He put the glasses on the edge of the sink, then cupped her face between his hands and dotted it with soft kisses. He kissed her closed eyelids and her cheeks, her forehead and her chin, before settling his warm, open mouth over hers and sending his tongue deep into it.

Their shower together became a ritual of love. Lips sipped water from pulsing flesh, unashamed and uninhibited. Soapy hands explored slick skin, caressed and massaged, earned murmurs of pleasure and sighs of fulfillment. His lathered fingers moved provocatively through the silky tuft at the top of her thighs. Slippery hands made milking motions that left him gasping.

“You make me so hard,” he rasped, bringing their bodies together. Their coupling was exquisite and seemingly timeless.

The water from the shower turned cool long before their ardor.

Lunch was a solemn occasion. Ruby was unnaturally glum. “Are you sure you haven’t forgotten anything?”

“I’ve packed everything and checked the room twice, Auntie. If I’ve overlooked anything, you can send it to my house in Houston. The housekeeper will be there even if I’m not.”

Rana said little. She was concentrating on not bursting into tears, while she idly moved the unwanted chicken salad around on her plate.

“What time is your flight?” Ruby asked.

“We’re scheduled to take off at four, but I’m sure media interviews will delay us. They always do.” A frown creased his brow as he watched Ana. He had expected a little show of sadness on her part, since they wouldn’t be seeing each other for three weeks. He hadn’t thought she would be this despondent.

“Will you be interviewed on camera?” Ruby asked him.

“Maybe. Watch the news tonight and you might see me.” Trying to lighten the mood around the dining table, he winked at his aunt. “Should I wave to you?”

When they had dragged out lunch as long as they possibly could, all that was left to do was say good-bye. Trent hugged his aunt and gave her a smack on the lips. “I thank you, the coach thanks you, the team thanks you, the fans thank you.”

She pretended to be irritated. “What are you blabbering about, you silly boy?”

“If you hadn’t given me a quiet room to rest in and three square meals a day, I wouldn’t be in such terrific condition. All the other guys will have a much harder time at camp than I will, and I owe it all to your tender, loving care.”

Ruby blotted her damp eyes with a hanky and mumbled that he had an open invitation to come and stay any time. He would always be welcome at her house. After his promise to call her often, she discreetly withdrew, leaving him alone in the entrance hail with Rana. He had loaded his belongings in his car before lunch. It was waiting for him at the curb.

Without a word, he pulled Rana into his arms. She buried her face in his neck and locked her hands together at the small of his back. She wished she could gather his strength, his smell, his warmth, and cork them in a bottle to be enjoyed later whenever she needed a “fix” of Trent.

“Are you going to tell me?” he asked softly, stroking her hair.

“Tell you what?”

“Why you look like someone has just run over your kitty.”

She smiled tremulously. “Is that what I look like?”

“Or worse.”

“I’m sad. I hate to see you go.”

“It’s only for three weeks.”

It’s for a lifetime.

“I’ll call every night.”

For a few nights, then you’ll skip a night, and then another.

“I’m going to miss you. So damn much.”

Until you meet someone else.

He tilted her head back and kissed her. Knowing that this would be the last time she ever felt his lips on hers, she poured all her love for him into that kiss.

When he pulled back, he let his thumb glide over her lips. “Kiss me like that a few more times, and I’ll be able to fly to California under my own power.” He hugged her quickly, fiercely. “See you in three weeks.”

Then he was gone.

She groped her way to the deacon’s bench behind the stairs and collapsed on it. She began to cry. Bitterly. Rackingly. And this time he wasn’t there to lend her comfort.

At least Rana’s days were busy. She finished her outstanding orders in ten days. Barry had promoted his idea of hand-painted upholstery fabric. She already had an order for three oversized cushions to decorate a poolside wicker settee.

To her delight, Trent called faithfully every night, and they talked until Tom, his roommate, demanded that he shut up and turn out the lights. He phoned with such regularity that it was with some surprise that Ruby called Rana to the phone one evening and said, “It’s a man, but it’s not Trent. And whoever it is, he got your name wrong. He pronounced it Rana.”

She avoided Ruby’s questioning eyes as she took the receiver from her. “Hello?”

“Rana Ramsey?”

A quick glance assured her that Ruby had already become engrossed in her television serial. “This is she.”

The caller identified himself as a representative of a life-insurance firm in New York City. “You are the beneficiary of a fifty-thousand-dollar policy, and I wanted to verify your current address. You’ll be receiving a check in the full amount, as the taxes were taken care of when the will was probated.”

Her throat constricted. “Who… Who…?“

“Oh, I’m sorry. Mr. Morey Fletcher.”

Her knees almost buckled beneath her. She certainly didn’t want to benefit financially from Morey’s suicide. The thought made her nauseous. She swallowed hard, fought off the dizziness, and wet her lips. “But in instances such as his, I didn’t think life-insurance policies were honored.”

The man was obviously taken aback. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand. What do you mean by ‘instances such as his’?”

She couldn’t bring herself to say the hateful word. “I mean, the way he died.”

“The insurance company has found nothing irregular about Mr. Fletcher’s death, Ms. Ramsey. No one could have predicted his reaction to the medication.”

“Medication?” She virtually inhaled the word, making a wheezing sound.

“Yes, the drug to control blood pressure that his physician had prescribed for him. I apologize again. I thought you were acquainted with the circumstances of Mr. Fletcher’s death.”

“I thought I was too,” Rana murmured. The implications of this telephone call were just beginning to sink in. Facing her mother’s part in describing Morey’s death was going to be painful.

“His doctor had given him a new prescription that day to bring his blood pressure down.”

“I understood that he took the medication with alcohol.”

“Yes, the postmortem confirmed the police report, but the alcohol content of his blood was so low as to be negligible. He might have had one glass of wine with dinner. Unfortunately, it’s very difficult to prescribe the correct dosage of the drug he was taking, or to predict a patient’s reaction to it. If someone else had been present when Mr. Fletcher lost consciousness, his life might have been saved, but the glass of wine made no difference one way or the other. I’ve upset you, Ms. Ramsey. Forgive me,” he said when he heard her telltale sniffling.

“No, no, thank you. Thank you for telling me.”

Morey’s death had been an accident!

He might have been disappointed about her decision not to sign a new contract, but she hadn’t driven him to suicide. She would continue to grieve for him, but she no longer had to bear the burden of responsibility for his death.

Her heart was still soaring when Trent called later that night. She told him about her previous call. “You can’t imagine how relieved I feel, knowing that he didn’t die hating me.” Trent didn’t know that Morey had been her agent, merely that he’d been a very dear friend.

“I was never convinced of that, darling.” He let the contemplative moment pass, and then said, “Since you’re in such high spirits, I’ll ask you tonight.”