House of Mirrors

by Yvonne Whittal

“Yes…and no.” She turned away from him and stared out of the window at the small sunlit garden beyond. Everything looked so blessedly normal out there in comparison with the wild confusion raging inside of her. Her throat felt tight, and her face felt stiff with the effort to control her expression. “Why me, Grant?” she finally asked without turning. “Why me?”

  “You’re lively company, you’re a good cook, and my shirts have never been ironed so perfectly since you took my clothes to task.”

  “I suppose I should feel flattered,” she laughed with a note of faint hysteria in her voice.

  “Dammit, Liz, if it’s all that romantic nonsense you want, then forget it but…”

  She turned when he paused, and as their eyes met across the room he said” “I have every reason to believe we’ll have a good marriage.”

  Liz felt her cheeks grow warm, but she did not look away. “I presume you’re referring to the physical side of marriage?”

  “I am.”

  She turned away from the mockery in his eyes and said angrily, “You’re not really offering me much, are you? Only physical desire.”

  “You’ll never want for anything, Liz.”

  His voice was low and quiet, but there was wealth of meaning threaded through that remark, and she rounded on him furiously. “Do you think I would consider any man’s financial status of prime importance?”

  “Confound it!” he growled, lighting a cigarette and blowing the smoke forcibly towards the ceiling. “What do you want, then?”

  “I want what you obviously can’t give me,” she replied with that direct honestly which was so true to her nature, and this was not the time to hide behind evasive statements, she decided when she looked directly into those steel-grey eyes observing her questioningly. “I want your love, Grant.”

  He looked taken aback, and a strained silence hovered between them before he asked, “Why is that so important?”

  “Because I happen to love you.”

  She had spoken those words quietly and calmly, and without hesitation. The secret, so long hidden, was revealed, and if he had doubted her sincerity, then one look into her unwavering eyes would have given him his answer.

  “You’re nothing if not truthful,” he almost accused her, and she winced inwardly.

  “I believe in honesty at all times, no matter how much it may hurt.”

  For endless seconds he said nothing while he studied the tip of his cigarette with frowning intensity, then he raised his glance to hers and said roughly, “I can’t give you what I haven’t go to give, Liz. I can give you respect, companionship, and the physical side of love, but no more than that.” His mouth twisted into a cynical smile which stabbed painfully at her heart. “For what it’s worth, that’s my proposal.”

  “I suppose I must be a glutton for punishment,” she smiled unsteadily, making up her mind suddenly despite all the warnings flashing through her brain and, kneeling down at his feet, she said simply, “I accept.”

  Was it relief she saw in his eyes? She could not be sure, but he put out his cigarette and drew her up into his arms. She lost herself in his embrace, and returned his fierce kisses with a warmth that flowed from her heart. She wished this moment would go on for ever, but she realised that nothing lasts for ever when Grant released her much too soon for her liking.

  “It’s time you went back to the safety of Stacy’s home,” he said harshly, his eyes mocking her for her reluctance to leave him. “We’ll discuss all the details tomorrow.”

  Liz did not argue with him. She was too happy, and also too agonisingly aware of the fact that she had agreed to marry a man who could never love her the way she loved him.

  It was not until after dinner that evening that Liz passed on the news of her intended marriage to Stacy and Angus and, as she had expected, her sister took it badly.

  “Have you gone out of your mind?” Stacy demanded, her usually soft voice high-pitched and anxious.

  “I love him, Stacy.”

  “You’re a fool if you imagine he could ever feel the same way about you.”

  That hurt; it would always hurt, but Liz dared not let Stacy see it “I know he doesn’t love me. He made no secret of it, and I accepted his proposal on those terms.”

  “What about Myra Cavendish?” Stacy demanded. “What if she decides to come back into his life?”

  A cold hand gripped Liz’s heart, but she smiled and announced with dramatic humour, “I’m hoping that by that time he will have fallen madly in love with me.”

