* * *
“Are you all right?” Jeff asked Rush as he moved past his friend to the engine-order telegraph.
“Fine.” The word was as sharp as a new razor. Rush wasn’t willing to discuss his problems with anyone, not even Jeff.
“There’s got to be some logical explanation why Lindy hasn’t written.”
“Right,” Rush answered, but he avoided looking at his friend, doing his best to look busy. He didn’t want to be rude, but he wasn’t going to discuss his troubles either.
“Susan’s letter says the wives’ association had Lindy over for lunch recently.”
“Is that supposed to reassure me?”
“I think it should.” Jeff unfolded Susan’s thick letter and scanned its contents. “Lindy’s kept in close contact with Susan and the others.”
“That doesn’t mean a damn thing.”
“Apparently they had a wedding shower for her.”
That made him feel a whole lot better, Rush mused sarcastically. Lindy seemed to have forgotten she had a husband, but she was busy accepting wedding gifts.
Jeff paused and cleared his throat. “It seems the wives went together and got Lindy a long silk nightie.”
Rush didn’t respond. His jaw was clenched so tightly that he was convinced his back molars would crack. He’d been four interminable weeks without a single word from Lindy. A whole damn month. The knot in his stomach was tight enough to double him over. His nerves were shot. He found himself snapping at his men, behaving irrationally, becoming angry and taking it out on everyone else. And worse, he wasn’t sleeping. For two nights now he hadn’t been able to so much as close his eyes. Every time he did, the images that filled his mind were of Lindy with another man, presumably Paul. The hot surges of anger and adrenaline that shot through him were so strong that any chance of falling asleep was a lost cause. Lindy might as well have taken a knife and cut open a vein as not written.
Unwillingly Rush’s mind leaped to a memory of how it had been with Cheryl. At first there’d been a flood of letters, filled with all the right phrases, everything a man longs to hear when he’s separated from the woman he loves. Then Cheryl’s letters had petered out to a handful in a month, and then just a sporadic few before his return.
But damn it all to hell, Lindy was his wife. He’d slipped a diamond ring on her finger and committed his life to her. He’d expected more of her than this. But apparently she took her vows lightly because she’d sure as hell forgotten him the minute he was out of sight.
It was a mistake to have married her. But he’d been so much in love with her that he’d refused to listen to the calm voice of reason. He’d lost one woman and feared losing another. He should have known standing before a preacher wasn’t going to make any difference, but he would never have believed Lindy could do this. All her reassurances about knowing her own heart had fooled him. She’d been so positive they were doing the right thing. None of that confidence was worth a damn now. They’d both made a mistake. A bad one. At the rate things were progressing, this marriage could be the single worst disaster of his life.
“I’m going below,” Rush announced, walking away from the gyrocompass repeater, which indicated the Mitchell’s course. The sight of Jeff holding a letter from home was more than Rush could take. He needed to escape before he said or did something he’d regret.
Jeff nodded, but his brow was creased with tight bands of concern.
Once in his compartment, Rush lay on his back with his hands cupped behind his head. Steve was right. Rush had known it the minute his friend had said as much. Lindy had married him on the rebound, and now that he was gone she’d realized what a terrible error in judgment she’d committed and wanted out.
They’d been living in a fairy tale, forced to share the apartment the way they were, and like a fool Rush had gotten sucked into the fantasy. Lindy had been wounded by love and Rush had been a convenient source of comfort to her damaged ego.
Now that he was gone, Lindy realized their mistake. The muscles of his stomach knotted when he realized how helpless he was in this situation. Lindy didn’t love him.
Now all he had to worry about was if she was pregnant. Not using any protection had been a conscious decision on his part. They hadn’t even talked about it the way couples should—hadn’t discussed the possibility of starting a family so soon. It wasn’t that Rush had been so eager for Lindy to get pregnant, he realized with a flash of insight. But he hadn’t wanted a repeat of what had happened with Cheryl. If Lindy’s stomach was swollen with a baby when he returned, he didn’t want any question in his mind about who was the father.
Rush refused to believe he’d actually done anything so stupid as to play that sort of silly mind game. Lindy wasn’t going to cheat on him—he refused to even consider the possibility. But then he’d honestly assumed she loved him, too—the same way he loved her. It hadn’t even taken her a month to forget him.
* * *
Lindy let herself into the apartment and stopped when she found her brother sitting in front of the television, watching a late afternoon talk show. Steve’s behavior was really beginning to concern her. He’d been assigned shore duty, and when he wasn’t working he sat around the apartment with a lost, tormented look that reminded her of how she’d felt when she’d first arrived in Seattle. His behavior wasn’t the only thing that was getting on her nerves. He’d become so cynical and so sarcastic about life. His thinking seemed so negative that she didn’t like to talk to him anymore. There’d been a time when she’d admired him for the way he’d handled the emotional trauma of the divorce, but his letters had been a convenient front. It became clearer every day that the healing process hadn’t even started in Steve. He still loved Carol, and he needed to either patch things up between them or accept the divorce as final. Otherwise it was going to ruin his life.
“Hi,” she said, and walked into the kitchen, setting down the grocery bag on the counter. “What’s Donahue got to say today?”
“Who?”
“The guy whose program you’re watching.”
“Hell, I don’t know. Something about nursing mothers.”
“And that interests you?”
“It’s better than staring at some stupid game show.”
“It’s a beautiful day. You should be outside.”
“Doing what?”
Lindy sighed. “I don’t know. Something. Anything.”
Steve stood and came into the kitchen. “Do you want me to do something for dinner? Peel potatoes, that sort of thing?”
She thanked him for his offer with a smile. “I’ve got everything under control.” Opening the refrigerator, she set the milk inside and decided now was as good a time as any to wade into shark-infested waters. “Is Carol still living in Seattle?” Lindy asked the question and then turned to face her brother.
“Carol who?”
His words may have been flippant, but he couldn’t disguise the instant flash of pain in his eyes.
“Carol Kyle, your wife.”
“Ex-wife,” he corrected bitterly. “As far as I know she is.”
“I think I’ll give her a call.”
A year seemed to pass before Steve answered. “Before you start meddling in someone else’s troubles, you’d better take care of your own, little sister.”
Lindy’s heart flew upward and lodged in her throat. “What do you mean by that?”
Steve pointed