A Deeper Dimension: A Vintage Contemporary Romance

by Thea Harrison

  By the time Alex had returned, she had herself under control and was working at her desk. But it was a precarious control, and there were slight smudges under her eyes and on her cheeks. Taking one keen look at her, he merely said cheerfully that he had got everything straightened out with Owen and that he’d sent down for some sandwiches for the two of them. Then he immediately sat down at his desk and was immersed in some papers. When the sandwiches came, they ate while still working and the afternoon was spent in a peaceful silence.

  Nevertheless, Diana was more than glad to go home to the empty silence of her apartment to soothe her raw nerves and try to relax.

  The next day went as peacefully as the day before had, and in the afternoon, Alex sat back with a smile. “This is very nice,” he commented, and Diana, looking up from her work, didn’t pretend to misunderstand.

  “It is, isn’t it?” she agreed with a returning smile. It was beginning to feel like a joy to come to the office again, and not a chore to be endured.

  “Are you busy tonight?” he asked suddenly, his gaze very blue and bright. They seemed to fairly sparkle in the cragginess of his features, and she stared, bemused.

  Some of her old caution returned and she replied carefully, “It really kind of depends, I suppose.”

  He ran his fingers through his hair, tousling it wildly, and chuckled, “Depends on what I have in mind, is that it?”

  She laughed, “Yes, I guess that is what I meant.” He didn’t take offence.

  Instead, he asked with a grin, “How good are you at roller-skating?” His eyes were definitely twinkling.

  “Roller-skating?” she exclaimed. “I’ve never been roller-skating in my life!”

  “What?” It was a mild roar as he stared at her in surprise. “You’ve never been roller-skating in your entire life?” She shook her head, smiling with amusement. “Ever?” He evidently found it hard to believe. “Would you like to go with me this evening, then?”

  She was doubtful. “I don’t know,” she muttered. “The floor always looks so hard.”

  “You nut, it is hard.” Alex grinned at her in amusement. “But if you go with me, you’ll never take a spill.”

  “How can you say a thing like that?” she scoffed at him in disbelief.

  “I promise!”

  * * *

  “Promises!” Diana said bitterly as she picked herself up off the floor by pulling with her hands on the railing that surrounded the roller rink. “I should have known better than to trust one of his promises! Especially one like that one was!”

  Alex picked himself off the ground with more grace than she had. “How was I to know you’d stick one of your big feet in front of mine?” he grumbled, gliding over with an ease that she eyed enviously.

  “Of course you should know, I’m a novice!” she snapped testily. She rubbed her bottom. “Boy, does my behind hurt!”

  “Want me to massage it for you?” He grinned as he looked at her mischievously. She glowered at him sourly.

  “No, thanks.” She shook her head sadly. “I know a little girl who’s going to be very sorry in the morning that she ever agreed to come to this fiasco. I wonder if she’ll be able to make it to work.”

  “I know a girl who’s not so little, and that’s why she’s going to be hurting tomorrow,” Alex retorted as he grabbed her hands and prepared to take off again. Diana started to shriek protestingly. “And,” he continued grimly, “if she’s not at work, she’s going to be hurting more on her behind, and it won’t be from falling! Oh, shut up, girl, and loosen up a little. I’m not going to let you fall, for heaven’s sake! No! Don’t do that—oh, hell—”

  “Promises!” she grumbled, starting to crawl in the direction of the exit from the rink. “See if I ever listen to your promises again!”

  After an exhausting and hilarious hour on the rink, they called it quits, or rather, Diana refused to get up to fall again, and Alex in skates could not get the leverage to pick her up. They went out for coffee in a cute little restaurant and spent much of the time laughing over the disastrous attempts Diana had made on her skates.

  He took her home late that night, and when they pulled up in the driveway, they kept talking, each reluctant to end the evening. He walked her to her door and she fumbled for her keys in the darkness. After locating them and inserting the key in the lock, Alex took over and opened the door for her, returning her key to her outstretched palm. She opened her mouth to say something, but he was first as he said softly, “It’s late, and we both get up early.”

