Lost in His Arms by Carla Cassidy Page A

had turned out well and everyone was all right.
    â€œElizabeth, I’m so glad you’re okay,” Richard said as he rose from the sofa. “Where’s Talbot?”
    â€œHe headed on to Morning View,” she replied. “He said he’d see you there.” Elizabeth looked at the man she had married so long ago.
    Richard wasn’t as striking or as potently male as his brother, but he was a pleasantly handsome man,with warm brown eyes that had always sparkled with boyish enthusiasm and a mischievous glint. At the moment neither the glint nor the spark was apparent. His eyes held a somberness Elizabeth had never seen before.
    â€œDad made pot roast,” Andrew said. “With carrots and potatoes.”
    â€œHe did?” Elizabeth looked at Richard in surprise. “I didn’t know you knew how to do a roast.”
    Richard shrugged. “Andrew can’t eat junk food all the time when he’s with me. It isn’t good for him.”
    Elizabeth stared at him, wondering when a pod person had replaced Richard. The man she’d known for the past ten years had never worried about the effects of junk food on himself or his son.
    â€œThat sounds marvelous,” she finally said, and realized the meal with Talbot had been hours ago and she was hungry again.
    â€œIt’s ready when you are,” Richard replied.
    â€œJust let me go wash up and I’ll be ready.” Elizabeth went into the bathroom. Richard had cooked a pot roast and Talbot had kissed her. This had to be the strangest day of her life.
    For a moment she stared at her reflection in the mirror, surprised to find her lips weren’t swollen or red. There was no lingering indication of Talbot’s kiss other than the burning memory of his mouth against hers.
    She sluiced her face with water, hoping the cool liquid would banish the heat of that memory, the taste of him. Why had he kissed her? And, more importantly, why had she wanted him to?
    The moment had obviously been one of those anomalies of nature, an uncharacteristic act between two people who had shared an unusual or life-threatening situation. She’d heard of such things—people making love in the midst of disaster, kissing strangers when a stressful situation was over.
    They had narrowly escaped death when the plane had gone down, had shared two nights and days together, lost in the woods. Reaching the apartment complex had indicated an end to the drama, and surely that was what had prompted the kiss. It had really meant nothing to him, and she certainly didn’t intend to make anything of it.
    She dried her face, then left the bathroom and went into the kitchen where Andrew and Richard were already seated at the table.
    The dinner conversation remained pleasant and light. Andrew told her everything they had seen while in the tiny town of Twin Oaks. When he mentioned the swimming hole again, he added, “Dad said sometimes they would go skinny-dipping!”
    Elizabeth fought the image that filled her mind—that of a naked, dripping-wet Talbot emerging from a sparkling pond.
    â€œThat must have been the pond where the farmerwould chase you with a shotgun,” she said to Richard.
    â€œReally?” Andrew looked from his mother to his father.
    Richard looked at her in surprise. “Talbot must have told you that.”
    â€œThere isn’t a lot to do other than talk when you’re lost in the woods for two days,” she explained.
    Funny, she thought as they continued the meal, she’d confessed to Talbot her fear of the dark, something she’d never told anyone before, something she hadn’t even shared with the man she’d been married to for nine years.
    She focused her attention back on Andrew, who was now telling her about seeing the house where his father had lived as a young boy.
    Elizabeth knew the McCarthys had lived in Twin Oaks until Talbot was twenty and Richard thirteen.
    At the time, their