In fact, Ava had been awake through most of the night, plagued by doubts. Had she judged Leo too harshly? Was Deenie playing some sort of game whose rules were known only to her? Was it really possible that after all the years they’d known each other and all the confidences they’d shared, Deenie had deliberately set out to deceive her supposed best friend?
“It’s just the jet lag catching up with me,” Ava told her mother. “It’ll pass before the day’s out. Is there any coffee left?”
“Plenty. I just made a fresh pot.” Her mother filled a cup and passed it across the breakfast bar. “Deenie phoned to remind you you’re going shopping together this afternoon to find gorgeous outfits for New Year’s Eve.”
“Oh….” Gloomily, Ava leaned on one elbow and stirred her coffee. “I’d forgotten about that.”
“She suggested picking you up here around two, but you mentioned wanting to buy a couple of Christmas gifts, and since I have to run a few last-minute errands as well, I thought it would be nice if we went into town together. We can do what we have to do, then get together for lunch before you meet Deenie at The Soiree Boutique, which is where she wants to shop. How does that sound?”
“Lovely,’ Ava said, striving to inject a little enthusiasm into her voice. Not that she didn’t want to spend time with her mother, because she did, but the thought of keeping up a cheerful front with Deenie appealed not at all.
“Lovely!” Her mother came around the breakfast bar and gave her a hug. “That’s what we’ll do, then.”
Christmas was only two days away, and Owen’s Lake town center, as always, looked picture-postcard charming. That morning, the air was so crystal clear, it almost rang. The snow huddled purple-blue in the shadows of the steep courthouse roof. In the middle of the square, some prankster had crowned the marble statue of Charles Owen with an evergreen wreath. It hung tipsily over one eye, hilariously at odds with the founding father’s air of timeless dignity.
Not far away, Stuart Shultz, who had to be eighty if he was a day and whose long white beard was real, sported the same red felt Santa Claus suit he’d worn for as long as Ava could remember, and did a roaring business selling hot chocolate and roasted chestnuts from his decorated stall.
On the corner, his wife Violet, dressed as Mrs. Claus in a long green skirt and lace-trimmed blouse under her red-checkered apron, doled out fresh-from-the-oven gingerbread men to the children passing by her shop while, from Saint Martha’s church at the other end of the square, came the sound of the boys’ choir practicing “Silent Night” for the Christmas Eve carol service.
This was what Christmas should be all about, Ava thought, swallowing the sudden lump in her throat. Not stealthy kisses and clandestine trysts with a man she wasn’t sure she could trust, but the pure, soaring voice of a boy soprano, and the wide-eyed innocence of children as a kind old couple who’d never had babies of their own put on a show that made even adults half believe in Santa Claus.
Her mother, waiting for her in the dining room of The White Horse Inn, at a table set between the fireplace and a window overlooking the lake, noticed at once that something was amiss. “We both need this,” she said, pushing one of two glasses of sherry toward Ava and raising the other in a silent toast, “and then you’re going to explain why you’re looking as if you’ve just lost your best friend. And don’t bother telling me I’m imagining things, because I know you too well.”
“I can’t talk about it,” Ava said, but the sherry loosened her tongue and she found herself spilling out her heart to the one person in the whole world who’d continue to love her, no matter how far she fell from grace. “Oh, Mom, I might well have lost my best friend, and it’s all because of Leo.”
“Leo Ferrante?” Her mother set down her glass and blinked in surprise. “Good gracious, what’s he done?”
“It’s what I’ve done.” No use blaming Leo, after all. He’d never have put the moves on her if she’d taken the moral high road to begin with, instead of throwing herself at him.
“I understand he walked you home last night,” her mother said. “Is that what this is all about?”
“Not really. It began before that.” Ava blotted her mouth with her napkin and heaved a sigh. “When Deenie first told me she was thinking of settling down with him, I was surprised because she’d always said she was married to the ballet. But she convinced me she was making a change for the better. She insisted she’d never been happier, that I’d love Leo, that he hadn’t changed a bit from when we both mooned over him in our teens, and that he was the perfect man for her.”
