The Downfall of a Good Girl

by Kimberly Lang

  She spent a restless, miserable night on the couch, and when the cathedral bells began to chime for the first Ash Wednesday services she dragged herself home through the nearly empty streets.

  Surprisingly, Lorelei was already up. From the pained look and dark bags under her eyes to the aspirin in her hands and the careful, unsteady walk, Lorelei was a living picture of a bad hangover.

  “Mercy, Vivi, what happened to you? You look worse than I feel.”

  Vivi took a deep breath. All the justifications and condemnations she’d arrived at during a mostly sleepless night scrambled to the tip of her tongue, ready to flay Connor.

  She burst into tears instead.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  GOOD to his word, Connor didn’t leave the apartment for several days. He told himself that he needed to work, and he did, getting more accomplished in those days than he had in weeks. Months, probably. It was amazing how productive he could be when he didn’t have all kinds of distractions.

  His first major accomplishment involved firing Angie shortly after she appeared on Wednesday afternoon. Her somewhat smug acceptance of the condensed and sanitized story of Vivi’s departure and her less than enthusiastic response to his decisions about his career clearly showed they’d reached the end of their usefulness to each other.

  But throwing himself into his plans only kept the demons at bay for a while, and it didn’t taken long for the walls to close in on him. He’d had such a high profile the last few weeks that any absence led to speculation, and his first couple of forays out into the public quickly hit the star-watching blogs—complete with questions about Vivi’s sudden absence and what it might mean.

  Vivi’s words and Vivi’s absence haunted him. After a few days he realized she’d been partly right. He’d fired Angie rather than continuing to let her use him as a cash cow, and it had forced him to recognize Vivi’s hurt at the possibility he’d used her in a similar fashion. The kernel of truth was there—however small—and had the tables been turned he’d probably feel the same way.

  But the fact she’d assumed the worst, rushed to judgment and condemnation…That was just messed up. They might not have the best track record, but that quick jump to believing the worst was uncalled for. She was the one who’d made noise about where they were going until he’d started to think that way as well. Now that that had bitten him in the ass, he was discovering he was more than just a little bitter about it.

  He was honest enough with himself to realize that the strange hollow feeling in his chest had Vivi’s name all over it, and the black irony of the situation didn’t escape him. The one woman he’d never thought he’d want to have was the one woman who turned out to be the person who’d made him the happiest. The one woman whose opinion seemed to matter the most didn’t like the man he was.

  Vivi didn’t want him, didn’t need him, and didn’t trust him. He sat at the piano, his hands wandering aimlessly over the keys, and realized that it mattered a hell of a lot more than it should. Because, if nothing else, the last few weeks had given him a whole new perspective on Vivi—a new appreciation for the woman she was.

  And she didn’t think he was worth it.

  It was a blow to his ego and his pride.

  Unable to focus, he took his coffee to the balcony. Two days ago, he’d rearranged the furniture so that all the chairs faced the other way. It gave him a different view, but more important it kept him from staring at the door of Vivi’s gallery as if life was a bad, broody music video. He’d seen her a couple of times entering or leaving the gallery, but she never looked up in his direction.

  While Vivi hadn’t dropped out of the public spotlight, she was definitely keeping a low profile, refusing to comment on Connor’s whereabouts or their sudden lack of public togetherness.

  As far as he could tell Vivi, had simply decided to pretend he didn’t exist.

  And why did that bother him so much?

  He’d made a heap of money singing about this moment, this feeling—even if he’d never truly experienced it before, never wanted to get emotionally involved with anyone before, ever. And now he knew why. It sucked. Once he got over it, though, he’d probably make a boatload more money from the songs he would write. He snorted. The whole music industry was predicated on the misery of failed relationships.

  Damn it, he didn’t want to suffer for his art or any of that crap. It was pathetic and ridiculous and shameful, but he wanted Vivi. He wanted that feeling of ease and contentment that came from being with her. He missed her smile and the way she rolled her eyes at him when he said something stupid, and the way she grounded him in reality when he started believing his own press releases.

