Undeniable: Dom & Gigi

by Callie Harper

  “How you doing?” I asked as we sat in the living room. She had so many pillows on the couch I had to push some of them to the side and a few slipped to the floor.

  “Better now that you’re here!” she sang out, and I realized she was drunk. That glass with ice clinking by her side wasn’t her first. Then again, I’d already had a couple, myself. “What can I get you?” she asked, motioning to her fully-stocked bar.

  “I’ll get it.” I headed over and fixed myself a scotch on the rocks. She’d never been one to tend to my needs. She didn’t have to start now.

  “You shaved!” She pointed to my face. “I’m so glad.” She didn’t get in touch too often, but when she did she always asked for a picture. “I want to see my baby!” she’d say. A few months ago I’d sent her a pic of me, forgetting she hadn’t seen my full beard before. She’d about lost her mind she hated it so much.

  I had to reassure her, it was not my new look of choice. All of us grew beards. It was a way of fitting in, or at least not sticking out so much. Green Berets were meant to interact with the locals. Counterterrorism and unconventional warfare took many forms. I’d have to grow it back when I went back for the remaining six months of my tour. But for now, I enjoyed the shave.

  “How long has it been since I’ve seen you?” she asked.

  “Two years.”

  “That long?” She poured herself another drink. “Well, you won’t believe what I’ve been up to.” She went on to tell me a bunch of stories about traveling and lighting up the town with her girlfriends. And then she really brightened up as she told me about her latest man.

  “He’s no Richard.” She shook her head and kissed the cross she wore around her neck. She’d never been religious before, but maybe she’d started something new. “But he’s a doll.”

  As usual, I let her words roll off me, paying attention to how she seemed to be doing rather than what exactly she said. Four years ago that had gotten me into a hell of a lot of hot water. If I’d listened more closely, or asked a couple of questions, I might have picked up on the fact that she was dating my girlfriend’s father. The chance of that happening again, though, seemed pretty unlikely. For starters, I didn’t have a girlfriend. I hadn’t been serious with anyone since I’d joined the army, and I wasn’t alone in that. Guys either had someone when they went in, or found someone when they came out. Serving a tour of duty in the Special Forces wasn’t exactly the best time to meet someone new.

  My mother seemed happy, and I had to hand it to her. Once again, she’d rolled with the punches. Some might call her a gold digger, and that wasn’t completely off base. She was certainly after the good life, but it seemed to me a lot of people were. I wasn’t going to judge. And Richard has passed three years ago. She didn’t need to still be in mourning.

  “Now listen,” she edged forward in her chair. “Do you want to come on a cruise? A group of us are heading out on one. We’re going to hit all the hot spots in the Caribbean. You’ve got to come. It’ll be just what you need to relax. You can get some sun.”

  I stifled a laugh. Sun was one thing I’d gotten plenty of in Afghanistan. “I don’t know about a cruise.”

  “Oh, don’t be a spoilsport. We leave the day after tomorrow! Don’t you want to spend Christmas in Guadalupe?” She snapped her fingers over her head and rose to do some version of a dance step.

  “The day after tomorrow?” I did the math. That meant she’d be leaving on Friday. The party I’d thought she would be going to was on Saturday. “So you won’t be here this weekend?”

  “No, it’s perfect. We’ll ditch this frozen city and have ourselves a good time.”

  I paused, looking into my drink. I could let it slide, not mention it. But there was a chance she’d forgotten. She wasn’t the most organized person.

  “So, you’re going to miss the Kavanaugh Holiday party?”

  “Oh, that snooty thing.” She gave a dismissive puff of air. “They don’t want me there. And I don’t want to be there, either.”

  “Really?” I guessed I hadn’t specifically asked her about the party before. She had told me that the extended Kavanaugh family had been less than happy with her share of the inheritance. But Colt always made a big deal out of inviting me. Every year he’d phone me, tell me he’d send a private jet, couldn’t I come just for the weekend? I’d always said no. This year? I was thinking of saying yes.

  “We’ll have more fun on a cruise!” She got carried away again, telling me about her friends and what a nonstop party we would have. Apparently she did a lot of cruising now.

