EILEEN CHARBONNEAU, Romance and Young Adult author: THE CONNOR EMERALD preview at The Romance Club

The Connor Emerald
©2000 Eileen Charbonneau. Timeless Treasures. All rights reserved.

Tad Gist gazed at the reflection in his bedroom door's full mirror. The tuxedo fit okay, he decided. Now, if only he could get his stupid hair right. He didn't want to embarrass Linda in front of the Walk With Wildlife people. He spritzed his comb again and pulled it through. The curl smoothed.

He fumbled through his desk drawer for scissors, then faced the mirror again. Before he got back to the bathroom, three more curls had escaped his slicked back hair. There was no driving them back, they were stiff with gel. He opened the blades. If you start this, his reflection told him, you'll end up looking like a plucked squirrel. Tad answered with a growl of disgust.

He surrendered, stuck his head in the sink, and yanked on the faucet. The water's flow in his ears muffled the first knock. Another knock, louder.

"Coming," he called, grabbing a towel as he sprinted through his bedroom. He buffed his hair quickly and pulled open the door. Maggie and his mother stood in the threshold.

His five year-old sister didn't even notice his wet hair, or the towel that draped his shoulders. "Even better, Sprite. It’s an award for keeping the critters of the Chattahoocee safe. And it comes with dinner."

His mom folded her arms and leaned into the doorway. She was not so easy to dazzle. "Aren't you supposed to take a shower before you put on the penguin suit?" she asked pointedly.

The water dripped down his neck, staining the starch out of his pearl-buttoned linen shirt. Under his mother’s scrutiny Tad suddenly felt younger than eighteen. Much younger. "Aw, Mom, you know...the hair," he tried, running his hand through his wet curls.

"Yeah," she said in mock sympathy. "It's tough being Adonis." She wore her own red hair tied back at her neck. It was not as abundant as Tad remembered from when he was a kid, due to the hot kleig lights she worked under at Current News Network. Kelsey Doyle wasn't vain, but she was sensitive about her hair. And she was right about his. It was healthy and thick. It just had a mind of its own, like Maggie's and Dad's, that's all.

"You'll bring Linda back, so we can get your photograph together before you go?" his mother reminded him.

"Oh, shoot, that's right. What time is it? Have the flowers come? I've got to get out of here!"

Linda wouldn't care about his hair. Besides, this was her night, her award. Nobody would take much notice of him. Tad snapped the towel from his shoulder, spraying Maggie. She giggled as he rushed by her.

His mother followed him downstairs. "Take it easy, the flowers are on the dining room table. They’re lovely, Tad."

"White goes with all colors. And the three camellias look perfect with the cedar twig."

"Yeah? You think?" Tad looked down through the clear plastic case to the wrist corsage he'd chosen for Linda. The camellia meant unpretending excellence, he'd looked it up in his mother's language of flowers book. The blossoms were a good choice for Linda, he figured, as she was being honored at the banquet for her work for Walk With Wildlife. The cedar was his idea, too. One of Linda’s summer projects was fitting a grove of cedars with bird houses. She'd absorbed the trees' scent. He liked it on her.

Tad grabbed the corsage and sped past his mother and Maggie, promising to stop back at the house with Linda. He climbed behind the wheel of his maroon 1982 Mercedes. His dad, Dr. Stan Gist, part time anthropology professor and part time tree shade mechanic, had helped him polish his old car to a high wax shine that afternoon. By the time Dr. Gist had left to teach his afternoon class, the deep red Mercedes didn't look its ancient age or its third engine’s current 250,000 miles. His first car was a good choice, Tad had to admit, despite his grumbles over his parents’ insistence on safety over style.

Though the fragrance of Atlanta’s magnolias lingered, the coming autumn was in the air as Tad pulled into the parking lot at Linda’s dorm. Where had the summer gone? He was just getting better at making some just-the-two-of-them time. Between their first courses at Morris University, Linda’s work at the wildlife refuge, and his volleyball season's demands, it had not been the summer of his dreams.

