Slightly Imperfect

by Tomlinson, Dar

  "Hi, Lizbett. Let me speak to Victoria."

  "She's asleep Mr. Zac. I'll tell her you called."

  "It's eleven in the morning."

  "Yes, sir. She's not feeling good."

  Neither was he. "What's wrong with her?"

  "I don't know, Mr. Zac. She's been poorly for a few days."

  "She was well enough to cover half of Texas."

  Pointed silence.

  "Okay. If she wakes up before I get there—" What? "Are the children there? Let me talk to them."

  He had a pressing need to make contact, assure himself he hadn't imagined them all. He had lain awake into the night wrestling with the strange turn in their relationship. Before this deviation in routine, he hadn't missed a day talking to Victoria, or seeing her, since she had gone to New York and left Marcus with him. Months ago.

  His physical craving, when he weighed the lurid possibilities indicated by this estrangement, stunned him. He had gone more than a year between Carron's death and making love to Victoria. That hunger hadn't touched on his present ravaging need. This craving bore a name, a face, and that face was slipping into a deep, dark hole marked obscurity.

  He talked with Marcus, told him they might not be fishing because of the rain. Marcus, it seemed, was unaware of the plan. Zac hung up after a one-sided conversation with the twins, no longer able to ignore the turmoil in the infallible recesses of his mind. He prayed he was losing his prophetic edge just this once, but God never deceived him. No choice remained but to identify the problem and begin to solve it.

  * * *

  While Zac waited in the Fischer's Landing office, Maggie and Angel stopped in to see Gerald. Zac lunged at Angel, swallowed her in his embrace, buried his face in the folds of her sweet, sweaty, baby neck. He entertained the urge to do the same with Maggie, draw the old, longed-for comfort from her, a selfish need he no long had the luxury of considering.

  "Is something wrong, Zac?" Maggie knew him well.

  Smiling, he shook his head, swung Angel in the air, then kissed her.

  "Where's Marcus?" She knew him very well. "I haven't seen him with you lately." She cocked her raven head, stared straight up into his eyes.

  He swallowed and kept quiet.

  "We have to go," she said softly. "Angel, tell Poppie you're sorry."

  "For what?"

  Maggie's smile was tender. "For whatever hurts you, Poppie. We're both sorry."

  Angel couldn't say a word. Not yet. She could only adore him with those obsidian orbs that spoke nonjudgmental volumes.

  * * *

  He endured the meeting with Gerald, finding no diplomatic way to turn down lunch when Gerald insisted they go to Luke's restaurant up Rocket Road in Clearlake.

  "Let's keep the money in the family," Gerald urged, smiling.

  Luke spotted Zac's disquiet the moment he entered Los Amigos. "What is it, bud?" he urged in his big-brother tone, his smile conciliatory. "Another Sun editorial gone sour?"

  Zac glanced toward the men's' room where Gerald had gone. "Worse, Luke. Much worse."

  "What? Tell me. I'll fix it."

  Zac guessed the urge to make things right was a family trait, but he couldn't tell Luke what was bothering him. He only knew for sure it was worse than any media attack on Fischer's Landing. But it was interesting Luke had brought up Pierce. A dim light flickered in the part of Zac's intellect reserved for dark speculation.

  * * *

  When he let himself into the suite quietly, Lizbett met him in the foyer, her face mirroring his anxiety. "Where is she? Is she awake?"

  "Hi, Mr. Zac. Yes, sir. She's in her room."

  He thought of going up the stairs to see the children, decided against it. "Lizbett, I'll treat you to a college education if you'll take the children to the pool."

  The sun had come out, bright, sweltering.

  She grinned, the sympathy in her eyes humbling.

  "Take that tent thing Victoria bought so the twins can have their nap down there. Stay a long time."

  She nodded. "Marcus, too, Mr. Zac?" >

  "Especially Marcus."

  The bedroom door was closed but not locked, adhering to Victoria's policy of never locking the children out. Zac recalled locked doors from his own childhood, wondering once more about the doors that could have impacted her enough to create her rule. After they married the unlocked-door policy would be subject to adjustment, whatever it would bear.

