Beyond Eden

by Catherine Coulter

Sydney looked to Taylor, then shook her head. “No, I won’t leave the papers today. I’ll call and we’ll arrange a meeting between the two of us.”

  “Fine. Good-bye.”

  “My, but you seem to have gained a modicum of confidence with your guy sitting here. Actually, you showed some guts in San Francisco. I admit to being surprised. Father was quite hurt. Because of the hunk here? Is that why you’re going to marry him, Lindsay? Because he’ll protect you when you can’t do it yourself?”

  Taylor rose quietly. He even smiled toward Sydney. “There you go again, firing at random. No hits for you this time. Perhaps you’ll excuse us now, Princess. We’re both very tired. I’ll see you to the door.”

  Sydney looked triumphant and Lindsay wished Taylor had stayed seated, his mouth shut, and let her deal with Sydney. She could have dealt with her this time. At least she could have tried. At least Sydney hadn’t ground her under this time, despite her salvos, her random hits, as Taylor called them. Lindsay fought the familiar tug of the loser, the way she usually felt around Sydney. When would the feelings go away? When could she face Sydney and simply not care what she said? She watched Taylor escort Sydney out of the living room. She heard her sister’s heels click on the marble entrance tiles. She could picture Sydney smiling up at Taylor, giving him a look that would turn most men into slave material. But not Taylor.

  She heard Sydney laugh, heard her say, “This is a beautiful place, Taylor. Will you let Lindsay pay for all of it now? And that diamond! Goodness, that must have set you back. Valerie told me, though, now that I think about it, that you weren’t poor—not up to our standards, certainly, but not poor by any means. And now you’re hooked up with my little half-sister. My very rich little half-sister. Has she let you take her to bed yet?”

  Lindsay closed her eyes and waited. She heard Taylor say in his easy way, “Good-bye, Sydney. It was interesting to meet you. Family members can be such a treat. You should be careful, though. That strategy of yours becomes old very quickly.”

  The front door closed. Sydney was gone.

  Lindsay eased down into the chair Taylor had vacated, her hands clasped between her knees, staring down at the exquisite golden oak floor. She saw a dust mote. She frowned at it.

  “I find it interesting that your half-sister knows Valerie Balack, but not incredible or overly coincidental. They’re remarkably alike, they run in the same social circles, so it makes sense that they’d hook up, both of them beautiful, confident, smart, rich. Both with no mercy, both certain that everything and everyone is here just for their pleasure.

  “I hate to say this, Lindsay, but your half-sister isn’t going to be my favorite person in the future. Is your father even worse? No, you don’t have to say it. He is infinitely worse. Now, come here and hold me. Your sister is a harrowing experience. I feel shaky. I need some reassurance. I need to know you’re still here for me and that you’ll take care of me.”

  She looked up at him and frowned. “ Reassurance,” she repeated, then rose and walked into his arms.

  “Jesus, sweetheart, I need you.”

  She accepted him and she accepted his words. “It’s all right, Taylor,” she said, patting her hands on his upper arms, his shoulders, lightly stroking her fingertips over his cheeks. “It’s all right. You did well with her. Much better than I ever have. She always leaves me defensive and feeling stupid.”

  “I thought you said she was in San Francisco.”

  “She must have come back to New York right after I did. I imagine she and Father got together and decided she was their best shot to get me to sign the money over to him.”

  “That seems logical, but not overly bright, given her blatant tactics. I wonder what her cut is from your father if she succeeds. Probably a very hefty amount.”

  “You don’t really think—Well, maybe you’re right. She’ll have to regroup now that you’re here. I wonder what her new approach will be. And she’ll have one, don’t doubt it.”

  “I can wait to find out—twenty years, at least. Think we can put her off that long?”

  “I’ll try, but I wouldn’t count on it.”

  “Just remember, Lindsay, it’s now two of us. For always.”

  “I’ll remember.”

  They ate at a small Italian restaurant that evening. Lindsay permitted herself one glass of Chianti, a small bit of Taylor’s spaghetti, and a big salad.

  “I’ve got a job on Tuesday. We’re talking skin and bones here. It’s February and I’ve got to pretend I’m a snow bunny in tight, immensely tight, ski outfits. The spaghetti is wonderful.”

