Intimate Portraits

by Cheryl B. Dale

  But Sarita didn’t forgive slights. She’d taken Rennie’s defection out on Francisco.

  Back to what was important. “You and Sarita broke up by a mutual decision, Francisco. No hard feelings, no leftover grudges. That’s all I know about it, all I want to know.”

  Francisco nodded, eyes darting back and forth. “That’s what I’ll tell the police if they ask.”

  “Yes. You do that. And Francisco.”

  Francisco had turned away but looked back. “What?”

  “Something else. When Autumn made Sarita’s photographs, Sarita was wearing some jewelry. Some jewelry that looks like that in the French exhibit at the High.”

  “Dani’s exhibit?” Francisco’s brow furrowed. “Sarita?”

  If Francisco had expected the question, he would be careful to show surprise, but Rennie would stake his life his brother knew nothing. “Is there any way she could have gotten hold of it?”

  “I wouldn’t think so. I'm not privy to their security arrangement, but I’d guess Dani and her people never let that stuff out of their sight.”

  “Not even if a close friend asked to borrow it for some photo shots?”

  Francisco’s eyes widened and his mouth gaped. He laid a hand on a stack of boxes to steady himself. “Are you accusing me of taking it for Sarita?”

  “No.” The word exploded in the air. Quick. Too quick. “Not at all. But let me know if you think of any way Sarita could have got access to it, okay?”

  “Sure.” Francisco rubbed a hand over his eyes, like he was gauging what Rennie meant.

  Better let him know Autumn was involved, too. “I think Autumn’s tied into it because she photographed Sarita in the jewelry.”

  “Autumn did what?” Again the surprise wasn’t feigned.

  Rennie explained about the butt bag being slit and why he thought the fall was connected. “So Autumn’s going to stay with us for a while.”

  Francisco, stunned, didn’t even leer. “Yeah. Okay. I guess that… Autumn… I can’t believe this.”

  He looked frightened, but who could tell what was going through Francisco’s mind?

  Rennie wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

  Chapter 18

  At the reception desk of Gus Huertole’s campaign headquarters, Autumn waited patiently for Rennie.

  So her feelings were hurt. So what? After all these years, she was used to being excluded.

  I’m just being hyper-sensitive.

  Not that telling herself that helped, not even after the past night when he had told her he loved her and proved it so sweetly. She’d assumed, in her happiness, his loving her meant the two of them would share everything, that she would never again feel like a child looking into a candy store window.

  Nope. She was still the odd man out.

  That’s what gnawed at her gut, that unhappy awareness of being a stranger looking on while the other kids had fun.

  Once when she was ten, playing dolls at the Degardovera home with Laney and Norma, Reseda had stormed in after someone broke a porcelain Madonna that normally sat on a shelf in the hallway. Reseda demanded to know who’d done it.

  Norma said, “Probably the dog, Mom,” without looking up from dressing her Barbie.

  “Yes, Chief was in there earlier, Mom,” Laney added, busy arranging her own doll’s hair.

  From across the room where Fran and some of his friends were watching television, he called, “Chief wouldn’t mean to, Mom. You know how his tail catches things.”

  Autumn knew Fran and his friends were the cause of the broken statue because she’d seen them roughhousing with a football in the hall when she first got there. But she sat quiet as a mouse while the Degardoveras perjured themselves. None of them asked her to keep quiet, but she still didn’t say anything.

  She had rationalized that she wasn’t lying, that she would be truthful if Reseda specifically asked her whether she knew anything about what had happened.

  But the rest of the Degardovera children, including Norma and Laney, had known and covered up. When they never spoke of the broken statue again, she realized they wouldn’t even admit to her who’d broken it.

  However much she loved the Degardoveras, she would never be one of them. No matter much how she wanted to be.

  Except Rennie had admitted he loved her. That ought to count for something, shouldn’t it? She should automatically become part of the tacit conspiracy of trust the Degardoveras shared.

  At least where Rennie was concerned.

  Guess she was wrong.

