardesty nestled in the corner of the sofa, her notebook computer balanced on
crossed legs. The kindling in the fireplace lay ready, but whenever she tried
to light the fire, it fizzled out. She’d put on Richard’s wool socks and she
could have turned the heat up, but she wanted the January chill to remind her
husband he should have installed a gas fireplace. Except for that wood-burning
hole in the wall, this room looked perfect: the soft ivory carpet, the
turquoise and ivory sofa Richard had bought under protest, and those
five-hundred-dollar brass lamps.
    Almost
midnight. Where the hell was he?
    The
intricacies of consumer contracts had become confusingly complex over the last
three hours. Repudiation ... the book balanced on the arm of her sofa referred to
it in the familiar terms one uses for the freeway. Why had her father
never explained repudiation?
    A
truck outside.
    Panic
tightened her chest. Should she push computer and books aside to meet Richard
at the door, or let him find her focused on her law project, oblivious to his
arrival?
    They’d
been married twenty-five months. Until last month, Richard had arrived home
daily in time for them to watch the ocean sunset together. The first time he
drove in the driveway late, she expected alcohol on his breath, but found only
ice in his blue eyes. She found herself wishing he would come home
drunk, give her something to shout at him about.
    He
had no right to treat her as if