  She nodded, and there was a silence as they stared at each other. Her blood began to pound as she remembered the feel of Alex’s arms, the pressure of his lips. He bent down and began to brush his lips by the side of her mouth and would have moved away, but she turned her face sharply and touched his lips with hers. They were softer than she remembered. He took in his breath hard, then his arms were around her and his lips weren’t soft at all as he tightened them, bringing her close. She was trembling when he finally lifted his mouth away.

  They looked at each other’s faces. Alex’s hand moved up to cup her chin and he watched her expression closely, slowly moving his head to hers for one final, deep kiss. He drew back, his breathing harsh and unsteady, and she reached up to touch his face with her hands. Alex sighed abruptly, muttering something incoherent to her as he took her hands in his and touched his lips to each before putting them away firmly. He pushed her hair off of her forehead in a rough movement as he whispered, “Go inside, Diana. Now.” He turned away and Diana watched him get into his car and drive off.

  She moved inside, her thoughts whirling chaotically around and around, uncomprehending her own responses to Alex’s touch. She knew it was illogical to feel hurt, for she had rejected him and his concern for her, and yet somehow the situation was different. She felt the unreasoning emotion of a child who had been denied what he wanted.

  She knew that it was what she was feeling; she told herself just that all night long. But it didn’t stop her from crying bitter tears of frustration. “Overreacting, my girl,” she muttered as she stared at herself in the bedroom mirror the next morning. “Always overdoing it. Why can’t you ever be in control?” A woebegone face looked mournfully back out of the mirror at Diana and shook her head. She skipped breakfast, taking instead two aspirins with her coffee.

  She avoided Alex’s gaze when she reached the office and limited her replies to monosyllables whenever possible. She felt stupid at the way she was acting, but couldn’t seem to help herself. The strangest things began to bother her, and Carrie was alarmed to see her eyes fill with tears over a simple accident with the coffee.

  “Are you all right, honey?” Carrie asked with concern as Diana dabbed at the spilled coffee on the table. “You didn’t burn yourself, did you?”

  She shook her head and stared up at the ceiling for a moment, her eyes widened to avoid any tears spilling over and down her cheeks. “No, I didn’t burn myself,” she said huskily. “I just had a bad night’s rest and things seem to be bothering me today.” She looked at Carrie and managed to smile. Carrie’s face relaxed slightly. “Really, it was very stupid of me. I’m okay, seriously.” Carrie nodded, but she refrained from saying anything, and her eyes followed Diana around the room with a warm concern.

  As the week went on, she could no longer use a bad night’s rest as an excuse, but the sensitive mood would not desist. She felt frustrated at herself and tried desperately to stay in control, but this only made things worse. People began to treat her with a subtle but definite difference, being more kind and thoughtful than before, and more tolerant of her mistakes. One day there were flowers on her desk without a card, and the next day Jerry, the elevator boy, had a small box of candy for her. She felt very touched at these gestures of affection, but at the same time, she felt quite depressed. She had begun to think about putting in her resignation and looking for work elsewhere, and the reminders of people she had started to care about were tugging at her emotion
s, making her want to stay.

  Still looming ahead was the dinner party on Saturday that had to be endured. Diana found herself brooding over it, wondering over and over again about the possible reasons Alicia had for inviting the two of them. There was one possible explanation that she came up with: Alicia wanted to make up with Alex and had prudently decided to try and pretend that she had no part in the vicious attacks on Mason Steel (thus, ultimately, on Alex). She mulled this thought over in her mind but then rejected it. A clever mind had been at work against Mason Steel, and to really think that Alex had not been fully aware of just who had been behind the whole set up was quite stupid. Only a fool would believe that there could ever be a chance to make up with Alex after that.

  Diana went to Owen with her ideas and told him about the conclusions that she’d drawn. “So Alicia could have only invited us for the foolish reason that she wanted to make things up with Alex, or there must be a very smart reason for it. She wouldn’t want to merely socialize—not with all that’s happened,” she concluded, leaning back in her chair. Owen drummed his fingers on his desk.

