"I'm not interested in these men. And they're only interested in me for the moment."
"It's not necessary for everything you do to have lifelong significance. Never pass up a chance to have a little fun, even if it lasts only for a moment."
"I'd have thought a person as serious as you would reject such a philosophy out of hand."
"I can't stop wondering how many young men who died in the war passed up a chance for a few moments of fun because it wasn't dignified, grownup, or didn't have any serious meaning."
"I don't understand you," Felicity said. "Here you are telling me to enjoy some frivolous moments of fun and in the next breath you're talking about death bed regrets."
"Call it my New England Puritan conscience showing through."
"It sounds more like you're looking back on your life and regretting some of the things you did ... or didn't do. You've got plenty of time. You're still young."
"Even young people can have regrets for moments lost and never to be retrieved. Now stop arguing. I want to dance."
Felicity allowed herself to be led onto the floor with a suitable show of reluctance. Holt could feel the tension in her body, but he had noticed the way she watched the other dancers, as if it was a pleasure she'd enjoyed in the past but didn't expect to enjoy again. She was stiff when he put his arm around her, but it took only a moment for Holt to realize that Felicity danced much better than he did. "You've been holding out on me," he said.
"All Southern girls learn to dance."
"You must have danced a lot."
"We used to have parties all the time before the war."
"We don't dance much in Vermont. It might get young couples too excited."
"Where did you learn to dance?"
"Vivian taught me. We had lots of parties in Virginia, too."
But dancing with a girl wasn't the same as holding a woman in his arms. He found it impossible to pay attention to his feet when he held Felicity so close. He wondered what she was like before the war, before her father's condition got worse, before they lost their money. Did she smile, laugh, flirt with handsome young men? He was certain they wanted to flirt with her.
"You're easy to dance with," Holt said.
"You, too."
"It's too late to start telling me lies, even little white ones. I know I'm a terrible dancer."
Felicity laughed softly. "You're not an accomplished dancer, but my toes are still uninjured."
"Give me time."
"You can only do so much damage in one dance."
"You're going to dance a whole lot more before the evening is over. There are at least three young men here who'd like to know you better."
But he wasn't ready to yield to those eager young men just yet. He liked dancing with her. She felt good in his arms. She didn't resist being close to him, seemed actually to enjoy being with him. For the last few minutes, she had lowered her defenses. She was treating him as a man she enjoyed dancing with. That was a change he found he liked.
"We ought to do this more often," Holt said.
"Then you'll have to find a way to get invited to more parties."
"We can have our own dance."
"Not unless you have a fortune you haven't told me about. It's expensive to hire an orchestra and buy food. If you don't know the right people, nobody will come."
"You don't have to be ..." He broke off, his thoughts breaking like a fragile thread.
"I don't have to be what?" Felicity asked.
"That woman who just arrived," Holt said. "It's Vivian."
Chapter Twelve
Holt had anticipated this moment for more than six years. He had imagined how he would feel when he caught his first glimpse of Vivian. He'd pictured what she would look like as a mature woman rather than a seventeen-year-old woman-child. He'd rehearsed a thousand different conversations, replaying them in his mind and rewriting them every time. He envisioned the smile that would light up her face when she saw him, the old familiar sparkle in her eyes when she shared a confidence. He'd tried to foresee every possibility.
And they'd all been wrong. He felt paralyzed, unable to move, unable to speak.
Part of him wanted to rush across the room and tell Vivian how long he'd searched for her, how much he'd missed her.
Another part of him wanted to hold back, to be sure of his ground, wanted to know why she'd disappeared without telling him where she was going, why she'd never attempted to contact him after her husband died.
But another part of him harbored totally unexpected feelings. It urged him to leave before she saw him, to disappear and never again attempt to contact her. It whispered to him that her part of his life was in the past, not to attempt to revive it. He wasn't the same man he'd been when he'd fallen in love with a charming pixie. Even if Vivian had stayed the same, he had changed.
Felicity's voice pulled him out of his abstraction. "Aren't you going to speak to her?"
"I don't want to go up to her just yet," he said, trying to recover his feeling of calm. "I'll wait until people aren't crowding around her." He tried to continue dancing, but gave up before he did permanent injury to Felicity's feet.
Still another part of him was surprised that Vivian's beauty wasn't as dazzling as he remembered. She was certainly beautiful. Maturity had enhanced her youthful attractiveness, but somehow it didn't grip him as viscerally as he'd expected. He thought she'd be more striking if she had more color, if she weren't so blond. Yet it had been her angelic fairness that he used to feel was the most compelling aspect of her beauty. Why should it have lost its hold on him?
"If you wait much longer, the line will stretch out the door."
It was obvious Vivian had made conquests of most of the men in the room.
"She's very beautiful," Felicity said.
"She always was."
"She enjoys being the center of attention," Felicity said.
"I don't know if she enjoys it so much as she knows it's inevitable," Holt said.
"Did your uncle have any daughters?"
"He had no children at all." His uncle had promised him Price's Nob in the expectation he would marry Vivian. The fact that Vivian had chosen to marry someone else wasn't enough to release him from the responsibility he felt to take care of her.
