by J. Smith
Jenna chuckled at him and teased, “Well it's nice to see you are a ray of sunshine wherever you go today, Erik.”
He rolled his eyes at her and smirked. “It hardly mattered, Mademoiselle!” he said, using the formal title in jest this time, instead of in anger. “Christine was far too distracted by the ball that the managers are holding in honor of opening night.”
“A ball?” she asked.
“Yes, a masquerade ball,” he informed, as if the matter bored him. “To be held immediately following the first performance. She actually asked me if I would attend.”
“And what did you say?” Jenna asked in excitement.
“I told her that Angels did not dance!” He huffed.
“Oh Erik!” Jenna sighed. “Angels may not dance, but men do. You should go. It would be the perfect opportunity to introduce yourself to Christine as a man. And since you wear a mask all the time, you would be in your element.”
Erik groaned, “Can we please not discuss this tonight, Jenna? I just want us to enjoy a quiet evening. Maybe reading by the fire? Perhaps later I could make us some tea.”
Jenna smiled and remembered Omid's words from earlier, about Erik having wanted to put her first. For now, she would let him. “I guess I should go make dinner,” she said, as she rose from the settee and began to make her way to the kitchen. When she was almost there, she turned to him and called, “Erik I really did miss you this morning.”
He looked up at her with a shy smile. “I missed you too Jenna. I missed you too.”
Omid moved quickly from his hiding place behind the wall when he saw Jenna approach the kitchen. Oh these two fools! They were so in love with each other that their feelings were almost a palpable thing. And yet, he was beginning to believe they would truly never figure it out. They hemmed and hawed, and actually looked for obstacles to set in the way of their love instead of trying to find ways to be together. They would forever be lonely and pining for one another at this rate!
Without his help, that was. As he traversed the tunnels of the opera house to the streets that would lead him to his home, Omid was hatching a plan. It might just light a fire under the feet of those two nincompoops who were both so smart about many things, but so blind when it came to the one thing that truly mattered: their love for one another.
32 A DANCE WITH AN ANGEL
“Ahh, good morning, beautiful,” Charleson said, rising from his café table when he saw Penny walk into the room. He had been enjoying a cup of coffee while waiting for her to join him. She'd called late last night and said she had some things she'd wanted to discuss. He'd offered to come by her hotel room, knowing that their discussions could be so much more productive—at least for him—in bed. But she had declined, saying she'd rather meet for breakfast. So here he stood, in the hospital coffee shop, kissing her cheek as he ushered her into her seat. She did not display the blush that usually appeared whenever he showed her some affection, and he noted that with a bit of concern.
His time with Penny was certainly not a love connection. The somewhat pleasant dalliance had, however, led to great advances to his cause of being named as Jenna Wilson's primary physician, which allowed him to try the drug therapy on her. If she had responded positively, his name would have been published in the leading medical journals, since treating coma cases with drugs was still new therapeutic ground. Of course, she had shown no improvement, and perhaps—if he were honest—did back-pedal a little. Still the experiment had been worth it, if for no other reason than the sheer pleasure he derived from watching that fool first year resident squirm.
He remembered him from Med School—always so quiet, always so studious; rarely with his nose out of a book. He had been completely oblivious to the attentions the female students showered on him, always preferring to spend Saturday night with his studies, never participating in the parties or other social occasions that were a natural part of dorm life. Blaine had been in a few seminars with him, and though he was brilliant, Blaine had never understood his backwardness and considered him to be a waste of his time. That was, until Cynthia took note of him.
Blaine had had his share of women during his Med School tenure. He was often with another girl every Friday or Saturday night. He did the work required, and he made the grades, but he also intended to have a little fun—because you're only young once, right?
