Brown-Eyed Girl

by Lisa Kleypas

  T

  he night of Hollis Warner’s art auction was humid and hot, the air pungent with wax myrtle and lantana. I pulled up to a valet stand beside a parking area filled with luxury vehicles, and a uniformed attendant helped me from the car. I was wearing the aqua beaded dress, its shortened hem now swirling around my knees. Thanks to Sofia’s help with my hair and makeup, I knew I had never looked better.

  Live jazz drifted through the air like smoke as I walked into the Warner mansion, a southern colonial built on a two-acre lot in River Oaks. The home had been one of the original residences back when River Oaks had been established in the twenties. Hollis had nearly doubled the size of the historic building by adding a modern glass extension at the back, a showy but jarring combination. The outline of a huge white tent loomed behind the roof line.

  A rush of chilled air surrounded me as I entered a spacious foyer with antique parquet floors. The mansion was already crowded, and the evening had just started. Assistant hostesses handed out catalogs of the artwork that would be up for auction later. “They’ll hold the dinner and auction in the tent¸” one of the hostesses told me, “but right now the house is open for viewing the artwork. The catalog describes the auction items, and lists where they’re located.”

  “Avery!” Hollis appeared in a pink chiffon dress with a slim-fitting silhouette, the skirt a swirl of pale pink ostrich feathers. Her husband, David, a lean, attractive man with salt-and-pepper hair, accompanied her. Pressing an air kiss near my cheek, Hollis enthused, “We’re going to have such fun tonight! My, don’t you look gorgeous!” Glancing up at her husband, she prompted, “Sugar, tell Avery what you just said when you saw her.”

  He obliged without hesitation. “I said, ‘That redheaded gal in the blue dress is proof that God’s a man.’”

  I smiled. “Thank you for inviting me. What an incredible house this is.”

  “I’ll show you the new addition,” Hollis told me. “All glass and granite. It took forever to get it right, but David supported me every step of the way.” She stroked her husband’s arm and beamed at him.

  “Hollis loves to entertain more than anyone you’ll ever meet,” David Warner said. “She raises money for all kinds of charities. A woman like this deserves any kind of house she wants.”

  “Sugar,” Hollis murmured, “Avery’s the one who did that wedding for Judy and Ray’s daughter. I’m going to introduce her to Ryan tonight, so she can help push things along with him and Bethany.”

  David looked at me with new interest. “Glad to hear it. That was some shindig, the Kendrick wedding. Lotta fun. Wouldn’t mind doing something like that for Bethany.”

  Wondering exactly what Hollis had meant by the phrase push things along, I asked, “Has there been an official proposal yet?”

  “No, Ryan’s trying to figure out a special way to pop the question. I told him you’d be here tonight to give him some ideas.”

  “Whatever I can do to help.”

  “We couldn’t have asked for a nicer young man for Bethany,” Hollis said. “Ryan’s an architect. Smart as a whip. His family, the Chases, are close kin to the Travises. Ryan’s mama died young – so unfortunate – but his uncle Churchill looked after the family and made sure the kids got educations. And when Churchill passed on, the Chases were included in his will.” Hollis gave me a significant glance as she continued. “Ryan could live off the interest of his trust fund and never work a day in his life.” She grasped my wrist with a clatter of multiple cocktail rings. “David, I’m going to tour Avery around the house. You can do without me for a few minutes, can’t you?”

  “I’ll try,” her husband said, and she winked at him before pulling me away.

  Hollis chatted with the ease of an accomplished hostess as she guided me through the house toward the modern addition. She stopped to show me some of the auction paintings displayed throughout the house, each lot numbered and accompanied by information about the artist. Along the way, Hollis texted Ryan to meet us in what she called “the skyroom.”

  “He’s going to slip away from Bethany for a few minutes,” Hollis explained, “so he can talk to you without her. He wants the proposal to be a surprise, of course.”

  “If he’d rather come to our Montrose studio,” I said, “we could discuss it there. That might be easier and more private —”

  “No, it’s better to take care of it tonight,” Hollis said. “Otherwise Ryan will drag his feet. You know how men are.”

  I smiled noncommittally, hoping that Hollis wasn’t trying to push Ryan into proposing. “Have he and Bethany been dating for a while?” I asked as we entered a small glass-sided elevator.

  “Two or three months. When you meet the right one, you just know. David proposed to me just a couple of weeks after we met – and look at us now, twenty-five years later.”

  As the elevator ascended to the third floor, I had a perfect view of the tent in the back. It was connected to the house by a carpet runner of fresh flowers arranged in geometric swirls.

  “Here’s my skyroom,” Hollis said with pride, showing me a spectacular gallery with steel-framed glass walls and a segmented glass ceiling. Sculptures perched on Lucite pedestals at various places in the room. The floor itself was made of clear glass with few visible supports. A tiled outdoor swimming pool glittered three stories directly below. “Isn’t it fabulous? Come, I’ll show you one of my favorite sculptures.”

