“Before I knew it, we were kissing.”
Ashley could hardly breathe.
“She’d obviously been around and knew what she was doing. Though I’d had my share of girlfriends, I’m afraid I wasn’t as experienced. After about a half hour, she wanted to move things to the bedroom.
“I’d never slept with a woman before. It suddenly dawned on me that my first time ought to be with a girl my own age, someone I really cared about—not one of dad’s employees who might spread tales and get me in trouble.
“Sheila represented forbidden fruit, a conquest if you like, but my hormones rather than my emotions were involved. I remember feeling very foolish and regretting like hell that I’d gone up to her apartment.
“She laughed at me when I told her I had to get home or my parents would be upset. Her taunts were another wound to my pride, but I got out of there before I made the ultimate mistake. Thank God.”
The violence of his emotions reduced Ashley to a trembling lump of flesh. She had a dozen new questions. You sound like you’re telling the truth, Cord. Are you?
“When I got home,” he continued, “my father was waiting up for me. He was livid. Apparently he’d called the office and the night custodian told him I’d left the office with Sheila some time ago.
“Without filling in between the lines, I told Dad that I had given her a lift home because she didn’t have her car. He obviously knew much more than that had happened. He could probably smell the beer. In any event, he was angrier than I’d ever seen him in my life. He slapped my face.”
Ashley stared at him in horror. “Your father actually hit you for that?”
“Yes. Unfortunately Mother had heard us arguing and she came in the living room in time to witness it. On that particularly black night I grew up, putting my adolescence and innocence behind me.
“Dad never apologized. He ordered me to stay away from the office and told me that I’d be spending the summer in Idaho, working at one of the potato chip plants.
“For the last remaining weeks the three of us avoided each other around the house, never referring to the incident again. I was glad to be going away for the summer because it meant I didn’t have to be in his company.
“When fall approached, I came home to tell my mother I wanted to stay in Utah and get a degree in forestry and land management. But she begged me to go on to Cornell and study finance and business. Dad had been planning that for me since my childhood.
“Mother was afraid of him, but I never realized how serious the problem was until that time. It was then I began to see that if I didn’t go, he might take it out on Mother since he counted on her influence to persuade me. So I went away to school. But the truth of the matter was, Cornell had always been his dream, not mine.”
The bitterness of his tone infiltrated every particle of Ashley’s being. She was devastated by what she’d just heard.
Cord relinquished the chair and put a hand in his pocket. His solid, well-honed body paced the floor for a silent interval.
“As I told you earlier, it was during my first year away at college that I picked up the habit of smoking. Near the end of the second semester, Mother wrote that she was going in for a hysterectomy. But what should have been routine surgery became something else. She had complications and contracted pneumonia. I flew home to spend the last few days in the hospital with her before she died.”
The pain in his voice haunted Ashley.
“Dad and I were speaking again, but there was a distance between us that could never be breached.
“After the funeral I flew back to Cornell and resumed my studies, but by the middle of my sophomore year, I couldn’t lie to myself any longer. I didn’t want to be there and had no intentions of going into the family business. Throughout that period I was smoking pretty heavily.
“Finally, I withdrew from school and flew home for the Christmas holidays with the intention of enrolling at Utah State in Logan, Utah. It was night when the taxi dropped me off in front of the house. I had no way of knowing if Dad was home because I hadn’t checked the garage.
“I called to him—there was no answer. When I took my bags upstairs, I thought I heard laughter coming from his bedroom. So I rapped on his door and peeked inside.”
Ashley knew what was coming and sat there in terrified silence.
“Another woman was in the bed he’d shared with my mother. It was Sheila.”
A moan escaped while she tried to stifle the pain she imagined he must have felt for so many reasons.
“When it didn’t work with the son, I suppose she decided to try it on the father, who was in his late fifties and old enough to be her father. I didn’t stick around for explanations. Instead, I took off in my car and drove to Logan where I worked any number of odd jobs to pay for my tuition and board.
“Through a friend, Dad found out where I was living and came to see me. At best, it was a pathetic meeting. He said he grieved for Mother, but the house was empty without her and he’d fallen in love with Sheila who was now his private secretary and fast becoming his right hand in the business.
“He explained that they suited each other and were planning to get married quietly at home. He wanted me to be there. I said no and asked him to leave.
“After that, I buried myself in schoolwork. A lot of my credits transferred from Cornell and I was able to finish up in four years time with a degree in forestry.