The Bewildered Wife. Vivian Leiber
just a look, just a word he could make her quiver.
She was nuts—he didn’t give her a thought other than in her capacity as nanny.
And yet he had just noticed her, had noticed her scent.
He noticed her as a woman.
Her heart soared and then fell flat with a thaddump! as her body heat made her scent blossom and even she could recognize its source.
“Cake,” she said blandly. “I smell like cake.”
“That was real close,” Chelsea said in a small voice.
“Real close,” Henry blubbered.
“Just pay attention to the story,” Susan urged. “Then you won’t notice the thunder. Now where was I? Oh, yes, the Continental Congress appointed five men to write a letter to the King explaining why the colonies should not be taxed under the Parliamentary—”
“Can you tell us about Eastman Bears again?” Chelsea asked.
“Sorry, honey, it’s not…not a good idea,” Susan said, thinking of their father’s new restrictions on what they should read. “Besides, I told you the whole story.”
“No, you didn’t,” Henry pointed out.
“Bears,” Baby Edward begged. He didn’t like the blue book about the American Revolution. Not even the pictures of Benjamin Franklin, the Liberty Bell or the midnight ride of Paul Revere.
The nightstand lamp flickered on and off. Susan glanced only briefly at the window, determined to not let the children see that she was worried. The wind was fast and furious—the massive Radcliffe oaks creaked and groaned as their branches were yanked back and forth. Hail and rain slapped against the windowpanes and the sky was a sickly yellow and black. No wonder they called this part of northern Illinois “Tornado Alley.”
“I wish Daddy was home,” Henry said dismally.
“Me, too,” said Chelsea.
“Me, thweeeeh,” Baby Edward added.
Clap!
Chelsea and Henry leapt into Susan’s arms at the crack of blazing light and thunder. Susan hugged all three children and watched the lamp flutter and die, plunging the bedroom into darkness.
The book on the American Revolution slid from her lap to the floor.
“I want my daddy!” Chelsea cried in great, convulsive gulps. “I’m scared!”
Baby Edward howled.
“All right, all right,” Susan soothed. “Now let’s try to be a little braver.”
“I can’t,” Chelsea exclaimed.
“I can’t, either,” Henry said.
Susan looked around the room, blinking to adjust to the darkness. Familiar furniture seemed like ominous prowling monsters and the curtains looked like unearthly ghosts.
And the candles were safely tucked in the dining room hutch, waiting for dinner parties that hadn’t been given since the mistress of the house had died.
She disengaged herself from the children enough to shove her hand into Chelsea’s toy box. Rooting around, she pulled out the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle flashlight. She flicked it on, shooting out a small but comforting speck of light.
“Calm down, all three of you. The Bear family survived a storm much worse than this without a single tear.”
Henry was the first to catch on. He gulped down his sobs and wiped his runny nose with his sleeve.
“They did? Not a single tear?”
“It was a much bigger storm than this one,” Susan said, guilty that she was going against her employer’s wishes but certain he would understand. Just this once.
She hustled them back into the safe bed, opening her arms wide enough to encompass them all. Even Henry, who sometimes considered himself too old for her embraces.
She started another tale, a story she made up as she went along, cuing her words to the reactions of her charges. She had described the storm, the bears, their bravery and was winding things up, when they heard the first anguished yelps.
“It’s Wiley!” Henry shrieked.
“Oh, no!” Susan cried.
The children leapt from the bed to the window, Susan behind them. Illuminated by the lightning, the pitiful, wet, sobbing Wiley stood in the court-yard—pulling at the chain that tied him to the steel shed out in back of the Radcliffe oak trees.
“The landscape service must have forgotten to let him loose after they mowed the lawn,” Susan said.
“Bring him back in!” Chelsea demanded.
“Yeah, get him!” Henry begged.
Susan stared in horror at the poor dog and then at her charges. If she did nothing, Wiley’s pain and terror would be unbearable—for all of them.
But if she went downstairs and left the three children on their own…
“I’ll go down there, but you have to stand right here,” she said. “And don’t move. And take care of Baby Edward. Chelsea, you’re in charge.”
She left them the flashlight and some comforting kisses. In the hall, she felt her way, hand over hand, along the walls of the night-shrouded house. Down the steps, through the cavernous pitch-black dining room. At last she reached the kitchen. She flung open the back door, then fell back as the wind slammed it right back against her. She landed hard.
She scrambled up, grabbed the door handle and shoved with all her might. A sudden vacuum created by the unruly wind sucked the door outward, and she lurched onto the back porch. Downed branches and ripped leaves, slathered to the porch with rain, made it slippery going.
Out past the courtyard, Wiley moaned for her, his eyes pleading for relief.
Woman and dog jumped as the sky cracked in two with a bang and a burst of light.
That was close, Susan thought. Must have hit right near the orchard behind the formal Radcliffe gardens. Swallowing the tight lump of fear, she charged down the steps and across the courtyard.
She looked back once through the sheets of rain to see three ghostly faces pressed against the window of the second-floor back bedroom. Then she reached for Wiley and he lapped her hand as she fumbled with the chain at his neck.
“It’s all right, Wiley, you’re safe now,” Susan comforted. She found the grip, and released him. He raced for the back door, slipping once but recovering as if the very hounds of hell were chasing him.
Susan felt a gentle tap on her shoulder and, still holding the metal chain, she turned around. She looked down at the bracelet Dean Radcliffe had given her—its little charms twinkling in the eerie storm light. She hadn’t wanted to wear it, hadn’t wanted to admit it meant something to her to receive a gift from him. But she wore it now—always, long after they grew up, the children would be in her memories. She hoped she would get over Dean.
A quivering light burst from the shed and slithered up the chain to the twinkling bracelet. She felt fire squeezing her wrists. And then came the roar of thunder, close against her ear.
“Daddy, you gotta come home.” Henry gulped, then choked on a sob. “Daddy, it’s just like the night Mommy…”
Dean Radcliffe picked up the receiver on the speaker phone and with a single silencing glance at the executives around the conference table, leaned back in his chair.
“What’s just like—”