  The Degardoveras closed ranks whenever outside forces threatened one of them. Closed ranks as Rennie and Fran did now, coming out from the back office and standing together in a solid front against the world and everyone else, including her.

  That was what hurt.

  The men’s grave faces made them seem more alike than ever.

  “It’ll work out,” Rennie was saying, “I’m going to take Autumn by her place and let her get some clothes. She’s going to stay at Mom’s house for a few days.”

  “No, I’m not.” She would learn to live with exclusion from their councils and get over smarting because she was still an outsider. No matter how she felt about Rennie, she was responsible for herself and could still make her own decisions. “I’ll be as safe at my condo as I would at Reseda’s.”

  So there.

  “Autumn, we all agree these things are connected, that someone may be…” Rennie hesitated. “Someone may be after you. Maybe whoever it is thinks Sarita told you something. Or maybe you saw something you don’t realize you saw.”

  “She didn’t, and I didn’t.” She looked at her watch. “I thought we were going to the exhibit.”

  “Oh, damn.” Eschewing his usual care, Fran ran his fingers through his curls without noticing he’d mussed them. “I forgot about it. Laney and Norma will be waiting for us.”

  “Then we’d better go,” Autumn said with false cheer.

  Rennie looked at her a long moment before his lazy grin hit her, warmed her despite her disillusionment. “Whatever the lady wants.” He picked up her hand, held it.

  She let him.

  She loved him.

  Even though she was an interloper. Even though she was an outsider. Rennie had made love to her so beautifully that she had forgotten for a while he would never treat her as one of the Degardoveras, never turn to her as he did his family.

  He loves me, she told herself fiercely. He said he loves me. And I know I love him.

  When she held his hand to her cheek, Fran’s brows rose. He launched a darkening stare at her and then at Rennie. “So that’s the way things are heading, huh? Big brother moved in on you while I was looking the other way? Kind of fast, wasn’t it?”

  She shouldn’t have been so blatant, but it was hard to hide her feelings for Rennie. “You make it sound like Rennie’s a trespasser.”

  “I thought you and I had an understanding.” Fran pushed his bottom lip out in a gesture he’d long grown out of. “I guess I was wrong.”

  “Now, Fran. Don’t pout.” She tried to tease him out of his ill humor. “I was a shoulder to cry on. We both know I’ve never been your type.”

  “I didn’t think you were Rennie’s type, either.” Fran’s eyes moved from her to his brother. “Or is it retaliation? Is that what it is, Rennie? Are you using Autumn to pay me back for Sarita? Because I dared go where big brother couldn’t make it? Because I went where you’d already gone and failed, right between Sarita Sartowe’s thighs? Is that it?”

  Shocked, Autumn at first didn’t understand Fran’s crudity, then when she did, she uttered a little cry, though it must have been in her mind for neither of the men looked at her.

  “Don’t be foolish, Fran,” Rennie said wearily.

  The blood roared in Autumn’s ears.

  She had accepted Jane’s existence as a part of Rennie’s life. Jane didn’t matter after Rennie said he loved her.

  But Sarita? What had he called her? Every man’s
fantasy.

  Rennie and Sarita? She didn’t want to imagine them together.

  Fran’s hands clenched. “I took Sarita away from you so now you take Autumn away from me. What’s the old saying, sauce for the goose, sauce for the gander? Is that what you’re thinking?”

  “Sarita was never mine for you to take.” Rennie’s voice was deathly quiet. “No one ever owned Sarita.”

  “No, but you would have liked to, wouldn’t you?” Fran’s voice was rising. “She told me how you begged, pleaded with her when she got sick and tired of you and your scruples. She bragged about you calling her on the phone, sending her flowers, trying to get her back after she dropped you.”

  Rennie and Sarita.

  Autumn wanted to ask, to break in and demand Rennie tell her it wasn’t true, that he hadn’t done what Fran said he’d done.

  But he had. She could look at his face and see.

  I don’t believe it. Answer him, Rennie. Tell him he doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Tell him you didn’t love Sarita.

  Instead, Rennie shook his head. “Don’t do this to our friendship, Francisco. Don’t do this to yourself. You’re worth a dozen Saritas, can’t you see that? She was a cheat and a liar. She was a waste of your time and mine.”