But that was before he met Cynthia. Long raven hair, and stunning gray eyes, Cynthia was a beauty like he had never seen before. He was immediately smitten and tried to get to know her, thinking it might finally be time to settle down with one girl for a while. They had a few dates—movies, lunch—but Cynthia never seemed as smitten with him as he was with her. When he finally realized the reason why, he couldn't believe it. While he was crazy over Cynthia, Cynthia was falling head over heels for the bookworm! And apparently, she was enough to finally make him take note that he was a guy, because they started dating.
After that, Blaine had not stopped trying to woo her away from him. He insinuated himself into her study group, and made sure to be named as her lab partner. He would sometimes meet her after class, or walk her back to her dorm after late lectures. He pulled out all the “friend” stops with her, but he had not been able to sway her away from the lame underclassman. One night, Blaine even got drunk, and went over to her dorm room with the excuse of having a research question, and forced a kiss on her lips. Of course, that was when Dr. Loser had shown up and pulled him off of her punching him in the nose. Cynthia and Dr. Loser lasted until graduation—when she left the country after being recruited by Doctors Without Borders. Funny, Blaine had always pegged him to be the one who would run off and join a philanthropist cause. But no, lucky for Blaine, a year after he had started his own residency with the hospital, Dr. Loser had shown up. And it had only recently begun to get interesting.
With Jenna Wilson's case, even if the treatment had not worked, he had still won. He had seen something his colleague had wanted so desperately—as much as he himself had wanted Cynthia—and had taken it for himself. And if he had ruined it a little along the way, at this point, he honestly didn't care. Most coma patients never woke up anyway.
“Good morning, Blaine,” Penny responded, calling him back from his memories. He had to make a point to be attentive to her because it was only by keeping her clueless that this arrangement could possibly work.
“And how are you this morning?” he asked with an alluring smile. “After our very good night?” he reached out across the table and stroked the palm of her hand.
Penny looked down at the table and pulled her hand away, using it to smooth out the cloth napkin that was in front of her. “Quite frankly, Blaine, I'm not that good.”
“Oh?” he plastered a look of concern on his face. “And why is that, my sweet?”
She cleared her throat and looked up at him. “Because of Jenna. Last night, after you left, I went over to the hospital to see her.”
Blaine let out a husky chuckle, “Really darling? I thought for sure I had tired you out!”
“When I got there,” she continued, not letting his innuendos sway her purpose. “It struck me that she has made no more progress on the drugs than she had before you started giving them to her.”
“Well, Penny,” he said, trying to keep his tone soothing. “These things take time.”
“You said they wouldn't take this much time,” she countered. “Blaine, I think I would like you to take her off the drugs. I think I'd like to go back and try the sensory therapy her other doctor was trying on her. At least he seemed to be having some small measure of success.”
Blaine looked at her, his eyes growing cold. Again! That thorn in his side was doing it again! Interfering with his plans—getting in the way. “I see,” he said simply to Penny's statement. “Is there any way I could persuade you to keep trying the medication?”
“No,” Penny said, looking him square in the eye.
“Well,” he said, removing the napkin from his lap and tossing
some money down on the table, “I suppose I need to go write some orders.” He pushed back his chair and rose from the table.
“Blaine,” Penny called out to him.
“What is it?” he asked, looking very put out.
“This means we're finished as well.”
As if there would be any reason for him to continue banging a middle-aged woman now! “I understand, Ms. Wilson,” he responded, moving away to take his leave. “Enjoy your breakfast.”
Erik reached out his hand to help Jenna from the boat. It had been a long morning and afternoon of rehearsals, with only a quick jaunt to the pantries around lunchtime for a bite to eat. Though Jenna had awoken again with one of her headaches, she had not felt dizzy, and nothing would have caused her to leave Erik's side today. Her need for rest had proven disastrous yesterday, and she truly felt the best thing for her was to stay close to Erik at all times. Conveniently, he agreed with her diagnosis, having begun her treatment the night before with a quick dinner and a quiet night of reading and tea drinking in the parlor. He had not occupied his usual reading chair, but had joined her on the settee, and they had each enjoyed that arrangement just fine.