  When he appeared in her bathroom door, she sat at the vanity, engaged in the familiar ritual of braiding her hair. Their glances reflected in the mirror briefly before she broke the visual connection, her fingers never missing a step in their intricate dance. She seemed to work with purpose. She wasn't glad to see him—yet her cool gaze betrayed a glimmer of longing. He had to trust that yearning to pave the road back from this mysterious estrangement.

  He waited for some offering, anything to explain the ten days of absence, trying to remember this was the woman who wore his ring, wanted to marry him. She wanted to have his babies, make a better world with him. Finally he ventured, "Lizbett says you're sick."

  She faced away, but the mirror revealed the sudden defiance in her eyes. "I'm fine. I don't know why she told you that." She loosened a plaited section of hair that had failed scrutiny, began braiding again.

  "Maybe she felt sorry for me. Maybe she was embarrassed for the way you're treating me." He leaned against the doorframe, braced with one hand on the opposite side, pacing himself. "Maybe she lied to keep from hurting my feelings."

  "It disturbs me to think Lizbett is cunning enough to lie." She was colorless beyond her usual pallor, the blush of her cheeks obviously contrived. Lizbett was right about Victoria's physical state.

  Zac's patience ebbed. "What have I done, Victoria? All you have to do is tell me, and I'll make it right."

  She finished the braid, squeezed it with her fingers to preserve it, meeting his eyes in even reflection. "Nothing, Zac. Don't ever think it was you."

  Was. That sounded scary enough to dislodge him from the doorframe—which scared her. She cringed slightly. He stepped forward, pulled her hands away from her hair, plunged his fingers into the complex pattern of the French braid and yanked it loose. He hurt her, he guessed. He wanted to, a little.

  "Don't." She pulled out of his reach.

  She wouldn't meet his eyes. When she stood, he gathered her rigidity into him, shocked by the lean, frail state her loose clothing had disguised. The word gaunt echoed in his mind.

  "Jesus." He pressed his palms into her ribcage. "What's wrong with you?"

  She pushed back, holding him at bay with her eyes. "I can't see you anymore, Zac."

  He almost laughed, except it was so pathetic. Ten days denial summed into one feeble declaration.

  "What the hell is this, Victoria? Finishing school?"

  Her head tilted up. He watched her suck up strength.

  "Can't see me? Is that anything like can't marry me? Can't live with me?" He thought of the wing being added to the house on Bay Shore, the pleasant background noise of hammering and sawing everyday now. "Can't wear my name and have my babies?"

  "The twins can't see you either." She plunged the rejection to the bottom line, making him wonder if she'd heard anything he said. "I would—I'd like you to continue as Marcus's mentor, however."

  "Really? Is that what I am? His mentor? Where's this script filed, Victoria? It needs editing."

  When she tried to brush past him, he jerked her around. Too roughly. Her head snapped; she threw one hand up in front of her face.

  Stunned by her reaction, he prayed for control. "Jesus," he breathed. "Do you think I'd hit you? The way I love you, do you think I could? Who has ever hit you?"

  She shook her head, her teeth raking color into her lip.

  "Who?"

  Her eyes defied him. "Tommy, even though he loved me more than his own life. I gave him reason to hit me. You have reason now."

  "Never as long as I live. Get used to it,
Victoria. Tell me what's wrong. Tell me where it hurts." He knew she hurt. Of the hoard of emotions crowding the room, pain prevailed. For each of them. "I'll fix it, I swear. But you have to tell me the truth." He could fix it, even if it was as simple as drawing her down to that rug, loving it away. No matter how superficial or temporary, that solution would break her resolve.

  "It's all wrong. Everything. We rushed into—"

  "You said you wished it had happened in Portofino. Where did that theory go?" He didn't know this Victoria. "Where's the woman who pronounced all my plans perfect, ten nights ago at the Fischer's Landing bash?"

  This time he let her pass, followed her into the bedroom, standing close by as she wrapped her body with folded arms. She leaned her forehead against the cool glass framing the sweltering summer afternoon.

  "We're so different," she said softly, without conviction.

  "Yeah. But we were the same ten nights ago when you told me you loved me sensually and spiritually. I haven't changed."