Well, it was not over yet. Tad tucked the corsage box under his arm. Linda's dorm, Jackson Hall, was named after Andrew Jackson, an American president who did nothing to prevent most of Linda's ancestors from being deported west on the infamous Trail of Tears. But Linda didn't find her placement in Jackson Hall ironic. She said it was better late than never that Old Hickory did something to benefit a person of Cherokee descent.

Strolling students in casual summer clothes turned to stare at his formal wear. Tad felt his collar tighten around his neck. But that was nothing compared to his unease once he got inside. Linda's entire dorm suite greeted Tad in the sitting room. Five unofficial big sisters, checking him out. He preferred the adoration of little sisters.

Tad was used to Linda being surrounded by other people by now, of course. She’d been his boss on the North Georgia archeological digsite where they’d had their rocky start back in that high school summer. Then he’d been under the close scrutiny of her family and clan members when he visited her at the Snowbird reservation on the Eastern Cherokee Nation. Now she was on his home turf—Atlanta. Even here Tad had to pluck her away from her dorm mates, to bring her to a banquet where she was the toast of the habitat co-sponsored by the university, Walk With Wildlife, and Garmon Chemicals. More people. This was getting old. Would he ever have her to himself?

"Sit down, Tad," her roommate Allison urged, her polished purple nails at his shoulder. "Linda's almost ready."

He couldn't sit. He walked to the windows that overlooked the campus and stared out. Here in Jackson Hall Linda was in the middle of Morris University's comings and goings. Tad lived at home across town, and on the road when the volleyball team was away on its summer pre-season games. She’d been offered scholarships to two ivy league schools, but had still chosen Morris, here in their home state. And in his city. He’d never asked her, but Tad hoped he had been some part of that decision. He felt her dorm mates' eyes scanning him. Did they think he was a dumb jock? Linda always met him at the door before. What was keeping her?

He turned. Linda was wearing a deep red dress with small swirling designs woven in. It covered her completely but its gauzy fabric clung and played off her shape so that her every movement was a dance between her and her dress. The rounded neckline left room to show her bone choker against her bronze-toned skin. Tad felt a familiar, exciting weakness in his gut as he looked into Linda's heart-shaped face. Elaborate feather and quill earrings peaked out from her shining blunt cut black hair.

"This is very different from what we wore at the Mound Builders' digsite, isn’t it?" she asked quietly. So. She had been thinking about them, too, way back to their beginnings, down in the mud.

She lifted a dozen long stemmed roses from the long white box on the table. Their scent filled the big room. "The flowers just arrived," she said. "Thank you."

"I didn't send those," he said, holding out the case with the suddenly inadequate, high-school-prom-looking corsage. "I brought this for you."

Linda placed the bouquet back into the box from a Buckhead florist--Nico's. The heavy scent of the roses lingered as she took the plastic container from his hands.

Linda glanced back at the roses. "I don't know. I don't care. Let's leave them here."

"Linda," Allison insisted, "the note said to be sure to walk in the door of the banquet holding them."

"Or from Garmon Chemicals." Allison again. "It's a British company, isn't it? You know how the English are in all those luscious movies, with their gardens and flowers! You're a guest of honor, aren't you, Linda?"

"Allison's right, Linda," Tad said quietly, though he hated to admit it. "Maybe whoever sent them forgot to sign the note, that's all. Maybe all the speakers and people getting awards got them. That's possible, isn't it?"

"I suppose," she conceded, still frowning. "But I want everyone to know your gift."

She brought the corsage from its case and skillfully separated one of the flowers and a sprig of the cedar. She lanced them with the spare pin and drew it through the lapel of Tad's black jacket. "There." She patted her creation. Her slender fingers shook, just a little. Why was that, Tad wondered.

Linda was nervous, Tad realized. He rarely saw her that way. It made him want to protect her.

Allison presented the elegant white box as Linda took up a black velvet purse with a swirling pattern of red sequins.

The purple outlining her already striking eyes was her roommate's idea, Tad figured, like the make-up, the lipstick, the velvet bag. Linda didn't usually wear make-up. And the only bag she'd ever carried was her backpack. Tad took Linda's hand. He couldn't wait to get her out of there.

