“Yes, I’m being quite gracious,” she snapped. “And I ask that you please not embarrass me in front of my parents. They’re good people who mean well, and they don’t have an eye for charlatans.”
“Charlatans, huh?” A note of hurt registered in his voice. “Well. You’ve seen right through me. But fine, I promise to be as unembarrassing as possible, and maybe I’ll even border on presentable.” He turned his head. “And this will count as our second-chance dinner date. It saves me a few bucks, anyway.”
She didn’t bother responding. His little joke didn’t merit a reply, and she was too angry to say anything nice.
Her parents’ house was built in the Georgian style, with a gray stone exterior and a long driveway that passed through a sprawling lawn. Ben whistled under his breath as they approached and he saw the front of the home lit by spotlights. Sally brushed her hair back, feeling suddenly very self-aware. She hadn’t grown up in this ostentatious house, but hadn’t been raised in a home that would pass as modest, either.
Her parents were wealthy, and while she’d never complained about it, she knew that it affected the way others saw her. She’d dated far too many men who showed an interest in her because they’d made certain assumptions about the size of her trust fund. She’d hoped to find someone who didn’t care about all that. Not someone independently wealthy, necessarily. Someone with character who would care about her for who she was, not what she came with.
Too bad, so sad, she thought wryly. She shouldn’t feel sorry for herself when others had so much less—didn’t she see that reality each day at work? Broken families, poverty, abusive relationships. If the worst thing that happened in her life was that she never found her soul mate, she’d be lucky. She had Mr. X, her mystery donor who was giving her a family. She’d be fine.
She pulled her coat tighter around her frame as they walked up to the door. “I half expect an English butler to greet us,” Ben quipped, though Sally thought she detected a hint of anxiety. “What do your parents do?”
“My dad is one of the founding members of Hamilton Dawson. He was in research and development for years.”
“Yeah? For what? Was he building a better virus?”
“Again with the assumptions.”
Sally inhaled the cool fall air. Ben’s eyes grew huge at the sight of the house. Everyone’s eyes were wide when she brought them to meet her parents. He might act immune to a lot of things, but not to the smell of money. “Dad started off developing artificial flavors. He was responsible for creating a pretty convincing strawberry-vanilla combination, although my favorite of his is chocolate mint mocha.” She rang the doorbell and listened to the chime echo through the great house. The door would be locked, and she’d forgotten her key.
“Artificial flavors. You mean for candies?”
“Candies, sodas, fruit drinks, medications, you name it. I call this the house that junk food built. He also developed natural flavors, but I’ll let you in on a secret.” She leaned closer conspiratorially. “The natural part of those flavors is that they are made from secretions in a beaver’s anal gland.”
He recoiled. “Wait...what?”
The door swung open. Her father was standing alone, his tall frame backlit by the crystal chandelier hanging in the foyer. A blessedly warm gust escaped and hit her, and for the first time Sally realized how cold it was outside.
“Hiya, sweetheart!” He stretched out his long arms and gave her a warm embrace. Sally exhaled. She might be an adult, but there was something about a bear hug from her father that left her weightless, like a child without cares. “Ar-r-r, it’s cold outside! Come in, both of you.”
Sally and Ben obliged. She wondered if she should have mentioned to Ben that her father spoke in his own language. “Hiya’s” and piratelike “ar-r-r’s” were only the beginning. He was quite expressive with his voice, and she often regretted that he hadn’t made use of his creativity to write novels instead of developing flavors.
“Daddy, this is Ben. We work together.” That about summed up the parent-friendly parts of their relationship.
The two men exchanged a manly handshake. She’d expect a full rundown from her father later, when he’d tell her whether or not Ben’s handshake had been at all limp, clammy or awkward. She was guessing he passed. The two men were built similarly, with broad shoulders, strong arms and a confident lift to their chins. Ben, like her father, was a true man’s man. “I understand you served in the marines,” her father said.
