“Of what?”
“Their relationship.”
But he didn’t believe that.He’d go farther in life than either one of them.“Try again, Hillary.”
“I think it’s nice that they’re close, she and her father.I wish I had half that closeness with mine.”
“If you did, you wouldn’t be as independent as you are.That’s what I like about you.You think for yourself.You don’t cling.You have your own life, and you let me lead mine.”
"Am I supposed to be happier that way?”
“Definitely.Look at Patricia.She’s just the opposite, and she’s miserable.”
“Is she jealous of the relationship between Pam and Eugene?”
“Not quite.She’s relieved they’re close.It takes the burden off her.She has a lot on her mind.”
That was a whole other story, one that John chose not to relate to Hillary.In her own way, Patricia was bothering him even more than Pam and Eugene.From the start their relationship had been awkward.Their closeness in age, John’s antagonism toward her, and her resultantdeference all led to tension.For years they walked carefully around each other.
Then John joined the business, and it was as though Patricia had suddenly found a friend.The business concerned her.She wanted to know how it was doing and where it was headed.Not only was Eugene spending more and more of his time in Timiny Cove, but when he was in Boston he had less and less patience for her questions.
John could understand why she turned to him.He knew what was going on in the company, could give her the answers she wanted, and he was available.He also came to understand that there was a power to be had in possessing and sharing information, particularly when the power had to do with Patricia and Eugene.So he indulged Patricia her questions, and the more he did, the more she asked.Increasingly, he found her waiting for him to come home, upset by something Eugene had said or done, desperate for reassurance.He gave her that, and if it meant speaking out against Eugene, he did so.
Surprisingly often, Patricia was on John’s side, particularly on the matter of expansion.She too wanted Eugene to broaden his base, but he wouldn’t listen to her either.Frustrated and upset, she argued with him, which promptly sent him running back to Maine, frustrating and upsetting her all the more.
And John was there.
It was totally spontaneous the first time, on a dark and rainy Friday night shortly after Eugene and she had argued.Eugene had swept Pam off in the car to spend the weekend in Maine, leaving Patricia behind to stew alone.Coming in from work, John had found her distraught.Gentleman that he was, when she slipped her arms around his waist and began to cry, he comforted her.Then, in the course of the comforting, something happened.His hands began to move over a body that was soft and lovely.His mouth touched hers once, then again and again.His body responded in the only way that an active twenty-eight-year-old man with a healthy appreciation of women could respond.
While the climax he reached that night wasn’t as sweet as some he’d had or as fiery as others, it was unique.It satisfied the dark cravings of his mind, gave him the perverse pleasure of cuckolding his father.
Chapter 5
“Mom?”Pam began calling as soon as she opened the front door.“Mom?”Even before the door slammed shut, she had dropped her book bag and was darting into the living room, but there was no sign of Patricia.Nor was she in the parlor or the library.“Mom?"She poked her head into the kitchen.“Hettie, isn’t my mother home?”
Hettie was a very large, very dark Jamaican who cooked like a dream.“Oo-yes, Miss Pamela.She be upstairs napping.”She held out a plate.“Sand dollars.Made just for you.”
Pam flashed her a grin, took one of the cookies from the plate, and pushed it into her mouth on the way out the door.She dashed back through the hall and was halfway up the front stairs when John came down from the top and blocked her way.He was the last person she wanted to see.
“What are you doing here?”she asked.
“I live here.”
“You’re supposed to be at work.”She moved to the side to pass him, but he flattened a hand against the wall.
“I had to change clothes.There’s a cocktail party at the Parker House.”
She moved to the other side, but he gripped the mahogany banister.“Move, John.I have to go up.”
“What’s the rush?”
“I have to see my mother.”
“She’s resting.”
Pam tried to duck under his arm, but she wasn’t as short as she used to be.In the last few months she’d sprouted up.She might have minded, had Eugene not been so proud of her height, which he said she’d inherited from him.Since she had more friends than ever in seventh grade, she figured it was just fine to be tall and slim rather than voluptuous.
She wasn’t anywhere near tall enough to be able to look John in the eye, though, and she wasn’t about to physically butt him.He made her uneasy.Although he wore the trousers and shirt he’d worn to work that day, the shirt was unbuttoned, exposing his chest, and his hair was mussed.He didn’t look as civilized as usual.