  He smiled at her, slowing his eating to match her pace. “Yes, it is. I’m sorry about your grandmother.”

  “Yes, I’ll miss her.”

  “And your mother.”

  Lindsay frowned as she chewed on a cucumber. “Poor Mother. She wasn’t happy. She was an alcoholic and I can remember back when I was sixteen—before they sent me away to school—that she’d gained weight and her drinking had increased. It was my father’s infidelities and her own weakness. He wasn’t ever faithful, even at first, I don’t guess. I knew it and I was just sixteen.”

  “Tell me.”

  “I remember once when Sydney was making fun of my mother, the fat alcoholic. She was also mocking Holly, who’s behaving just like my mother did before she finally left my father. Sydney laughed and laughed until I pointed out that Father was more than likely never faithful to her mother either. Why should he be? I thought she was going to hit me. She was red and trembling with rage. She believes her mother was Father’s only true love, and after she died, all the mistresses and wives who followed her were vague copies of the real thing. Father was searching, ever searching, you see, to try to replace his first wife. I don’t even know what her name is.”

  Taylor wanted to tell her that sounded just like some of Dr. Gruska’s garbage. “What happened to Sydney’s mother?”

  Lindsay frowned, the tomato on her fork forgotten. “Sydney believes her mother died tragically, but she didn’t. I overheard that her mother had remarried and was living in New Zealand or someplace like that. I assume my father had to divorce her in order to marry my mother and then Holly. He’s kept up the pretense that her mother died. Perhaps to hold Sydney, I don’t know.”

  Taylor smiled at her. “And you don’t have the meanness in you to tell her the truth.”

  “What good would it do?”

  “Oh, it might do something. Next time Sydney drops in on us, let’s ask her about her mom. It might just throw her off-stride. It just might do her a world of good to be thrown off-stride. I can’t imagine that she often relinquishes control.”

  “No, that would be cruel.”

  He raised an eyebrow at her. “You’ve got to toughen up, Lindsay. Sydney needs to be taken down a couple of pegs, she needs to know that her life can’t go along according to her dictates.”

  “No, it hasn’t always. Why, even the prince—”

  “What about the prince? Her husband, right?”

  But Lindsay’s head was down. A thick tendril of deeply waving hair fell forward, nearly hitting her salad. Taylor leaned over to tuck the hair behind her ear. She flinched, drawing back.

  “No, love, don’t do that. Remember, you’ve got to keep me reassured.”

  “Did you make love to this Valerie Balack?”

  “Yes.”

  He twirled spaghetti around in his spoon and took a big bite. He waited. Please show me some jealousy, he was thinking. Just a dollop of jealousy. Snipe at me. Be a bitch. Turn red and yell.

  Instead her shoulders slumped. Defeat fitted her better. She was far more used to defeat.

  He said deliberately and slowly, “However, I’ve never in my entire adult life made love with a woman who was more passionate, more loving, more giving, than you.”

  She looked up, paling; then her beautiful dark blue eyes darkened further.

  “Will you make love with me when we get home?”

  She looke
d at the lettuce now wilted on her plate. When she spoke, she surprised him. “What if I can’t feel anything this time? What if that one time was an aberration, an accident?”

  Taylor leaned forward and took her hands between his. He spoke quietly and firmly as a preacher, his voice and look filled with conviction. “I promise you that’s just not true. There’s no going back now that you’ve crossed the line with me. There’s no more frightened Lindsay, no more flinching when I touch you. I would never lie to you.

  “I swear that when you kiss me—any minute now, in fact—you’ll want me just as much as you did last night. Once the dam bursts, so to speak, there’s no stopping the flow. You’ll have a lifetime of pleasure with me now. It’s true. You can trust me. You don’t have to worry about it ever again.”

  “I never thought of it like that.”

  “You’re beautiful and you have some lettuce between your front teeth.”

  She howled, clapping her hands over her mouth, and he laughed, slapping her hands away, drawing her face toward him, and he met her halfway over the table and kissed her, once, then again and again until she was flushed and laughing herself. He felt happier than he could ever remember.

