“Sounds as if it could be a hoot. I’m just glad I have a date.” They’re almost to her escort, and Amelia turns and takes Laura’s hand in hers and squeezes it as if they’re old school friends. She’s smiling so brightly Laura wishes she’d worn her sunglasses inside. “Would be a little funny if I showed up all alone, huh?”
She smiles back. “Yes. Yes, I suppose it would,” Laura says congenially.
Files stowed under her arm, Laura reaches up and rights Amelia’s hat.
And Amelia swoops in and kisses her cheek. It’s all very friendly, things women who happen to be friends do. “Next time, just send me an invitation,” she murmurs, her lips feather light against Laura’s ear.
Laura would be inclined to agree, but she’s busy being something of a tit again. It’s Amelia’s proximity. And her voice. And the way she’s cottoned on to Laura’s plan.
Unlike some people, Amelia Maldonado is never boring.
“I wasn’t sure you’d attend,” she manages to croak.
“That makes two of us.”
That night, she comes home a little later than usual, and Michel is in the kitchen staring hard at a peculiar arrangement of flowers. They’re shaped like a bird.
“Where on earth did these come from,” she asks.
Michel doesn’t saying anything. Just hands her the card as he continues to stare. It is very uncommon to get something like a foot-and-a-half-tall arrangement of flowers shaped like a bird.
There’s no signature. Just a neat scrawl that Laura remembers well from the checks at a New York City diner once upon a time.
How about, from now on, this be the only tit in the room.
Laura snorts so loudly it wakes the children.
CHAPTER 17
Michel hires a pianist for the dinner party. A young American prodigy with a shock of blond curls sprouting from the top of his head. He sits at the piano, churning out Russian concertos with swaggering flourishes. Everyone lingers in the drawing room to listen and murmur quietly around him as they sip their rum tonics and gin fizzes.
Laura is ordinarily a good hostess, but tonight she sips her own bourbon on the rocks too often and glances at the door. One shoe dangles on her toe and the heel wags, and Michel sometimes squints at her as if he thinks staring will explain her nerves.
He’s the only one to notice though. Laura is, if nothing else, a professional spy. She can hide the nerves from everyone but him.
And maybe Amelia.
Who isn’t there. And isn’t there. And isn’t there.
Until she is.
The bell rings forty minutes after the party’s started and twenty minutes before the meal is served. She smiles and smooths the skirt of her dress down. There’s no need to announce that she’ll get it.
She’s the hostess and always answers the door.
Chalmers’s bulk takes up too much of the doorway. His tuxedo stretches across a broad chest and broader shoulders.
“Mrs. Sauveterre,” he says. His voice oil on all her water.
Her smile is tight. “Representative Chalmers. How lovely.”
“Sorry I am so late. My date doesn’t believe in clocks.”
His date is standing just behind him and looks as peeved as Laura feels. In fact, when she catches Laura’s glance, she rolls her eyes and makes a face. One that quickly disappears when he turns around to introduce her.
“Laura Sauveterre, this is Amelia Wright, the actress.”
He says it significantly. As if Amelia might be fine Italian leather or a rare wine he procured.
Amelia smiles. “Why Laura, it’s been ages.” Her voice is high and bright, and Laura leans into the kiss pressed to her cheek. “Mike, dear, didn’t I tell you? Laura and I go way back.”
“An absolute distance,” she agrees.
“Good! Good. You two can catch up while the rest of us chat. Now, darling, can you point me toward your husband?” he says.
She nods back toward the piano music, which has turned into something jazzy. “The drawing room, just past the gin.”
Amelia waits for Chalmers to disappear around the corner before stepping in. She seems shy, with her purse held in front of her, and her head ducked down. “Bit of a step up from the Sebastian, huh?”
“No, Mrs. Myrtle is a considerable improvement.”
She hands Laura her stole and deposits her gloves in her purse before handing it over too. “Bet it’s a lot easier to sneak in and out.”
“I know Michel in particular misses the old place. He was rather fond of devising ways to sneak in, and here he just has to use the front door.”
There’s something sharp in Amelia’s bright eyes. “Are you and Michel still… friends?”
“Married,” she says and tries to ignore the glare boring into the back of her skull.
“Now I know why my invitation must have gotten lost. Do they all know what you two do—did?”
Laura hangs Amelia’s things in the front closet and keeps her voice low. “Sadly, no. Michel’s a mere diplomat now, and I’m a simple housewife or something equally banal to the people in the other room.”
“Darning socks?”
“And obsessing over soap operas. I think I’m supposed to be curious about Guiding Light,” she mockingly drops a hand to her chest, “but am remaining loyal to Search for Tomorrow.”
“See, I’m a Love of Life girl myself. Need something short and sweet, you know? Can’t be weighed down by all that time.” Amelia’s words dance on a razor.
When they step into the drawing room, the young boy playing piano stops and stares in awe. Others turn too and Chalmers’s barrel chest puffs out. “Ah dear, I was beginning to think you’d gotten lost.” He holds his hand out for Amelia, and she obliges.