  I hesitated, staring uneasily at the glass floor. Although I had never thought of myself as having a fear of heights, I didn’t like the looks of it. The glass didn’t look nearly substantial enough to support my weight.

  “Oh, it’s safe as could be,” Hollis said as she saw my expression. “You get used to it right away.” Her heels clinked like cocktail ice as she walked into the gallery. “This is the closest you’ll ever get to walking on air.”

  Since I’d never had any desire to walk on air, that assurance wasn’t exactly motivating. I reached the edge of the glass and my feet stopped, toes curling in my pumps. Every cell in my body warned that walking onto that expanse of clear glass would result in sudden and ignominious death.

  Steeling myself not to glance at the sparkling swimming pool below, I ventured out onto the slick surface.

  “What do you think?” I heard Hollis ask.

  “Amazing,” I managed to reply. I was tingling all over, not in a happy, excited way, but in an epic-freak-out way. Perspiration collected beneath my bra.

  “This is one of my favorite pieces,” Hollis said, guiding me to a sculpture on a pedestal. “It’s only ten thousand. Such a bargain.”

  I found myself staring blankly at a cast polyurethane head that had been divided in half. A collection of found objects – things such as a broken dish, a plastic ball, a cell phone case – had been wedged between the two sides. “I’m not sure how to interpret postmodern sculpture,” I admitted.

  “This artist takes ordinary objects and changes their context —” Hollis was forced to pause as her phone vibrated. “Let me check this.” Reading the message, she gave an exasperated sigh. “I can’t slip away for ten minutes without someone needing me to do something. This is what I hired my secretary for. I swear, that girl is one twist short of a Slinky.”

  “If there’s something you need to take care of, please go right ahead,” I said, inwardly relieved at the prospect of being able to escape from the skyroom. “Don’t worry about me.”

  Hollis patted my arm, her rings clattering like castanets. “I’ll find someone for you to meet. I can’t run off and leave you here alone.”

  “I’m fine, Hollis. Really —”

  She pulled me even farther across the treacherous floor. We passed a trio of women chatting and laughing and an elderly couple examining a sculpture. Hollis tugged me toward a photographer who stood in the corner taking candid shots of the old couple. “Shutterbug,” Hollis called out playfully, “look who I’ve got with me.”

  “Hollis,” I protested faintly.

/>   Before the man lowered his camera, I knew who he was. My whole body knew. I felt his presence instantly, even before I looked up into the eyes that had haunted me every night since we had met. Except that now they were as hard as onyx.

  “Hi, Joe,” I managed to whisper.

  Eight

  “J

  oe’s doing us a favor by taking some pictures for the website,” Hollis said.

  He set his camera by the sculpture, his gaze pinning me like a butterfly to a spreading board. “Avery. Nice to see you again.”

  “Would you mind keeping company with Avery while she waits here for your cousin Ryan?” Hollis asked.

  “My pleasure,” Joe said.

  “There’s no need —” I began uncomfortably, but Hollis had already disappeared in a flurry of ostrich feathers.

  Silence.

  I hadn’t expected it would be this difficult to face Joe. The memories of everything we had done surrounded us like scorch marks in the air. “I didn’t know you’d be here,” I managed to say. Taking a deep breath, I let it out slowly. “I haven’t handled this well,” I said.

  His face was unreadable. “No, you haven’t.”

  “I’m sorry —” I stopped, having made the mistake of letting my gaze drop too far. A brief glimpse of the glass floor had given me a bizarre tilting sensation, as if the entire house had begun to rotate sideways.

  “If you don’t want to see me again,” Joe said, “that’s your decision. But I’d at least like to know —”

  “Jesus.” The room wouldn’t stop moving. I wobbled and reached out to grasp the sleeve of Joe’s jacket in a desperate bid for balance. My evening clutch dropped to the floor. I made the mistake of looking down at it and wobbled again.

  Reflexively Joe reached out to steady me. “You okay?” I heard him ask.

  “Yes. No.” I gripped one of his wrists.

  “Too much to drink?”

  It was like standing on the deck of a ship in a rolling sea. “No, it’s not that… the floor, it’s giving me vertigo. Shit, shit–”

  “Look at me.” Joe gripped my wrist and reached for my other arm. I stared blindly at the dark blur of his face until my eyes refocused. The rocklike steadiness of his hold was the only thing that kept me from tipping over. “I’ve got you,” he said.

  A wave of nausea drained the color from my skin. Beads of cold sweat broke out on my forehead.

  “The floor does this to at least half the people who try to walk on it,” Joe continued. “The effect of the water below throws you off balance. Take a deep breath.”

  “I didn’t want to walk out here,” I said desperately. “I only did it because Hollis insisted, and I’m trying like hell to land her as a client.” The sweat was going to ruin my makeup. I was going to dissolve like a chalk drawing in the rain.

  “Would it help you to know that the floor is made out of layers of structural safety glass that’s at least two inches thick?”

  “No” came my woebegone reply.

  The corner of his mouth twitched, and his expression softened. Carefully he released one of my arms and took my hand. “Close your eyes and let me lead you.”

