Starstruck Read Online Free PDF Page B

found.
    “Hell,” he muttered. He poked his head out the door, hoping to see a stray child who might fetch him one. No luck. He retreated to the bathroom and peered out the window. Craning his neck he could see Liv standing in the driveway talking to a tall, dark-haired man who was leaning against the door of a late-model car. “Dad” most likely. Joe squinted, but he couldn’t make out much at this distance and without his glasses. Besides, his gaze seemed to want to linger stubbornly on Liv.
    She had changed out of the rust-colored skirt and paisley blouse and was now wearing a dressier light-blue jersey dress that was cinched by a belt at the waist, so that it accentuated the curve of her hips. Jeez, so much for cold showers. He groaned, feeling the tightening in hi s loins, and dragged his eyes away. No help that way, that was for sure. He opened the door again. Theo had looked like a sympathetic sort. Besides, Theo owed him one for the peas. Theo it would be.
    “Theo!” he bellowed. “Theo! Come here!”
     
     
    I f Tom didn’t get into that car and drive away in five seconds, Liv thought she might scream. Of all the days that he should feel inclined to stand and talk, especially after his nagging her about having to get off to Chicago, this was the one she needed the least. She couldn’t even bring herself to look at him. She felt sure he would see Joe Harrington’s lips imprinted on hers. Besides that, the longer he stayed and the more he said, the angrier she got.
    “I just can’t take them that weekend,” Tom was saying, looking far more like a harried father than she thought he had any right to. “Surely you can understand that!”
    “What I understand,” Liv said, trying to hang on to the last shreds of her temper, “is that you never seem to want your children anymore.”
    “That’s not true. I just have plans for next Saturday.”
    “You had plans with the kids first.”
    “So that’s what I’m telling you. I want to change it.” They had been through this before countless times. It was as though once he had divorced her, he had divorced the kids too. Looking at him now, it was hard to imagine what she had ever seen in him. Certainly he didn’t have the magnetism of Joe Harrington. But, at nineteen, he h ad swept her off her feet, and they had struggled together to get him through college and dental school, while she earned her degree and raised the kids. It hadn’t seemed terribly burdensome at the time—at least not to her. She had figured that the time they devoted to childrearing early on they could make up for later. After all, to her way of thinking, they had agreed to stick together forever. But Tom had other ideas. He had, he said much later, never been really satisfied with their relationship. But he hadn’t actually come out and said it until ten years later when it was more socially acceptable to admit that marriage and a family “cramped his style.” Then, when he did say it, he told Liv that he wanted “breathing space” and an “open marriage.” Liv, having learned about Trudy by that time, told him that what he really wanted was a divorce. And that was what he got. Now she just wished he’d go away. If he didn’t, Joe Harrington was going to walk out the kitchen door and create a situation that Liv had no desire to deal with tonight. Or any other night, for that matter.
    “Mom.” Theo appeared to tug at her arm.
    “Say good-bye to your father,” she said, mentally urging Tom into his car.
    “Good-bye,” Theo said. “Mom— ”
    “Hi, Theo, how’s it going?” Tom ruffled his son’s dark hair.
    “Okay. Mom— ”
    “What?”
    “Joe needs a towel.”
    Oh, no, thought Liv.
    “What?” Tom demanded, straightening up.
    “Can I give him one of the new yellow ones?” Theo went on.
    “Anything. Whatever you want,” Liv said, “All right,” she told Tom, “I’ll take them next weekend.” Anything, she thought frantically . Just leave.
    “Joe