  I would not be cruising. But I might still be going to the Kavanaugh Holiday party. Now that I was there in New York, it would be easy to stop by. I wasn’t far from the Waldorf Astoria where it would be held.

  I could tell myself I was going for Colt. Colt had proved a true ally, checking in, helping me out even when he didn’t need to. As you went through life you realized that didn’t always happen. He’d said recently he wanted to catch up and hear about my plans for the future. After I finished my remaining six months, I had no idea. Most likely I’d sign up for another tour. But I’d be curious to hear what he had to say on the subject.

  He’d also shocked me and said he wanted to introduce me to his wife at the party. I guessed time has passed for him as well. He might be 30 or even 31 now, and apparently somewhere along the way someone had caught his eye. I wondered how he’d found the time. He’d taken over Kavanaugh Investors after his father’s passing. He’d had to step into some big shoes, and I was sure he’d had to become damn cutthroat to do it. But somewhere along the way he’d also managed to fall in love. Interesting. Yeah, I decided I might as well head to that holiday party in a couple nights’ time.

  Around midnight I excused myself. It had been a long day. I figured I’d turn in.

  “Tomorrow night let’s go out!” my mother insisted. “I need to convince you to join us on the cruise.”

  “Maybe.”

  I headed down to the guest bedroom and took a hot shower, enjoying the convenience. I wasn’t big into getting pampered, but the rising steam, the heat on my sore muscles and shoulder, it felt good. I stayed in longer than I needed to, then pulled on some sweatpants and climbed into the guest bed. More cherubs flashed me from a lamp on the bedside table. It was strange to see my mother surrounded by wealth, living a life of ease. But I’d take it over most of the other more likely outcomes she’d faced. With the rough start she’d had, things could have ended up much worse for her.

  I relaxed, letting my chest rise and fall. As always, when I let my mind wander, it traveled to the same place. The difference tonight was the woman I was picturing wasn’t thousands of miles away. Chances were good Gigi was in town for her family’s big party that weekend. She might only be a couple of blocks away.

  As I’d done so many times in the late night hours, I reached for my billfold beside my bed. The picture inside had seen a lot of wear and tear. I’d ripped it out of a country club newsletter. They made a paper version for all the older members who liked to sit around the lobby and read up about themselves.

  One issue during that summer in the Hamptons, Gigi had been on the cover. I’d torn it off before I could think twice, folding it up and putting it in my pocket like a guilty schoolkid. Once I’d gotten home, I’d tried to tell myself to throw it out. Acting like a love-struck sad sack didn’t do anyone any good. But I couldn’t make myself.

  I’d kept the photo, cutting it out and putting it in my wallet. It traveled with me everywhere I went. Looking at Gigi’s radiant face with those wide, trusting eyes, I could hear her lilting laugh, remember the way she’d looked up at me as if I were her hero. I’d taken that photo out more nights than I cared to admit, turning to her when I needed it most. When everything around me seemed to be heading straight to hell, I’d look at her and feel lifted up.

  If I went to the party Saturday night, I might not even speak to her. Maybe I’d say a brief hello to Colt, thank him, meet h
is wife, then make a quick exit. If I could only catch a glimpse of Gigi’s beautiful face, just for a minute, that would be enough. Gazing at her well-worn photograph, I knew even as I told it to myself it was a lie.

  11

  Gigi

  “More tea?” Gram gestured to her elegant, flowered teapot. A servant hovered by the wall, awaiting the slightest nod.

  “Yes, please,” I agreed, allowing myself to be served some more. This ritual was central to my grandmother’s sensibilities. British to the core, she felt strongly about teatime. Those few years I’d spent with her after my parents divorced, some of my fondest memories were coming in out of the brisk cold and having a hot spot of tea to warm me to my bones.

  “I’m so pleased you could join me.” In her 80s, she sat down a lot more than she stood up, but her cornflower-blue eyes still sparkled with lively wit. “You do know I’m growing quite old.”