  “Oh, Liz!” Stacy shook her fair, curly head and glanced briefly at her husband for support. “Do you know what you’re letting yourself in for?”

  “I know it isn’t going to be easy,” Liz sighed, “but I’m hoping for the best.”

  “Well, if I might interrupt a moment to say something,” said Angus, coming across to where Liz stood clutching her hands so tightly in front of her that they ached. “Congratulations, Liz,” he smiled, hugging her against him and kissing her on her cool cheek. “When’s the great day to be?”

  “We haven’t discussed it yet, but I-” She bit her lip and glanced beseechingly at Stacy. “I presume it will be soon.”

  Stacy followed her husband’s example, but there was anxiety in her doe-like eyes when she gripped Liz’s hands. “I’m afraid for you.”

  “Don’t be silly my love,” Angus laughed comfortably, draping a heavy arm about each of them. “Liz can take care of herself.”

  That night, when Liz lay awake in bed, Angus’ words drifted back into her mind. Liz can take care of herself. She appreciated his confidence in her, but was she capable of taking care of herself? Would her love for Grant not make her more vulnerable under the circumstances?

  Liz slept badly that night, in fact she hardly slept at all, and she got up the following morning with a thumping headache which did not abate until she had swallowed down a couple of aspirins.

  When she arrived at Grant’s cottage that morning she found him sitting at the kitchen table with a mug of coffee between his hands. He was dressed in khaki pants and a blue shirt, but his jaw was unshaven, and there were shadows beneath his eyes.

  “I decided to skip the exercise this morning,” he answered her silent query.

  “Oh.” She studied him more closely. “You’re not ill, are you?”

  “I simple didn’t sleep too well,” he replied, gesturing her into the chair close to his, and she smiled faintly as she joined him at the table. “Neither did I have much sleep,” she confessed quietly, and he glanced at her sharply.

  “Have you been doubting your decision?”

  “No,” she shook her head and eyed him anxiously. “Have you?”

  He put down his mug and slipped his hand beneath her hair. His fingers caressed the nape of her neck, awakening little nerves that sent shivers of pleasure down her spine, then he drew her head his. Their lips clung, tasted, explored, and the intimacy of his kisses made her feel a little dizzy with the emotions he aroused.

  “I want you, Liz, and God knows I need you,” he groaned against her mouth.

  “We have to talk, and at this rate we’re not getting anywhere fast.”

  His voice was low and seductive, and she responded to it in a way she had never thought possible, but he was right, they had a lot to discuss. Taking the initiative, she broke his light clasp and sat back in her chair.

  “All right, let’s talk,” she said unsteadily, trying to behave naturally even though her cheeks were flushed, and her heart was racing at an uncomfortable pace.

  “How soon will you marry me?” Grant asked evenly, and she envied him his obvious control.

  “As soon as you wish.”

  “Saturday?”

  Liz felt her heart lurch in her breast. “That’s two days away!”

  “We could postpone it, of course, if you want the usual wedding with all the trappings.”

  He made the offer, and he would go through with it if she wished, but she sensed somehow that an elab
orate wedding did not appeal to him. She was not so sure that she wanted a big wedding herself. With her father not there to take her into the church, and Stacy with a baby barely a few weeks old, it would perhaps not be such a good idea, Liz decided.

  “I think a quiet wedding would do nicely, and Saturday will be fine,” she assured him after a thoughtful pause.

  “What about your family?” asked Grant, looking oddly relieved.

  “They’ll agree to whatever we decide.”

  His heavy eyebrows rose a fraction. “There were no objections to the news that you were thinking of marrying me?”

  “Stacy thought I’d gone out of my mind, but I’m old enough to make my own decisions,” she brushed aside his query, then she changed the subject quickly. “We will live here, won’t we?”

  “For a while, yes.”

  “Grant…” She hesitated but the question had to be asked. “What about Myra?”

