I can see why, Catherine wrote, penning a quick cartoon of a baboon with tiny ears.
Typical man, he wrote. I apologize for the whole of mankind.
Nicole’s face was flushed, her eyes blinking back tears. “That’s because you only see what you want to see. It doesn’t matter if there are toxins in the water or not, even though most of the time I’m right. Do you remember when you wanted to eat those canned artichoke hearts and I told you not to? I saved your life.”
“I wouldn’t have eaten the hearts. I’m not stupid.”
“I think we should order dessert,” said Catherine, smiling gracefully at Daniel.
“I heard the tiramisu is exquisite.”
“You’re tempting me,” she said, and she meant to talk about dessert, she really did, but she wasn’t talking about dessert anymore.
Apparently he figured that out because his jaw tightened, his nostrils flared, and she could feel the responding wetness between her legs. Like Pavlov’s dog. Next to them was World War III, but right now, she felt as if she were floating, light-headed and breathless. Completely aroused, she was contemplating even bigger and bolder steps when Nicole began arguing again.
“Ha. You’re not listening to a word I’m saying. I’m just the white noise in your life, aren’t I? It doesn’t matter how many times I have rescued your sorry ass, does it? Next time, you inspect your own food.”
The man’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “Now you’re getting mean, Nicole. Find some patsy who’s happy with your mother-complex.”
“Sondra Barnes doesn’t mother you, too?” Nicole shot back, and Catherine cheered, even if she didn’t know Sondra. It was time that Nicole stood up for herself.
Jack’s face whitened. “What’s Sondra got to do with it?”
“Oh, come on. Do you think I’m blind? Always staring down her shirt, always tucking in your stomach. Do you think she’d go for a retread like you?”
“She already has,” he spat, pure venom in his voice.
Catherine flinched.
“Don’t do this, Jack,” Nicole begged, tears now spilling unchecked from her eyes.
She should leave him, Catherine wrote.
She loves him, Daniel wrote back.
They both glanced at Jack, wondering what he was going to do, before cautiously looking away.
“You’re going to make a scene, aren’t you? Make me out to be the jackass.” Jack looked around the restaurant, noticing the eyes carefully not staring in their direction. “She drives me to this. I swear.”
“Jack. I love you.” Nicole half rose, but Jack had his mind made up, and if he didn’t leave, Catherine was ready to help him.
“Too late, Nicole. Pay for your own freaking dinner. I’m not hungry anymore.” Then he stood, threw his napkin on the table and left. Nicole promptly began to sob in earnest.
Catherine made a face at Daniel. Should she help? Oh, yuck, she was never any good at people things. However, the waiter beat Catherine to it, coming over and giving the woman a glass of wine.
Not that wine was going to fix a broken heart.
Nicole took her napkin and wiped her eyes. Then she drank her wine and stared silently, the tears streaming down her face again.
Torn, Catherine looked at Nicole, picked up the pen, but then began to sketch. Eventually, she had a passable sketch of Jack, sprawled on the floor, an open can of artichoke hearts oozing onto the wooden floor.
Daniel watched her as she drew; she could feel his eyes on her. “Can I see it?” he asked after she put the pen down.
“Is it awful?” she asked.
“I think you should give it to her,” he told her, quite sincerely, too. She could tell. That’s what she liked about Daniel. He didn’t say anything he didn’t mean.
“I can’t give it to her.” Catherine didn’t like to share her art. It made her nervous, and open, and bare, but then, compared to Nicole’s situation, those things didn’t seem so bad.
Daniel looked at her, his eyes encouraging. “Yes, you can. I think she’ll treasure it forever. And sign it. It’ll be valuable someday.”
“You think?” she asked, liking the way he thought.
Daniel nodded, and Catherine felt flush again.
“You’re good for me,” she told him, because he gave her courage. When she was with him, she thought she could be a trailblazer.
His eyes cooled. “I wish I was good for you.” Then he nodded to the sketch. “Give it to her.”
