Lily

by Greenwood, Leigh

  "Maybe," Lily said, "but I don't know him well enough."

  Lily sat down to bush her hair. She might have to talk to Zac in the middle of the night, but she didn't have to look like she'd just gotten out of bed.

  * * * * *

  Lily opened the door and stepped inside Bella's formal parlor with its heavy furniture and dark fabrics. It was almost like entering a funeral parlor. Appropriate. She was about to announce the death of her marriage.

  Her heart beat a little faster when she saw Zac. He was so handsome. It was hard to believe she had actually walked out on this man, but she couldn't let herself be sidetracked by his looks. No matter how much he stirred desire in her, she was more concerned with his feelings for her.

  She couldn't really judge Zac's state of mind. He wasn't dressed with his usual neatness. His eyes looked red and his eyelids sagged, but he'd been up all night in a smoke-filled saloon. He seemed as much upset as angry. But knowing Zac, they both meant pretty much the same thing.

  "Aren't you going to say anything?" he asked when they had stared at each other for what seemed like a long time.

  "I was waiting for you."

  "Why? You were the one who ran away."

  "I thought you'd be happier, that things would be easier."

  "It's only going to make things worse. Why did you leave?"

  She might as well tell him the truth. She owed him that much. She had forced herself on him for weeks. She was the one who was at fault from the beginning. He had put up with more than any other man would have.

  "Because you don't love me."

  "Yes, I do."

  He looked slightly stunned by the sound of his own words. She guessed he'd never meant to say them, but he manfully repeated them.

  "I do love you."

  "No, you don't. You never have. You've tried to cover it up, pretending you like having me around, like . . . well, you know what I mean, but even a stupid girl from the mountains will figure things out eventually."

  "I do like having you around. And I do like trying to make a baby with you."

  "Maybe, but that's not the same as love."

  "It must be. We're married. I've introduced you to my family. I plan to take you to parties, show you around town. That proves I love you. But if you stay with Bella, people will think something's wrong."

  He didn't understand. He thought saying the words, doing the deeds was love. He didn't understand that it had to come from his heart, not from his head.

  "Maybe that's not a bad thing. Maybe it's time we stopped pretending."

  "We're not pretending. We're married."

  "It might be best if we pretend that never happened."

  His face turned white. She didn't know why. It seemed like a perfect solution to her.

  "Half of San Francisco knows we're married," Zac said. "Besides, people in society don't stay in places like this."

  "I'm comfortable here. I don't think I could be happy with people like Anthony Bellrose and his friends."

  "You don't know until you try. Besides, not everybody's like that."

  "Maybe you ought to forget me, let me sink or swim on my own."

  "I tried that, and it didn't work."

  He was right. She was always making a mess of things then coming to him to straighten them out.

  "Why did you come?" she asked.

  He looked thunderstruck. "You walk out on me, and you ask me why I came after you? Wouldn't you come after me? Wouldn't you want to know why?"

  "But you've known I loved you from the beginning."

  "Okay. I admit I haven't been saying I love you at least once every hour, whispering it in your ear, acting like you're the only person in the world. But that doesn't mean I don't love you. And it's no reason to disappear without a word. I never pretended to be the best husband in the world, but I deserve more than that."

  "You're right. I've messed up everything else. Why should this be any different?"

  She stood up and moved behind the sofa. She needed to get her thoughts straight. She directed her gaze to the carpet at her feet. She couldn't concentrate when she looked at Zac.

  "I left because there didn't seem to be anything else to do. This whole mess is my fault. I came out here without an invitation. I expected you to take care of me even though I insisted I wanted to do it myself. I wanted you to marry me even though I knew you didn't love me. I never once did what you asked. I've done nothing but defy everybody who's tried to help me, from my father and Hezekiah to you and Mrs. Thoragood."

  "You don't have to keep doing it."

  "I know, but I can't go back to the saloon, or the hotel. Not yet."