  He wanted Vivi to want him the way he wanted her. He wanted Vivi to love him.

  Because he was in love with her.

  He sighed and let his head fall back. Great timing figuring that out.

  Or maybe it wasn’t.

  He might have been a little slow getting to this point, but she’d hated him for twenty-something years and managed to come around—and she’d come far enough to admit she wanted more. She’d only had a few days to hate him this time, and she didn’t know that he was in love with her. He might be able to salvage this.

  How was a damn fine question, though.

  It wasn’t like he could just call her. Even if she deigned to take his call, this was news that needed to be delivered in person. But he had no idea where she was. If he went to the gallery to look for her someone would notice—and the chances of that working out well were slim to none.

  Which meant his best bet was to call Lorelei.

  It took him forever to find her number, and by the time she answered he was feeling more confident about the possibilities.

  “It’s Connor.”

  “I know.” The clipped words, followed by silence, undermined that confidence a little. She’d always been an ally, but now…Whatever Vivi had told her, it had turned Lorelei against him as well. He’d really screwed this up.

  “Do you know where Vivi is?”

  “Of course.”

  Sisterly loyalties were obviously stronger than he’d thought. This was going to be worse than pulling teeth. But this was nothing compared to the reception he expected from Vivi, so it would be good practice.

  “Could you tell me where she is?”

  “I could,” she stressed, “but why on earth would I want to?”

  “Because it’s really, really important that I talk to her.”

  “Let me save you some time, Connor. She doesn’t want to talk to you.”

  “I just need to tell her something. Please, Lorelei?”

  “Why don’t you give me the message and I’ll pass it a long.”

  He wanted to bang his head against something hard. It would probably be easier in the long run to sit on her front porch until she came home. It would be very public, and possibly very messy, but it might still be preferable to this.

  No, if it got ugly, he didn’t want it on the blogs. “It’s not that kind of message.”

  “Then, no. I’m not going to let you hurt her more. You’ve done enough damage.”

  “And I want to fix it.”

  “Really?” Lorelei’s voice held interest for the first time in this conversation and it buoyed his hopes.

  “Yes. That’s why I need to find her. To apologize and tell her that I—” He stopped himself. If he was going to say the words, he should say them to Vivi first. He rubbed his temples, feeling like a complete idiot right now. “There’s something she needs to know.”

  Lorelei thought for a moment, and he hoped that meant he was winning her over. When she spoke, he heaved a sigh of relief. “She’s got a ton going on today—”

  That figured.

  “—but she should be home by five-thirty or six, maybe?”

  He didn’t want to wait that long. “Where is she now, Lorelei?”

  “It’s that important, huh? All righty, then.” He thought he could hear a smile. “She has m
eetings this morning—Arts Council, maybe?—then a luncheon of some sort. She’ll be at your mom’s at three, of course—”

  “My mom’s?”

  “Oh, how quickly we forget. It’s the third Thursday of the month. That’s the Musical Association meeting.”

  Of course.

  “That’ll work. Thanks, Lorelei.”

  Her voice turned deadly serious. “Don’t screw this up. If you hurt her, I will strangle you with Mardi Gras beads and throw your body in the bayou. Understand?”

  “Perfectly.”

  She laughed. “I’m actually looking forward to this meeting now. Good luck.”

  Lorelei hung up, and Connor felt optimistic for the first time in days. Vivi would be tougher to win over, but Lorelei wouldn’t have provided the information if she didn’t believe Connor had something to say that Vivi would want to hear. That boded well.

  He had a couple of hours to figure out what he was going to say and how he was going to do it. He knew the when and the where, but beyond that…His brain went blank.

  Lorelei’s words came back to him: Don’t screw this up.

  He had to do this right.

  For the first time ever, he had a bout of stage fright.