  “Oh stop.” I didn’t like her talking like that. I’d seen how quickly life could pass when my father had died of cancer three years ago. Right in the prime of health he’d been struck down. I didn’t want to talk about the obvious reality of Gram aging, too.

  “Oh, I will not stop,” she assured me. “That is one of the lovely gifts of age. Absolutely no one can tell me what to do.” She gave a giddy, almost childlike laugh, and I had to laugh as well. She made aging sound like fun.

  “Here is what I have to say. You know well how I instructed each of your brothers to settle down.”

  “Yes, and they listened to you!” I’d nearly begun wondering if my grandmother had some sort of magical powers. Four years ago she’d given my older brothers a stern talking to about wanting them married and producing grandbabies. Like dominos, one after another, every year since they’d showed up at our annual holiday party dutifully coupled up, first Ash, then Heath, then Colt. I couldn’t see any obvious evidence that my grandmother was an actual fairy godmother with a wand, but looking at her so poised in her cream blouse, her hair up in a regal bun, the concept didn’t seem too far-fetched. She had an almost supernatural air or wisdom.

  Gracefully nodding her head, she accepting my assessment. I loved her so much, but my heart clenched in anticipation over what she was going to say next. I was only 23. I didn’t want her waving her magic wand over my head, at least not yet. There was no one I could imagine settling down with, not even anyone I felt serious about. At least there hadn’t been anyone for a long time.

  “For you, my Georgiana, I have something entirely different in mind.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, because you, my dear, excel at being the dutiful daughter. You are excellent at always doing what is expected of you. In fact, I find that you are entirely too polite and refined for your own good. And I say that as a British woman of a certain age.”

  I sat back, somewhat stunned. Was this my grandmother? Telling me I was too polite? She still generally wore gloves when she left the house. I didn’t know she thought there was such a thing as too polite.

  “I see that you are surprised, my lovely girl, and I am not suggesting that you change who you are one bit. Just, perhaps, what you do.” She looked at me and, honestly, she arched an eyebrow. Saucy minx. I couldn’t suppress a smile.

  “At my age, one has the ability to reflect. I do not regret, but I do wonder…” She looked off through the window for a moment. I’d never seen Gram look wistful. She was far too purposeful and cheery for that. But for a moment, I saw something flit across her face. Then she turned back to matters at hand.

  “You need adventure!” she declared, turning back toward me, her eyes dancing. “Something daring, romantic, perhaps even a bit dangerous.” She leaned slightly forward, lowering her voice. “But only if he’s absolutely dashing.”

  “Dashing? You think?” I wasn’t 100 percent sure I knew what dashing meant, but judging from the pink that blossomed on Gram’s cheeks it was a good thing.

  “Darling, I don’t just think. I know.”

  I laughed, wondering not for the first time what life would have been like had I stayed on living with my grandmother for my teen years. Less conservative Greenwich prep, and maybe a whole lot more dashing? But regret wouldn’t do, as she would say. Only I did wonder.

  “You’re so concerned about making a mess,” Gram continued. “I’m worried about what you’re missing. Believe me when I say that love is not tidy.” This from a woman I’d never seen anything less than perfectly groomed and coifed.

  She reached out and took my hand. Hers felt so soft and delicate, almost like a child’s. “You only live once, Georgiana,” she urged me. “Make a bit of a mess.”

  She gave my hand a soft squeeze, then announced, “It’s time for my nap.”

  I rose at once, thanking her profusely for her time and advice. She nodded, gamely, indulgently as her butler showed me out. I’d see her again tomorrow night at our annual Kavanaugh Holiday party.

  “Wear a gown the color of moonlight!” she called after me. I smiled, took the elevator down, wrapped my thick coat and scarf around me and began the two block walk to my apartment. From someone besides Gram, that moonlight comment might have made me wonder if she were growing senile. With Gram, I knew she knew what she was saying. She was intentionally referencing Cinderella, hoping the party tomorrow night might somehow be transformative for me.

