“Immaturity. Paranoia,” Harry countered. “And problem-solving requires logic. That leaves Tracy out.”
“It also requires some knowledge of human emotions, and Harry hasn’t felt an emotion in years.”
“Are you listening to yourselves?” Isabel’s gentle shake of the head left Tracy feeling faintly ashamed. “You’re both adults, and it’s obvious you love your children. If your marriage isn’t working the way you want it to, then fix it. Don’t run away from it.”
“It’s too late for that,” Tracy said.
Isabel’s expression remained sympathetic. “Right now you can’t afford a disposable relationship. You have sacred responsibilities, and no amount of wounded pride justifies walking away from them. Only the most selfish and immature parents would use beautiful children as weapons in a power struggle.”
Harry had never been called immature in his life, and he looked as though he’d swallowed a mouthful of guppies. Tracy had more experience, so it didn’t sting quite so badly.
Isabel bore in. “It’s time to transfer your energy from arguing to figuring out how you’re going to live together.”
“Ignoring the fact that you are completely out of line,” Harry said, “what kind of life would it be to grow up with parents who can’t stand living together?”
His words made Tracy want to cry. He was bailing out on her. Harry Briggs, the most hardworking, stubborn, decent man she’d ever known, was bailing out.
“You can live together,” Isabel said firmly. “You just have to figure out how you’re going to do it.” She zeroed in on Harry. “You have some priorities to sort out, I think. Call up the people you work with and tell them you won’t be in for a few days.”
“You’re wasting your breath,” Tracy said. “Harry never misses work.”
Isabel ignored her. “There are plenty of bedrooms in the villa, Mr. Briggs. Pick one and unpack.”
Ren’s eyebrows shot up. “Hey!”
Isabel ignored Ren’s protest. “Tracy, you need some time to yourself. Why don’t you take a drive? Harry, your children have missed you. You can spend the afternoon with them.”
Harry was indignant. “Wait a minute. I’m not going to-”
“Oh, yes, you are.” Physically, Isabel might be the smallest person beside that pool, but she was angry now, and that made her formidable. “You’ll do this because you’re decent and because your children need you. And if that’s not good enough”-she bore down on him-“you’ll do it because I’m telling you to.” She held his eyes for what must have seemed like forever, then turned and marched away. Ren, who hated emotional upheaval nearly as much as Harry did, couldn’t follow her fast enough.
Harry swore under his breath. Being alone with him was more than Tracy could tolerate right now, and she rushed toward the house. Isabel was right. She needed to be by herself for a while.
Church bells rang in the distance, and Tracy’s heart felt so bruised it was hard to breathe. What happened to us, Harry? Our love was supposed to last forever.
But forever seemed to have passed them by.
Ren followed Isabel as she swept through the villa’s garden and down the slope toward the vineyard. The soft bounce of her hair beneath her straw hat was at odds with her purposeful stride. Ren wasn’t normally attracted to warrior goddesses, but nothing about his attraction to her had been normal from the beginning.
Why couldn’t an ordinary woman have rented that farmhouse? A good-time woman who understood that sex, was just sex, and didn’t have squirrelly ideas about how everybody in the world should live their lives. Most of all, a woman who didn’t pray when she was with him. Today he’d received the distinct impression she was actually praying for him, and what kind of crap was that to have to put up with from a woman you wanted for sex?
He pulled up next to her. “I just saw the Four Cornerstones in action, didn’t I?”
“They’re both wounded right now, but they have to get over it. Personal responsibility is at the heart of any well-lived life.”
“Remind me never to piss you off. Oh, wait, I already did that.” He resisted the urge to destroy that silly hat. Women like Isabel shouldn’t wear hats. They should go about the world bareheaded, with a sword in one hand, a shield in the other, and a chorus of angels singing the “Hallelujah Chorus” behind them. “Was it my imagination or did you really call those little monsters from hell ‘beautiful children’?”
Instead of smiling, she looked so troubled he wanted to stick a red rubber ball on his nose and grab a seltzer bottle.
“You think I should have stayed out of it, don’t you? That I was pushy and dictatorial. Possibly even driven, demanding, and difficult?”
“You took the words right out of my mouth.” He didn’t really mean it. She’d been terrific with them. Still, if he gave her an inch, she’d take over the world. “Didn’t any of those psych classes teach you to butt out of other people’s lives unless they ask you for advice?”
As her steps slowed, she seemed to get angry all over again. “When did we get the idea that disposable marriages were all right? Shouldn’t people have figured out by now that it’s not going to be easy? Marriage takes hard work. It takes sacrifice and commitment. Couples need-”
“He’s screwing around on her.”
“Is he? Am I the only one who’s noticed that Tracy doesn’t seem to be the most reliable source? And from what I saw today, they haven’t talked through a single one of their issues. Did you hear either of them mention a word about counseling? Because I didn’t. What I saw was wounded pride wrapped up in all kinds of hostility.”
“Which-and correct me if I’m wrong-doesn’t seem like the best way to keep a marriage going.”
“Not if the hostility’s genuine. I grew up that way, and believe me, that kind of warfare poisons everything it touches, especially children. But Tracy and Harry aren’t in my parents’ league.”
He didn’t like to think about her growing up with hostility. It was one thing for him to have been raised by jerks-he’d learned to tune it out. But she cared too deeply about the people around her, and it made her more vulnerable.
Her expression grew stormier. “I hate it when people try to bail out without a fight. It’s emotional cowardice, and it violates everything our lives should be about. They loved each other enough to conceive five children, but now they want to throw up their hands and take the easy way out. Doesn’t anybody have a backbone anymore?”
“Hey, don’t get mad at me. I’m just your sex partner, remember?”
“You’re not my sex partner.”
“Not at this exact moment, but the future’s looking good. Except you have to stop that praying crap. It turns me off. You, however, turn me on.”
She lifted her face to the heavens. “Please, God, don’t strike this man with lightning, even though he deserves it.”
He smiled, glad he’d finally managed to cheer her up. “Knock it off. You want me. Admit it. You want me so bad right now that you can’t stand it.”
“Women who want you end up dead and buried.”
“The strong survive. Unbutton your blouse.”
Her lips parted, and her eyes got big. Momentarily, at least, he’d made her forget the Briggses’ troubles.
“What did you say?”
“It’s not smart to argue with me. Just unbutton it.”
In less than a heartbeat her expression shifted from confused to calculating. She had his number, and if he weren’t careful, she’d carve it in his chest with the tip of one of those polished little fingernails.
He gave her a half-lidded sneer, then thinned his lips with just enough menace to get her blood pumping.
Her jaw set in a stubborn line that boded no good.