"I'm sorry Tad," Linda whispered, as she draped her shoulders with the deep blue beaded and fringed shawl. Well, that was her own, Tad thought. Her grandmother had made it for her. Tad liked Linda’s grandmother. Delores Longknife was funny and wise. And she liked him.

Linda’s head reached his shoulder, as usual. Tad glanced down to see her small feet graced by high laced, black suede moccasins. Their tops disappeared under the swirling hem of her dress. He smiled. She hadn't borrowed a pair of Allison's spiked heels, at least.

"Nice footwear, Ahyoka," he whispered her Cherokee name as they stood for another set of photographs.

The camera flashes stopped, though the spots before Tad's eyes did not. "We're in for more of the same at my house," he warned.

Dr. Gist had returned before Tad and Linda arrived, but Tad's dad couldn't figure out who from the university might have sent Linda the roses.

"We're in a pretty tight budget crunch," he told them. "And I can't imagine not-for-profit Walk With Wildlife being so extravagant as to shop at Nico's. I'd look to Garmon or one of the other corporate sponsors to find your secret admirer, Linda."

Once his mother had finished taking photographs by the dogwood tree, she placed a fine linen handkerchief in the pocket of his tux’s coat. "There," she patted it, "Now you’re the perfect gentleman." She kissed his cheek.

"My turn!" Maggie whooped, before launching herself into Tad's arms. She hugged him hard, pressing her curly head against his heart.

She slipped from his arms and reached into the pocket of her jeans to retrieve a carefully folded paper. Shyly, she approached Linda and offered a colorful chalk drawing.

Linda stooped down beside his sister, admiring the fierce green dragon. Tad liked the way Linda always had time for Maggie. She’d giggled when his sister asked her to twirl about to see her dress’s bell-like shape unfurl. The girls he went out with before Linda had barely tolerated Maggie’s antics. One or two had been annoyed by her. Tad glanced at his sister’s drawing.

Uktena wore splendid horns just like the Cherokee mythical serpent. Maggie knew all Linda’s stories about him. Linda kissed his little sister's cheek. "A good likeness. Will we need Uktena?" she asked. "Do you think this banquet will be a dangerous place, Maggie?"

Dr. Gist frowned, ruffling his younger child's golden curls. "Have you been playing Tad's 'Escape From Demon Lair' computer game?" he chided.

Linda leaned over the railing of the gazebo. She breathed in the scent of the river grasses.

Professor Milton drew her shawl up to her shoulders, startling her. "Cold?" he asked.

Linda wondered about why he was skipping around subjects. "Where are the riverfront plans, Dr. Milton?"

"The sophisticated, grown-up look. Only the white camellias are wrong." He frowned at her wrist corsage. "A little youngish, don't you think? The roses suited you better. Deep red, intoxicating. Like you, Linda-- too mature to waste your time in a boy's company."

"I know all about you, Linda. Much more than he does, or ever will. Of course, you've been sheltered by your parents, but you're free of them now, aren't you? On the reservation you're everybody's pride and joy. The great red hope. Morris has taken you on full scholarship. Your father is a very severe man, I'll bet he didn't like you leaving. You're religious. Fundamentalist, maybe, am I right?"

"Your unnaturally prolonged virginity, Linda. That's what I'm talking about. My dear, I understand, believe me. I'm just asking you to let me guide you. Not this boy. Your first time, with him, now that would be a disaster. Linda, we—you and I, are much more complicated than he will ever be. Sex between us will be adult, I promise. I think we can share something quite beautiful and positive."

Linda felt as if her feet were growing roots, snaking their way between the open spaces in the deck.

"You have no plans for the riverfront habitat to show me," she said in a voice that was almost not hers, a faraway voice.

"My plans are for us. For your first adult experience. There is a powerful attraction between us. There has been since the beginning of the project."

"Oh, you didn't have to. The air between us has always been alive, charged--without any touching! Now as your teacher, as an authority figure, I can guide you to the next step. Sex is powerful. Let me initiate you."

Where were her feet? Had they fanned out under the dock? Why couldn’t she move? Something was moving. Her roommate's evening bag dangled against her legs.

