Interior Designs Read Free Page B

wanted nothing to do with him. It would never do in this instance for Judy to get a line on her true feelings.
    "Now, Cathryn," began Susannah, adopting what Cathryn recognized as her let's-stop-and-think-about-this tone of voice. "I know how you feel about men who are trying to get over past relationships, but maybe he's different. Anyway, who's left? By this time, all the eligibles have been married at least once. Maybe even to me." She giggled.
    "Susannah," said Cathryn patiently. "Let's face it. Most divorced men qualify as the walking wounded, and Drew's no exception."
    "So nurse him," Susannah said matter-of-factly.
    "That," said Cathryn, "is exactly the point. Let me tell you about Drew Sedgwick. He's like all men in his situation—he's been through the worst sort of emotional trauma and he's desperate for someone to expend valuable emotional energy on him. He wants someone who will pick him up, dust him off, and put him back together again. And afterward, he'll find someone else, a woman who won't remind him of this traumatic period of his life."
    "Drew could be an exception, you know," Judy replied.
    Cathryn remembered the yearning in his eyes, and she recalled how strongly she had been moved by it. Past experiences with such men had made her cautious, however, and she didn't need a man with flighty emotions in her life, now or ever. What in the world would she have in common with a high-powered department-store executive anyway? What would they talk about? His problems? That she didn't need. Or want.
    "I don't think so," she said. "Just forget I ever mentioned him, okay?"
    "If you insist," said Judy reluctantly.
    "Must you insist?" asked Susannah.
    "I insist," replied Cathryn in her most convincing tone. "And now, what are you two wearing to the reunion?" She thought it was the perfect question to nudge the conversation off the subject of Drew Sedgwick.
    But, oddly enough, the next day Cathryn couldn't remember for the life of her what either Judy or Susannah had said they were going to wear.

Chapter 2

    "Cat Mulqueen! Is it you? You look the same! Exactly the same! Doesn't she, Judy?" Shrieking at them was Tria Dinwoody, former captain of the cheerleaders, her shrill voice undiminished by time. Fascinated, Cathryn couldn't pull her eyes away from Tria's hair, which when last seen had been a mousy brown but was now dyed red for the festive occasion of their class reunion.
    Judy, recovering first, laughed. "It's go good to see you again, Tria! I'd like you to meet my husband, Ron," and she drew Ron, owlish in his horn-rimmed glasses, into the group.
    The class reunion had been in full swing for a couple of hours. They'd chosen the posh Whitecaps Beach Club, an adjunct to the grand Whitecaps Hotel on the ocean in Palm Beach, for their bash, and the first hour had been the most frantic, with screams of delight, warm embraces and broad grins very much in evidence. Now they had finished eating dinner, and a band was setting up to play for dancing.
    "Oh, no," said Susannah under her breath. "Donny Paddock is going to throw Chuck Giles into the pool! Let's get out of here, Cathryn. It's likely to be us next!"
    But on their way to the safe haven of the ladies' room, Susannah was whisked off to the dance floor by one of her innumerable old beaux, which left Cathryn on her own. She ducked behind a potted palm and watched in amusement as Chuck Giles, recently bald, swam fully clothed in the spacious inside pool, inviting everyone to join him. No one did, but Cathryn suspected that it wouldn't be long before Donny Paddock, always a rowdy, tossed in someone else to keep Chuck company.
    Cathryn was feeling restless, and despite the hundreds of her classmates present, she felt lonely. She had dutifully oohed and aahed over numerous pictures of other people's children and accepted graciously her classmates' admiration of her own accomplishments as recounted in the reunion booklet.
    But now that she was alone, away from the crowd,