Obediently, Catherine took the napkin and passed it to the other table.
Nicole took one look, and then stared. Then she laughed. It wasn’t a healthy laugh, more hysterical than anything, and Catherine looked at Daniel in alarm.
“Trust me,” he whispered across the table. “That’s completely normal.”
After Nicole regained her composure, she managed a smile. “Thank you. I’m sorry to interrupt your dinner.”
Catherine waved a hand as if it happened all the time. “No worries.”
Daniel paid the check and Catherine noticed that he picked up the tab for Jack and Nicole, too. It was all done discreetly, and she wouldn’t have noticed except for the brief conversation with their waiter.
Catherine frowned at the wayward pull of her heart. She already suspected that he wasn’t good for her. Yes, he wanted to be good for her, but merely wanting it wasn’t enough. She knew that. He knew that, too. It was there on his face.
“Ready?” he asked.
He had no idea how ready she was.
Once outside the heavy doors of the restaurant, the building was nowhere near as welcoming. Tall stone pillars were everywhere, the marble floors echoing every word, every footstep, every thudding beat of her heart. Catherine locked her arms around her waist. Time to go home.
“Thank you for dinner. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I had a wonderful time.” She wasn’t sure whether to kiss him, shake his hand or to simply walk away. While she was pondering the social implications of going on a date with a widower, he took her hand.
“Thank you for the company,” he responded, his thumb pressing intermittently against her palm. It wasn’t a conscious gesture, almost nervous, like bad Morse code, and she smiled.
“What?” he asked.
“It’s nothing,” she said, right before he kissed her, his mouth hungry and warm, so seductively warm. He drew her closer, until she couldn’t breathe. She didn’t want to breathe; she was drowning in this, drowning in the luxurious waters of a man’s kiss.
Catherine parted her lips when his restless hands glided over her, across her hips, around her waist and along the curve of her back. Everywhere he touched, it was like hot liquid pouring over her skin. But there was no pain, only marvelous heat.
She could feel one of the pillars at her back, cold and hard. In a split second, he had shifted them behind the pillar, out of the light, into the shadows, where it didn’t matter if he was good for her or not. This was good.
Her hands slipped around the brawny sinews of his back, sliding up and down, betraying her thoughts. She loved this, touching him and kissing him, and in a moment, kissing wasn’t nearly enough. His mouth went from hers to her neck, the rasp of his stubble skimming her throat, and she shivered, relishing the delight. His hips pressed against hers, and she could feel him there, between her legs, until she was dying to moan. Boldly, his hands slid underneath her dress, cupping her rear, pressing her closer, which was throwing gasoline onto an already-blazing fire. She felt so hot. So drenching hot.
The hands slid lower, sliding between her legs, and he touched the damp silk. She felt her whole body tense rigid as a bow. Instead of rushing her, his thumb slid back and forth, slow, steady and merciless, until her eyes closed, her head weak and languorous. Oh, this felt so good. Too good. This time she did moan, quietly, carefully, but she knew he heard.
He whispered against her neck, things she understood only too well, the insistent pressure killing her. Music spilled out over the building speakers, ol
d Barry Manilow, and it seemed wrong to feel like this, and she wanted to laugh, but as the piano keys crashed in her ears, she didn’t want to laugh, she wanted this. Only this. His hands slid the fabric aside, and he was touching her there, and her hips moved, grinding against him, harder and harder, her muscles tensing around his hand. He moved faster, and she could feel his body grinding, as well, and it was pretty much sex in clothes, but she didn’t care. Right now, she just needed to come. Badly.
His other hand lifted the back of her dress, the cold stone against her bare skin. Her muscles locked, frozen, as he stroked her faster and faster, and she was close. So very, very close. She could hear the sound of a zip, not hers, and she exhaled.
Oh, yes, yes, yes.
But right when she was ready to explode, right when he was about to enter her, there were voices there in the lobby, echoing voices, and a violent shock ripped through her. No. She needed to come. She struggled to breathe, the voices getting louder, the crescendo of the song’s refrain building, and she felt Daniel adjust her dress, his hand pressing her harder and harder, and his mouth settled on hers.