  "What will you do?"

  "I don't know, but I've got to decide for myself."

  "How long is this going to take?"

  "I don't know."

  "What am I supposed to do?"

  "Forget you ever heard of me."

  "I can't do that."

  "Why not? You've been trying to do it ever since I reached San Francisco."

  "Only at first. Ever since then I've thought about you a lot."

  "We aren't even talking about the same thing. You're talking about working together, occupying the same room, being physically attracted."

  "That's a lot."

  "Maybe for a man, but not for a woman."

  He looked confused, indignant. He had no idea what she was talking about.

  "You've never understood women," Lily said. "You've known how to seduce them, flatter them, keep them hanging on your every word as long as they continued to interest you, but you've never known the first thing about how a woman feels. You worked with Dodie for years and never once guessed she was in love with you.

  "I'm not just talking about knowing how to make a woman feels pretty and desirable. That's important, but there's much more to love than that. A woman wants to be needed, to feel her man can't get along without her, to feel a part of him. She wants him to share all of himself with her, not just a part. She wants to feel appreciated, valued because she can give him something no other woman in the world can. She wants her feelings and opinions to be important to him."

  "They are."

  "Zac, you haven't asked me what I thought or listened to a word I've said since I got here." Lily stopped. She made herself wait until she felt more calm. "That's not what I wanted to say. I'm not trying to blame you. I was just trying to explain why I left. I know you can't love me just because I want you to. Maybe you do love me a little bit, in your own way. But I want more. I need more. You can't give it to me. I've got to decide what I'm going to do about that."

  "Do I get to help make this decision?"

  "No. This is one I have to make on my own."

  Chapter Twenty-five

  "Daisy told me you were lovely, but she didn't tell me you were absolutely stunning," Fern Randolph said to Lily. "It'll be nice to finally have someone in the family who can give Iris a taste of her own."

  When the maid had announced that Mrs. Randolph was in the parlor wanting to see her, Lily and Bella were playing cards. It seemed to be all she did these days. She had induced Bella to explain some of the finer points, even play with her. Lily assumed her visitor was Mrs. Tyler Randolph. She didn't want to see anybody just yet, but she couldn't refuse to see Daisy, not after she'd been so kind.

  Lily was stunned and bewildered when a woman she'd never seen before greeted her with all the warmth of a long lost friend.

  "I'm Fern Randolph. It was stupid of me not to realize until after that young woman left that you were probably expecting Daisy."

  "I'm sorry. I should have recognized you, but it's been more than four years."

  "Nonsense. You had no reason to remember an old married woman surrounded by a horde of boys."

  Only then did Lily remember Fern was the mother of five energetic sons and married to Madison, who looked so much like Zac it was unnerving.

  They sat down. "I should have remembered all of Zac's family," Lily said.

&
nbsp; "You can't. Even George forgets a nephew or a niece now and then."

  "I meant the older ones," Lily said, wondering wildly why Fern had come to visit her.

  "I know you're wondering where I materialized from," Fern said. "Madison has decided to move his business headquarters to San Francisco. I came ahead to look for a house. I nearly fainted when Daisy told me Zac was married. Why on earth didn't you let anybody know? The family will be gaga with curiosity."

  That thought turned Lily white with fear. She had already refused to see Mrs. Thoragood and Hezekiah because she didn't know what to say to them. She had been dreading having to explain things to Daisy. She was even more at a loss with Fern.

  "I can see it's the gaga with curiosity that has you worried," Fern said. "You have a right to be in this family. They'll ask anything regardless of how awkward or personal. Believe it or not, the men are worse than the women."

  "I don't know how to begin to explain the mess I've made of things."

  "My dear, any woman who marries Zac has a superhuman task on her hands. It's only to be expected you'll make a wrong turn now and then. I really shouldn't have come here. I should have cornered the selfish creature in that saloon of his."