“Well, has he? Changed, I mean?”
“No,” Ava said, staring hopelessly out of the window at the sun-washed gloss of the frozen lake. “Unfortunately, neither have I, Mom. That’s the trouble.”
“Good heavens! Are you saying that you’re still smitten with him?”
“That’s one way of putting it, I suppose. But I’m afraid my feelings go deeper than that.”
“Oh, Ava!” Her mother’s distress was palpable. “Honey, you’re overreacting. Think how embarrassed you and Leo both would be if he had any inkling—”
“He knows.”
“You told him?”
“Not in so many words. I didn’t have to. But that’s not the worst of it. He….”
Comprehension dawned, leaving her mother temporarily at a loss, but she recovered quickly. “Oh, my stars! Ava, are you trying to tell me he returns your feelings?”
“He’s…intimated as much. Or if not that exactly, then he’s made it pretty clear he’s never been serious about Deenie.”
“But that can’t be true! Gail Manville as good as told me he’s giving Deenie an engagement ring for Christmas!” She shook her head, bewildered. “This isn’t like you, Ava. I know how much you hope to marry and have children someday, but you’re not a teenager anymore. You’re twenty-eight years old, widely traveled, an expert in your field of nursing.”
“None of which exactly qualifies me for the young-and-foolish category, and certainly doesn’t excuse my stealing another woman’s man. I know, Mom. You don’t have to hammer the point home. But it doesn’t change what I feel.”
“Which is pure infatuation. The kind of love a marriage is built on doesn’t strike out of the blue like this.”
“It did with you and Dad. You’ve said so many a time.”
“So I have.” Her mother’s shoulders sagged in defeat. “If Gail gets wind of this,” she said mournfully, “she’ll string you up by the thumbs! She confided to me only last night that she’s hopeful there’ll be wedding bells for Deenie and Leo by Easter.”
“I’m more concerned about how Deenie might react. You know how close we’ve always been, and this is killing me. If I’d had any idea….”
But how could she have known that she would indeed love Leo—not, as Deenie had presumed, in a sisterly way, but with all the passion and depth and longing of a woman who’d long outgrown her schoolgirl crush? How could she have known the realization would strike her the minute she laid eyes on him at the airport? That all the time she’d been roaming the world hoping to meet Mr. Right, he’d been waiting on her back doorstep at home? How could she have known she’d be so susceptible to him?
“I wish I’d stayed away,” she said miserably. “I wish the pair of them would just disappear in a puff of smoke. At least then, I wouldn’t be torn in half like this.”
“If he’s telling you the truth and Deenie’s misunderstood his intentions—and I have to say, Ava, Leo’s never struck me as a man who’d lie about anything, let alone something as serious as this—wishing isn’t going to change a thing. You have to deal with what is.”
“And how do I do that, Mom? How do I justify getting involved with him, if he ends things with Deenie? What sort of friend does that make me?”
“Well….” Her mother looked past Ava and scanned the room at large as she debated the question. But whatever advice she’d been about to offer suddenly shifted direction as he
r gaze settled on something beyond Ava’s view. Face creased with dismay, she leaned forward and said urgently, “Oh dear! Better put this conversation on hold for now and paste a smile on your face, honey. Deenie just walked in the door with those two dancer friends of hers, and they’re headed this way. One look at you, and she’ll know there’s trouble in the air, and this is certainly not the time or the place to air it.”
Setting an example, her mother beamed brightly as the trio came abreast with the table. “Hello! How nice to see you again, Mr. and Mrs. Markov, and what a coincidence, running into you here, of all places.”
“Not really. I phoned your house and Mr. Sorensen told me where you were meeting for lunch.” All smiles, Deenie slung an exuberant arm around Ava’s shoulder. “Listen, there’s been a change of plan. Lynette and Paul are catching the four-thirty flight out of Skellington this afternoon, so I’m taking them on a bit of a sightseeing tour of Owen’s Lake before they leave. We’ve got a limo waiting outside and—”
“I quite understand,” Ava said, a huge wave of relief washing over her. “Please don’t worry about canceling the shopping trip. It can wait until another day.”
