“A little,” she hummed softly.
His fingers were suddenly still, probing. “Hey, what’s this?”
“That scar?” Her own slender forefinger joined his in confirmation.
“Yes,that scar.Where diditcome from?”
“The school bus.”
“School bus?”
“Uh-huh. Scott Anderson got angry because I called him a ‘wimp,’ so he threw his lunchbox at me.”
“Why did you call him a ‘wimp’?”
“Because hewasone. At least, that was the meanest thing I could think to call him at the time. And he deserved it. He had hidden his bubble gum on the underside of one of my braids so that the teacher would not catch him chewing it. When we got on the bus, he decided he wanted it back. It was very painful!”
“I’ll bet.”
Justine raised her head as though hurt. “You don’t sound terribly sympathetic, Sloane. Hmph! A lot of good you are!”
In the silence that followed, she curled into the waiting haven of Sloane’s body and they lay together, quiet and at peace. “Tell me about yourself, Justine,” he asked softly. “About your home, your parents, your experiences as a child …”
Keenly attuned to her mood, he felt her tension instantly. “Oh, you don’t really want to hear about that,” she scoffed evasively. “It’s very humdrum.”
“Fine. But tell me anyway. I know so little about that part of you.” He hugged her even closer in a futile attempt to dispel her unease. “Where were you born?”
Any other subject would have pleased her more. “A hospital …”
“Where?”
His determination overrode her hesitancy for the time being. “A small town in Montana. You won’t have heard of it. I grew up on the outskirts of Butte. Very ordinary.”
“Your parents? Are they still alive?”
How strange it seemed to be sharing, after the fact, such personal information with a man with whom she had been so totally intimate already! In Sloane’s arms, she forgot all else. Only her present with him mattered.
Buthewanted to know more, and she couldn’t deny him. “My mother died several years ago. My father is alive—he still lives in Montana.”
“Why didyouleave?”
Why did she leave?With painful memories of a childhood haunted by her parents’ misery, the ugliness of their divorce and its lonely aftermath, she’dhad toleave for her own survival. Besides, if, as a family law practitioner, she hoped to be able to help as many victims of similarly broken homes as possible, the big city was the place to be. “I felt that the opportunities for a lawyer would be better in New York,” she answered simply. “I came east to college, then stayed on for law school. By that time I was pretty much addicted to the big city. What with the possibilities for employment beginning to open up for women, it seemed the logical decision.” It had become easier to talk as the subject moved further from Montana—just as life had grown simpler with the distance.
“I’ll bet you were a wild one, back in college,” he teased her softly.
Her foot made contact with his solid shin as she kicked him in mock punishment. “You’ve just had proof to the contrary. How can you even suggest such a thing? I was a studier. That’s all I did. Study. I won the hearts of all my teachers, made the dean’s list every semester, and was accepted at the law school I wanted—Columbia. Very wild!”
Sloane laughed into the copper-colored curls which covered his shoulder. “I’m glad,” he mused, then paused as he grew more serious. “What do you want out of life, Justine? In the long run, what do you want?”
On the surface it was an easy question. The answer had been her motivational force for years. Now, she answered with the strength of her conviction. “I want to be agoodlawyer. I want to be respected as such. I want to continue to find the inner satisfaction I do now in my work. That’s all … that’s all.” Her voice had lowered at the last and she frowned against the warm wall of his chest. Thatwasall … yet, where didthisfit in? Was there a place in her life for Sloane? Reluctant to brood on the future, she deftly turned the conversation around. “And what about you, Sloane? What doyouwant out of life?”
The length of his body grew even greater as he stretched lazily. She was not oblivious, however, to the thread of intensity which wound through him. “I want many of the same things, Justine. I want my business to flourish and its studies to benefit as many people as possible. I also want … a wife and children.” Like a bomb, he dropped the last, leaving the silence to absorb its impact.
For a heart-shattering moment Justine knew an awesome fear. It was the same fear she had felt, though not recognized, the very first time she had met him. Periodically over the past three weeks it had returned in thin-wisped fragments to her consciousness. She hadn’t understood it until now. Sloane represented a threat to her of the highest order. He wanted marriage … the one thing she wouldn’t give him! She had seen her parents tear each other to bits. As the product of their unhappy union, she had herself been wrenched apart. Day after day she saw similar tragedies. Long ago she had decided that marriage had no place in her life. Love or no love, she would stick to her guns.
Sloane’s voice was low and private. “Haven’t you ever thought of children, Justine? Wouldn’t you like to have them?”
She shrugged, willing indifference as she fought the turmoil within. “I’ve thought about it,” she admitted—which, in fact, she had. But without a marriage there would be no children. She had accepted that and learned to live with it. “Work keeps me busy, though. And there’s so much I want to see and do. You”—she poked his ribs as she steered toward safer ground—“travel a lot in your work. Some of us aren’t that lucky. I’m just beginning to discover the beauty of traveling. I’d never been out of the country until I went to France last year. I spent a week in Paris … and loved every minute!”
