Serena put the towel down and slumped. She turned to look at him again. "What is it you want to know?" she asked in an exasperated voice.
"Come on, Serena. You know," he said. "The things lovers tell each other." He gently pushed strands of wet hair from out of her eyes. "About your family, about growing up, your friends and dreams and ambitions. All those things that tell me about you."
She looked into his eyes, her own glinting bright and hard in the dim light. "If I tell you once and for all, will you promise not to ask me anything about the past again? Ever?"
Misha nodded. "I promise," he vowed. He pulled her to him and kissed her tenderly.
Serena pulled back and wrapped her hair in the towel again. Then she got under the covers next to him. She stared straight ahead. "You know what you read in the magazine article," she said. "That I was born in Florida."
"Yes," Misha said.
"Well, I was," she said. "Only it isn't the Florida that most people know. It was in a tiny, dilapidated cracker shack near the Gulf coast. Way out in the boonies near Crystal River."
Misha listened, watching her beautiful face, and saw the faraway look in her eyes. He was afraid that if he interrupted her to ask questions, she wouldn't continue.
"My father, if you could call him that," she said harshly, "was a fishing guide. When he wasn't too drunk. My mother was what some people would call a housewife. When she wasn't too drunk." She paused and looked down, studying her fingernails, as if the rest of her story lay hidden in them.
"I had two older brothers who I don't remember much about," she finally continued. "At least not until I was about ten years old." Her voice became hushed, and her eyes dimmed with sadness. "That's about the time they started messing around with me."
Misha gently put a hand on her arm, but she brushed it away.
"When it wasn't them, it was my father," she said. "And when I told my mother, she beat the shit out of me for leading them on. For tempting them, as she put it." She turned and glanced at Misha. "So there was no way I could win." She paused again, and looked away.
Misha wanted to reach out and touch her, to hold her, to give her comfort, but he was afraid she would push him away again.
"Anyway, I started running away from home when I was about twelve," she went on. "Then finally, when I was fifteen, I ran away for good. And I haven't been back to that hellhole since," she said with vehemence.
She turned and looked at Misha again. "I became a rock band groupie, hanging out with the guys, traveling all over the country with them, doing gigs. They gave me food and shelter and booze and drugs." She looked away again. "And I gave them anything they wanted. And I do mean anything."
She was quiet for a while, studying her fingernails again. She seemed reluctant to finish her story, but finally took a deep breath and went on. "I started taking pictures of the band and the groupies. Onstage, while the band was performing, and backstage while they were gearing up. Then at the parties in hotel rooms, motel rooms. It was an accident really. Just something to pass the time. Have fun."
She looked over at him again and shrugged. "Anyway, you know the rest. Magazine editors saw some of my pictures when they were interviewing the band, and my career got started. They were snapshots really. The early ones, I mean. Candid shots that were hard to come by, but I got them. I had the access. When I realized what I had, I used that as a stepping-stone, learning as I went along. Then I met Coral Randolph, my agent, and the rest, as they say, is history."
"You've come a long way," Misha ventured.
"Yes," she said. "I've come a long, long way. And I've never looked back. And I never will, either."
"I'm glad you've told me, Serena," Misha said, taking her hand in his.
"So there you have it," she said, extracting her hand. "I don't want to talk about it anymore, Misha. Can you understand that?" She looked into his eyes.
"Yes," he said. "I do now. I won't ask you about it again."
"Don't," she said. She got back out of bed and padded toward the bathroom, toweling her hair again. "Not ever."
Misha watched her disappear into the bathroom, his mind swirling with what she had told him. No wonder there were no family photographs sprinkled about the apartment, he thought sadly. No wonder she never mentioned her past. It dawned on him that Serena was probably afraid of true intimacy and that she most likely didn't trust anyone. Not surprising, considering her childhood.
He wondered if he could ever penetrate that beautiful, polished exterior. The sex is so fantastic, he thought. But will it ever go beyond that? Will she allow it to?
He supposed that her own terrible experiences explained why she had no desire to meet his parents. He had been so anxious to show her off to them, but she had resisted so far, making any number of transparent excuses. Could it also explain why she never wanted to spend the night at his place? She had made jokes about his richly decorated and lived-in apartment, calling it an Aladdin's den of treasures. Was she intimidated by its being more of a real home, a place where he lived with many of the things he loved? Or was she afraid of him in his own lair, on his own turf?
He didn't know the answer to any of these questions, but there were a few things he did know now. Serena, for all her beauty and talent and accomplishments, was somehow damaged. That he knew with a certainty. At her core, he decided, was an insecurity and a fear that seemed to color her every action. But most frightening of all, he thought, was a certain poverty of spirit.
Serena was a fighter and a survivor, that was clear, but could she ever really learn to give of herself without fear? And to accept what's offered her on trust?
Will she ever let me really love her? he wondered.
Chapter Twenty-seven
Serena was in Kenya, photographing models cavorting about in couture gowns at a wildlife preserve.
Misha was in Tokyo, playing for a packed house.
Serena was on an estancia outside Buenos Aires, taking pictures of muscle-bound male models, strutting about the stables, dressed in the latest "macho-man-meets-nancy-boy" looks from London designers.
