"No one caught you escaping?"
"Not in time to stop us." She smiled bitterly. "I'll never forget my mother, standing there at the back of the boat, her hair flying out around her face, her arms raised high, laughing at the people back on shore as they began to re alize we were getting away. She loved it. It was all a big game to her, and she'd won that round."
He stirred beside her. "You didn't love it, did you?"
"No, I didn't love it." Her voice tightened. "I was so ashamed. I hated every minute of it. I was glad when they were convicted and put away on Tonga. We got to go live with Aunt Doris in Boston."
She glanced up at him again, just to see if he thought that was terrible. His shadowed gaze didn't tell her anything, and she looked down at his naked chest.
"It was so wonderful there. We had clean sheets at night. Marmalade on our toast in the mornings. It was heaven."
She paused, then said more emphatically, "That's what Aunt Doris did for me. She gave me a won derful gift. She taught me how to be normal. She gave me love, security, supervision, a sense that someone really cared. That's why I feel like I have to repay her by living the sort of life she would choose for me. Do you see?"
She turned to look him in the face and this time he nod ded, cupping her cheek with his hand.
"I see," he said softly.
She settled back, satisfied. "The other two didn't take to it the way I did. Maybe because they were older, be cause they were more used to the crazy way we'd always lived. I don't know."
They were both quiet for a long moment. A sound came from the living room-a bumping noise.
Ross looked at Charity. "The front door?" he asked.
She listened. It came again. She shook her head. "W.A., walking in his sleep," she guessed.
They were silent again, but the room was alive with awareness. Charity could hear Ross breathing. Finally she put her hand against his chest, spreading her fingers and staring at how pale they looked pressed to the darkness of him. She could feel his heartbeat, and it seemed to her it was very fast, urgent, compelling. For the first time she let herself draw in the full sense of him: the width of his shoulders, the smoothness of his skin, the rock-hard mus cles of his abdomen, the long strength of his legs. The full shock of his maleness made her gasp, and she looked up quickly to see if he'd noticed.