  She looked at him. Emotion skidded across the green plane of her eyes, laying her soul bare for probing. The look left him lacking again, unable to penetrate the mystery of the sudden shift in what she professed. "We want different things."

  "Name one."

  "Gambling."

  He seized on it. "I don't give a flying frig about gambling. I don't care if I ever see one casino in Galveston County. I believe in Gerald Fitzpatrick—not gambling. He's an honorable man who thinks gambling will provide jobs and tourism and raise the standard of living. Not for you maybe, but for the people who could use a few frills."

  The open, half-filled bags on the bed caught his eye. He had been too intent on his mission earlier to notice or be alarmed. "Are you packing or unpacking?"

  "Packing."

  "Where the hell are you going?"

  "To Andrea," she whispered, as though getting it straight in her own mind.

  An interesting turn of phrase. "No!"

  Her eyes widened, nostrils flaring with an intake of breath.

  "Don't do that. That's the old Victoria—your old pattern. Running away never solved anything. Stay and fight."

  Whatever the hell they were fighting.

  "I don't know how to fight." She faced back to the window. "I'll leave Marcus with you."

  He quietly, desperately tried to discern the meaning behind that, clawing at the shroud of ambivalence, searching for a fallacy to stomp out.

  "You're saying I prefer Marcus over the twins—that having him will pacify me?"

  "No. I'm not. I don't think that."

  "Then you're saying the twins are enough for you."

  "No. Oh, God! I'm not—"

  "What the hell are you saying? Don't go anywhere, Victoria. Don't leave him if you love him. That's telling him he's not good enough for the three of you—only for me. Only for his own kind. It's telling the twins the same thing." He placed his hand on her forearm, gently. Her skin iced over. "Think, novia."

  She turned, left the room. He stayed for a moment, resting his head against the glass where hers had been, reasoning with himself to stop caring. He tried to want to leave, to quit. He left the room when he heard her calling Lizbett.

  "I told her to take the children to the pool."

  Across the room, she whirled, leveled her eyes on him. Distance kept him from knowing if he saw fear or imagined it. "You had no right—"

  "I wanted to talk to you."

  "Christian is coming to pick them up. They have to be—"

  The look on his face—sudden, blaring awareness—had probably stopped her. "How long has Christian been here?"

  No answer.

  He moved closer. "Are you sleeping with him?" Silence. "Who are you sleeping with, Victoria?"

  She shook her head, pulled her bottom lip in, hugged herself. Her eyes pleaded, it seemed.

  "Who's feeding all your insecurities? Coby, maybe?"

  He could have stuck a pin in an already limp, water-filled balloon. Tears, big, hot looking, oozed out, ran in a stream through her perfect facial Aura. He could keep puncturing her, but he wanted her back, didn't want to inflict irrevocable damage. "I didn't mean that about Coby. I'm sorry."

  She lowered her eyes to her hands, slipping off his ring, soundlessly placing it on the granite-topped table behind the sofa.

  His heart ripped just as soundlessly. "Don't do this."

  He grabbed the ring, grabbed her hand, shoved the ring on her finger and clamped his hand around it, too tightly. She winced. He held on.

  "You're hurting me." Fresh tears.

  "You're hurting me, novia." He let go.

  She slipped the ring off, offering it; he took it.

  "It was a dream, Zac. I've been... awakened."

  "It's not the gambling," he said softly. "You just woke up one day—about ten days ago, I guess—and you remembered I'm Mexican, and you're not, and you don't want to live the rest of your life apologizing for that." He wondered if the scenes from brunch at the Wentletrap were running through her mind, too.

  "I love you," she whispered. "I want you to know."

  "I know that. You just don't love me enough to turn my skin white—or Marcus's. God help him when you get over your cross-culture whim."

  Her head moved in agreement of which she might not be aware.

  The doorbell pierced the silence. She swiped her wet cheeks with the pads of her fingers. He reached for her. She stepped around him, crossed the room to open the door. Christian entered, appraised the scene, appearing complacent in Zac's eyes.

  Zac speared his gaze. "It's bad luck to count your winnings while you're sitting at the table."

  Christian looked puzzled. His mouth hardened a little.