  Unfortunately, that evening there was to be no repetition of the previous night. Nor was there any chance Lindsay was pregnant. Lindsay was embarrassed, but his matter-of-factness cast a whole new light on things. She came out of the bathroom so pale Taylor stopped in his undressing and stared at her. “Let me guess. You’ve contracted the plague.”

  “No, it isn’t plague. It’s worse.”

  “Let me check your armpits just to make sure.”

  “No, no, it’s just that I can’t—I wondered why I’d put on two pounds and hadn’t eaten anything to deserve it, the water retention, you know, and now . . .”

  “Oh,” he said. “No, that isn’t plague. That’s just plain bad luck. That’s to bring me down off my high and to punish me for being a sex maniac. And you as well.”

  “At least it didn’t happen last night.”

  “Thank God,” he said fervently, and hugged her. “You hurting?”

  “A little bit.”

  “Get into bed and I’ll get you some of those magic pills.”

  And that was that.

  When he held her, finally feeling her body relax as the pills worked, he said, “Don’t you forget I love you even though your body is giving me the Bronx cheer.”

  On Tuesday, Taylor cracked “The Case of the Embezzling Wife.” He tended to give his cases names, thinking that when he was eighty and his mind was going on him, maybe he could remember his cases if he identified them well, giving them Perry Mason-type names. He met with the husband at noon to give him the evidence he needed. There was no need to commiserate with the man, he was too furious. He’d already called the cops on his wife and contacted the district attorney.

  Taylor was whistling, thinking about the individualized monitoring program he was going to create for the Norman Communication Company to try to trap a hacker. Now that he knew the computer’s control access language, he was going to write in a program. He was sure he’d seen this hacker’s modus operandi before. Yeah, he was going to set a trap for this guy.

  It was a sunny cold day. Beautiful clear air. A perfect day in New York despite the forty-degree tag on the temperature. He thought of Lindsay and smiled. At breakfast that morning, while he ate a bowl of cereal and she a piece of dry toast, she’d said in the most natural way imaginable, “Let’s go out on Thursday night, okay?”

  “Thursday night? Something special happening?”

  She flushed and he frowned over his spoon of wheat flakes.

  “Well, yeah, at least for me.”

  He took another bite of his cereal. “Okay. Let’s call Enoch and Sheila and see if they’d like to do something. Good idea.”

  “That isn’t what I meant, Taylor!”

  “Oh?” He stared at her blankly.

  She flushed more deeply, then saw the laughter in his eyes, and threw the half piece of toast at him.

  “You’re awful and ought to be circumcised.”

  “No, not circumcised! Anything but that, mistress.”

  She frowned. “No, that’s not right.”

  He was laughing so hard he couldn’t help himself. He rose from the table, grabbed her beneath her arms, and hugged her so tight she squeaked.

  “Let’s stay in Thursday night and celebrate for about twelve hours.”

  He was smiling like a besotted fool as he wondered how her ski shoot was going. At least it was a gorgeous day and she was wearing ski clothes, so she’d be warm enough. He would have thought the best place to take ski pictures would be at a ski slope. But no, they were at Washington Square.

  Actually, the shoot wasn’t going well at all. Lindsay looked over at the director and sighed. He had an attitude problem, a common-enough malady, but he was both arrogant and ignorant, which made things nearly impossible because the photographer was good but mush. He had no control over anything. Lindsay was nothing more than a stupid bimbo, the crew a useless group of grunts, the makeup people faggots and hags. He was, in short, the nephew of the ski-clothing-store president. The ad people were biting their nails, trying to keep peace, trying to give the jerk suggestions couched in the most diplomatic phrases, but nothing was working. He was demanding and contradictory and just plain stupid. Demos had left, he was so pissed, just giving her a commiserating nod. She’d mouthed, “Coward,” at him and he’d agreed.