  I gripped his hand and tried to follow as he moved us forward. After a couple of steps I stumbled, panic clamoring through my body. His arm locked around me immediately, hauling me against him, but the tumbling sensation persisted.

  “Oh God,” I said in dazed misery. “There’s no way I’m getting off this stupid floor without falling.”

  “I’m not going to let you fall.”

  “I feel sick to my stomach —”

  “Easy. Stay still and keep your eyes closed.” Keeping his arm around me, Joe reached into his tux jacket and pulled out a handkerchief. I felt the soft folded cloth press gently against my forehead and cheeks, absorbing the film of sweat. “You just got yourself a little worked up, that’s all,” he murmured. “You’ll feel better once your blood pressure goes down. Breathe.” Pushing a lock of hair away from my face, he continued to hold me. “You’re fine.” His voice was quiet, soothing. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”

  Feeling how solid he was, the strength of him all around me, I began to relax. One of my palms pressed against his chest, riding the steady rhythm of his breath.

  “You look beautiful in that dress,” Joe said quietly. His hand moved gently through the soft waves of my hair. “And I like this.”

  I kept my eyes closed, remembering the way he had gripped his hands in my hair that night, holding my head back while he’d kissed my throat —

  I felt the movement of his arm as he gestured to someone.

  “What are you doing?” I asked weakly.

  “My brother Jack and his wife just got off the elevator.”

  “Don’t call them over here,” I begged.

  “You’ll get nothing but sympathy from Ella. She got stuck out on this floor when she was pregnant, and Jack ended up having to carry her off.”

  An affable voice entered the conversation. “Hey, bro. What’s going on?”

  “My friend has vertigo.”

  I opened my eyes cautiously. It was obvious that the striking man standing next to Joe was from the same supernally blessed Travis gene pool. Dark hair, alpha charisma, a raffish quality in his grin. “Jack Travis,” he said. “Nice to meet you.”

  I began to turn to shake his hand, but Joe’s arms tightened.

  “No, keep still,” he murmured. He told his brother, “She’s trying to get her bearings.”

  “Fuckin’ glass floor,” Jack said ruefully. “I told Hollis to add a layer of smart glass, and then she could turn the whole thing opaque just by flipping a switch. People should listen to me.”

  “I listen to you,” a woman said, approaching us with small, painstaking steps.

  “Yeah,” Jack replied, “but only so you can argue.” He smiled down at her and slid an arm around her shoulders. She was slim and pretty, with chin-length blond hair, her eyes denim blue behind a delicate pair of cat’s-eye glasses. “What are you doing, tiptoeing out here?” Jack asked her in a gently scolding tone. “You’re going to get stuck again.”

  “I can handle it now that I’m not pregnant,” she told him. “And I want to meet Joe’s friend.” She smiled at me. “I’m Ella Travis.”

  “This is Avery,” Joe said. “Let’s put off the rest of the introductions for now. The floor’s making her dizzy.”

  Ella gave me a sympathetic look. “The same thing happened to me the first time I walked out on it. A see-through floor is such a ridiculous idea – do you realize that anyone in the swimming pool could look right up our skirts?”

  I couldn’t help glancing down in reflexive alarm, and the room lurched again.

  “Whoa, there.” Joe steadied me immediately. “Avery, do not look down. Ella —”

  “Sorry, sorry, I’ll shut up.”

  Laughter rustled through Jack’s voice as he asked, “Anything I can do to help?”

  “Yeah, see the rug they hung on that wall over there? Take it down, and we’ll lay it across the floor like a bridge. That’ll give Avery a fixed visual reference.”

  “Won’t reach all the way,” Jack pointed out.

  “It’ll be close enough.”

  I glanced at the rug on the distant wall. The artist had applied dozens of strips of colored duct tape to the surface of an antique Persian carpet and melted them onto the textile.

  “You can’t,” I said. “That’s an auction item.”

  “It’s a rug,” Joe replied. “It’s supposed to go on the floor.”

  “It was a rug before. Now it’s art.”

  “I was thinking about buying it,” Ella volunteered. “The choice of materials represents a fusion of the past with the future.”

  Jack grinned at his wife. “Ella, you’re the only one here who actually reads the catalog. You know I could duct-tape a rug and make it look just like that.”

  “Yes, but it wouldn’t be worth a dime if you did it.”

/>   His eyes narrowed. “Why not?”

  Ella’s fingers walked playfully up the lapel of his tuxedo jacket. “Because, Jack Travis, you do not have the mind of an artist.”

  His face lowered until their noses nearly touched, and he said in a sexy purr, “Good thing you married me for my body.”

  Joe looked exasperated. “Cut it out, you two. Jack, go get the damn rug.”

  “Wait,” I said desperately. “Let me try walking again. Please.”

  Joe didn’t bother to hide his skepticism. “You think you can?”

  I was feeling steadier now that my heart rate had returned to normal. “As long as I don’t look down, I think I’ll be okay.”