The crowd around Vivian was deeper than ever, but she was moving in their direction. He wouldn't have to compete to capture her attention. She'd see him, and that would be all that was needed. He could already see the look of surprise in her eyes, could see the smile that would curve her lips until it wreathed her entire face. She would hold out her hands to him the way she always did, expecting him to take them in his own, give them an affectionate squeeze.
"I would guess from all the attention she's getting, she hasn't married again," Felicity said.
In the beginning he'd told himself he hoped she had remarried, that she'd found someone she could love, but now he knew that all of that was untrue. He was holding his breath, waiting for her to tell him there was no other man she loved as much as she loved him.
"You don't have to introduce me," Felicity said. "I'll--"
Holt's hand shot out to restrain her. "Of course I'll introduce you. I hope you two will become friends."
"We live in two different worlds."
"You've got to stop saying that. You told me your father used to be rich."
"My father represented a class that passed out of existence before he was born, people who expected money to be there because they were born with it, who would work very hard for others but had no idea how to work to support themselves. The people crowding around your friend are very different. They know what they want, and they know how to get it."
Vivian was getting so close, Holt expected to see her look of recognition at any moment. He could hear her voice when she answered one of the men surrounding her. Her laugh was the same soprano trill he remembered from afternoons sitting together on a bench behind the serpentine walls that surrounded the gardens of the U
niversity of Virginia. She was so close he could see the candlelight reflected in her eyes, hear the whisper of her petticoats as she walked, so close he could reach out and touch her.
She walked past him without any sign of recognition.
Holt felt the blood slow in his veins, the breath still in his lungs. The moment he'd looked forward to for so long had passed without anything happening.
"She didn't recognize you," Felicity said.
Holt felt the energy drain from him, leaving him with an unfamiliar feeling of weakness. It took a great effort to answer Felicity. "It's been a long time. I guess I've changed more than I thought."
"She was too busy flirting with all those men to notice anybody who wasn't directly in her path, or to pay attention to a man who appeared to be taken already."
"What do you mean?" But he knew before the words were out of his mouth. Vivian would take it for granted that any man standing with another woman was married. "She has no reason to think I'm within a thousand miles of Galveston. Even if she noticed me, she'd think I was some stranger who just looked a lot like a man she used to know."
"You can make excuses if you want, but I think she was too busy to notice anyone who wasn't standing next to her."
Was he making excuses, or was he just being realistic? People change a lot in six years, especially if they're young. He'd have recognized Vivian anywhere, but four years of war and two years of working cattle under the brutal Texas sun had changed him inside as well as out.
"Are you going to speak to her?" Felicity asked.
"In a minute."
"What are you waiting for?"
"Until she's not surrounded by men."
"She'll never be without a circle of men around her."
Why did he feel so reluctant to speak to Vivian? He was certain she'd be glad to see him. He was certain her feelings for him hadn't changed. He'd been trying for years to find her. There was no reason for him to hesitate a minute longer.
Still, the ambiguity of his feelings held him back. He'd expected to approach her as a lover reunited with a long-lost love, each yearning for the other. But Vivian didn't appear to be pining for him or her husband. And he had been shocked to discover that the reality of her wasn't the same as his expectations. What was so different? Why was it different?
"Go talk to her," Felicity said.
"It's not the right time."
"If you don't speak to her now, I'm going home."
"Why?"
"Helping you find that woman is the only reason I'm here."
"Okay, I'll speak to her."
"I'll wait for you here."
Holt reached for her hand, grasped it firmly. "I won't let you hide behind the furniture."
Felicity resisted the tug on her hand.
"If you don't go, I won't go either," Holt said.
"You're the one Vivian remembers. Why should she want to meet me?"
"Because you're my friend."
"I'm not your friend. You don't even like me."
That statement shocked Holt. He was certain she knew he liked her. He'd told her she was extremely attractive in her new gown. He'd been proud of her tonight, proud of the interest the men showed in her.
"That's ridiculous," Holt said. "I've always liked you."
"You have not."
"Stop being coy. You know you're extremely attractive in that gown. If you don't believe me, you can at least believe all the other men who've told you so."
It was hard to tell in the uncertain light, but he thought she blushed slightly.
"Do you mean to say your opinion of a woman could be changed because of her looks?"
"No, but that doesn't alter the fact that you're very pretty."
Now he was certain she blushed. "It's just the dress."
"It's a pretty dress, but it merely complements your looks. In fact, I'm not sure but what it's only pretty because you're wearing it."
"Something's wrong with your eyesight. Maybe you spent too much time in the sun when you were chasing those cows. How can you look at Vivian and still say I'm attractive?" she asked, gesturing to where Vivian stood surrounded by a half dozen men.
"People are attractive in different ways. Owen Wheeler was the best-looking man in our troop, but Pilar thinks he's not half as handsome as his cousin Cade. Everybody likes something different. I happen to think you're extremely attractive."
"You'd better go talk to Vivian before your brain goes soft," Felicity said.