“Yes, sir. I served as part of the Judge Advocate General’s Corps.”
“You served in JAG?” He nodded. “I served in the marines myself.”
“Oh?” Ben looked at Sally. “You never mentioned that.”
“It doesn’t usually come up in conversation,” she replied. “Look, if you two are going to talk about marine stuff, I’ll go help Mom in the kitchen.”
“Dinner’s on the table,” her father replied. “Let’s go eat before it gets any colder.”
* * *
Ben felt as if he’d walked into the mouth of a beast. He’d been swallowed and digested by the massive gray architecture of the impressive home, along with original oil paintings and tapestries, and random pieces of silver cutlery that probably served a function, but that function escaped him. So this was where Sally came from? He’d always known she was rich and spoiled, but he’d never actually imagined what that would look like. She probably didn’t have to work ever again, if that’s what she chose. Yet she’d gone to law school and taken a high-stress, low-pay job in the state’s attorney’s office. The thoughts flitted across his mind, and he simply registered them without analyzing their significance.
Sally’s father was over six feet tall and still muscular into middle age. He led them into a dining room that the family probably considered intimate, but in reality was almost as large as Ben’s apartment. A great stone fireplace at the far end of the room held a roaring blaze. The table was long and wooden, draped with white linens and set with china, silver and crystal. He suddenly regretted seizing the opportunity to make Sally squirm. He was out of his league.
A woman who had to be Sally’s mother entered the room, a warm smile on her face. Her blond hair was the same soft shade as Sally’s, but cut to her chin. She wore a button-down blue shirt and a gray skirt. And pearls. She was wearing pearls to dinner in her own dining room. He was way out of his league.
As if she sensed his discomfort, Sally turned to him with a smug smile and arched her eyebrow as if to say, Look at what you just got yourself into. She didn’t need to say anything out loud. He got the message, all right.
His own family was squarely middle class. After his father died, his mother had remained unmarried until recently. His new stepfather was a nice guy, but no millionaire. His mother had raised him and his brother on her own, on the modest salary she’d received as a middle school math teacher. He’d earned scholarships to go to college, and had taken out loans to go to law school. Life had changed a few years ago, when his uncle had died and left him and his brother with sizable trust funds. Ben would inherit that money next month, when he turned thirty-five. Beyond buying a better car and renting a nicer apartment, he had no idea what to do with the cash.
He itched under his shirt collar. He’d had some exposure to this kind of wealth when he was working on Wall Street, but he’d never become comfortable around it. He owned designer suits, but they were almost as old as his law degree. Being here, surrounded by fancy clothes and silverware, being in the company of people who’d had every advantage in the world... He straightened his tie, wondering if they could sense how much it had cost him, and how many seasons ago he’d purchased it.
“This must be Ben.” Sally’s mother raced over to give him a hug, startling him. “I’m Lana, and you’ve already met Hank.”
“Yes,” he said, grateful she had withdrawn
from the embrace. Those things always sent his nervous system into overdrive. “Thanks for having me over. Dinner smells delicious.” He couldn’t identify the aromas in the room, but his mouth was watering. He hadn’t realized how hungry he was.
Lana waved one hand and squeezed his upper arm with the other. These Dawsons were touchy-feely, weren’t they? “Really, it’s our pleasure to have you here. We enjoy meeting our daughter’s friends.”
He was relieved to see that Sally didn’t start foaming at the mouth when her mother referred to him as a friend. That had to be a good sign. She simply smiled that tight smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes, and said, “Mom. Let’s eat.”
“I should get you a drink,” said Hank. “Wine? Beer? We have a full bar.”
Ben had managed to not touch a drop of alcohol in years, and no matter how uncomfortable he was, he wasn’t about to give in now. “Just water is fine.”
Dinner, as Lana and Hank explained it, was handmade ravioli stuffed with butternut squash and dressed with a mixture of pine nuts, sage and melted butter. “We get the butter down the road at a little farm,” Lana said as she piled ravioli onto Ben’s plate. “We know the farmer, and all of his cows are grass-fed.” She sent Ben a knowing look. “It makes such a difference.”