  Fran jerked as if yanked by a string attached to his body. Pain, pure, jagged, white-hot pain showed before he turned away. Pain that she understood and empathized with. When he turned back, bleakness remained. “You shouldn’t use Autumn to get back at me for Sarita, Rennie.”

  “Francisco. Don’t you know me better than that? I love Autumn. I hope she’ll marry me.”

  The unsolicited, clear declaration that once would have given her everything she desired, filtered through her mind and heart.

  This is what I wanted. I should be happy. I am happy.

  Fran swung toward her. “Is that true?”

  I am happy. She hadn’t waited all these years, longed for Rennie all this time, dreamed of him all those lonely nights, to turn his proposal down. No matter how forced it was.

  She loved him and wouldn’t throw away her opportunity to have him. No matter how numb her heart had become after imagining him with Sarita, she still loved him. “If that was a proposal, Rennie, I accept. Yes, Fran, I love him.”

  Strange how calm she sounded. No one could tell her heart was broken.

  Fran didn’t want to believe her. “Even if he’s using you?”

  Strength returned. She could overlook anything. Jane, Sarita, however many women Rennie had known in the past.

  She didn’t care. She was his lover now and that was all that mattered.

  But the image of him and Sarita together still cut through her. Why hadn’t he told her?

  Because she was an outsider, because she would never be the one he turned to with his intimate sorrows and joys. Because she was and would ever remain on the outside.

  “Even if he’s using you, Autumn?” Fran persisted.

  She glanced at Rennie. A melancholy hinted at the faint unhappiness she had suspected before.

  That shadow isn’t there because he’s thinking of Sarita. He’s upset because of what Fran is saying. He’s worried about Fran.

  She clung to that belief.

  Rennie spoke to his brother, but his words were for her. “I’m not using Autumn, Francisco. I would never use Autumn.”

  “Nobody’s using me for anything, Fran.” Her voice was her own, clear and prosaic despite how disembodied she felt, how separate from everything around her. Sarita and Rennie. “I’m surprised you’d say such a thing about your brother. He’s right. You should know him better than that.”

  “Should I?” Fran’s teeth flashed but his grin was mirthless. He didn’t take his eyes off Rennie, but Rennie didn’t flinch. “If you’re not trying to get back at me, then you’re using Autumn to take your mind off somebody you can’t have. Either way, it’s wrong.”

  Autumn’s gut clenched. At some point Rennie had loosed her fingers or she had pulled away from him. Her hands hurt. She was gripping them together too tightly.

  “I wouldn’t do anything like that to Autumn, Francisco. Not to anyone, but especially not to Autumn. And I can’t believe you’d think that.” Rennie’s voice was quieter than before. The skin over his cheeks and around his eyes was so tight she could see his bones. “I care too much for her. I hope she knows that.”

  “Of course I do.” That was her own voice so calm, so reassuring, so matter-of-fact.

  Rennie’s tightness relaxed. He pried her clenched hands apart and tucked one through his arm. “Isn’t it time we left to meet the others at the High? They’ll be wondering where we are.”

  Outside, the day was bright, with blue skies and fleecy white clouds and fifty degree temperatures better suited to March than December. The building shadows remained minimal, allowing the sun leeway to fall on parked cars and pedestrians alike.

  The exceptional weather was wasted on Autumn. The ten minute walk to the High Museum between the two men was interminable, with Fran stiff and removed on one side of her while Rennie’s fingers entwined with hers on the other. No joy bubbled up as it should from Rennie’s proposal.

  She wouldn’t cry, no matter how she felt like it.

  ****

  The building housing the High Museum of Arts rises like a modern fortress at Peachtree and Sixteenth Street. Its poured concrete seems to be all circles and squares and glass. Large white porcelain tiles frame and protect the sides and give it a dazzling pristine appearance. Designed by architect Richard Meier, the striking edifice houses Atlanta’s art treasures and hosts visiting exhibits from around the world. Atlantans take great pride in the High.

