Navy Woman

"Oh." Kelly frowned and removed the earmuffs. "After lunch we went out for Mexican food and Catherine ordered a chili something..."



"That explains it," Royce teased.



"No. She wasn't feeling bad until she got her mail. I think it had something to do with that. She opened a letter, and the next thing I knew she was staring out the window, looking real spacey. I think she might have been crying, but when I asked her, she said she had something in her eye."



The gutsy woman Royce knew wouldn't easily give in to tears unless something was drastically wrong.



Kelly hesitated. "I think she was crying, though... I don't know. Catherine's not the type to let on about that sort of thing."



"What happened next?" he pressed, losing patience.



"Well, she made herself a cup of tea and said it was time to run me home. I didn't want to come back so soon, but I didn't say so because I knew she wanted to be alone."



"How did things go on the ride home?" Royce was beginning to feel like a detective, ferreting out each bit of information he could.



"She was real quiet. That's why I think she's not feeling very good."



Catherine was on Royce's mind for the remainder of the day. Hell, what was so unusual about that, he asked himself as he turned out the lights before heading up to bed. The beautiful Lieutenant Commander was in his mind about ninety-nine percent of the time, despite his best efforts to forget about her. Having Kelly chatter about her for hours on end certainly didn't help matters any.



Royce swore the kid had talked nonstop from the moment Catherine had let her off at the door. She'd repeated everything two and three times, so excited about every detail of their time together. Royce hadn't realized how much Kelly needed a mother's influence.



As was his habit, Royce read each night. It helped relax him. He expected to have a difficult time falling asleep, but as soon as he turned out the light, he felt himself effortlessly drifting off.



A phone call, especially one in the middle of the night, was never good news. It rang, waking Royce from a deep sleep. He groaned and groped for the receiver, dragging it across the empty pillow at his side.



"Yes?" he demanded.



Silence.



Royce scrambled into a sitting position. Something told him it was Catherine on the other end of the line. Some inner instinct.



"Catherine?" he asked, his heart racing. "Answer me. What's wrong?"



Chapter Seven



Catherine felt like an idiot, phoning Royce in the middle of the night. She didn't know what had prompted her to do anything so foolish, nor did she know what she intended to say once he picked up the receiver. As soon as he answered, she realized her folly and was about to disconnect the line when he called her name.



"H-how'd you know it was me?" She pushed the hair off her forehead and drew in soft, catching gasps in an effort to stop the flow of tears that refused to cease.



"It was a good guess," Royce admitted gently. "Now tell me what's wrong."



If only he'd been outraged, instead of caring. She might have been able to avoid telling him, but she needed him so desperately—as desperately as she'd ever needed anyone. "I'm fine, really I am," she lied. "It's just that I'm a little out of sorts and..." She couldn't admit to him she hadn't wept, really down-and-out wept in years, and once the tears had started, it was like a dam bursting over a restraining wall. Nothing she tried to do helped.



"Catherine, love, it's two-thirty in the morning. You wouldn't have phoned if everything was peachy keen."



She swallowed a sob and knew the noise she made sounded as though she were drowning, going underwater for the third and last time. "Thank you."



"For what?"



She gnawed on the corner of her lip and ran a tissue under her nose. "For calling me your love. I...need that right now." She was convinced he had no idea he'd used the affectionate term.



He hesitated, then gently pried again. "Are you going to tell me what's wrong?"



Catherine sat curled up on her sofa, her feet tucked beneath her. The pages of her mother's letter were scattered across the top of her coffee table. She'd moved the picture of her father down from the mantel and set it in front of her as well. For part of the night she'd held it to her breast and rocked to and fro in a frantic effort to hold on to him. The area around her was strewn with used tissues.



"Catherine," Royce repeated. "What's wrong?"



"I...I shouldn't have phoned. I'm sorry...I was going to hang up, but then you said my name."



"I'll be right over."



"Royce, no...please don't." She couldn't deal with him, not now. In addition, her apartment complex was full of Navy personnel. If anyone were to see Royce coming in or out of her apartment in the early hours of the morning, it could be disastrous.



"Then tell me what's troubling you."



Catherine reached for another tissue. "I got a letter from my mother..." she sobbed. A fresh batch of hot tears coursed down her face, streaking it with glistening trails of pain. Even now, hours after reading the letter, her mother's news had the power to wrench her heart. "You're going to think I'm so stupid to be this upset."



"I won't think anything of the sort."



"She's getting married. I don't expect you to understand... how can you when I don't understand myself...but it's like she's turning her back on my father after all these years. She loved him so much.



She deserves to be happy but I can't help thinking... there'll be no one to remember...my dad."



"Just because your mother's marrying doesn't mean she's forgetting your father."



