Danielle Steel - Lone eagle

They both had fearsome hangovers and said very little that day. She was profoundly upset by what had happened the night before. She had vowed to herself fourteen months before that she would never sleep with him again. And she hadn't, until then. But she was so lonely, the champagne had unleashed a torrent of desire that had gone unquenched for too long.

They made no mention of it and went back to their separate solitude, and it was only at the end of January that she told him the news. She had been devastated when she found out. It was yet another bond to him, but she had long since given up hope of getting out. Andy had made it perfectly clear to her. He owned her for the rest of her life. And now, she was expecting another child.

He hoped it would bring them closer to each other, but it drove them even further apart. She was constantly sick, day and night. She took to her bed and stayed there most of the time. She was in bed all through the spring, and only got up briefly in the afternoons to take Reed to the park. Her illness was yet another way of shutting Andy out.

They dined in silence at night, and the only sounds in the apartment once Andy got home, were Reed's chatterings. Andy and Kate rarely spoke to each other anymore. And in June, Kate saw in the newspaper that Joe had gotten engaged. She called to congratulate him, and found he was in Paris. He never called her anymore. At twenty-nine, she felt as though her life was over. She was married to a man she felt nothing for, was having a child she didn't want, and had lost the only man she'd ever loved. The baby was due in September, and Kate didn't seem to care. The only joys in her life were her son, and her memories of Joe.

It was Andy who finally came to her, just before their second child was born. She was lying on her bed, reading late at night, Reed was in bed next to her, sound asleep. He had turned two in March, and was a beautiful, loving child. She looked up when she saw Andy come into the room. Looking at him now was like seeing a stranger. It was hard to imagine they'd ever been close or thought they were in love, or were even friends.

“How do you feel?” he asked, sitting next to her on the bed. It was the closest they'd been to each other in eight months. It was hard to believe it had been that way between them for almost two years. The only decent time they'd ever shared was their first year of marriage, before he left for Germany and Joe came back.

“I feel large,” she smiled. Talking to him was like talking to a distant friend, someone you had met years before and hadn't seen in a long time.

“I thought you'd like to know. I'm moving out after the baby comes.” He had made the decision weeks before, and rented an apartment that afternoon. He couldn't live that way anymore. Anything they'd ever shared or dreamed had long since died. And he knew now that he could no longer keep her like a bird in a cage. Her spirit had long since flown. The victory he had won over Joe was meaningless, he knew now. Kate had never been Andy's to lose. She was always Joe's.

“Why are you moving out?” she asked quietly, putting her book down.

“Why stay? You were right. It was a mistake. I'm sorry I got you pregnant on New Year's Eve. This complicates things for you.”

“Destiny, I guess. That word again.” It was the thing that made people come and go, or stay, or wish they could, and not make the right decision when they should. Chance. “The baby will be good for Reed,” she said quietly. “Where are you going?” It was like asking a fellow traveler on a train, not a man she had once loved. She was no longer sure she ever had. Probably not. They had been better as friends. She had just been so heartbroken after she left Joe. But they had both paid a high price for what they'd done.

“I should have listened to you two years ago,” he said. She nodded and said nothing. The two years he'd taken to agree to a divorce had cost her Joe. She wondered if he was married yet. The papers hadn't said, only that he'd gotten engaged several months before. And she had to respect that now. It was too late for them. And certainly for her, she felt. Andy had wasted her life, and destroyed her dreams. They belonged now to the woman who was going to marry Joe. And Kate had none.

“You were probably right to try,” she said to Andy, trying to be fair. But she had been too much in love with Joe to even consider it. The marriage to Andy had ended the moment she saw Joe again.

“Go back to him, Kate,” he said softly, looking like the friend he had once been as she watched his eyes. “I've never understood what you two had, or why, but whatever it is, it's powerful for both of you, you deserve to have it, if you want it that much.” She had all but died when he left. There was nothing left. She felt dead inside. “Tell him you're free now. He has a right to know.” Andy had spent two years feeling guilty over the lies he'd told Joe, particularly once he saw that Kate had closed all doors to him. But he had no idea how to undo the damage he had done to her, in Joe's eyes. And he didn't have the courage to tell Kate. But as much as she and Joe loved each other, or had, Andy suspected Joe would forgive her anything.

“He's engaged to someone else,” she said with somber eyes.

“So what?” Andy smiled. “We were married when he came back. If he loves you, he'll want you now, no matter what.”

“Is that how it works?” She smiled back at Andy for the first time in a long time. For two years, he had been her jailer and nothing more. Maybe now, in freeing her, they could at least be friends again. It was what he had hoped when he had decided to let her go. Even he wanted more. “It's too late for us.” Andy knew she was talking about Joe. “Our timing is pretty grim. He's engaged.”

“I remember when everyone thought he was dead, and you still believed he was alive. You've been dead for two years, Kate. You need a life again. All you've ever wanted was to be with him.”

“I know,” she said softly. “Crazy, isn't it? I always did. The first time I met him, I was hooked. It was the damnedest thing. Like some giant fishhook in my gut. We never seem to be able to cut the line.”

“Then don't. Swim back to him. Do whatever you have to do, but follow your dream.” He had, but the dream he had followed had belonged to someone else, and he knew it always would. She had always been Joe's and never his.

“Thank you,” she said, and he bent down to kiss her cheek.

“Get some sleep,” he said, and left her room.

She lay in bed thinking about Andy after he left her room that night. It was strange how little she felt, not sadness, not relief. She felt nothing at all, and hadn't for two years. She had been numb. She thought of what he'd said to her about Joe, and wondered if it was even possible anymore. Follow your dream… swim … fly… go to him… She smiled as she turned over and went to sleep. It was hard to believe that the dream would ever be hers. It had always been just out of reach. And it was again. He was engaged, or maybe even married by then. She felt she had no right to turn his life upside down again. Whatever he had now, he had a right to it. And it was odd to realize that in the end she had lost them both, Andy and Joe. Whatever Andy said now, out of guilt, she knew it was too late to call Joe. Her gift to him this time was to let him go.

Andy took her to the hospital when the baby came. It was a little girl this time. They named her Stephanie. And two weeks later, Andy moved out. It was surprisingly unemotional. Everything between them had been dead for so long that neither of them felt anything but relief.

Kate left for Reno with both children and a nurse when Stephanie was four weeks old. She stayed for six weeks, and came back on the train, divorced, on December 15th. She had been legally married to Andy for three and a half years, and in reality only for one. She heard from a friend that Andy was going out with someone else by then, and supposedly madly in love. She hoped he was. They had both been lonely for long enough. She wished for him that he would marry again and have more kids. He deserved a lot better than she'd given him, although they both loved Stephanie and Reed. He was going to see them every Wednesday afternoon, and alternate weekends. It had all been so neatly and quietly done, as though it had never happened at all. Now that it was over, it seemed like a dream. Her parents mourned the marriage far more than either she or Andy did. They had never fully accepted or understood why it died.