“Come,” he whispered against her lips. “Come,” he ordered, his voice covering hers, his tongue not so seductive, purely carnal, and helplessly she obeyed, shattering apart.
The voices continued to complain about the hot weather, about making plans for a dinner next week at Nobu, and asking after an uncle who’d been ill. Catherine tried to breathe deeply to force oxygen into her lungs.
While the idle chatter droned on, and the crooning sounds of Barry Manilow changed to an up-tempo Avril Lavigne tune, Daniel put their clothes in order. He pressed his forehead against her own. Finally, thankfully, the voices went away, and they were alone again. Daniel took a step away from her. The distance firmly back in place.
“I can’t do this,” she whispered, holding a hand to her chest, her heart ready to explode.
“I didn’t mean for that to happen,” he said. “I shouldn’t have done that.”
She stared at him, his gray eyes bitter. “What do you want?” she dared to ask. With only a little bit of encouragement, she would risk this. Sometimes she did things she shouldn’t do, either.
“I want you.”
Such simple words. Such difficult words. If she didn’t ask any more questions, she could interpret those words however she wanted to, but Catherine wasn’t stupid. “You want an affair? No emotional commitment, no sharing, no ties?”
Daniel wound a hand through his hair and took a quick breath. The shadows of the building couldn’t disguise what he was battling inside. He looked at her then, the conflict seemingly resolved. “That’s all I can do.”
Not the answer she had hoped for. “That’s not me.”
“I know,” he said, and when his expression softened, she put up her hand.
“Go. Just leave before I change my mind.”
THE PHONE WAS RINGING when Daniel walked into his apartment. He picked it up, wanting to hear Catherine’s voice.
“I know it’s late, but I thought you might be up.”
Claudia. Frustrated, Daniel collapsed onto the couch, his body still aching. “I always have time for you.”
“Thank goodness Michelle married you,” his mother-in-law answered.
Daniel quickly changed the subject. “Are you all right? Do you need something? Some repairs on the house?” Claudia live in a fifty-year-old house on Long Island, the house that Michelle had been born in, and a house that Daniel had repaired because that was his family, too. He and Michelle had worked together for three years, dated for almost a year, and been married for five months, but Claudia would be his family for life.
“No.”
“Is this about the anniversary?” he asked, aware she knew which one he was talking about.
“I hate it. Every year I don’t go, and every year I feel guilty for not going.”
“I know,” he said, because he spent every September eleventh in a bar somewhere. Always somewhere new. He couldn’t tell her the pain and the guilt would go away because he wasn’t sure they ever would.
“I was talking to Stella Mancini this morning, and she made me so mad, telling me that it was past time that I moved away from New York. I don’t want to move.”
“Don’t move, then,” he told her, rubbing tired eyes.
“Maybe she’s right. She said I should find a condo in Florida. Something around Tampa, and get away from the city. Stella said there were too many bad memories for me here and as long I stay in the shadow of Michelle’s death then I’ll never get back to normal. Those were her words. ‘Get back to normal.’ Like I can ever get back to normal. What is normal? Tell me, Daniel. You buried a wife. I buried a daughter. Are we ever going to get back to normal?”
“No,” he replied. There was heaven, hell, and then there was purgatory. That halfway place where nothing ever changed, time didn’t move and everything was comfortably numb. Right now, purgatory was as close to normal as he got.
“Is Stella right, do you think? Do I need to move?”
“What did you tell her?” He didn’t want Claudia to move. She was his link to Michelle, and he needed her just like she needed him. Claudia didn’t have anyone else but him. Michelle had been her only kid.
“I told Stella that I’d talk to a Realtor. So I did. Do you know how much I can get for this old place now?”
“You’re going to sell the house?” he asked, and his pulse jumped nervously.
“You don’t think I should, do you?”