"I've been telling myself that all night, but it just doesn't seem to sink into my heart. I'm happy...for h-her." Catherine sobbed so hard her shoulders shook. "I'm really p-pleased. She's been dating Norman for ten years. It isn't that this is any surprise... I don't even know why I'm crying, but now I can't seem to stop. I feel like such a fool...I'm sorry I woke you. Please go back to sleep and forget I—"



"No," he whispered softly. "There's an old road off Byron Way. Just head north and you can't miss it.



I'll meet you there in thirty minutes."



"Royce..." She meant to tell him to forget everything, that she was overreacting, behaving like an insecure child. Instead she found herself asking, "What about Kelly?"



"I'll have a friend come over. If he can't, I'll bring her along. Don't worry." The buzzing noise told her he'd hung up the receiver.



She shouldn't meet him. Catherine told herself that at least a dozen times as she drove down Byron Way. It wasn't fair to Royce to drag him out of bed in the middle of the night to an obscure road just because she couldn't deal with the fact her mother was marrying Norman. Dear, sweet Norman, who'd loved her mother for years and years, who'd patiently waited for her to love him enough to let go of the past.



Catherine managed to hold back the emotion while she struggled to find the road Royce had mentioned, but she felt as unstable as a hundred-year-old prairie farmhouse in a tornado. The first gust of wind and she'd collapse.



Royce was standing outside his car, waiting for her. The moonlight reflected off the hood, illuminating his face, which was creased with anxiety.



Catherine pulled off to the side of the road and turned off her engine. She didn't need a mirror to tell her she looked like hell warmed over, as her mother so often teased. Her eyes were red and swollen, and heaven only knew which direction her hair was pointing.



None of that seemed to matter when Royce walked over to her. He stared down on her as if she were a beauty queen, as if she were the most attractive woman in the world. His world. His eyes wandered over her face, and he raised his hand and caressed her cheek with his fingers.



If he hadn't been so gentle she might have been able to pull it off. She might have been able to convince him she was fine, thank him for his concern and then blithely drive away, no worse for wear. Royce destroyed her plans with his tenderness. He demolished her thin facade with a single look. Tears welled in her eyes, and she placed the tips of her fingers over her mouth in an effort to hold back the wails of grief and anguish that she had yet to fathom.



Royce reached for her then, pulling her into his arms. She went sobbing, banding her arms around his waist. She buried her face in his chest, not wanting him to know how hard she was weeping.



He led her to his Porsche and helped her inside, then joined her, taking her once more into the sanctuary of his arms. Again and again, he stroked the back of her head, again and again he whispered soothing words she couldn't hear over the sound of her own weeping. Again and again, he brushed his chin over the top of her head.



"It's all right," he whispered. "Go ahead and cry."



"I...can't seem to stop. Oh, Royce, I don't understand why I feel like this. I'm...I'm so afraid everyone is going to forget him. And it would be so unfair."



"You aren't going to forget."



"Don't you see?" she sobbed even harder. "I don't remember anything about him." Her throat was so thick she couldn't speak for several moments. "I was so young when he went away. Mom tried to help me remember. She told me story after story about all the things we used to do together and how much he loved us. As hard as I try I can't remember a single detail. Nothing."



"But he's alive here," Royce said gently, pressing a hand over her heart, "and that's all that matters."



Catherine wished it were that easy. But her emotions were far more complicated, as complicated as her love for Royce. Being in his arms, drinking in his strength and his comfort, helped to abate the tears.



"Kiss me," she pleaded, craving the healing balm of his love. "Just once and then...I promise I won't bother you again. I'll leave, and you can go back home."



He didn't hesitate. His hands were in her hair, his splayed fingers buried deep, angling her head so that his mouth could sweep down to capture hers the way a circling hawk comes after its prey.



Catherine sighed in appreciation, opening to him. Royce groaned, thrusting his tongue deep into the moist warmth of her mouth. She sighed anew and welcomed the spirals of heat that coiled in her stomach. Her hands gripped his shirt, holding on to him, needing the anchor of his love now more than ever before. The emotion that had been playing havoc with her senses all evening burst wide open and spilled over her like warm, melting honey.



Catherine whimpered.



Royce moaned softly, seeming to experience the same wonder. His hands roved over her back, dragging her forward until their hearts were pressed against each other's, each pounding out a chaotic rhythm of love and need.



When her breasts made contact with his chest, Catherine experienced a sensual hunger she had never known, a need that went beyond the physical. It was as if she were emotionally starved, as if the bleakness of her existence had been laid bare.



Royce's lips claimed hers a second time with an urgency that took her by surprise, his kiss of fierce possession, a deepening urgency, a ferocious hunger neither would be able to tolerate for long.



Royce must have sensed it, too, because he abruptly broke away, his chest heaving with the effort. Catherine longed to protest, but he raised his hand to her face and gently pressed his palm against her heated cheek. Her fingers covered his, and she closed her eyes, savoring this closeness.