"I'm going inside now." Perhaps saying it would help her uproot her feet, she thought.

Dr. Milton's hand grasped her shoulder. It felt different from the times he'd done that before. The times she'd thought he was her friend. Everything was different now. From their work together at the habitat she knew how strong he was. She felt herself separating, became another Linda, drifting up above this one. The one who was facing a man whose eyes now sparked raw and ugly with anger.

Maggie's dragon hissed, there in her bag. What was happening to her, to the Linda there, below her? "I never thought of us that in that way, no, sir."

Which of her was speaking in that flat, hollowed-out voice? She felt sorry for the one caught now in the man's grip. He shook her. Her shawl fell to the wooden planks. He took a long look over the contours of her body. He was yelling now, his intellectual tone disappearing.

"Tell me why you dressed in those shorts, those tight shirts that made me crazy? Of course you want this! Students-- they..they throw themselves at me all the time!"

She dressed for comfort, as she always did, Linda thought, but the Linda below her said nothing. Doctor Milton yanked down her corsage from her wrist. The delicate camellias fell to the deck with her shawl.

"Now. You want a taste of it now. Out here, beneath the stars, isn't that right? Isn't it?"

The Linda hovering above sent out a silent, desperate call to Tad. Doctor Milton twisted the wrist, pressed the other, the grounded girl, to her knees on her shawl. The roots snapped, freeing her feet. But his big hand locked her head still, its hard palm at her jaw. He pressed so hard Linda felt her earring's stud tear at her neck. He smelled of strong drink.

"Listen. Listen to the river's call," he said. "It's rough now, isn't it, the river? Must be a storm coming. Is that how you want it, my little Indian? Rough?"

He eased his grip. Talk, the hovering one told the other, the terrified girl. Talk. She raised her eyes to his. "Doctor Milton, you could do this thing," she said quietly. "If it comes to a fight, you will win. You are stronger than I am. But this is ugly. I want you to let me go. Think about how you would feel after, and let me go."

There. His hands were off her. She felt the trickle of blood down her neck. He saw it. His face changed, went remorseful. Or was it? Linda got to her feet. The river below rushed at her ears. Doctor Milton stood. He still stood between her and the voices, the walkway, the lights of the banquet.

"Don't be ridiculous. I'm not going to hurt you, silly girl. Your shawl. Here." He offered it. "Come get your shawl, Linda."

He lunged. Linda braced her hands on the gazebo's railing. A fleeting thought danced through her mind. She wished she had borrowed Allison's spiked heels for this. She aimed between his legs. Kicked. Her heels connected. He doubled over.

Linda turned, swinging her bag over her shoulder and calling to her other, floating-above self to join her, so that together they would run faster.

She didn't stop until she was through the nearest door back inside. She found Tad, struggling to get past rough looking men guarding another exit door. Their eyes met. He turned toward her, then vaulted over a display table.

When they touched, the two Lindas came together. She felt shaken, her mind clouded over. But she was whole again. She breathed in Tad's starch and soap and hugged-by-little-sister-eating-peanut-butter scent in great gulps.

"The flowers, your flowers, Tad--" was all she could think to say as she offered her wrist.

"Easy. Breathe easy," he counseled, gently stroking the scratches, the swelling, with his thumbs. Linda's newly rejoined self struggled for balance.

The roomful of people descended on them, because of her ragged appearance, because of Tad's acrobatics. The brightness of Lady Garmon's necklace blurred. Purple spots before Linda’s eyes blotted out the stone's brilliance. Tad lifted her high in his arms. Everything was better there.

"I'm here, Taddeusz," she assured him with his full, beautiful name, which meant what he was, courageous. She tucked her bag with its wonderful, hissing Uktena under her arm.

Voices rose around them. Linda closed her eyes against them. She felt Tad plowing through, then climbing marble stairs past more shouts, whispers, stares. Linda felt his heartbeat quicken, but his hold on her was strong, steady.

Linda heard a muffled, breaking sound, then Tad's sharp, pained, intake of breath. She grabbed wildly at his shirt front, before they both fell.

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