  Vivi wanted to care about what Mrs. Gilroy was saying about the annual Musical Association Ball, but honestly she couldn’t manage to pay attention—much less dredge up enough of a damn to offer anything to the conversation. From the looks Mrs. Gilroy kept giving her, Vivi had to guess that she was surprised she had so little to say.

  But the truth was Vivi didn’t care about centerpieces or invitation lists. She didn’t care about the budget or potential donors. She didn’t even care that Mrs. Mansfield had promised her famous petit fours after the business meeting.

  She just didn’t care. About anything.

  She’d tried the time-honored tradition of ice cream and mindless TV, but that had only provided time for self-recrimination and painful moping. Coming face-to-face with the fact she was sanctimonious, supercilious, uptight and everything else Connor had called her was downright depressing. She deserved every bit of the pain she was feeling and had no one to blame but herself that she’d screwed this up so bad.

  So she’d gone the opposite route, covering herself in work in the hopes it would keep her busy enough not to think and possibly redeem herself at the same time. Even adding three new committees to her schedule hadn’t filled the empty spaces. All it did was occupy her time and exhaust her enough to sleep at night.

  But it didn’t mean anything or fill her with any satisfaction. She felt like a fraud.

  She didn’t want to go home, but she certainly didn’t want to sit here in Connor’s mother’s parlor under the gaze of twenty women who all knew she’d been involved with Connor and were dying to ask questions that etiquette mandated were none of their business. Mrs. Mansfield kept giving her long, inscrutable looks from her seat under a picture of Connor at his high school graduation.

  I should have just skipped this meeting.

  Her mom, showing clairvoyance, patted her knee under the table and gave a small squeeze of support. On her left Lorelei, unbelievably, looked enraptured by the discussion of the possibility of a “Winter Wonderland” theme. Aside from the ridiculous fact the Musical Association Ball would be held in the sweltering heat of August, same as it had been for the last thirty-five years, Lorelei hadn’t given the ball a second thought since her presentation seven years ago. She only came to these meetings because Mom expected her to, so this newfound interest in the Association’s business was a new development.

  Vivi gave herself a strong mental slap and sat up straight in her chair with the intent of listening to Mrs. Gilroy and coming up with something constructive to add. Like it or not, this was her life. Connor had been an interlude, a fling, a stray outside of the norm. Like all experiences, it had something to teach her—mainly about the dangers of straying outside the norm.

  But the norm was very hard to find now. Not giving a damn about Connor beyond the fact she couldn’t stand him was the norm, and it was nearly impossible to get back to that state of being. It was the first challenge of her life that didn’t hold excitement or appeal. She didn’t even want to try.

  Her best hope was that time would help. She’d overheard Mrs. Mansfield tell Mrs. Raines that Connor would be going back to L.A. sooner than expected to take care of some business. To Vivi, that had felt like a slap, but she knew that not having Connor around, staying just yards from her gallery’s door, would be good for her in the long run.

  If that didn’t work…Moving to a different city herself was an option under serious consideration as well.

  Through the jumble of her thoughts Vivi heard the magic words “meeting adjourned.” The ladies of the Musical Association headed for the sideboard en masse. Vivi leaned toward her mother. “I’m going to leave now. My allergies are giving me a splitting headache.”

  Lorelei turned toward her and frowned. “You don’t have allergies.”

  “Well, something is giving me a headache.”

  Mom stepped in. “Go home and lie down, Vivi. I hope you feel better.”

  “Good afternoon, ladies. I hear my mom made petit fours.”

  The silence that fell in the wake of Connor’s entrance was total as the matriarchs of New Orleans society swiveled their heads to Connor and then to Vivi.

  “Connor, sweetheart.” Mrs. Mansfield swept forward to give her only son a hug. “This is certainly a surprise.”