Today, he seemed to stick closer to her in the tunnels, even lifting her over a few of the obstacles she could easily have side stepped on her own, and he moved his seat a little nearer to hers in Box 5. Every now and then she had felt his fingers brush her hand, and they would glance at each other and smile, and blush, and go back to watching the rehearsals, contact broken. But the last time it happened, his fingers actually curled around her hand and lingered. She looked up at him, but his eyes remained steadfast on the stage. She did detect the hint of a blush in his cheek, though, so she followed his lead and looked back at the players. But her fingers circled his palm as well.
So now, when she grasped his hand to step out of the vessel, she did not immediately release it, and as he made no move to take it back, they walked hand in hand into the lair, two specters all in black, their capes billowing and swishing behind them.
“What in the bloody hell?” Erik blurted as the sitting room came into view.
His expertly appointed sitting room, in which the furnishings had arranged placed exactly as Erik wanted them, had been ransacked! Raided! Utterly destroyed. His beloved reading chair had been pushed to the far side of the room and now resided practically in the bookshelf. The settee remained, but it was much farther back from the fire, and cushions and blankets had been set out on the floor before it. The Persian rug had been rolled up and was stowed in a corner, out of the way, so that the floor between the settee and the hearth was laid bare. Myriad blooms were scattered about, some in vases placed on the floor, others woven into the arms of the candelabras. At the forefront of the room was his small dining table, elegantly set for two with a pair of silver plate covers arranged across from one another, and a lit candelabra in the center, red rose petals strewn about the cloth. Next to the table was an ice bucket on a stand, and in it were two bottles of the finest Parisian wine, one red, one white. Affixed to the side of it, was a note written on heavy parchment.
Enjoy this elegant feast and dance floor in preparation for the upcoming masquerade ball. (I cooked, I cleaned, but I assumed Erik would have the masks covered.) – Omid
P.S.: Don't ruin it, Erik.
“I really am going to have to kill him now,” Erik growled as he read the note a second time.
Jenna smiled, amused by Erik's grumpy reaction to Omid's efforts. She had been planning all along to try and discuss the masquerade ball over dinner with Erik tonight, and it's almost as if Omid somehow knew.
“Well before you do,” Jenna joked, “let's eat. After all, murder requires strength.”
Erik looked at the plates laid out on the table with disgust. “If he cooked, he probably poisoned it.”
“No, Erik,” she teased. “That's you you're thinking of.”
“Great idea!” he retorted. “Let's invite him over for dinner.”
“Oh, if you were to willingly invite him into your home, he would suspect that some scheme was afoot.”
“You're right,” he admitted, lost in thought. “Better idea,” he said, holding one finger up. “I'm going to poison the Cognac!”
“Erik!” Jenna laughed despite herself at what she hoped was simply his dark humor. “I'm hungry.” She removed her cloak, laying it across the back of his reading chair and moved over to the table. “Let's eat.”
Erik looked up at her and saw her, for the first time that day, without the cloak obscuring her figure. What he saw took his breath away. Jenna had chosen a coral and black ruffled frock that he vaguely remembered snagging from the costumery. However, though he had seen the dress before, he had not seen it on her.
The hue of the gown enhanced the natural peachy glow of her skin, making her eyes seem to glisten a little brighter. The bodice fit her better than most of the dresses he had chosen, and it needed no belt to expertly hug her curves—which Erik was noticing, for perhaps the first time, were rather pleasingly ample. The neckline on this dress fell a bit lower than the others too, and Erik was embarrassed to admit his eyes were lingering a bit overlong on the trim of delicate lace that skillfully framed the gentle rise of her bosom. She's beautiful, he thought to himself and he marveled at the fact that he had not really noticed it before. As she stood there, gazing at him, an absolute vision of sweetness, he was reminded of something he'd wanted to give her.