He wasn’t sure what to make of that; every form of butter seemed as good as the next to him. But obviously Lana took some pride in the grass-fed cows. “Sounds perfect.” Yes, that was the right response—he could tell by her smile. “It must be nice to live so close to a farm like that. Local produce is...popular.”
Popular? He’d just hit rock bottom.
“The farm,” Sally chimed in, “is half an hour away, not down the road. The only thing down the road from here, businesswise, is a designer shopping center and a Starbucks.” She picked up a fork and jabbed at her salad. “Mom and Dad travel for their ingredients.” Her words were pointed, but the look she gave them was affectionate.
Hank put his hands up as if in surrender and laughed good-naturedly. “We’re taking cooking classes,” he said. “Sally’s right, we’ve been traveling to find the right foods to create our meals. It’s all for fun, to spend time together. The classes were my idea. Lana accused me of not knowing how to boil water, so I had to invest in a little help.”
“It’s been so much fun,” Lana gushed. “We have the classes every Tuesday night, then on Wednesday we make the meal by ourselves.” She shrugged, seeming embarrassed. “It’s a luxury, I know. But we’re semiretired now, and we figure we need to spend the time together while we still have our health.” She reached out and squeezed Hank’s hand.
“Mom is semiretired from charity,” Sally explained as she reached for a glass of water. “She’s a director on the board at the children’s hospital and volunteers her time with an animal rescue nonprofit.”
Sally looked uncomfortable, but Ben couldn’t tell whether it was from her parents’ open displays of affection or something else. His presence, maybe. But he realized now how wrong he’d been about her. She’d come from a perfectly normal, loving family. They had money and yet managed to be down-to-earth. She’d lived a charmed life, indeed. Still, she was crumpling her napkin in her lap and seemed disinterested in her food.
Well, if she wasn’t going to eat, he would. The ravioli practically melted on his tongue, and the broccoli with lemon that they served as a side dish was cooked to perfect firmness. They served a butternut squash risotto and handmade bread rolls with an entire bulb of baked garlic soaked in olive oil for dipping. Dessert was a good, strong coffee and individual raspberry tarts. Funny, but when he’d accepted the invitation to dinner, part of him had expected meat loaf.
Throughout the meal, Sally was nearly silent. She’d chime in now and then to correct her parents or tell them that she didn’t want to talk about work, but overall she looked miserable. So miserable, in fact, that he seriously regretted pushing for dinner the way he had. Lana and Hank were pleasant and gracious, and welcomed him openly, but Sally was unhappy, and she was the one he’d have to deal with in the morning. He shouldn’t have teased her like this.
They said a quick goodbye at the end of dessert, with Sally giving the excuse that it was nearly ten o’clock and they both had to be at work in the morning. They walked to the car and drove down the driveway in silence, and Ben had the impression that he’d done something very, very wrong at some point that evening.
“I tried to be on my best behavior.” He cleared his throat and looked out the window as the Georgian home slipped from view. “Your parents are very...” Affectionate? Gracious? Culinary? “...pleasant.”
She made a noise like a hiss and turned on the heat. “They’re all right.”
All right? She’d grown up in the Cleaver household, but with millions of dollars. “You’re really lucky to have a close family.” Loving parents who made her meals and enjoyed spending time with each other.
“Hmm,” was her response. “Sometimes I think they just have me over to rub it in my face. How happy they are.” She sniffed, but she wasn’t crying. Just sniffing. “They were quiet about it tonight, but normally I’d hear the lecture about how I’m not getting any younger, and do I really want to go through life on my own, without a partner? They’re great, but they really want me to settle down. Ever since...” Her voice trailed off.
“Ever since what?”
She was quiet for so long that Ben wondered if she was ever going to answer his question. Then, just when he’d given up, she said, “Ever since my engagement blew up in their faces.”
