Forever Wife Read online

  She drew in a breath and let it out. She was okay now.

  “Honey, where did that come from?” he asked quietly.

  She shrugged. “I’m sorry I overreacted. I’m fine now.”

  He touched her chin, guiding her to look at him. “Beth, that was a full-blown panic attack. I’m sorry that I triggered it, but I’m sure that I am not the original cause. What’s going on?”

  “I… I don’t know, Vidar. Please, I don’t want to talk about it right now.”

  He was silent for a while. His grip tightened, and she sensed he was not happy with her. But then he kissed her temple. “Fair enough,” he said. “Maybe now is not the best time to discuss that, but there will be no secrets between us, Beth. When I return, I want you to tell me everything. What you’ve been doing, where you’ve been living, and where you are in your grieving process. I know it’s been less than two years, and grief isn’t something you can mark on your calendar and be done with it after a certain amount of time has passed… but if you are not in a position to make any life-altering changes right now, I want to know about it.”

  “Communication goes both ways, Vidar. I want to know everything about you, too.” She felt it, a slight tremor. He shifted, obviously uncomfortable with the idea, and yet he did not deny it. She wondered yet again what his childhood must have been like, that he refused to talk about it. The only thing she knew about him was that his mother’s name was Dagmar and he had been born in Iceland. She kissed his check, then his lips. She deepened the kiss, tracing his lips with her tongue.

  He growled playfully and swatted her thigh, before depositing her on her own two feet. He rose then, rubbing the back of his neck. “It’s not much of a story,” he hemmed.

  She shrugged. “That’s the deal, buddy. You share, I share. Otherwise, we’ll continue to be strangers passing in the night…” she let her voice trail off as she sang the last bit like words to a song.

  “Brat,” he quipped, tapping the end of her nose with a finger.

  She grinned. “Yep. Now, let’s get back. Tracy is coming over again this afternoon, and I’d like to wash my hair before then.”

  Vidar made sure the fire was out in the camp stove before packing everything back into the picnic hamper. Liz waited for him on the dock as she watched a pair of loons out on the lake. She had grown up listening to their eerie call, hearing it echo across the lake. One dove under the water and disappeared for a few moments. She felt herself holding her breath until it reappeared far from where it had gone down. Now it was closer to the other and they called back and forth, an intricate step in the mating ritual. In early summer she would be able to watch a new batch of baby loons splashing along within the protective cocoon of their parents’ devotion. How she loved this lake!

  Vidar had asked where she wanted to go – but everything she wanted was right here.

  Soon Vidar joined her, stowed the picnic hamper and helped her onto the little sailboat for the return trip. Liz wasn’t sure how they’d make it home, as there didn’t seem to be a single breeze, but Vidar must have been an expert sailor, for as soon as he trimmed the sails, a gentle breeze lured them all the way across the lake.

  Once home, he pulled a business card from his wallet and passed it to her. “Call me, anytime,” he said.

  “But you said you have work to do.”

  “And nothing is as important to me as you are, Beth.”

  She smiled, basking in the afterglow of their lovemaking. “I will call you at three a.m., then,” she promised.

  He kissed her nose. “I look forward to it.”

  “Every night.”

  “Even better.”

  “Wearing nothing.”

  Vidar guffawed. “Geesh, Baby. Makes me wish we had Skype set up, or something… I won’t sleep a wink all week!”

  She pouted. “Neither will I.”

  “I’ll return. I promise.”

  “Then go! The sooner you leave, the sooner you can return.”

  “Take care of yourself, Beth,” he warned.

  “Always! Good-bye, my love.”

  “Good-bye,” he said. He paused and looked as if he might change his mind after all, but then he turned and left. Suddenly she was alone.

  Liz went to the window to watch him turn the rental car around. She waved, but he didn’t look back to see her. No doubt his mind was already elsewhere, focused on whatever catastrophe had popped up at his work. She blinked rapidly, refusing to let tears fall again. He promised he would return… and she was going to trust him. She dashed up the stairs to her childhood bedroom to take a shower. She and Tracy had a lot to do today. They would take their cause public; they would begin gathering signatures and rallying local support. Save the Lake, Say No to Urban Blight. They would have to come up with a better slogan than that.

  * * * * *

  Vidar returned the rental car, but decided to forego the formality of a commercial flight. No one really knew he was here except Liz. Moments later he was in his Denver office, trying to get his assets manager on the phone. The man had left him a panicked voice-mail message, something about the casino deal was ready to collapse. Not now! Not when it was imperative that he dispose of the lakefront property. He didn’t know why Liz had gone there, when it obviously upset her so much. She loved it, but it harbored too many bittersweet memories. He needed to get rid of it! Maybe he would get another property, something on an island in the Caribbean where it was warm, and private, and provided endless days of good sailing. A place where they could build new memories together. When he finally reached the manager, the news wasn’t good.

  “Leland said someone is stirring up trouble,” Rick babbled. Leland was the chairman of the town board and an investor in the casino.

  “What kind of trouble,” Vidar said calmly. Rick had been with him for years. He was a good man, and a whiz when it came to wading through the mire of legal documents, building codes, zoning laws, and all the other nitpicky details of his real estate ventures, but Rick tended to be rather dramatic.