“Who said anything about canceling?” Deenie trilled. “Of course we’ll still go shopping! Just not as early as we planned, that’s all, because I’ve also made an appointment to see a house I’m thinking of renting—I need a place with a room I can set aside as a dance studio, you see,” she said coyly, “and Leo’s apartment isn’t nearly big enough.”
“No,” Ava’s mother murmured, in the awkward pause following that remark. “I can see that it wouldn’t be.”
“Exactly!” Deenie bathed Ava in a winning smile. “So instead of meeting me at the boutique, I wonder if you’d mind picking me up at the rental property, instead?” She pulled a slip of paper out of her purse. “Here’s the address. It’s out at the far end of Lakeshore Drive and since that’s on the Skellington side of town, we’ll wind up our tour there, and the limo driver can drop me off before he heads out to the airport with Lynette and Paul.”
Ava hesitated, wishing she could come up with a very good reason to refuse. She didn’t want to spend time alone with Deenie. She particularly didn’t want to look at a house Deenie implied she’d be sharing with Leo.
Seeing her reluctance, Deenie produced another dazzling smile. “Pretty please?” she wheedled. “Say in about an hour and a half? That’ll still give you time to enjoy a nice long lunch with your mom.”
How could she refuse without seeming churlish, or worse yet, arousing Deenie’s suspicions?
CHAPTER SEVEN
IT TOOK longer than she expected for Ava to find the property. Located in a cul-de-sac and hidden from the road by a dense hedge, the house had been built at the turn of the twentieth century by one of the well-to-do families who’d settled the area.
There was no sign of the limousine, but a car she assumed belonged to the leasing agent stood parked at the front door. Probably the Markovs have left already, she surmised, ringing the old-fashioned pull bell, and Deenie’s inside, inspecting the rooms.
But to her utter consternation, Leo answered the door. And from the grimace which passed over his face, not to mention his decidedly hostile greeting, he was no more pleased to see her than she was to see him. “What the devil do you want, Ava?”
“I came to pick up Deenie.”
“Well, she’s not here, and I ought to know. I’ve been hanging around for nearly half an hour, waiting for her to show up.”
“You?” Ava said disbelievingly. “She’s supposed to be meeting the agent showing this house.”
“Bull!” he shot back. “She asked me to pick up the keys and meet her here because she wanted me to look over the lease before she signed anything.”
More of Deenie’s games? Ava wondered, dragging her gaze away from Leo who looked good enough to eat in a very lawyerly grey suit and dark tie, and staring instead at the snow-draped shrubs edging the garden. Or was she being unfair? Now that she thought about it, Deenie never had actually said she was meeting the leasing agent, merely that she’d made an appointment to see the house.
“Well?” Leo said, as the silence between them lengthened. “Cat got your tongue, all of a sudden, darlin’? Aren’t you going to accuse me of some dastardly plot to get you and her in some hidden, out-of-the-way spot, and indulge in a three-way orgy?”
“No,” she snapped, feeling a flush ride over her face. “I’m wondering why you’re not driving your own car.”
“Because it’s in for servicing and this one’s a loaner. Any other questions riding around in that suspicious little mind of yours?”
“No,” she said again, feeling more of a fool with every second that passed.
“Then perhaps you’d tell me why Deenie needed you to pick her up, instead of driving herself here in the first place.”
“She took her ballet friends on a limo tour of town and was supposed to be dropped off here before the driver took them to the airport.” She shrugged. “I guess they’re running a bit late.”
He scowled, his displeasure mounting. “What next, for Pete’s sake?”
“Well, don’t take your frustration out on me!” Ava shot back, her own temper more than a little frayed around the edges. “I’m just catering to the diva’s wishes, but since you’re here anyway, you can drive her back to town. And tell her I’m not going shopping for dresses, either, while you’re at it!”