The weight of that answer settled between them. Sally had been engaged? He hadn’t kept track of her, but the news was surprising. “I had no idea you’d been engaged.”
“It was so brief. Whirlwind romance, then he proposed and we were supposed to be married three months later. It was barely enough time for me to plan everything.”
“Why the rush?” He realized he may have just overstepped his boundaries, but he didn’t care. He wanted to know what had happened. The intensity of his need to know was surprising to him.
She withheld her answer for a few moments, pressing her lips together. “I was pregnant,” she said at last, her voice barely a whisper. “We got engaged, and I started to plan the wedding. Then I lost the baby.” Her voice quavered with still-raw pain.
Ben didn’t know what to say. “I’m sorry,” he finally murmured.
“Thank you.” She sniffed. “I mean that, by the way. You don’t know how many people have told me it was for the best, or that it wasn’t meant to be. Especially after I caught him in bed with another woman two weeks before the wedding.” Sally swept a finger beneath one eye. “He was all wrong, and I guess I was with him because I thought I couldn’t do any better, but that was my baby. I still wanted that baby.”
Ben chewed on the realization that someone as beautiful as Sally could think she was somehow unworthy of a decent man. There was something tragic and infuriating in that, but just as he was about to pass judgment on the cheating bastard, he thought about the way he’d moved on from Sally himself. If she thought she couldn’t do any better than a man who treated her like garbage, did he have something to do with it?
His forehead tensed. “I am sorry, Sally. You deserve better than that.”
She eyed him. “So? What’s your baggage? I showed you mine. Seems only fair.”
He hadn’t expected they’d be sharing so much of themselves tonight. He had a number of skeletons in his closet that could be marched out. He chose the first one that came to mind. “Since we’re on the topic of broken engagements, one of my closest friends is marrying the woman I was supposed to marry. The wedding’s next week.”
If he’d thought he’d come to terms with that, he thought wrong. Even now the emotion closed around his larynx.
“What?” She took her attention off the road for a bit longer
than he was comfortable with, to glance at him with her huge, expressive eyes. “Your close friend? That’s awful!”
“It’s been over six years since we broke up. I was awful,” he added. “I’m the one who screwed up.”
“That sounds kind of harsh. What could you have possibly done?”
He thought back to that night, clear as if it was yesterday. Didn’t he hear the crunch of metal each time he turned a key in the ignition? Didn’t he still always brace himself for a repeat of that evening? “I almost killed her,” he said quietly. “I hit a tree while I was driving her home. I’d been drinking.” And then, as an afterthought, he added, “Her name’s Karen.”
He couldn’t read Sally’s expression in the inky darkness of the vehicle, but he knew what her silence meant. Judgment. This was the moment that would vindicate her low opinion of him. He was reckless. A drunk. Not to be trusted. She didn’t need to say anything, and he didn’t need to hear it. He’d looked in the mirror many times since that night and thought the same.
“She’s lucky to be alive. We both are,” he continued. “We were arguing again, and I was over the legal limit and lost control. She had a few broken bones. I walked away with some scratches.” He tightened his fists until his palms hurt. “That’s what kills me. I was the one who should have paid. I was the one who almost killed her. And I walked away.”
Sally was still quiet, not saying anything, not audibly breathing. The headlights of the vehicle ripped through the darkness ahead, but did nothing to illuminate the space between them. He’d made a mistake all those years ago, and while the scratches and scrapes and broken bones had healed, talking about it still felt raw, like nerves on fire. Like something bubbling painfully up from his gut. Healing never came. It never had. Karen had forgiven him, and he’d pretended to accept her forgiveness. Then he’d enlisted in the marines in the hopes of finding salvation through death. Two of his buddies were killed by a roadside bomb in Afghanistan. Another lost his legs. Ben was unscathed. Brutally, unfairly unscathed.
The Burden of Desire Page 11