“Do you mean that?”

“Yes, I do. When it was good, it was wonderful, and I wouldn’t have missed that for anything. I just took a gamble and lost. That happens, doesn’t it?”

“It happens all the time to me,” Paula answered sadly.

“It will be easier for me once I’m back at work,” Cindy said with assurance. “I have nothing to do here now that the research is finished. Once I’m teaching those undergraduates, listening to their problems and trying to untangle their schedules, I’ll be able to forget.”

“Do you really think so?” Paula asked doubtfully.

Cindy sighed. “No, Paula, but I’m trying to be brave and you’re not helping me,” she said, irritated.

Paula bit her lip and they both laughed.

“Well, at least you haven’t lost your sense of humor,” Paula observed.

“The last refuge of the brokenhearted,” Cindy said.

“You love him very much, don’t you?”

“I think I always will. But I can’t change what’s happened; I have to live with it.” She pointed to a pair of slacks hanging on the back of the door. “Hand me those, will you?”

Paula gave them to her and said, “What time is your flight tomorrow?”

“Three-thirty in the afternoon. You’ll be on duty, right? I’ll have to call a cab.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, to go that far it will cost a fortune. I have several people who owe me favors; I’ll switch with one of them. Let me make a few calls.”

“Thanks, Paula. I’m sorry about the timing, but it was the only flight I could get.”

“No problem,” Paula called, walking into the hall where Cindy heard her dialing the phone. Low tones of conversation followed while Cindy finished her packing and snapped the suitcase shut.

“I’m off again,” Paula announced from the doorway. “Have to pull the night shift to clear the day tomorrow.”

“Are you sure that’s all right? Won’t you be tired?”

“I’ll have two days off to rest,” Paula replied. “I’ll take a quick shower and change.” She paused in mid stride. “I hate to leave you here alone.”

Cindy smiled with a wry awareness of her situation. “You’re not my babysitter, Paula. I’ll be fine.”

Paula went into the bathroom, and Cindy sat on the edge of the bed, looking around at the room that had been her home for several weeks. It was barren now, empty of her personal items, like a hotel room when the guests have left.

At that moment, it seemed the perfect complement to her desolate soul.

* * * *

After Paula left Cindy tried to read some of the glossy magazines that Paula bought in stacks of five. The articles on miracle diets and the latest makeup techniques failed to hold her interest, and she switched on the television set. The schedule offered nothing but situation comedies full of unfunny situations and canned laughter, and she shut it off again in frustration. Finally she put on a local FM radio station, turning the volume up on the rock music that filled the apartment. She felt warm in the enclosed rooms and opened the outer door to the screen. It was a cool night, and Paula hadn’t turned on the air conditioning. Drinking in the fresh air that flooded in from the hall like a tide, Cindy began to hum along with the singer whose voice canceled the silence and lifted her spirits.

“I can’t hold back; I’m on the edge,” she sang as she started to dance, which she often did when alone. Too reserved to perform in public, she liked to fling herself about when no one was looking. She indulged her need for self-expression and got the benefit of the exercise at the same time. She soon became overheated trying to keep pace with the driving rock beat and paused between songs to strip to her chemise, tossing her clothes on the sofa.

A new number began, and she joined in with it. She shimmied and spun around, carried away by the music, lost in the throbbing drums and wailing guitars. It was bliss just to move, not to think, to feel her heart beating and blood pumping, the air filling her lungs. She was alive, and that, at least, was something to celebrate.

Cindy was so absorbed in what she was doing that when she whirled past the door and caught sight of a figure there, she stopped cold, gasping with shock. Her eyes widened and the back of her hand went to her mouth. It was Fox.

She had no idea how long he’d been there, but from his expression, it was a while. He was breathing hard, his broad shoulders rising and falling, his face filmed with a fine sheen of perspiration. The fever pitch of his excitement flowed from him to her in potent wordless communication.

Cindy stared at him, mesmerized.

He pushed the screen door open and stepped through it, never taking his eyes from hers. He kicked the storm door shut with his foot and locked it without looking at it. As he passed the stereo he shut it off with a snap.

He was wearing a blue cotton shirt, open at the throat, with a turquoise amulet on a silver circlet around his neck. It was the first Indian thing she had ever seen on him, and it glowed like a sapphire against the honey bronze background of his skin. His jeans, as always, fit him like a sheath, clinging to his slim hips and powerful legs with flattering precision. His feet inside the battered brown moccasins were bare.

Cindy took a step toward him, forgetting that she wore nothing but a silken teddy, forgetting everything but the miracle of his presence. When he saw that she wasn’t going to send him away, he covered the remaining distance between them in a second. He caught her to him in an embrace so powerful that it lifted her bodily into his arms.

He just held her for a few moments, savoring the sensation, and then knelt, lowering her to the floor. He looked at her for a long, breathless beat, then ran his hands over her body from shoulders to knees, molding the damp silk to her slender form. Cindy’s lashes fluttered, and then her eyes closed.

Fox slipped the straps of the sleek ivory chemise down her arms, and then pulled it from her body, tossing it aside. He bent and encircled her waist with his hands, laving the tip of each breast with his tongue. Cindy sank her fingers into the wealth of hair at the back of his neck, holding his head against her. When he finally sat up she clutched at his shirt, desperate to maintain contact.

He put her hands aside gently and took off his shirt as she watched through heavy lidded eyes. When his torso was bare she reached up and caressed him, moving her palm from pectoral to bicep, admiring his beauty. His large fingers covered her smaller ones, and he pushed her hand down his muscular midsection to his thigh. When she touched him he closed his eyes and sighed so deeply that it echoed in the stillness of the room.

He was motionless for a time, absorbing the feel of her hands on him. Growing impatient, she put her arms around him and tugged him toward her. Then he stood and removed his pants while she shifted restlessly, anxious for his return.

When he joined her again, she put her arms around his neck and received him eagerly. He kissed her for the first time since he had arrived, his mouth full and warm on hers, and entered her at almost the same moment. Tears gathered in the corners of Cindy’s eyes, and she turned her head, squeezing her lids shut to hide them. She knew that this was his farewell. She would never have this with him again.

It was over quickly; they were both too hungry to go slow. At the end, exhausted, they fell asleep immediately. Cindy’s final impression was of Fox surrounding her, of being pinned to the earth by his sweet weight.

* * * *

When she woke up, Fox was gone. Her head rested on a throw pillow from the sofa, and he had brought the quilt from the guest room, covering her with it. Her chemise was folded in a neat square on the chair by the door.

Cindy got up and, dragging the quilt after her, looked for a note. There was none to be found, but she hadn’t really expected one. Dissatisfied with their brittle goodbye at the lake, he had come at the last moment to do it properly, to say with his body what he would never put into words.