  "An old gambling adage. It means the game's not over yet." Zac walked past him to where Victoria leaned against the open white lacquered door, watching. He met her eyes, drew his index finger along her cheek, across her lips.

  "Does this mean I'm not in your soul anymore, Victoria?"

  She raised her palms to her face, her shoulders shaking.

  "That's enough," Christian said from behind them, his cultured voice deep, authoritative.

  "Yeah," Zac considered hitting him, destroying his pretty Anglo face, finding a Bible somewhere in the lauded suite and feeding it to him, page by page. "Yeah. You're right. It's probably just enough."

  * * *

  "Lizbett?"

  She glanced up from a Cosmopolitan magazine, panic crossing her face.

  Zac guessed he looked as unraveled as he felt. "You've got to do something for me."

  She sat up quickly, closing the book.

  "You have to get me the entire list of Andrea Von Felsberg's phone numbers. The yacht, too. Can you do that?"

  "I don't know, Mr. Zac. Ms. Victoria keeps up with all that stuff. I don't usually fool with—"

  "You have to." He glanced at the sleeping twins, at Marcus climbing the ladder of the high board. Zac checked out the alert lifeguard. "I'm going to move all of you into that

  hacienda-plantation-kind-of-Mecca on Bay Shore, and we're going to live there for the rest of our lives, Lizbett. But first you have to do this for me. Will you?"

  "Yes, sir, Mr. Zac. Somehow I will."

  * * *

  Zac went straight to Buck's Cowboy Bar.

  He commandeered his old end stool, the one that had supported him through falling in love with Carron, his marriage breaking up, learning Carron was dying. He hadn't been there for a while, but the hard leather and his pain had a familiar feel.

  Now Victoria's name, resting soundlessly in his thoughts, created an ache that seized, choked, doubled him over. He couldn't stop his mind running to her.

  Little things, like how he'd loved watching her dress, the way she'd leave the door open if she welcomed intrusion, the way the twins or Marcus—or all of them—would stand outside knocking, calling to her if she chose to close the door. Zac would sometimes take the children, entertain them, to give her privacy, to sho
w he cared.

  He had loved her little rituals, the way she bent forward from the waist and brushed her hair down from the nape of her neck, its pale ends sweeping her shins.

  Watching her evoked all kinds of erotic notions he couldn't quite work out the details for—until he realized it was not complicated. He simply loved everything about her, and learning new things had given him a rush very near the sensation of an erection.

  Yeah, he'd loved her little rituals; he loved her. Maybe not the way he'd loved Maggie, that probably would never happen again. But he was sure as hell in love with Victoria.

  Sitting there, staring at his face in the veined mirror, listening to Vince Gill, he remembered how it had hurt watching Carron die. Today hurt almost as much, ripped his gut; he thought he could hear blood gurgling inside his chest. It pained him to know Victoria didn't trust him enough to share real reasons with him, but it hurt a hell of a lot more to know she'd made a new decision of how she wanted to live her life.

  Given a choice, Carron would never have left him.

  Maggie had never left him. Not really.

  Way down deep, in that part of him he took no pride in, he had thought the money he'd inherited was enough to make a difference. It wasn't. There wasn't enough money in the world to bleach his skin or alter his ethnic heritage.

  He had come full circle.

  He finished his Corona with just enough time to take a cold shower and still make his philosophy class, where maybe he'd discover a wisdom the familiar barstool hadn't afforded.

  He sat in Buck's parking lot, staring into the traffic crawling on Rocket, squeezing the truck phone with aching fingers until her machine kicked in.

  "Victoria, I don't know about still seeing Marcus." He swallowed, waiting for a steady voice. "I guess it depends on how intense the pain gets. Right now I'm numb." He breathed into the numbness, tried to rationalize. He thought of Ruffin Sloan, the freighter, a cabin with two bunks, maybe. "I've thought of taking him and running away. Not a lot has changed since that first day in Portofino has it?" The day ran through his mind. Late afternoon sun, gentle breeze stirring Victoria's hair, Marcus so like Allie, the twins falling asleep against Zac's neck. "But then what would I do about Ari and Alex?"