  “Someone is organizing a protest!”

  “Yes,” he prodded. They had dealt with protestors before. Nothing major there.

  “Not just a protest of the casino, mind you, but of doing ANYTHING with the lake. They are raising a “save the lake” campaign, and trying to get the land designated as a wildlife sanctuary. Not only would you not be able to build the casino, but you’ll be severely limited in doing anything with all those cabins you’ve bought! Man, you could really take a hit on this one! We have to act fast! We have to move the timetable forward, before they can organize!”

  Vidar cursed under his breath. He loved wildlife as much as the next person, but this was personal. Although he had left Scrimshaw Lake years ago, he knew that the area had been hit hard in the last recession. Scrimshaw needed the casino to provide jobs for the locals, or they could be forced to sell their homes. He’d seen it happen before in Maine. The coastal property there became so valuable, that most of the locals could not afford it. Two-thirds of the coast of Maine was owned by New Yorkers. He was not going to let that happen here if he could help it. And by golly, being rich meant that he should be able to make an impact. What good was all that money otherwise? It’s not like he could ever spend it all if he lived another thousand years.

  “Find out who is behind it,” Vidar snapped. “If it’s just some tree-hugger fresh out of college with an ax to grind, we’ll have to convince him to find another lake. I can’t believe that anyone in the community could honestly turn away this opportunity!”

  It was a good thing he’d returned as soon as he did. Since government offices were closed on Sundays, he would get the jump on whatever shenanigans his opposition was cooking up. Hopefully, he could get the casino deal settled by a week from Friday. Maybe they could hold a groundbreaking celebration on the sixth, right before he whisked his beloved away on the journey of a lifetime.

  * * * * *

  It was the longest week Liz could ever rememb
er. She missed Vidar so much it hurt, like someone had amputated an important body part – a leg, or an arm. She missed his smile, his deep voice that could be so gentle or incredibly firm. She missed how his beard never seemed to grow, but never seemed to be completely gone, either. How did he do that? How did he manage to have that “just missed a shave” look all the time? She missed his short, blond hair, the way it often looked like he’d just run his fingers through it and some of it stuck up on end, but some still seemed neatly combed. She missed his sexy look, the one he had when they were making love, the look that was somewhere between passion and pain, between hopeless need and ecstasy. She missed how she was able to make him look that way… Her! Plain little Elizabeth Dagmar Shelburne, virtual virgin, inexperienced woman of twenty-nine, had been transformed into a sex goddess in his eyes.

  The only way she was going to survive this week was to keep busy. It was such a relief to know that Vidar owned her family home! She didn’t have to hide anymore. She didn’t have to go around on tiptoes, afraid that the real owner was going to show up and throw her in jail for trespassing. And somehow… if Vidar owned Camp Birches, and he really did love her, then in a way, sort of, it was still hers. Almost. Not quite. It wasn’t like anything legal had passed between them, but if he truly loved her, if they were truly going to build a life together, then she could live here! For always! She never had to leave again! Joy filled her, and she had to laugh. She had to dance and clap her hands, or she might simply explode.

  She raced through the cabin, greeting every room with renewed hope. She stripped away all the remaining sheets and coverings. She swept and vacuumed, and rearranged the furniture. If only she could afford some paint, or a few new pieces of furniture… that one morning she had awakened in her parents’ bedroom had been a little freaky. Carefully, she closed that door. She wouldn’t go in there again until she could redecorate.

  Back in her own bedroom, she gazed at the closet still bursting with dated clothing. And at the back of the closet were more boxes of clothes – smaller sizes, everything she had ever worn while at the cabin. From winter jackets to summer swimming suits and all sorts in between, from adult smalls all the way down to infant sizes. Her parents had been the worst packrats!

  Suddenly she had an idea of how she could come up with a little grocery money. The next town over used to have a consignment shop where they sold gently used clothing. She gathered armload after armload and hauled it down to the laundry room off the kitchen. Although everything had surely been packed away clean, it all smelled a little musty. She would wash everything and then have Tracy take her to Second Time Around – if they were still in business. Everything would go, except some of the smaller jackets. Those she would donate to Tracy’s school for the annual coat drove they held in the fall.

  By Sunday night she had a mountain of clothing to donate, almost enough to open her own store, she thought dryly. Why had her parents spent so much on her? Looking back with the eyes of adulthood, she could see that they had spoiled her. They had given her more than any child could possibly want or need. At first they had been able to afford it. She knew from studying their past tax returns that they had been very wealthy when she was born. But after Vidar left, Daddy’s income dropped. She didn’t understand why. Maybe Vidar had been the brains of the business all along. Maybe Daddy had made one bad investment after another… but he had continued to spend money he could no longer afford on his only child. They insisted she attend a major college, too, when she could just as well have gone to a state school where tuition was half the cost. She clenched her fists, overcome with anger for her beloved parents. Why hadn’t they taken better care of each other! Why hadn’t they lived! She missed them so!

  She fled into their bedroom after all and wrapped herself in their quilt and cried.