Laura pours herself another drink and watches the party fawn over the latest guest. Their faces are all flushed with eagerness and a little envy and lust, and Chalmers puts his arm around Amelia’s shoulders as if he’s got a right to.
But Amelia.
She has this grace Laura never would have thought her to have. This kind of goddess come down from the mountain to move amongst the mortals. Laura wraps one arm around herself, sips her drink, and basks in Amelia.
It has to be like this. They must stay apart… all of the time. Yet Amelia’s swanning through her party, and Laura is again completely enamored.
So enamored it takes her a moment to realize Michel is glaring at her from across the room. Genuinely glaring too. When he finally catches her eye, he tilts his head in Amelia’s direction, and Laura has to smile and shrug.
He doesn’t relax when they are all seated for dinner—the prodigy now playing some sweet bit of Chopin—and Amelia mentions that she and Laura were neighbors back in New York “after the war.”
“Have you kept up?” Wallis’s wife asks.
“Not since the Sebastian burned down,” Amelia says. “I didn’t even realize she’d gotten married.”
Amelia’s bright eyes fall on Laura’s rings, and then they’re dancing around the table, settling on each person that speaks. She’s got a way about her—one she’s always had—where she can make anyone feel as if they are the center of her world. It was something that used to enchant Laura.
Now, it infuriates her a little. Makes her feel used. A little less special.
What an awful thing…
After dinner, they gather again, and Chalmers leans back in a chair Laura likes to read in and rests a hand on the small of Amelia’s back and tells her to sing.
It isn’t an order, but it rankles Laura as such.
Others chime in, and Amelia smiles in that charming way of someone who’s very good at what she does and is about to show off.
She crosses the room and hip checks the prodigy, who smile
s boyishly. “What’ll we wow them with,” she asks him in a conspiratorial stage whisper.
He wags his eyebrows and the two of them are off. Speaking in a secret language of musicians. “This one?” he says and follows it with a flourish on the keys.
“No that one.” And then Amelia leans over and taps a few more.
Back and forth playfully until it becomes a song itself. Unfamiliar.
Then familiar. A true song plays. Some standard from the late thirties when Laura drifted through music halls in a haze of booze and excitement. It’s a playful song about a woman who knows a man doesn’t love her. People smile, and Chalmers laughs, and Laura tries not to flush with ill-conceived embarrassment.
The song isn’t about her, and she knows it. The way Amelia grins, she knows it too. She’s teasing. Flirting. When she spies Laura through the throng, lips finally tilted up into a smile, she looks completely sated.
The song’s not about her, but now it’s a joke. One just between the two of them. Mute laughter alighting across the room like candlelight on crystal.
For a moment, the others in the room are just refractions. Shadows. Gone.
For a moment, if Amelia sighed, it would be for Laura’s ears alone.
The prodigy’s playing slows and twists and turns, and then half the room groans because apparently he’s moved onto some popular—and hokey—Broadway tune. Amelia chuckles and sings along, telling the whole world how they kiss in shadows.
Her eyes catch Laura’s again, and Laura has to lean against the wall and cross her legs at the ankle. It’s as if hot fire pools inside and spreads out from the center of her.
But then there’s cold water in the form of small feet thumping almost silently on the stairs. She peeks around the corner and sees her daughter and son pressed against the wall, listening. They are as enchanted by Amelia’s voice as their mother.
When they see her, they blanch, only to calm when she brings her finger to her lips and winks.
They all listen together.
Over on his chair, even Michel bobs his head a little.
But eventually the spell releases its hold, and Amelia is bowing out from a full concert and the prodigy is playing something borderline ribald that has half the room in tears.
Laura motions to her children to sneak back upstairs, but Wallis sees them first. They are both trucked out in a fashion to smile and bow and curtsy for the room. Amelia’s eyes are wide and waifish at the sight of them.
“I didn’t know you had children,” she says, her voice hoarse.
One of the children declares they’re twins, and the other hoots agreement. The party all laughs, except for Amelia who is still looking at Laura’s children with wide wet eyes.
Then Laura insists they go to bed and announces she’ll see them up herself. She suffers the little looks of delight and sympathy the rest of the room shoots her.
“You’ve got a good wife there, Sauveterre,” Chalmers declares.
She’s so very good about resisting the urge to beat him to death with the silver platter on the buffet. She makes a point not to look at Amelia as she goes. Being the good little wife is humiliating enough without having to see Amelia’s look of pity.
Upstairs she’s feeling indulgent and a little giddy and reads her children a story. They can both read a little on their own, but they’re young enough to like hearing about Babar the elephant from their mother.
A creak sounds in the hall, and Laura knows they’re not alone. Someone—not her husband—has come to watch her read. Michel’s walk is distinctive. No, this person is wearing heels and moves with a shuffle of delicate and expensive fabric. Even before she looks over her shoulder and finds her leaning against the door frame, she’s sure it’s Amelia.
She watches them with dark eyes and has a ghost of what could be a smile on her lips. All Laura can do is smile back.
