Judith McNaught - Remember When

She left the office at five-thirty and, at her family's insistence, she drove to their house for dinner. Being there was even harder than being at the office. Unlike her employees, her family didn't hesitate to voice their opinions about Cole's situation or to insist that Diana talk about it, although Corey and Spence remained silent and supportive. Even Glenna had an opinion to express, but she, too, was part of the family. Besides, she was a flagrant eavesdropper. Everyone was sitting outside by the pool before dinner, when Glenna came out to tell Diana that she had an urgent call. The entire family brightened, thinking it was Cole.

"It's a reporter," Glenna said, holding a cordless phone in her hand with the hold light flashing.

"I don't want to talk to any reporters," Diana replied, and added to her family, "I don't know how they're getting this number, but we're probably going to have to change it."

"He wants to ask you about your divorce."

Everyone stopped talking and stared at the housekeeper. "My what?"

"He says he wants a comment from you on the 'grounds' you're going to use."

Diana took the phone, said hello, and then listened for a moment. "Where did you hear that?" she demanded. "Well, I don't think it's actually 'public knowledge,' Mr. Godfrey," Diana replied, slowly standing up, "because I don't know anything about it. Good-bye," she said, but a small feeling of hope was slowly dawning in Diana's heart. She turned and ran to the nearest television set with her family in close pursuit. The screen lit up just in time for a local Houston newscast team to confirm what the newspaper reporter had just told Diana.

"There's been a side development in the Cole Harrison-Unified Industries uproar," the woman on the screen told her male counterpart. "Diana Foster, his wife of less than two weeks, is filing for divorce on unspecified grounds."

"That didn't last very long," he said to the camera.

His coanchor nodded. "Sources close to Cole Harrison confirmed the rumor less than an hour ago. It seems that Diana Foster has chosen to disassociate herself and her company from the scandal brewing in Washington over Harrison's takeover of Cushman Electronics."

Henry Britton looked almost accusingly at Diana. "Is that what you're going to do, Diana?"

Diana slowly shook her head, her eyes glowing with relief and happiness. "That's what Cole wants me to do. Charles and Doug Hayward warned me to get rid of Cole so the scandal won't spill over onto me. Now Cole is trying to make sure it won't."

Corey looked at her husband and quietly pointed out, "So much for the theory that Cole married her to help his public image. He just blew it to pieces for her."

Diana didn't hear that; she was thinking and planning.

"What are you going to do?" Gram asked, but Mary Foster already knew the answer to that. Putting her arm around Diana's shoulders, she said with a soft laugh, "Diana is going to Dallas."

Diana was definitely going to Dallas, and for a woman who once couldn't function without a detailed schedule or leave on a short trip without lining every article of clothing with tissue paper, she accomplished that feat with amazing expediency. With Corey and her grandmother helplessly standing by, she stuffed whatever clothes she had at the house into two suitcases she owned; then she threw all her toiletries in on top of them. "That's that," she said, closing the last piece of luggage. After that she phoned her two top executives and told them they were in charge and to call her at Cole's numbers if they had questions or problems.

She took care of the items on her filled calendar by turning to Corey and saying, "Tell Sally to cancel all my appointments."

"What reason should she give everyone?"

"Tell everyone," Diana said as she dragged the two heavy cases off her bed, "that I'm in Dallas. With my husband."

By seven forty-five, Corey had dropped her off at the airport and Diana was in line to board her eight o'clock flight when she realized that the man who was sprinting past the rows of gates toward her was Spence. "Give this to Cole," he said, taking an envelope out of his pocket. "Tell him I said it's a belated wedding present and to use it if he absolutely has to as an equalizer."

"What is it?" Diana asked, moving forward as the boarding process continued.

"It is the end of Doug's political career," Spence said somberly.

The man who answered the intercom and looked at her through a tiny camera located at the gate of Cole's estate was surprisingly easy to convince that Mrs. Harrison should be allowed to surprise her husband by being admitted without advance notice. In fact, the middle-aged man was positively beaming with delight as he showed her through the silent house to the back door that opened onto the patio surrounding the mammoth free-form swimming pool.

Cole was standing alone in the dark, his hands shoved deep into his trouser pockets, his head tipped back as if he were looking up at the stars. Diana opened the door and silently slipped outside, watching him, trying to think where to begin when all she wanted to do was fling herself into his arms. She'd rehearsed a dozen opening speeches on the flight there, all of them designed to let her stay and face his trouble together with him. She'd thought of pleading, of reasoning, of demanding. She'd considered trying tears to weaken his resistance. But when the moment was finally upon her, she couldn't seem to begin. She took a step forward and saw him stiffen with resistance the instant she spoke. "Cole?" He didn't even turn his head or look at her. "What are you doing out here?"

"Praying."

Tears stung her eyes when she remembered the way he had dismissed the idea as the last resort of fools—dreamers who won't face the fact that they cannot have something. "What are you praying for?"

"I've been praying for you," he said in a hoarse whisper.

Diana walked into his arms. They closed around her, yanking her against him, while he buried his lips in hers. When he finally ended the kiss, he kept her crushed against his length, his jaw resting against her head, as if he were afraid to let her go for fear she would vanish. Content to stay there, she rubbed her cheek against his hard chest. "I love you."

His hand slid up her back in a caress, and he brushed a kiss against her temple. "I know you do. The proof is in my arms."

"I know why you're having so much trouble with the SEC. Charles Hayward told me."

He went very still. "He told you what?"

"I went to see him last night. He told me you got Barbara pregnant and she had to have an abortion. She can't have children because of complications from it. She's been in and out of intensive therapy programs for years."

"He told you all that," Cole said, leaning back and studying her with puzzlement and disbelief, "and you came here, to me?"

She smiled at him in the moonlight and nodded; then she cuddled closer in his arms again. "I know it isn't true."

"Because you believe in me?" he speculated, confused.

"Yes. And because back then we all had bets about who would get you to kiss them."

A low chuckle rumbled in Cole's chest beneath her ear. "And no one won," he stated, understanding at once where she was going with that. With a smile in his voice, he whispered, "How much did you bet?"

His wife opened his shirt button and pressed a playful kiss on his chest. "Nothing. I only make idiotic bets in Las Vegas."

They were on their way to the bedroom when Diana remembered what she'd brought to give him. "What's this?" Cole asked, setting her suitcases at the foot of his bed. She handed him an envelope and a hand-decorated sack. He opened the envelope first and then the sack. Spencer Addison had sent him a brief history of Doug Hayward's drunk-driving arrests, the last of which was while he was in law school and had resulted in serious injury to the face of the female passenger with him at the time.