  “I think the one thing we can safely say is that Alicia is no fool,” he commented dryly.

  “That’s what worries me,” she sighed. “I wanted to talk to someone who knew her to see if I was going crazy. This kind of thinking is really bizarre. I can’t comprehend a mind that works like that.”

  “For someone who can’t comprehend a vengeful mind, you sure have an intuition for trouble,” chuckled Owen.

  She smiled. “It must be my feminine juices at flow,” she drawled. “That girl makes my hackles rise!”

  He looked sympathetic. “I know what you mean,” he replied. “That girl makes my hackles rise, and I hadn’t even known that I had ’em to begin with!” They both laughed, but then he sobered. “The damnedest thing of it is, Diana, you could be right. And if so, that leaves a very unpleasant question hovering around in my mind: what could she possibly have planned?”

  She rubbed her eyes and shook her head. “Don’t ask me, Owen. My mind doesn’t work like that!”

  “I think you and Alex should cry off the night,” he spoke forcefully. “You should just spend a nice quiet safely peaceful evening playing checkers or something, and forget that Alicia Payne ever existed.”

  But she shook her head at that. “No, whatever her nasty little mind has come up with, it can’t really be all that dangerous. At least not physically, and we can handle anything else she sends our way. Besides, I’d kind of like to see just what she does have in mind. You know, sort of a sightseeing trip, and all that.”

  Owen didn’t smile this time. “Just you be careful. Don’t go and get yourself hurt.”

  Diana spoke confidently, “There’s nothing Alicia could do to hurt me. Nothing!”

  * * *

  On Saturday afternoon, she began to rummage around in her closets and pull things out. Alex had offered to pick her up at six-thirty, which left her around two hours to get herself ready. She looked at what she had to wear and started to laugh. She had known what she was going to wear even before she’d pulled the different outfits out of the closet. She laid out the lavender dress with care and got out a pair of slender silver shoes to wear with it. She decided to pull her hair off to her face with two silver combs, leaving the back to fall in a chaotic mass of curls.

  As she was preparing for the dinner party, Diana noticed in a vague way a darkening of light in her room. She impatiently flicked on the overhead lights and stopped. Going over to the window, she peered outdoors and gave a sigh of disgust. It looked like rain, the pallid grey of the earlier sky giving way to the darker clouds and turbulent purple streaks. The tree out by her front window swayed back and forth as a capricious wind tilted it first one way, then the next. There was no sign of the yellow golden sun of the previous weeks, and she was rueful as she contemplated the real end of summer and the beginning of fall. There was a heavy feeling to the air, lending an ominous cast to the rest of her preparations.

  She was prompt and so was Alex, ringing the doorbell at exactly half past six. She let him in and went to put on a mid-length raincoat with a hood. She was unaware of the widening of Alex’s eyes as he took in her appearance, or the glow of appreciation as he complimented her on her looks. She looked over her shoulder at his remark, belting the waist of the coat firmly. “So you just like the dress, is that it?” she teased, and shook her head with a mock pout. “And I spent all that time on my make-up for nothing!”

  He laughed. “I put the compliment badly, didn’t I? Let me rephrase: Diana, I’m sure you’ll be the loveliest woman at the dinner party tonight, because you’re the loveliest woman in the world. No matter what you wear, how you dress, you would still be the most beautiful, because of who you are.” Shaking a finger at her, he leered, “Of course, the dress doesn’t hurt at all! Really, it’s very, very nice!”

  She sniffed and said sharply, “It should be. They charged me by the ounce!” A glow had started somewhere in the middle of her stomach and spread throughout her body at Alex’s remark. She eyed him appreciatively. He was very tall and very formal in a black suit with a black tie, the severity of the outfit being broken only by a pair of heavy gold cufflinks and the stark white of his shirt. It made him look more powerful, emphasising the lean length of his legs and the width of his shoulders and bringing full attention to the strong vitality of his face, the rich brown and red glints to his hair and the vivid directness of his blue gaze.

  He asked meekly, “Will I pass?”

  She laughed, nodding her head in affirmation.

  “Just barely, but you’ll do.”