When the children realize they have a guest, they brighten considerably. The parties never migrate into their bedroom, and this is cause for celebration. Her daughter recognizes Amelia first and then reminds her brother who she is. They beg for her to finish the tale their mum’s begun.
“You’re an actress,” her son says breathlessly. Her daughter nods eagerly, and Laura is forced to give up her seat and book to the more appropriate storyteller.
Amelia comes from a sizable family, and Laura has it on good authority that she’s aunt to many nieces and nephews. Reading a children’s book is little more than an acting exercise to her. But Laura watches raptly all the same. Watches the way Amelia engages with the children, eyes shining in the glow of the little pink lamp. Watches the way she uses her hands and modulates her tone. Watches as her fingers flick through the pages, rattling the bracelet on her wrist.
Amelia is happily occupied by Laura’s children. She’s buoyant, and Laura wants to join in—but the scene is so close to one consigned only to idle daydreams. So she can do nothing more than watch and enjoy the warmth unfurling inside of her.
“Oscar caliber,” she says quietly when the children are near passed out and Amelia has come to the close of the story.
“Definitely going on my reel,” Amelia jokes. She hands the book to Laura, and Laura kneels and puts it away.
When she rises again Amelia’s closer, but her smile’s gone. It’s been replaced with something intoxicatingly enigmatic.
Laura nods toward the direction of the hall, and they exit the bedroom. She dims the lights and closes the door as she goes.
Amelia holds her hands behind her, and she speaks softly, demurely. “You’ve got two wonderful children.”
There’s so much there, and some of it frightens Laura.
“Thank you. I am rather fond of them.”
Amelia makes a show of looking around the hallway. “And a lovely home.”
Laura agrees. Steps closer.
Amelia steps back, stopping when her hands and hips brush the console table right behind her. She looks up at Laura who is so close she can smell more of Amelia than just her perfume.
Her breath is a whisper across Laura’s lips.
“It seems rather perfect.”
She notes that Amelia makes no mention of the husband downstairs.
Good.
“Not quite.” She tries not to look at all of Amelia, to not look at her lips. She fails miserably.
Amelia, though, Amelia’s staring her in the eye, demanding her attention in the way only generals ever could. “What’s missing?”
Laura’s hands find their way to the console table, bringing her close enough that their hips could touch if they like. She’s trapped Amelia in, but she’s the one that feels caught. She swallows. “You know.” Her voice is hoarse.
As much as she desires it, as much as she feels the need, she will not kiss Amelia. Not now. Amelia’s made it clear. All she’s allowed to do is be there, taking up all the space around her and daring her to do anything but finish this perilous dance.
Amelia’s close enough now that when she sighs it’s as good as a kiss. Their mouths are open, their lips wet, and their breath shared. Just the finest of lines between them.
It’s when Amelia finally speaks—finally moves her lips—that it’s all over. Just the barest of touches as her lips try to form that first letter. She cannot finish saying Laura’s name without their lips brushing together.
It’s done. Laura holds onto the table with one hand and grasps Amelia’s hip with the other as she dives down and consumes Amelia. All fire. Wet and hot fire that burns her belly and reaches out to fingers and toes.
They breathe in abortive messy gasps, punctuated by lips and tongues and the graze of teeth.
It’s exquisite and right and could go on forever, but there are footsteps on the stairs. She forces herself away until her back presses agai
nst the wall and she presses her hand to her mouth. Amelia looks at her with hunger, as if she’s trying not to pant.
“Laura?”
She closes her eyes at the sound of her husband’s voice.
When she opens them again, she finds Amelia stricken. She knows that nothing she can do can get them out of the mess she’s dragged them into.
“Coming down,” she says instead. Her voice as piqued as the rest of her.
“Have you seen Miss Wright up there,” he whispers loudly.
Amelia takes one moment that’s truthfully infinitesimal but feels far more substantial. Then Amelia isn’t flushed or breathless. Her thumb and finger swipe over her mouth and remove any smudges. “I’m here,” she says. “Was looking for Laura and the nickel tour.”
Michel frowns at her, but only for a moment. Before he was a foppish diplomat, he spent years operating in the French Resistance. He’s no fool, and he’s good at masking things. He steps back and waves down the stairs. “I think your date is getting ready to leave. Something about wanting to see more of you before you leave tomorrow.”
He says it politely enough, but there’s something nasty there under the surface. Laura feels primeval in her anger, and whether it’s directed toward her husband or Chalmers, she can’t be sure.
Amelia doesn’t look at her as they descend the stairs. Laura’s back is ramrod straight, and she’s as rigid as a board, coiled tight with all kinds of emotions that Michel’s brother would have been ashamed of and would turn away Amelia if she could see them.
Halfway down, cool knuckles brush against her wrist.
It could be the mere swing of Amelia’s arms that form the contact, but Laura grasps the touch like a lifeline and uses it to pull herself out of a mire of her own making.
Chalmers is chatty and handsy when they reach the bottom of the stairs. His lips are cold and wet against Laura’s cheek, and his hands large and clumsy in hers.
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