  On cue, everyone started speaking again—slightly louder than necessary in an uncomfortable attempt to seem normal. Her mom’s lips pulled into a tight line and she stepped closer to Vivi. Lorelei was grinning like a fool. Everyone else was ignoring her—except Connor, who seemed to be trying to stare her into the floor even as he greeted the women who pressed forward to see him. The ice that had formed around her feet at the sound of Connor’s voice felt impossible to break, and Vivi’s pulse jumped as adrenaline surged through her veins.

  Connor’s voice sounded unnaturally loud. “I remember when Mom used to make me come and play for Association meetings. I thought it might be fun to do it without being forced.”

  “For once.” Mrs. Mansfield smiled with pride. “That would be wonderful.”

  Connor moved to the piano, and the women seemed to be back in their seats instantly. Only Vivi remained standing. Leaving now would only call attention to herself and embarrass her. She gave the universe the chance to grant her wish and let the floor swallow her, but when that didn’t happen, she sank carefully into her chair with what she hoped looked like poise.

  The need to strangle Connor felt comfortably familiar, and actually helped tame her racing heart. She felt her mother’s hand slide under hers in support, and then, unbelievably, Lorelei did the same from the other side.

  Connor played a quick progression of notes. “Trust my mom to keep it in perfect tune.”

  Mrs. Mansfield looked ready to burst with pride and pleasure.

  “This is the Musical Association, so I should probably play some Chopin or Liszt. If I remember correctly, Mrs. Gilroy loves Rachmaninoff.” He played a few bars.

  Now Mrs. Gilroy had the same expression as Mrs. Mansfield. Vivi focused her eyes on an oil painting above the piano and took slow breaths.

  “But I’m a bit out of practice on the classics, ladies—sorry. I’m actually here to get your collective and esteemed opinion on a new piece I’ve been working on.”

  Vivi could feel the pleasure of the members. Spare me. Connor had these women eating out of the palms of his very talented hands. She knew the feeling.

  “It’s actually a song inspired by our own Vivienne LaBlanc.”

  A gasp fluttered though the crowd.

  “We’ve spent quite a lot of time together the last few weeks, as you know.”

  I hate him. Did he have to have the last word, humiliating her in front of people she’d known her entire life? If I ever get out of here, I’m moving t
o a cabin in Wisconsin.

  “It’s funny how coming home can bring you full circle. One of the first songs I ever wrote was for Vivi. We were in junior high and, while the rest of the class enjoyed it, it didn’t go over very well with Vivi herself.”

  No, I’ll kill him first, and then move to Wisconsin.

  “I hope she likes this one a bit better.”

  Vivi was so focused on not looking at him, not completely losing it in front of all these people, that the music didn’t register at first. Then shock moved through her. Sixteen notes that she knew by heart. The sixteen notes that he’d taught her that first night they were together.

  She remembered sitting inside the circle of his arms while he helped her find the keys, and then the way he’d made the music around her. The memory brought a physical sensation that bordered on pain. Her eyes began to burn, and she quickly swallowed the lump forming in her throat.

  Look at me, what do you see?

  A man, longing to be free.

  Connor’s voice rolled over the room like a rich blanket, and pain streaked through her soul.

  Free to be, true to you,

  To the end.

  Vivi could feel twenty pairs of eyes on her, but she refused to take her eyes off the painting above the piano.

  I’ll listen close and understand.

  To the end.

  The music grew louder and Connor’s voice grew stronger.

  I dare you to hold me.

  One touch and you’ll never know lonely again.

  Although she didn’t want to, Vivi couldn’t stop herself from risking a peek at Connor. His eyes bored straight into hers.

  Again and again, we’ll just be—

  To the end.

  Vivi’s feet finally unfroze, and she moved quickly to the door. She was nearly blinded by the tears in her eyes, but she made it down the porch stairs without falling and headed for the gate.

  Connor caught her before she had it open.

  “Vivi, where are you going?”

  “Anywhere but here. I can’t believe you just did that.”

  Connor’s eyes went wide. “That? That was my attempt at an apology.”