  “You little minx!” he growled.

  “Not so little—my behind is still quite tender,” she chuckled as she locked the door and slipped the key into her small silver purse.

  “You were smart to wear the raincoat,” Alex told her as he opened the car door for her and she climbed in. “The forecast is pretty nasty for tonight—we may even want to leave the party early.”

  “That bad?” she asked in surprise. “I didn’t know we were to expect such bad weather.”

  “It really just developed this afternoon because of a freakish wind we’ve been getting today from the southwest. It is a little early for this kind of weather, though. The bad weather shouldn’t be here until October or so.”

  “Southwest, did you say?” she asked, frowning. “Isn’t that tornado weather—winds from the southwest?”

  “Only favourable conditions for one,” he replied calmly. “It probably only means we’ll have a bit of a messy night ahead of us.” He concentrated on his driving for a few minutes in silence, then asked, “Are you worried at all, Diana? If you like, we could always turn back.”

  “Oh, I’m not worried,” she said lightly. “But I’ll save the option for worrying until later on, if you don’t mind. If it looks pretty rough outside, then maybe we could leave.” She hesitated, looking at his hands on the steering wheel. “Alex?”

  “Hmm?” He glanced sideways, a little smile tugging one side of his mouth awry. Diana didn’t smile back.

  “Are you—worried in any way about tonight?” Diana knew she sounded vague, but it was hard to articulate to Alex the way she did for Owen. Somehow, she felt foolish.

  “In what way? The weather?” he asked slowly, frowning slightly.

  “Oh no. I mean about the motives Alicia had for inviting us to the party tonight.” There was a pause. Diana finished, wishing she had kept her mouth shut, “You know, I really don’t think we’ll be just socialising.”

  He chuckled, “I’ve given it a great deal of thought. That little girl has mischief on her mind, I’m afraid. Just what, I don’t know, but we should be on our guard tonight. She’s going to pull something on us—on me, at least.”

  “Well, you don’t seem worried at all.” Diana was surprised.

  “Curious, yes. Worried, not really,” he told her. “Alicia just doesn’t get me worried.” Ha! thought Diana
. “Now Derrick Payne is another matter. He’s the vengeful son of a bitch that I’m going to watch tonight!”

  Diana shook her head. She was sure that Alex was wrong about Alicia. He was underestimating her badly. Possibly he still believed a little in the sweet girl he had dated a while back who just got a bit too possessive for her own good. At any rate, Diana resolved to watch Alicia tonight. Derrick Payne was Alex’s problem. She would deal with Alicia herself.

  The sky was very dark by now and Alex put the car’s headlights on. Everything was covered with the greyness that dusk brings, and Diana shivered. It seemed a cold, cold night, the kind of night that winter brings, without the comfort of the day’s warm sun, the safe light shining on the land. Darkness is frightening, Diana mused, because of the unknown quality about it. We look out into the night from our safely lit windows and shudder at the thought of what might walk out there unseen. It’s not knowing that’s so unnerving about the blackness. Anything, anything at all could hide behind the veil of night. She shook off the mood of fancy and looked out her window with a fresh awareness. They were pulling into a long driveway with large trees that seemed to be maple on either side. The house was very large and well lit, with light streaming from big windows.

  They reached the door and rang the bell, standing back while they waited, each in a withdrawn state and not looking at the other. Alex seemed to be affected by the heavy darkness as much as she. They heard footsteps in the hall inside, and then, as the door opened and a smiling servant greeted them, the skies opened up with a furious roar and wetness streamed torrentially down.

  They stood looking out of the front door and marvelled that they had never got so much as a stitch of clothing wet, and the servant girl shut the door with an emphatic bang. “Just in time, weren’t you?” she asked cheerfully.

  She took their coats and directed them into a very large and spacious room where a profusion of light and laughter spilled out. Diana got a blurred impression of a great many people, and thought to herself in disbelief, this is a small dinner party? Then Alex had a hold of her arm and was propelling her forward through the crowded room. Several times they were stopped by someone who knew Alex or knew of him, and any progress they made was painfully slow.