“I'll be right back!” he said, and quickly ran off to his bedroom to retrieve the mysterious item. When he returned, his hands were behind his back. Jenna looked at him quizzically, as he swallowed hard and said, “Since tonight's dinner is apparently going to be an elegant affair, I thought it fitting to give you this.” He held his hand out to her.
Jenna gasped at the gift proffered and she covered her mouth slowly with her hand. In Erik's grasp was a stunning cameo, depicting a rosebud whose beauty would never fade. It was surrounded by a setting of rich antique gold, and hung gracefully from a black velvet ribbon. Of all the roses he had ever given Christine, including the one she herself had left behind, this one was the sweetest, and Jenna knew she would cherish it all the days of her life. “My rose…” she said, with a hushed gasp.
“Hopefully you won't leave this one behind in the tunnels,” he responded drolly, to cover up his delight at her reaction, “since it shall be tied around your neck.”
“Oh, Erik,” Jenna said in a tearful whisper.
“Oh, don't cry, Jenna!” Erik cajoled awkwardly, not quite sure what to do with this moment.
“It's just so beautiful, Erik,” she murmured by way of explanation for her tears.
“Then it is fitting it should grace your neck, Mademoiselle,” he answered in a husky voice, which in no way conveyed any desire to push her away.
Jenna stared at him, transfixed. Something had changed in Erik in the last few moments, and the fire in his eyes set her heart aglow. It was almost as if…as if… No, she would not even let herself think like that! It could only lead to her getting hurt, for though Jenna knew Erik cared for her deeply, she'd always known his heart truly belonged to Christine.
“Will you help me put it on?” she asked in a shaky voice, pulling her hair away from her neck and turning around.
“Gladly,” Erik answered, as he lifted the necklace over her head with trembling hands. The scent of her hair tickled his nose, and he found himself intoxicated by the smell of soap and candles. Good lord, what was happening to him? Everything about Jenna tonight, her smile, her scent, her voice—it was as if it was all magnified a thousand times, and he had the strangest sensation that he was drowning. Stranger still, he wanted to.
Though his fingers were most uncooperative, he managed to tie a knot in the ribbon. “There,” he said, and his voice was deep and warm. “All finished.”
Jenna turned once again toward him, her hair loosed once more to rest on her collarbone.
“Thank you, Erik,” Jenna said, a
smile lighting her eyes.
“Lovely,” he whispered, gazing at the woman before him who he was seeing in such a different light tonight.
“Yes,” she nodded, placing her fingers to the cameo, where it rested on her chest. “It is.”
Not quite ready to correct her mistaken assumption, Erik gracefully pulled out Jenna's chair. “My lady,” he said, making a gallant gesture with his hand.
He caught the blush on her cheeks as she nodded at him with lowered lashes and took her seat at the table. “Let's see what the Persian cooked up for dinner, now, shall we?” With one arm tucked around his back, Erik leaned over and removed the cover from her dish.
Delicious aromas and spices wafted up around her, but Jenna barely noticed because Erik was standing so close. It was a little easier to breathe when he crossed over and took his seat on the other side of the table, but not by much, because then she had the view of his smoldering eyes and the gentle upward curve of the exposed side of his lips, and the last thing on her mind was eating. The way he was staring at her almost made her wish she were the meal laid out before him. Or the dessert.
Jenna! She scolded herself, and realized that if she did not start some kind of conversation she was going to embarrass herself by drooling into her dinner. “So,” she said, clearing her throat to try to dislodge the dryness that had gathered there. “Would you care for some wine? Personally, I'm parched.”
“Red or white, Jenna?” Erik asked, reaching toward the bottles that Omid had so thoughtfully uncorked, allowing them a chance to breathe.
“Oh, white,” Jenna responded, and Erik deftly filled her glass. After he placed the bottle back in the bucket without pouring himself a glass, Jenna asked him, “Aren't you going to have some?”