  "It's not Zac's fault," Lily said, determined his family wouldn't blame him for what she had done. "He's acted like a perfect gentleman from the very first. I'm the one who's made all the stupid mistakes."

  "Are we talking about the same person?"

  "You sound like everybody else," Lily said, flaring up, "assuming if anything is wrong, it has to be Zac's fault. It's not Zac's fault I didn't have the good sense to stay where I belonged. Neither is it his fault that he ended up married to a woman who's not nearly as clever as she thought. Anybody else would have strangled me by now."

  Fern simply stared at Lily. She made no attempt to reply.

  "I'm sorry for snapping at you like that, but everybody says the most awful things about Zac. I don't pretend he's perfect, but no one else sees the good in him."

  "And you do?"

  "I don't see how anyone could not."

  "Probably because he keeps as far away from his family as possible," Fern said.

  "If everybody treats him like they did that time in Virginia, I don't blame him."

  "I think we've started off on the wrong foot," Fern said beginning to rise. "Maybe I should leave."

  Lily jumped up. "Please, no. I don't know what's wrong with me. I never used to act like this, not even when things were terribly wrong."

  Reluctantly Fern settled in her chair once more. "Are things terribly wrong now?"

  "Worse than ever."

  "I'm a good listener. You can't live in the same house with six male Randolphs and not learn."

  Lily smiled.

  "You're going to have to explain some time. Once everybody hears your name, they won't be able to contain their curiosity."

  "I don't understand."

  "Surely it hasn't escaped your notice that all of Zac's sisters-in-law are named after flowers. He's been running from flower women for years. Everybody's going to be dying to know how you caught him."

  "Unfairly."

  "That statement demands an explanation."

  So Lily explained. She started from the beginning and went straight through to the end. She didn't leave anything out.

  "So you see, it's all my fault. If I hadn't been so foolishly certain I knew the answer to everything, none of this would have happened."

  "I must say, I'm sorry Rose wasn't here to hear this. She knows Zac a lot better than I do."

  "He's afraid of her. George, too."

  Fern laughed easily. "Rose and George are probably the only people in the world Zac loves without reservation. He stays away from them because he doesn't want to hurt them." Fern was quiet a moment, apparently turning a thought over in her mind. Finally she said, "I can't be sure, of course, but from what you've told me, it's quite possible he loves you just as much."

  Tears sprang to Lily's eyes. She brushed them away. "Zac doesn't love me. He says he does, but he doesn't. Not really. He doesn't even want to be married."

  "Oh, I have no doubt about that. Zac has fought any kind of control or restraint for as long as I've known him, probably from the first moment he drew breath. But if he's done half of what you've told me, he loves you. I know the Randolph men, and I know Zac well enough to see that."

  Lily didn't want Fern to plant a seed of hope in her heart. She wanted her to say it was over, hopeless, that the sooner she went back to Virginia the happier everybody would be. She could stand that. Barely. But she couldn't stand having her hopes raised then dashed time and time again.

  "Then it's not the kind of love I need," Lily said. "I don't want to change his life. I thought about doing that -- I suppose every woman considers making her man over into one more of her liking -- but I decided he wouldn't like it. But he's got to let me into his life, and I don't mean just the saloon. I mean all of it. He's trying to force me to live in a separate world from him. He tells me what to do, what to think, where to live, who my friends ought to be. That's not a marriage. It's like he owns me. That's the way my father treats my mother. I swore that would never happen to me. It's part of the reason I ran away."

  "Have you tried talking to Zac, telling him how you feel?"

  "Yes, but he doesn't hear what he doesn't want to hear. He's made up his mind about the way things should be, and nothing I say seems able to change his mind,"

  "That's a Randolph through and through," Fern said. "I could tell you stories about Madison . . . but you're not interested in my husband. Suffice it to say that every male Randolph feels he has all the answers to everything."

  "What should I do?"