  Lindsay sighed again, leaning against the set, waiting, waiting, waiting. The male model, Barry, had given the director the finger—when his back was turned—and was sitting over at one of the stone tables playing chess. Washington Square was an odd place. Serious chess players, most of them old as the square itself, played chess next to dope dealers who were even now conducting business as usual. Prostitutes eyed her to see what she had that they didn’t. Business appeared to be brisk for both sets of folk. And there was the crew, pissed as hell and bored and grousing. The elaborate set, for which the ski clothing company had shelled out over one hundred thousand dollars, was sitting there dark and heavy and towering some forty feet in the air, and so far unused. After endless hassles with the city, the ad agency had gotten the necessary permits, but the director hadn’t figured out yet how to get Eden and the ski lift together in the same shot. There was even a lift chair, but she hadn’t sat in it yet. The gondola swung in the light breeze above her head.

  She moved away from the fake ski lift and went over to watch Barry. She played a little chess, but the thought of challenging one of the resident graybeards terrified her. She saw quickly that Barry was getting his ski socks knocked off. She stood quietly, enjoying the game, when one of the set men came and whispered she was to go back and stand against the lift and not move. They had to take some lineup shots. She wondered about Barry, but the man didn’t say anything to him. Lindsay walked back to the lift and obligingly leaned against the sturdy wooden beams at its base, wondering what Taylor was doing. She smiled. All she had to do was think of him and she’d smile like a fool. He filled her and made her happier than she’d ever been in her life. He was her life now.

  She began humming, closing out the director’s whining orders, staring down at her ski boots as she wiggled her toes. They were tight. She looked up when one of the photographer’s assistants shouted at the director. Oh, dear, open warfare. The man told him the light would be gone in thirty minutes and to get his shit together. The waiting was costing a fortune and he was a shmuck.

  The director raged on and on. The photographer’s assistant, an old-timer of immense experience, just looked sardonic and finally shut his mouth. Lindsay knew what he was thinking: Who the hell cared if this jerk cost his dear uncle three times what he should? Who cared if the photographer, a wimp of the first order, just stood there and bit his fingernails?

  Lindsay wondered what had happened to the set man who’d asked her to come back here. No lineup shots? She d
idn’t see any movement. She looked up to see Edie, the makeup woman, striding toward her. Maybe, at last, something was going to happen. She started to call out a greeting, something light and funny because Edie looked like the rest of them felt. Then suddenly Edie dropped her bag and stared upward, a scream coming out of her mouth and another. Then she screamed, “Eden! Jesus, move!”

  Lindsay started forward, then heard other screams, and she looked up.

  The entire ski-lift structure seemed to lift off its base, then burst into flames like some sort of exploding oil rig, spewing orange fire and black smoke upward. The blast sent a rain of steel flying outward, then down, hard and fast. The noise was deafening. Odd, but the people’s screams around her were even louder. But this noise was different. It was stark and close and unreal because it was here, above her and all around her and soon—

  “No,” she whispered, terror freezing her in place for an instant. She lurched away.

  She wasn’t fast enough. A thick support beam struck her shoulder and bounced off, hitting the concrete beside her. She felt an odd sense of warmth, a blankness that was strange, but there was no pain, only this pressure seeming to come from inside her. It intensified, sending her to her knees. Another piece of debris struck her, full on the side of the face, knocking her sideways, her knees crumpling. Pain, sudden and fierce, made her yell. Planks of wood crashed down from the ruined ski lift, hitting her, flinging her about. She couldn’t do anything about it. Pain was there, full and deep and ugly, holding her. Then there was blackness, blessed blackness that was settling over her, blanketing the pain as one would blanket flames.

  Odd about the screams. They went on and on. Had a lot of people been struck? Why wouldn’t they stop? The screams were closer to her now, she knew that; they were softer, more vague, and she could almost feel those screams touching her, feel them coming even from her, but somehow she was moving away from them toward that wonderful blackness that blanked out everything and left nothing in its place.

  19

  The sirens were shrill. They pounded into her head. She hated them. She wanted to get away from them but she couldn’t seem to move. Someone was squeezing her hand, she felt his fingers suddenly, warm fingers, blunt. A man was speaking softly and gently to her, but he was insistent, he wouldn’t stop. He was like the sirens. She wanted to tell him to be quiet, but she couldn’t seem to get the words to form in her mind. She didn’t at first understand what he was saying, but she recognized the pattern, the repetition, and despite herself, she began to pay attention to him, looking to his voice to force her outward toward him.