“That’s not my decision to make, Claudia.” His fingers pulled at the fabric of his pants, his face carefully controlled, even though there was no one to see him.
“Are you ever going to move from that apartment, Daniel?”
“No.” It was his home. Their home.
“I don’t know what to do.”
“Do what you need to do.”
“I don’t think Michelle would have wanted me to leave Long Island. This was her home, too. I was looking through my pictures yesterday and I couldn’t find her graduation pictures.”
The graduation pictures. Daniel remembered those. Cap, gown, on-top-of-the-world grin? Check. “I think I have those. We put a lot of things in storage, but I haven’t touched them.”
“Could you get them for me?”
Storage. He didn’t want to go to storage. It was dusty, and cold, and untouched.
“Okay,” he agreed, and she must have heard the uncertainty in his voice.
“You don’t have to do this, if you don’t want to.”
“No, no. It’s fine. There’re probably a lot of pictures, Claudia. Do you want me to get all of them for you?”
“Yeah. In case I move. I’d like to have what you’ll let me have.”
“I’ll look for you,” he promised, feeling the sweat on the back of his neck. “Is next Saturday okay?”
“That’d be perfect. You don’t think I should move, do you?” she asked him again. Claudia needed him.
“It’s your decision. I can’t make it for you.” He would always be there for her though. That’s who he was.
“I wish…I wish so many things. I keep thinking that I should have grandchildren. I have a cross-stitched birth announcement without a name. It needs a name….” Her voice grew quiet, and Daniel closed his eyes. People expected him to be the strong one.
“I should stop talking and let you go to bed. You’re a good son, Daniel. The very best.”
Daniel hung up and stared at the wall where all of Michelle’s pictures hung. Their wedding day, Michelle standing in front of Niagara Falls on their honeymoon, Michelle pulling a beer at the bar. Five months. They’d only been married for five months. Daniel assumed they had all the time in the world. His mouth twisted into a deep frown.
Daniel walked into the bedroom, carefully putting the wedding ring back on his finger where it belonged. And when he woke up, he reached for a woman who wasn’t there.
9
THE WEDDING
RING was back in place.
The next morning, Catherine saw Daniel on the elevator. She stared at the scarlet and gold threads of the rug, picking out the curling arabesques in the curvilinear pattern. Her eyes did stray once. To his hands.
Catherine’s stomach cramped. However, she survived day one.
Wednesday, day two, dawned and she saw him again. This time, on the fourth floor. Catherine had gone there to ask Montefiore’s high renaissance specialist about a Cellini sculpture scheduled to be auctioned on the weekend. The appraisal rooms were wide-open spaces with desks here and there, unopened crates and objets d’art scattered in a seemingly haphazard manner, which actually did make sense, once you knew the system.
Yuri was deep in conversation with one of the cataloger trainees, so she waited patiently. When an auction featured a particular period, those specialists were always swamped.
While she idly picked through an old catalog on Yuri’s desk, Daniel walked in, and began talking with Eamon, one of the senior jewelry appraisers. Catherine skulked two small steps in his direction, curious. Every time she saw him, he was so put together. The tie neatly knotted. The shoes black and polished. Shirt starched. No hot burn in his eyes—they were coolly impassive, and she missed the heat.
She leafed through the pages of the catalog, not really looking. Not close enough to overhear, either.
Daniel came up behind her and the tender skin on the back of her neck pricked. “You can ask, if you want to know,” he said quietly.
“No. It’s not my business,” she told him, keeping her eyes firmly on the Bronzino painting in the catalog, Neptune, the strong contours of the sea god’s shape, aloofness of the subject, the cool color tones.
Daniel dropped a ring on the picture. “My brother found this at his bar. I told him I’d try to track down the owner.”
It was an engagement ring. The man seemed to be drowning in rings.
“Oh,” she answered casually, picking it up, the metal still warm from his touch. “It looks like Oliver Cummings. Platinum. What did Eamon say?” She dared to look at him, noticed the gray eyes warmed to silver.
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