  "First, decide if you love him enough to put up with this for the rest of your life. They don't change. They may love their wives to distraction, but they're still the same hardheaded, egotistical, know-it-all beasts they were before we corralled them."

  "You make them sound awful."

  "My dear, I'm married to the most stubborn of them all, and I've got five boys just like him. I wouldn't trade one minute of the time I've known Madison for anything in the world, but there are times when I'd give almost anything to be big enough to beat him up."

  "I feel that way about Zac a lot."

  "That's because he and Madison are very much alike."

  "How do you get what you want when he's determined you're not going to have it?"

  "First, I make very sure of what I want and what I mean to do when I get it. Then I tell Madison. He may shout and make threats, but he won't actually stop me. If you can get someone to oppose you, so much the better. He may not think I ought to do a thing, but he'll defend my right to do it against someone else."

  "But that doesn't make sense."

  "Men rarely do when it comes to women. They're very good with figures and building things, but if they didn't have us to help them along, they'd never be able to find their underwear."

  Lily laughed despite herself. "That doesn't sound like Zac."

  "Give him time. From what he said, he has a woman doing a lot of the work for him already."

  "Dodie, but she quit."

  "Good. He'll fall on his face even sooner. When he does, you be there to pick him up."

  Lily didn't want Zac to fall on his face, neither could she imagine being able to solve his problems. If she wanted to be his wife, she couldn't continue to do nothing but cause problems. She had to be the answer to at least one of his needs.

  She thought of the hours they'd spent making love. She felt slightly guilty thinking of that first. But it had been the only time she felt truly a part of him, the only time when they didn't argue, when he didn't seem to be trying to put her out of his life.

  "I guess most of the time I've been waiting for him to make the decisions," Lily said. "Whenever I haven't, I've ended up causing him trouble."

  "Don't worry about that," Fern said. "You're his wife. It's your right to cause troub
le."

  "I don't want to."

  "Don't be foolish. He's going to cause you trouble from dawn to midnight for the rest of your life. He deserves a few rough moments in return. Besides, it'll make him more attentive. It'll also make him respect you more."

  "I don't understand."

  "Don't waste your time trying. I told you men were foolish creatures. They're always trying to make out that we are, but they're no better. It's just that they won't admit it."

  Lily had to admit Zac did have some rather ridiculous ideas. Even Dodie thought so. She doubted, though, he would change his mind just because she wanted him to.

  "Are you sure you won't move to the hotel? Daisy is worried about you."

  "It'll be better if I stay here. It has nothing to do with Daisy. If I go to the hotel, Zac will think I've given in. Besides, I mean to take a job until I can make up my mind what to do."

  Fern got to her feet. "Well, don't take too long. Rose and George will be coming to San Francisco in the fall. I don't even want to think of what they'll do if things aren't straightened out by then. It almost makes me feel sorry for Zac."

  "But they're only his brother and sister-in-law."

  "They're more like his parents. They brought him up. I think Rose feels like he's her oldest child."

  Lily had no idea what kind of guidance Zac might have needed as a child, but she knew he didn't need a mother now. Whatever he did, he must do it because he wanted to. She had been party to forcing him into something against his will once before. She would never do that again.

  "I know things are unsettled, but you must come see Daisy and me. I promise we won't pry. You're part of the family now. It's our right to worry about you."

  "That's just it. I'm not part of the family. So far my marriage is just so much meaningless paper. Until Zac decides he wants me in his life, that he needs me, I'll still be an outsider."

  * * * * *

  Daisy and Fern had found Zac in his office. He felt like a cornered rabbit when Fern locked the door and dropped the key into her purse. "I'm not taking any chance on your running away until we've had our say," she said.

  "You've got to do something about Lily," Daisy announced without preamble, "and you've got to do it quickly. It's sinful for that poor girl to be living by herself, working in a woman's clothing shop, when she's got a perfectly good husband who ought to be taking care of her."