Misha was climbing pyramids in Teotihuacan after his performance thrilled critics and audience alike in Mexico City.
Serena was somewhere in the Indian Ocean on one of the Maldive Islands, taking an extended vacation with Coral and Sal/Sally—"Sorry, ladies only, Misha!"—after a particularly grueling and trouble-fraught fashion shoot in the wilds of Rajasthan.
They really were like ships passing in the night.
Misha, back in New York, was lonely and a little angry with Serena. He was utterly bored with the beautiful models who wanted to go club crawling every night, more often than not high on drugs.
He decided to call Vera to see if she would like to go antiquing upstate over the weekend. She was thrilled at the chance, and they sped off together in his little silver- blue BMW sports car, the top down, their hair blowing in the wind. Up the Taconic State Parkway they went, searching for treasures in off-the-beaten-track places.
In Hudson, they found two magnificent lead garden urns, a matched pair. Just the thing to place on pedestals, one in each of Vera's parlor windows. Down the street they found a massive four-poster Italian Renaissance bed, beautifully carved and canopied. Precisely the piece Misha had been searching for to replace the bed in his apartment.
They dined at the Charleston Restaurant, enjoying its excellent cuisine, then spent the night at a romantic little bed and breakfast in the nearby Berkshires.
Returning to New York, they glowed with the happiness of their new acquisitions, which would soon be sent to them. Though they weren't necessarily bargains, they'd had fun searching for them. More important, they relished their rediscovery of each other's company.
Sunday night Vera insisted on cooking in rather than going out, as so many weekenders did on returning to the city. At Misha's apartment, in his large, well- equipped kitchen, she threw together a delicious pasta with artichoke hearts, scallions, and cayenne pepper,
while he made a salad of arugula and tomatoes with an olive oil and balsamic vinaigrette.
They drank wine and talked and talked and talked. Vera occasionally got up to move one of his treasures here or there for greater effect, making suggestions about re-hanging some of his pictures, helping him decide how to place the new bed in his bedroom. They discussed which of the ancient fabrics they both collected would make the best hangings for it, Vera telling him about her old crewel work that she might be willing to part with.
It was very late before they finally ascended the stairs to his bedroom for the last time that night, hand in hand, smiles of contentment on their faces. They were already pleasantly tired by their mutual enjoyment of the weekend and the pure delight they took in each other, but invigorated at the same time. It was a night of sweet and leisurely lovemaking, ending in heavy, reenergizing sleep.
Misha's private telephone line began a persistent, shrill ring early Monday morning. He rolled over and turned the offensive instrument off, noticing that Vera had already gotten up and gone off to work.
Later, after coffee, juice, and toast, he listened to his messages. All from Serena, as he suspected they would be. He knew that she was due back in New York this morning. He decided he would call her back, although he was still miffed that she hadn't found the time to fit him into her hectic schedule. He knew from his own experience that with some effort—and desire—she could have done so.
He picked up the receiver and dialed her number.
After three rings her telephone was answered. "Yeah?" It was the gruff John Wayne voice.
"Sal ...Sally?" Misha asked.
"Who wants to know?"
"It's Misha Levin," he said. "I was calling for Serena."
"Hold on."
He heard the receiver bang loudly against something, as if Sal had deliberately let it drop. After a moment Serena's voice came on the line.
"Hi!" she said cheerfully. "I tried to get you earlier but didn't get an answer."
"I had the phones off," he said. "I was sleeping late." The enthusiasm in her voice mollified his anger to some extent, but he still wasn't ready to forgive her.
"Aha!" she said. "What've you been up to?"
"This and that," he said, unwilling to be forthcoming. "A guy has to amuse himself when he's been left in the lurch. You know?"
"Are you pissed?" Serena asked.
"I guess you could put it that way," he allowed.
"Misha," she said firmly, "we've been seeing each other for months, and I would think that by now you would've gotten used to my crazy schedule. You know how it is. I can't drop everything like some bored little housewifey and run every time you say run."
"I know that," he said heatedly, "and you know very well that I hardly expect that."
"Look," Serena said mildly, "I've got the day free. Why don't you come on down here and we'll talk? Okay?"
"Would you like to come up here?" he asked, knowing that she would say no. "There'd be fewer distractions."
"No," she said, as predicted. "Better here. I'm expecting some important telephone calls."
"Of course," he said with a tinge of sarcasm. "The all-important telephone calls. That all-important umbilical cord. You could bring your cell phone up here, you know."
"That won't work," she said. "There may be some deliveries, and there won't be anybody here but me." She sighed. "Look, Misha," she added, "I just can't help it. Please come on down here."
"Give me about an hour," he said, unable to resist her allure, the seemingly magnetic pull that she held for him.
He hung up the receiver, staring off into space. "Damn!" he exclaimed. And he thought, How much longer can I go on like this, her running hot for me one minute, then cutting me off completely?
The elevator bobbed to a halt on Serena's floor, and Misha got out. John Wayne stood there, legs spread wide in a particularly butch pose, waiting for the elevator.
"Hi, Sal," he said brightly.