  His jaw hardened, and his eyes became slivers of ice. “We won’t discuss her.”

  “But-“

  “I said we won’t discuss her!” he interrupted savagely, thrusting back his chair and getting to his feet. “She belongs in the past, and that’s where she’ll stay.”

  “Very well, if that’s what you want,” she replied coldly.

  “Liz, please try to understand.”

  His hands were shaking when they gripped her shoulders, and then he was drawing her up into his arms, and holding her so tightly that she was finding it difficult to breathe. His cheek was rough against her own, his breath warm against her temple, and then he was kissing her with a fierce hunger that made her numb with a new kind of fear. What was there he wanted her to understand? That he was using her to forget Myra Cavendish? It hurt… oh, God, it hurt!

  “I think I’d better get on with what I’m supposed to do,” she said at length when her lips were freed from his fiery kisses.

  “I’ll take a drive into town to make the necessary arrangement.”

  “You’d better shave first,” she suggested, her cheek still stinging where his beard had scratched her, and she could not help noticing the scars on the back of his hand when he fingered his jaw.

  “I’d better shave,” he agreed, grinning as he walked out of the kitchen and left her clinging limply to the cupboard.

  Liz’s legs were shaking, and she felt a little sick inside, but she had never lacked confidence, and she was not going to lose her courage. Their marriage was going to succeed, she would make every effort to see that it did, and in time, perhaps, he might learn to love her a little.

  Liz went shopping that afternoon or a wedding outfit, and chose an ivory-coloured suit with a wide-brimmed hat to match. It was nothing elaborate, but when she observed herself in the full-length mirror she agreed with the saleslady that she looked cool and chic.

  “Is that what you’re going to wear on your wedding day?” Stacy asked when she walked into Liz’s room that evening and saw the outfit hanging against the wardrobe.

  Liz looked up from her work and nodded. “I thought it would look smart and not too flashy.”

  “You’ll look lovely in it,” Stacy assured her, fingering the expensive material.

  “Do you really think so?”

  “You don’t need me to tell you that,” Stacy smiled, then she remembered why she was there. “We have a guest for dinner, so I suggest you put on something nice.”

  “Is it someone important?” Liz asked absently, nibbling at her pencil and allowing her mind to drift back to the characters in the story she was attempting to write.

  “I’ll leave that for you to decide,” Stacy laughed softly. “And come down as soon as you’re ready, will?”

  She went out, closing the door quietly behind her, and Liz sighed irritably.

  She wanted to get this story in the post before Saturday, and it was difficult enough trying to write while she thought of what still lay ahead of her. If Angus and Stacy were entertaining a guest this evening, then she wished, for once, that they had left her out of their arrangements. She was not exactly in the right mood to be polite to strangers, but for Stacy’s sake she supposed she would have to be.

  “Put on something nice,” Stacy had said and, studying the dresses hanging in the wardrobe, Liz selected a silky sapphire blue frock which she had worn only once before. It was cool and comfortable, and it added a touch of sophistication to her appearance.

  When she observed herself in the mirror some minutes later the words “fragile and feminine” leapt into her mind, and she giggled to herself. Deep down she would always be a tomboy at heart, but there was one man who had always succeeded in making her intensely aware of her femininity, and soon, very soon, he was going to be her husband.

  Husband. The word shook her considerably. Grant would be her possessor, and she the possessed. Body and soul she would be his to do with as he pleased, and thinking about it in those terms suddenly made her nervous and edgy. She had no experience in sexual intimacies; it was something quite few of her friends had indulged in, but Liz had been rigidly determined to remain untouched, almost as if she had been saving herself for the man she would one day marry. What if, as result of her inexperience, she failed Grant?

  It was a frightening thought, but she thrust it aside for the moment, and went downstairs.

  She could hear Stacy in the kitchen, and Angus was in his study presumably chatting to their guest. She would have a few moments alone to control that awful tremor at the pit of her stomach, Liz thought when she entered the living-room, but her heart almost stopped beating when she saw Grant standing there facing the door.