  I enjoyed our annual holiday gala, but I’d stopped hoping for a magical night. Four years ago, I’d barely slept the night before the party in hopes I’d see Dom. He hadn’t shown up for the post-wedding party earlier that fall, but then again a lot of people had boycotted that one. The British side of the extended Kavanaugh family had had a collective aneurysm over Brandi. We had a title in the family, for God’s sake. My father was the Baron of Warwick. Barons did not marry former cocktail waitresses, if that was indeed what she had been in the past. Tongues wagged, rumors abounded.

  I didn’t care what Brandi had or had not done in the past. I didn’t even begrudge my father for marrying her. He had seemed happy, really happy in their brief time together, and so had she. But seeing them together had made me think of Dom and how I’d never be able to be with him the way I wanted. It made my heart hurt and my head spin and I felt like vomiting. I basically didn’t know what to do with myself, so I’d done the only thing I’d known how to do, dutifully playing my part as college sophomore sorority girl.

  But that Christmas, how I’d hoped that I see Dom at the holiday party. Colt had mentioned that he’d invited him, telling me so casually he’d clearly had no idea how he made my heart do cartwheels and somersaults. But Dom hadn’t come to the party.

  And less than a year later, he hadn’t come to my father’s funeral, either. I’d had to stand there smiling and smiling, accepting people’s condolences and heartfelt wishes. Colt occasionally brought me a fresh drink, but mostly I’d felt completely alone with my stiff cheeks and aching heart.

  My father hadn’t told me about his diagnosis until after I came home from spring semester. He already looked gaunt and pale and walked with a cane to greet me. Stomach cancer. There was no reason, no explanation, and apparently nothing his billion-dollar fortune could do to fend it off.

  Funny, in his last few months he was the one who brought up Dom a couple of times to me. He became nearly obsessed with uniting all of his family. He wanted Dom in the fold, at least to make his wife happy. And, it turned out, Dad had another son, an illegitimate one he’d had even before Colt. Three years ago that revelation had rocked everyone’s worlds, too, but now Declan and his wife Kara were a part of the family, their adorable kids lighting up our Kavanaugh gatherings. I guessed that’s what Gram meant when she said love wasn’t tidy.

  I knew what Gram was talking about when she said I was too good. What she didn’t know was why. It wasn’t that I had all sorts of impulses I was fighting, crushes on men I resisted, forcing myself to keep away from my wild side. It was that no one tempted me. No one since Dom.

  Four years ago—four ye
ars and four months, but of course I wasn’t counting because that would be crazy—Dom had walked out of my life. I hadn’t felt a thing for a man since. That might sound like an exaggeration, but it wasn’t. Sure, there were some nice guys I’d met, charming and friendly. But I’d graduated college last June with my reputation as a prude fully in tact because, honestly, I didn’t feel tempted in the least. When a man kissed me, I’d think about when I’d do my laundry the next day. Never had anything even approached the wild ride Dom had taken me on.

  The wind whipped at my cheeks, and I buried my chin in my scarf like a turtle into its shell. I missed Nashville. I missed the slower pace, the warm nights, the music seeming to come from every street corner. But after graduation the pull of family had been strong. Colt urged me to move back to the city. Gram wanted me near. Penny had called me every day, asking, “When will you be back?” She’d even found us a two-bedroom apartment and rented it solo for a few months in the hopes I’d return and become her roommate. I had contacts in the city who’d help me start out in interior design, connecting me with clients and helping me get the right kind of exposure so I could make a name for myself. I’d hung on down south for a few months after college, but then I’d caved. Back in New York it was.

  I saw a life stretching out in front of me, the life I’d been groomed for. A life of country clubs and pearls and parties. First I’d be the maid of honor in Penny’s wedding to Zander, then she’d be the matron of honor in my wedding to fill-in-the-blank. Trevor, if it was Penny writing in the name. It would be so easy. Tidy.

  But I wanted difficult. I wanted messy, just like Gram said, with a hint of danger. I’d long since given up hope of getting him, but the truth was, when I listened to my heart in the dark hours before the dawn, I wanted Dom.

  * * *

  §

  * * *

  The next night Penny and I dressed for the black tie Kavanaugh Holiday party, trying on dresses, the pile of rejects growing on my bed.