Love Can Be Murder

traffic thinned and the fall leaves thickened.
    "Will your sorority be doing something special for Homecoming?" she asked Angora.
    She shrugged. "I suppose."
    "You don't keep up with your sisters?"
    Angora's face went odd, and she looked off in the distance. "I quit the DZs."
    "I didn't know that. Why?"
    She shrugged again. "Some of the girls started being mean to me, calling me 'Church' because I wouldn't sleep with their creepy brothers. Tammy Paulen—" She stopped walking.
    Roxann swung her head around. "What about Tammy Paulen?"
    Angora seemed dazed.
    "Angora, what about Tammy Paulen?"
    "She...was the worst."
    She wet her lips and spoke carefully. "I thought you said you didn't know Tammy very well."
    "I didn't. I don't even think she knew my name."
    "But she teased you?"
    Angora nodded. "Her brother heard I was a virgin, and she...wanted to give me to him for his birthday."
    Roxann's stomach convulsed. "That's sick."
    "Well, she got hers, didn't she?"
    A chill went through Roxann that had nothing to do with the breeze. "Angora—"
    "Hey, is that who I think it is?" Angora pointed like a bird dog across the street.
    Roxann followed her finger, and her heart vaulted. She hadn't realized it, but the path led them high above and opposite Carl's office building, leveling off in front of the humanities building for a splendid view through an opening in the trees the distance of a football field. Without knowing, Angora had led them to a perfect vantage point.
    It was Carl, all right. Sitting on the steps of the building, munching a sandwich and reading a book in the sunshine. Still broad-shouldered and lean, he was wearing a soccer coaching jacket over chinos, T-shirt, and V-neck sweater. The sunlight picked up the silver in his hair, and the glare from his small wire-framed glasses. Years fell away, and Roxann's tongue was glued to the roof of her mouth. No man had affected her the way Carl had, not before and not since.
    "I was thinking barbecue for lunch," Angora said, nodding to a concession stand below them on the street mere paces from where Carl sat.
    "Sounds good," she murmured.
    Concrete steps took them down to street level. Thank goodness there was a handrail for stability—the heeled boots were making her legs wobbly. Scenes about how she might approach him, and what he might say flashed through her mind, but suddenly they were on the sidewalk across the two-lane street and he looked at her. He stopped chewing and wiped his mouth, then squinted. She smiled, and when he set aside his book and lunch and stood, her heart lifted. She waved over passing cars. He removed his glasses, then jaywalked through slow-moving cars toward them.
    "Roxann?" he said, jogging up to her. "Roxann, is that you?"
    He was more handsome than ever, pale, pale blue eyes surrounded by black lashes. His eyebrows were jet black, thrown into relief against the silvery shock of hair that fell over his wide forehead. His chiseled nose and wide forehead were the same, along with his strong chin. And his smile—how could she have forgotten the gift of his incredible smile? It lit his entire face, and animated his body. That smile was the energy bank that he and people around him drew upon.
    The sights and sounds around them receded. "Yes, Carl, it's me."

Chapter Fourteen

    "I HOPE YOUR COUSIN doesn't mind that I stole you away," Carl said, holding open the door to his office.
    "She said there were a few places on campus she wanted to visit," Roxann said, passing under his arm. She was assailed by that big-person-in-a-small-person-place feeling again. As if all the things around her were props, and Carl was the leading man on stage. Very surreal.
    He stepped in, closed the door, and hung their coats on a hook on the back. When he turned, they simply stood and smiled at each other for a long moment, just as a script might call for. He was divine—longish silvery hair, flattering glasses, chiseled features, sparkling blue eyes, clean-shaven jaw. Action.
    "You haven't changed," he murmured. "Still so beautiful."
    She blushed. "I have changed, but thank you."
    "God, I've missed you." He clasped her shoulders. "Did you get my message about the award? Are you married? How long are you staying?"
    She laughed, and he looked sheepish.
    "Where are my manners? Please sit down. Would you like some coffee or tea?"
    "No, thank you." She sat in the cane-bottomed chair he proffered, comforted by the clichéd clutter of books and papers in the crowded