  She hadn’t allowed herself to weep when her father told her about Mom having cancer. She had to be strong for him. She helped him drive Mom to her doctor visits, watched her grow weaker and weaker, and watched her wonderful Daddy fade before her very eyes. And then, when the doctors had no more hope, she found out about that new treatment in Mexico. She mortgaged her horse ranch to buy the tickets for her daddy to take mom. Mom died there. And Daddy had a heart attack. She never saw them alive again.

  She had been strong through the funeral. She returned to work burying her grief, because it was too painful to face it. And then, she’d had the accident that ended her career. Vidar was right about one thing, she hadn’t ever allowed herself to grieve. She cried herself to sleep. She woke up hours later, hungry and sore, and cried some more. And then somehow it happened….

  Acceptance.

  Everything had happened for a reason. Her parents had been old when she was born… they were never going to live long enough to see her married, to see their grandchildren. But if they hadn’t passed away, if she hadn’t had the accident, hadn’t lost her ranch, she might never have met up with Vidar again!

  Her parents had given her a safe, secure, loving home. She grew up knowing that her parents adored her and each other. They had given her roots. Now she had Vidar and he would give her wings.

  Her back complained loudly. She had done too much work that day, and it would likely keep her awake for the rest of the night. She arose, popped some pain pills and stood in a hot shower, letting the spray work away the worst of the aches. Then she curled up with the telephone and waiting until 3 a.m. to call Vidar.

  Thus began their nightly ritual. Four nights in a row, they talked in the middle of the night, saying not much of anything at all for nearly an hour. The things they said made her want him all the more, and she could sense the urgent need in his voice as well, but he never told her not to call him. He never scolded her for disturbing his sleep. For all the talking they did, it was amazing that they didn’t actually communicate more. She longed to tell him about the new peace she felt regarding her parents’ passing, but it was a bit too intimate, too intense for a telephone conversation. She asked him how his business affairs were coming, but he brushed it aside and changed the subject. And so they continued to talk and not say anything that needed saying. She was so frustrated, that the first thing she wanted to do to him when she saw him next was bop him on the side of the head! If it weren’t for Tracy and the Save the Lake campaign, she would have gone completely insane!

  Finally Friday arrived. Liz hoped Vidar would come a day early, but he had said nothing about it on the phone the night before. She yearned to tell him about the campaign, as she and Tracy had gone to the town board and presented their case. When they had first arrived, all of the members of the board had been in favor of the casino, but by the time the meeting adjourned, almost half had changed their minds. They had seen only the financial benefit of the casino – local jobs, increased revenue. They hadn’t thought about the expenses. Having a major casino in their community meant they’d have to increase their fire department and police force. They’d have to remodel their sewer system to handle the increased population, and the casino might cause more to move into the area. They would eventually need a larger school, hospital, streetlights… not all growth was progress, and progress did not always mean growth. The board decided to appoint new committees to investigate these issues.

  Tracy had rolled her eyes. Committees! Nothing was ever solved by committee. But at least they had been heard. And about half of the residents on the lake had signed the petition. Some had already sold out to the investors, and some were summer residents only. They might not even be aware of the issues yet, although Liz was sure that the investors must have already approached them. She still didn’t have the name of whoever was in charge of the damn casino, but when she did, she was sure going to bend his ear!

  Friday morning passed interminably slow. Liz made some coffee, but her stomach was too tied up to drink it. She hadn’t earned much money at the consignment shop yet, because the owner didn’t like to put out anything out of season. Winter was over, and summer wasn’t quite there ye
t. Only a few of Liz’s slacks and shirts were available, and of that, she got just enough money for some cans of tuna and packages of Ramen noodles. She didn’t even splurge on sweetened creamer for her coffee, but coffee was definitely on the shopping list. She could make it weak to stretch it further, but she could not get through the day without it.

  Friday afternoon came and went. No word from Vidar, not even a phone call to let her know he was on his way. She craved him like a drug and cursed him for it. She made up conversations in her head, the ones she planned to have with him that night on the phone if he didn’t come; sometimes she played a seductress, and sometimes she railed at him like a shrew. She didn’t want to be a shrew!

  She wandered through the cabin, recalling her memories and treasuring each one. She stroked the surface of the player piano. No one knew how to actually play the piano, but it had come with several roles of music, and over the years, Vidar added to their collection. Liz selected one now, a compilation of ragtime tunes, threaded the paper role on to the parts and turned it on. The perforated paper somehow made the keys play by themselves, although the sound was a little tinny – more like vaudeville than a classical concert. They had dozens of paper rolls of Christmas songs, and on Christmas Eve they would gather around the piano and sing the carols in typical Shelburne off-key fashion, for they had far more enthusiasm than talent.

  While the music played, she continued her sentimental journey. There was the grand dining table with all sixteen chairs. They almost never ate there. It was just too big for a small family and while they hosted endless soirees and dinner parties back in the city, they treasured their privacy at the cabin. Most of their meals were taken either in the kitchen, or the picnic table in the woods, or sometimes they just lap-ate in lawn chairs down at the beach. The only time she remembered the dining table being used was that summer her parents had hired a tutor for her.