"Only if you come with me."
"Why do you want me to meet her?"
"Like I said, I want you two to be friends."
"That's impossible, but I suppose the only way to convince you is to show you."
Holt was unprepared for the anxiety he felt as they made their way toward Vivian. It didn't make sense that he should feel perfectly comfortable one moment and just the opposite the next. It wasn't as though he were approaching a woman he didn't know, a woman whose reaction to him he couldn't predict. It wasn't as though his whole future rested on what happened in the next few moments.
It didn't, did it?
"Excuse me," he said to one of the men standing between him and Vivian. "I'm an old friend. I haven't seen Vivian in years. I want to say hello."
The man seemed inclined to refuse, but his expression changed once he saw Felicity. Holt could practically hear his thoughts. Married man. No competition here.
"Hello, Vivian," Holt said when the man moved aside. "I've been looking for you since the war ended. Why didn't you let my uncle know where you'd gone?"
Holt had no difficulty identifying Vivian's expression. It was obvious she had no idea who he was. He had remembered everything about her, down to the shoes she wore the last time he saw her. Yet she didn't remember him at all.
Holt felt like a fool. The men probably thought he was too drunk to know that Vivian wouldn't be interested in a married man, even if she had known him sometime during her childhood. Holt knew he ought to give her his name, give her a chance to remember him, but he was too proud. If she didn't remember him, he'd turn and walk away.
"Holt Price!" Vivian exclaimed, animation turning her expression from quizzical surprise to a dazzling smile of welcome. "Is it really you?"
Holt felt the tension inside break and a wellspring of relief surge upward. Vivian did remember him.
"Have I changed that much?" he asked.
"Completely," Vivian assured him. "I wouldn't have recognized you if you hadn't spoken. What are you doing in Galveston?"
Looking for you. But he couldn't say that. The words wouldn't come out. "I've been working on a friend's ranch for the last two years. Right now I'm working with a doctor here in Galveston."
"I met Holt when he was studying to be a doctor," Vivian said to the impatient men gathered around her. "I was a foolish girl and he was my wise big brother." She reached out, took one of his hands in hers, and brought it to her cheek. "I couldn't have survived growing up without him. Whenever I needed someone to talk to, he would always listen." She dropped his hand and smiled brilliantly at him. "I can't believe I've found you again. You've got to introduce me to your wife."
"We're not married," Holt said.
Vivian's laugh sounded like a soprano cadenza, rising and falling without effort. "Sorry. I just assumed--"
"Holt works with my father," Felicity said.
"Then--?"
"There is no then," Felicity said. "I'm only here because Holt is new in town."
"I know what you mean," Vivian said and turned to Holt. "I've felt like a stranger almost my whole life."
"You were never a stranger to me," one of the swains around her said. "I feel as if I've been waiting for you my whole life."
Holt didn't know how the man could make such a statement without gagging. Not only that, the idiot looked as if he believed his own words.
"You're sweet," Vivian said, giving him a smile. "I love Galveston. I can't imagine living anywhere else."
"I'm going t
o do my best to see you never leave," another suitor said.
"We've got to talk," Holt said to Vivian. "I want to know everything that's happened to you since you left Charlottesville."
Vivian's brilliant smile clouded. "When my husband was killed, I was certain I would lose my mind with grief. I had nowhere to go, no one to turn to."
"You could have come to me," Holt said. "You know I would have taken care of you."
Vivian reached for his hand once more, clasped it in hers, and drew it to her breast. Holt heard gasps from at least two of the men gathered around her. He was sure they would have endured privation to be in his shoes at this moment.
"I never doubted that," Vivian said, looking up at him as though he were some stone saint rather than a flesh-and-blood man. "But I felt I had to make it on my own."
"Maybe you should save the rest of this until you can speak privately," Felicity said to Holt.
"Felicity's right," Holt said. "I'm so glad to have found you, I forgot your friends."
The several young men immediately looked less bored, ready to compete for Vivian's attention once her intrusive big brother moved away.
"I'll call on you tomorrow afternoon," Holt said.
"I can't. I'm to ride in Randall's boat," she said, indicating a slim dandy with reddish-brown locks plastered to his scalp.
"Yacht," Randall corrected. "It's too big to be called a boat."
"I'm shaking already," Vivian said. "Boats scare me half to death."
"Yacht," Randall repeated.
"Then I'll come in the morning," Holt persisted. "Where are you staying?"
"With poor Abe's sister and her husband," Vivian said. "They have a brand-new house on Broadway. Don't come too early."
Holt couldn't understand why he didn't mind letting her go. After waiting six years, these few minutes should have been far too few to satisfy the emptiness that had built inside him. He didn't blame Vivian for wanting to turn her attention to the young men gathered around her. She must have suffered during the war. Her beauty would fade. Let her enjoy it while it lasted.
"It was so good to find you after all this time," Holt said.
"I'll look forward to tomorrow," Vivian said. "I can't wait to sit with our heads together as we used to do, sharing secrets and laughing at people behind their backs."
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