Chapter 4

She noticed Darrin was still working when she pushed up the overhead door to move the car inside the studio. Their neighborhood wasn't the best, and Darrin thought it prudent to pull the car inside each night. He waved at her and told her he would lower the door after she drove the vehicle inside.

"Hi, sis, how are you?" he asked as she stepped out of the car.

"My feet hurt, but it was a good-tip night."

"Are you going right to bed?"

Damn, he wants to talk. "Soon. I'm pretty tired."

"Waddaya think?" he asked as he waved his hand toward the studio.

"Oh, Darrin, you built the new easels."

"Uh-huh, and stretched ten canvases. I also sized the canvases on the easels. I had a good night, too. Let's celebrate."

"Celebrate?"

"I'm not a drinker, but I feel like a drink. Want to join me?"

She grinned. "Are you trying to corrupt me? I'm not old enough to imbibe, not according to Nevada law."

"Law, smaw. Don't tell me you've never had a drink."

She laughed. "No, that would be a lie. Okay, let's celebrate. What do you have to drink? I don't like beer."

"Brandy. You'll love it. It'll warm you clear down to your toes."

She settled on Darrin's ratty sofa, the sofa she had recovered - one of many projects she'd conceived and executed to make the place livable before the parents visited to check out her living conditions. After she kicked off her shoes, she pulled her feet up to the sofa and rubbed them.

"Brandy should be sipped from snifters after its warmed by a candle," he said as he set a bottle on the coffee table.

She chuckled. "No snifters, but I have a candle, and a couple of the glasses I bought at a garage sale almost look like snifters. I'll get them."

"Sit, I'll get them. I'll wait on you tonight for a change. Where do you keep the candles?"

"On the top shelf of the pantry. You should find a box of kitchen matches with the candles." She had painted a freestanding metal cabinet she'd swiped from the studio and turned it into a pantry. White paint transformed its industrial appearance, and she used stencils to add flowers here and there on the doors. The pantry enhanced and brightened the room and was quite functional.

Darrin settled onto the sofa next to her, poured two glasses with about two inches of brandy, lit a candle and warmed one of the glasses briefly. He handed it to her. "Appreciate its aroma," he instructed.

She did enjoy the scent, but the whiff stung her eyes a little, and she suspected brandy was a strong drink. Was he trying to get her drunk so he could have his way with her? With a sly grin, she hoped so.

He clicked her glass with his. "To you, Carrie. I didn't know when I offered to help you that in the end you would help me more than I helped you. Over the past month I have come to rely on you in so many ways. You run this place like a well-oiled machine, and you do it at almost half the cost I would have spent."

"Thank you, Darrin." Cool, my plan is working.

"Sip," he ordered.

He'd been correct. The brandy warmed her to her toes. "Nice," she said.

He sighed. Here it comes, she thought.

"We have a problem, Carrie."

She didn't respond. He'd need to define the problem before she'd react.

"I love you," he said.

"What's the problem? I love you, too."

"The problem is I love you more than I should," he said.

She gazed adoringly at him. Was he saying what she thought he was saying?

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"I love you more than I should love a sister."

Yes! She sipped the brandy again. What should she say? Should she admit she had the same feelings for him?

"If you feel uncomfortable with my feelings," he said, "I'll understand if you want to move out. I'll go back to work five or six days a week, whatever it takes, and help you as much as I can. I don't want my feelings for you to stop you from going to college this fall. In a couple of months you can move into a room on the college campus, and I'll help you financially then, too. I know how I feel about you is wrong, and I promise I will not act on my feelings, but I felt strongly that you needed to know. It is my hope you will keep how I feel about you between us, and not inform Mom and Dad, but if you feel compelled to tell them about my perverted love, I'll understand."

He's babbling. She put her hand on his cheek. "Hush, Darrin. I love you the same way."

Tears welled in his eyes. "I was afraid you'd say that. Damn it! What are we to do?" He squeezed his eyes shut, and a silent tear rolled out of one eye and streamed down his cheek.

She leaned and brushed her lips to his, a heartfelt, soft kiss. "I've loved you, Darrin, for as long as I can remember. When my love for you turned into something deeper, I can't tell you because I don't know myself, but it's been at least a year, since your visit to Milltown last summer. When you asked me to live with you so I could go to college, you made me the happiest woman in the world. I couldn't believe my good fortune. I had come to believe I would spend the rest of my life loving you without the opportunity to express it. I love you, Darrin, with all my heart, mind and body. I will not move out of our home, a home we created together with half of nothing. You called your love perverted..."