The sparking anger in his blue eyes softened slightly. “Oh, what the hell! Now you’ve driven all this way, you might as well come in and take a look around. I’ve only walked through the downstairs rooms so far, but it’s enough for me to see it’s quite a show-place. Come on, Ava,” he coaxed, when she shook her head and turned away. “Let’s at least try to behave like the mature adults we’re supposed to be.”
Would she have acquiesced so easily, had the request come from any other man? Would her heart have leaped so erratically when he caught her arm and said with a rueful smile, “Hey, I’m sorry. I know none of this is your fault.”
Of course she wouldn’t! But it wasn’t any other man; it was Leo. And that being the case, her resentment melted like butter left out in the hot desert sun. Defeated, she allowed him to draw her over the threshold and relieve her of her heavy coat.
The entrance hall was magnificent. Graced by a branched staircase of mellow oak, it could well do double duty as a small ballroom, and her first thought was that Deenie would be in her element playing hostess in such a setting.
Leo’s mind ran along a different track, though. “I bet those banisters have known more than their share of kids sliding down them,” he remarked. “This place was made for a large family. You ever thought about having children, Ava?”
“Um…” She gulped, unnerved by the question. Having babies wasn’t something she could discuss composedly with Leo Ferrante.
Appearing not to notice her discomposure, he cupped her elbow and steered her toward a door on the right. “This is the dining room. See what I mean? You could seat twenty people around that table, and still have room to spare.”
“Does the place come furnished?” she babbled, desperate to change the subject.
“It’s one of the options in the lease.”
She ran a finger over the glossy surface of a rosewood sideboard. “That’s convenient for Deenie.”
“I guess.” He raised his shoulders in a mystified shrug. “But I can’t see why she’d be interested in a place this size unless she plans to start her own dance school.”
“Actually, there is supposed to be a room somewhere which would do as a studio.”
Leo scanned the sheaf of papers in the folder he carried. “Must be the games room over the garage, then. Says here it’s thirty feet by twenty. Let’s go take a look—unless you want to see the kitchen first? It’s quoted as being ‘a gourmet affair, recently updated with top-of-the-line appliances.’”
“No,” she said. “I don’t want to see the
kitchen.”
He shrugged again. “Why not? Isn’t it supposed to be the heart of every home?”
Don’t talk to me about heart! she wanted to cry. Mine’s aching too much already. If things were different, you and I might have been looking at this house with the idea of us living here together and planning where we’d put the Christmas tree next year, and where we’d hang the stockings when the babies came along. Then, of course I’d want to see if the refrigerator’s big enough, and if there’s counter space enough for me to roll out cookie dough, and which room we’d use as a nursery!
But the confusion and mistrust brought about by the last few days was such that the only thing she’d likely be tempted to do in the kitchen was stick her head in the oven!
“I wonder what’s keeping Deenie,” she said, peering out of the stained-glass window next to the front door.
“Who knows? She enjoys being fashionably late. On the other hand, given her mood swings lately, it’s just as likely she’s changed her mind altogether about renting the place and not bothered to let us know.” He slapped the folder closed and threw it down on the table. “Let’s check out this room she’s interested in, and if you don’t think it’ll serve the purpose, we might as well lock up and leave. I don’t know about you, but I’ve got better things to do than waste what’s left of the afternoon hanging around here.”
He loped up the stairs, leaving her hard-pressed to keep up with him, and had thrown open a door on the left by the time she reached the landing.
“Well, will you take a look at this bedroom!” he said, giving a low whistle of appreciation.
“You take a look,” she told him shortly. “I’m only interested in the games room.”
Clearly baffled by her attitude, he gestured to a wide, paned window running the width of the landing. “You’ll be telling me next you’re not impressed with the view, either. What’s the matter, Ava? Isn’t this your kind of house?”
Catherine Spencer - Christmas Passions Page 6