  As Autumn and the two brothers approached the ramp, she ignored the large and hideous modern sculpture that towered over the grounds beyond. Even the graceful statue in the Rodin tradition that surveyed the sidewalk from their left barely warranted a glance. The tension between Rennie and Fran consumed her. She ought to do something but she didn’t know what.

  Their feet clomped on the walk as they went toward the curved underbelly of the building that housed the entrance. Two hardy souls ate lunch beside a merrily playing fountain below them, but the usual lines of impatient school kids were absent.

  Good. She didn’t think she could stand the noise. Not with the headache forming in her right temple.

  Inside the lobby, Norma and Laney chatted with a security man and the admittance attendant until Laney caught sight of them. “Oh, there they are! Come on, Norma. Autumn, we heard about the fire. What happened? Did anything get saved?”

  In the light-filled atrium, Rennie dropped her arm as the sisters threw question after question at her. In the flurry of answers and explanations and exclamations, Fran’s tightlipped silence went unnoticed along with Autumn’s tension.

  She was grateful Rennie sensed her confusion and had stepped aside so that he wouldn’t subject her to more of his sisters’ scrutiny. After Fran’s attack, she couldn’t deal with Laney’s excitement and Norma’s squeals if they realized what was going on between her and Rennie.

  Or worse, their censure. They had matched Rennie up with Victoria Montezela and might disapprove of Autumn’s horning in.

  One other thing to worry about. Oh, my head.

  Before they started up the ramp to the exhibit on the third floor, John appeared. In the flurry of Laney’s affectionate greetings, Fran tried to excuse himself from the tour. “I don’t need to be wasting time here.” His glance challenged Rennie and rebuked Autumn.

  “Not a waste of time,” said John. “Good PR.”

  With that, and in the face of his two sisters' indignation, Fran sulkily agreed to stay a few minutes, but strode on toward the elevators without waiting for anyone.

  On the third floor, Ornaments for the Human Body was being presented. The spectacular jewelry lay behind sparkling glass, in high and low cases, and throughout different galleries. Viewers wandered at leisure, pausing to admire and rave to by
standers.

  John and Fran fell back, surveying the crowds while Laney dragged Autumn to the first case. Norma, who had quarreled with Paul, tagged along with her sister and Autumn, anxious to confide details. “Then I told him if he couldn’t come today after Dani had gone to the trouble to get us passes, not to bother coming over tonight. Can you blame me?”

  Autumn’s head throbbed. Rennie moved up beside her to stare at a sumptuous jeweled tiara.

  Laney, attention torn away from the tiara to counsel her sister, groaned. “Norma, do you like Paul?”

  “Of course I like him.”

  “Well, you act like you’re trying to drive him away. You can’t expect a man to take criticism all the time and still hang around.”

  “I don’t criticize him. But I’m not going to be a doormat either.”

  Norma would never let a man, any man, walk all over her. Not like Autumn.

  She put two fingers to her aching temple.

  As the sisters moved away, arguing the merits of playing hard-to-get versus ready-to-fall, John and Fran strolled up discussing campaign issues.

  Fran hadn’t said one word to Autumn or Rennie on the way to the museum or after entering.

  Good grief, if she wasn’t careful, she would alienate the entire Degardovera family.

  As if reading her mind, Rennie took her arm and led her to the next case, where they stopped and pretended to be looking inside at the glitter of precious gems and metals.

  She couldn’t focus.

  After an awkward silence, he said, “About Sarita and me.”

  “You don’t owe me an explanation, Rennie.” She didn’t want to hear what he had to say, not here in the museum after their confrontation with Fran, when her defenses were down and she was so miserable. She wasn’t sure she ever wanted to hear anything about Sarita from him.

  He put a hand against the glass protecting items worn centuries before. “When I first went out to Los Angeles, Sarita looked me up. Mom had told her mother that I was out there, and her mother told Sarita. You know we were in high school together. We’d worked on projects and gone to the prom and done other things together. She was a different person then. Still promiscuous, but I liked her sense of humor. Her optimism. She was always upbeat. And she was fun. When she called, I was glad to hear from her.”