"It is perverted, Carrie. It's called incest!" He took a gulp of the brandy.

"I know what it's called. I've loved you much longer than you've loved me. You fell in love with me during the last month. I fell in love with you a year ago. I tried to ignore how I felt. I dated others, both boys my age and older men, much to Mom and Dad's chagrin. I really tried to find someone else I could love, but when all was said and done, I still loved only you." She took his hand in hers. "I realized a year ago you were my one great love, and perverted or not, I would love you all the days of my life. I didn't believe I would ever have the opportunity to tell how much I truly love you and had planned to go through the rest of my life keeping the secret to myself. But know this, perverted or not, I love you, Darrin Cannon, and I want you more than you can possibly know or imagine."

"Don't be so sure, Carrie. I want you, too." He squeezed her hand. "But if we consummate our love, we'll destroy each other."

"How? Why?"

"We are brother and sister. We cannot marry. We cannot have children. Don't you want to have children? And what would our parents say? Our friends? Besides, incest is against the law. We could be arrested."

"A choice between you and children is easy. I choose you. Our parents and others don't need to know. I'm staying with you to save money and go college. We'll have a minimum of four years, Darrin, before the parents even become suspicious, and I can stretch that time by skipping a semester or two, claiming poverty. I don't need a marriage ceremony to feel like your wife. I've been your wife in every way but one for the last month. And finally, fuck the law!"

He shook his head, obviously not convinced, which didn't surprise her. "I'm going to bed, Darrin," she said, and when he looked up at her with a torn expression she added, "to my bed, alone. I've had more time than you to work through my personal demons and the potential conflicts of an incestuous relationship. Take your time. I'm in no rush, and if you want to talk, I'll talk with you. I'm not going anywhere; I'm certainly not moving out of my home. I'll try not to put any pressure on you, but don't take that as a promise. I want you. I want you as a lover and a life's companion, with the emphasis on the latter." She placed her hand on his cheek again. "I'm going to kiss you goodnight, Darrin, and it's going to be a romantic kiss, not a passionate one, and certainly not sisterly." She leaned forward and placed her lips on his, sighed and melted into the embrace. Her heart raced as it always did when she kissed him, but she had promised romance not passion, and that's all she offered. He didn't draw away from her and returned the kiss in the same spirit it had been offered. She leaned back and whispered, "Goodnight. I love you, bro. I love you as a sister and as a lover." She smiled. "You're just going to have to learn to live with it."

She rose and left him, and Darrin sat and drank another brandy, and then another. Carrie's revelations had stunned him. She wanted everything he wanted and more. One moment he reveled in the fact she loved him like he loved her. The next, he despaired because he strongly believed any incestuous relationship was doomed. He had never felt so conflicted. In comparison, all other life altering decisions had been easy to make. Finally he decided to heed her advice. He'd take his time, and he'd talk with her about it - a lot. He pushed himself to his feet and lumbered away to bed.

Carrie squared her shoulders and walked into the gallery. She had spoken to the owner, a Mr. Kensington, on the telephone and had an appointment. She was dressed in a business suit she had picked up at a yard sale, along with two others similar to the one she wore. She looked good in a professional sort of way and carried Darrin's portfolio under her arm.

"Mr. Kensington, please," Carrie told the attractive receptionist. "My name is Carrie Cannon. I have an appointment."

"He's on the phone, Ms. Cannon. Why don't you stroll through the gallery? I'll let you know when he's free."

Ten minutes later, Carrie knew she had selected the wrong gallery. Nothing in the showrooms approached Darrin's style. All the art displayed seemed fussy to her, certainly not large and bold like Darrin's paintings. She decided to meet with the owner anyway - for practice, if nothing else.

Soon, the receptionist showed her into the owner's office, and when Kensington shook her hand, Carrie decided if the gallery owner wasn't gay, he was missing a hell of an opportunity. Christ, he floated a foot above the floor.

She sat in front of a Queen Anne desk and waited for Kensington to say something.

"You called me, Ms. Cannon."

"Yes, sorry. As I said on the phone, I represent my brother, Darrin Cannon. Barbara..."

"I know all that. You don't need to repeat yourself. Is that the artist's portfolio you have with you?"