She eyed him with suspicion, then nodded, grudgingly, he thought. She got into the elevator with a swagger and slammed the button with a fist.
He rang the second intercom—there was one in the lobby as well as one at the loft's door, for added security—and Serena buzzed him in. He stepped into the mammoth loft, and Serena called to him.
"Misha," she cried. "Back here. In the studio."
He headed off to the right, toward the vast space that adjoined her living quarters. It contained her photographic studio, complete with bathrooms, changing rooms, wardrobes, storage facilities, and dark room. She was standing, almost hidden, by huge trunks filled with lighting equipment, cameras, and countless accessories, as well as several rolling racks of clothing and boxes piled high with shoes, boots, hats, and who knew what else.
She looked up at him and smiled widely, her raven hair framing her lightly tanned face. "Hi," she said.
At that moment, she looked, he thought, like a Madonna. Exquisite and innocent. Pure and—
Then he saw what she was wearing.
"What in the world?" he gasped. Then he laughed lightly.
Serena grinned. "I'm trying on clothes for a photo shoot," she said. "A magazine in London is doing a big feature article about me! Imagine! And they sent down tons of outfits to try. I have approval—with their input— as to what to wear in the photo spread."
She did a pirouette, then stood looking at him. "What do you think?" she asked.
Misha was momentarily at a loss as to what to say. "Well, I think it makes you look like a hooker," he blurted. "A hooker with a specialty," he added with amusement.
Serena laughed. "You don't think black leather hot pants with skull studs all over them are mo/? How about the matching bustier? Oh, wait," she said, looking in the mirror. "It doesn't match. It's studded with crossed bones."
"It makes your breasts look huge," he said, eyeing them appreciatively.
"And the boots!" she said. "Practical, no? Stiletto heels and thigh high. Nice for a day of shopping."
"Yes," Misha said, laughing. "I can just see it. You'd clear the store out wearing those. All the customers would go running."
"Come here," she said, stamping one of her heels.
He walked over and took her into his arms, kissing her deeply. She responded immediately, throwing her arms around him, matching his desire with her own.
"I think you like these big breasts," she said, drawing back and looking mischievous.
"I like you," he said.
"And the big breasts?" she said teasingly.
"Maybe those, too."
"Let's go to the bedroom," Serena said, taking him by the hand and leading the way.
Misha followed, glancing at her firm buttocks, tightly molded by the shiny leather. He found himself excited by the bizarre outfit.
In the bedroom, the sexual high jinks were quick, boisterous, and explosive, both of them hungrier than ever for each other. Not only had it been a long time, but they also found that her fetishistic clothing was erotic and arousing.
Afterward, they lay naked and spent upon the bed, then finally began to talk.
"So," Serena said, staring up at the ceiling. "Are you still mad at me?"
Misha turned his head and looked at her long and hard. "I have to confess that I find it very difficult to be angry with you, Serena. Especially when I'm with you. But believe me, I was angry. When you were away."
"Well, you may as well get over it," she said a little imperiously. "Because this is the way I am. This is me. This is my life."
"I understand," he said, "but did you have to cut me out of your vacation entirely? We could've done something together. I had free time, and so did you. And you knew it. It seems like—"
She jerked up off the pillow, staring daggers at him. "Don't ever expect me to do something like that," she burst out. "To give up something special for you. I was with my agent, Coral, who is vital to my career."
She paused for a moment, and some of the anger seemed to drain out of her
eyes. "Besides, we didn't want any men around. It was a girl thing."
She ran her fingers through her long black hair, looked over at him, and shrugged. "Don't you ever do that?" she asked. "Hang out with the guys, I mean?"
"Not really," Misha replied. "I guess I'm sort of past all that. I did it in school some, sure. But nowadays I guess I'm not much into male bonding."
Serena groaned aloud. "God, Misha!" she said. "I can just see you encroaching more and more on my independence. Gradually making more and more demands. Eating up my time. Eating me up in the process."
Misha was stunned. What the hell was she talking about? Ever since he'd known her, she'd done everything she wanted to do. Though at times he'd been hurt and angry, and, yes, sometimes he'd complained, he had certainly not "encroached" on her independence, as she put it.
"Do you really feel that way?" he asked, when the initial shock had worn off.
"Absolutely," she said without hesitation. "And," she added, "I won't put up with it from anybody."
"What if I were your husband?"
She turned the full force of her bewitching hazel eyes on him and then stared at him.
He thought that for a moment at least, she had suppressed a laugh or a smile, but he couldn't be certain.
"Husband!" she exclaimed at last. "Husband!"
She paused a moment, and the wonder on her face was replaced by a serious expression.
"If I ever marry, Misha—and that is a very big if—it will not change my life one iota." She stabbed the air with a finger. "Not marriage to you"—her fingers stabbed the air again—"or anybody else."
Then she dramatically slammed a fist into the palm of her hand. "No compromises! None!"
He hung his head under the weight of her ruthless gaze. Whatever dreams he had nourished were all now dashed onto a rocky shore.
After a bout of silence he ventured another supposition. "So . ..," he began, then cleared his throat, before continuing. "So ... I guess it's safe to say that you'd never cut back on the travel for a ...family."
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