Mirror Image

What was that? A shot! Tate was covered with blood. Tate turned to her and, as he fell, he sneered, “Avery Daniels, Avery Daniels, Avery Daniels.”

“Carole?”

Avery Daniels.

“Carole? Wake up.”

Avery sat bolt upright. Her mouth was gaping open and dry. She was wheezing. “Tate?” She fell against his bare chest and threw her arms around him. “Oh God, it was awful.”

“Were you having a bad dream?”

She nodded, burrowing her face in the fuzzy warmth of his chest. “Hold me. Please. Just for a minute.”

He was sitting on the edge of her bed. At her request, he inched closer and placed his arms around her. Avery snuggled closer still and clung to him. Her heart was racing, thudding against his chest. She couldn’t eradicate the image of a blood-drenched Tate turning to her with contempt and accusation burning in his eyes.

“What brought this on?”

“I don’t know,” she lied.

“I think I do. You haven’t been yourself since Dr. Webster mentioned Avery Daniels.” She whimpered. Tate threaded his fingers up through her hair and closed them around her scalp. “I can’t believe he didn’t know she died in that crash. He was so embarrassed by mentioning it, I felt sorry for him. He had no way of knowing how much the comparison would upset you.”

Or why, she thought. “Did I behave like a fool?” All she remembered after the doctor had spoken her name was the clamorous ringing in her ears and the wave of dizziness that had knocked her against Tate.

“Not like a fool, but you almost fainted.”

“I don’t even remember leaving his office.”

He set her away from him. Her hands slid onto his biceps. “It was a bizarre coincidence that you were on the same airplane with the Daniels woman. Strangers often mistook you for her, remember? It’s surprising that no one has mentioned her to you before now.”

So he had known who Avery Daniels was. That made her feel better somehow. She wondered if he had liked watching her on TV. “I’m sorry I caused a scene. I just get…” She wished he was still holding her. It was easier to talk when she didn’t have to look him in the eye.

“What?”

She laid her head on his shoulder. “I get tired of people staring at my face all the time. It’s an object of curiosity. I feel like the bearded lady in a sideshow.”

“Human nature. No one means to be cruel.”

“I know, but it makes me extremely self-conscious. Sometimes I feel like I’m still wrapped in bandages. I’m on the inside looking out, but no one can see past my face into me.” A tear trickled from the corner of her eye and splashed onto his shoulder.

“You’re still upset over the dream,” he said, easing her up again. “Would you like something to drink? There’s some Bailey’s in the bar.”

“That sounds wonderful.”

He divided the small bottle of Irish cream between two drinking glasses and returned to the bed with them. If he was self-conscious about having only his underwear on, he gave no outward sign of it.

It pleased her that he sat back down on her bed, not the one he had been sleeping in before her nightmare woke him up. Only a narrow space separated the beds, but it might just as well have been the Gulf of Mexico. It had taken an emergency to get him to cross it.

“To your victory, Tate.” She clinked her glass with his. The liquor slid easily down her throat and spread warmly through her belly. “Hmm. This was a good idea. Thanks.”

She welcomed this quiet interlude. They shared all the problems inherent to any married couple, but none of the intimacy. Because of the campaign, they were always in the public eye and under constant scrutiny. That put an additional strain on an already difficult relationship. They shared no counterbalancing pleasure in each other.

They were married, yet they weren’t. They occupied the same space, but existed in separate spheres. Until tonight, Mandy had served as a buffer between them in the confines of the hotel room. She’d slept with Avery.

But tonight Mandy wasn’t here. They were alone. It was the middle of the night. They were sipping Irish cream together and discussing their personal problems. For any other couple, the scene would result in lovemaking.

“I miss Mandy already,” she remarked as she traced the rim of her glass with her fingertip. “I’m not sure we did the right thing by letting her go home with Zee and Nelson.”

“That’s what we had planned all along—that they’d take her home after her appointment with Webster.”