  Liz could not remember afterwards whether he had given her some indication, or whether she had taken the initiative, but she went into his arms as naturally as a pigeon to its nest, and buried her face against the jacket of his grey, lightweight suit their lips met somehow, and clung, and then she was easing herself a little away from his disturbing nearness.

  “Why didn’t someone tell me you were here?” she demanded breathlessly.

  “You would have been in the way.”

  “Oh?”

  “We had quite a few things to discuss.” asked, tilting her head back and eying him suspiciously.

  “Such as you and me, our wedding on Saturday afternoon at four o’clock, and the future,” he told her with a twisted smile, and her nerves knotted themselves into a tight ball.

  “Grant-”

  “Stacy has been very helpful, and we’re being given these few minutes alone together so that I can give you this,” he brushed aside her fears and, dipping his hand into his jacket pocket, he brought out something which glittered brightly between his fingers.

  It was a ruby, like a bright red drop of blood set in a circle of small diamonds, and her hand was shaking in his when he slipped it on to her finger. “Oh, Grant,” she murmured unsteadily. “How did you know it would fit so perfectly?”

  “I came here this morning, and Stacy gave me one of your dress rings to take along with me.” Overcome with surprise, she could not think of anything to say until he gripped her fingers tightly and asked, “Do you like it?”

  “It’s beautiful, but-”

  “But?” he prompted when she halted abruptly to bite down hard on her quivering lip.

  “You shouldn’t have,” she managed in a choked voice, her eyes brimming with tears.

  “I’ve never seen you cry before,” he announced with a mixture of concern and amusement.

  “It’s one of my many failings,” she laughed through her tears. “When I’m happy I nearly always cry.”

  His hands framed her face, and with a surprising display of tenderness he kissed away the tears that had escaped to roll down her cheeks.

  “May we come in?” Stacy interrupted, knocking discreetly on the door.

  “Yes, please do,” Grant announced gallantly as they drew apart to see Stacy entering the living-room with Angus following close behind.

  “I think this occasion calls for
champagne, don’t you?” said Angus, producing a bottle of the best.

  “It certainly does,” Liz agreed, linking her arm through Grant’s, and glancing up at him in an attempt to read his expression, but there was nothing there except amused tolerance.

  The cork popped loudly from the neck of the bottle, and Angus proposed a grand toast. They drank their champagne and talked and laughed, and Liz could almost make herself believe that Grant was as happy as she if it were not for that distant look in his eyes which she glimpsed on several occasions. Was he thinking of Myra, and how different it had been when they had become engaged? Was he wishing that it was Myra who was wearing his ring on this occasion?

  These thoughts hurt, and Liz found it extremely difficult making conversation during dinner that evening, but no one seemed to notice her lack of participation.

  When Grant finally announced that it was time for him to leave it was natural for Liz to accompany him out to where he had parked his Jaguar. There were so many things she wanted to tell him, but the words simply would not come, and his preoccupation with his own thoughts made her feel worse.

  “Will I see you tomorrow?” he asked, turning towards her in the darkness when they stood beside his car.

  “Of course,” she replied with a forced brightness that sounded false to her own ears.

  His hands were on her shoulders, his thumbs caressing the smooth skin below her collarbone, and sending delicious little tremors along her taut nerves It had almost therapeutic effect on her tense body, and she found herself relaxing, like a spring uncoiling slowly.

  The evening had not been a roaring success, but the painful thoughts faded when his mouth found hers in the darkness, and she slid her arms inside his jacket, pressing closer to his hard length in an unconscious effort to ease away those stubborn little fears lurking in her mind.

  “Grant,” she whispered eventually, straining a little away from him in an attempt to see his expression, but the moon had shifted behind the clouds, and his face was no more than a blur. “If you want to change your mind about marrying me, I’ll understand.”

  “What makes you think I want to do that?”