“I’m learning to knit lace.”
“Lace! Mon Dieu. What for?”
“I’m also working on a pattern for a fabric. I’m going to try really hard to make this work.”
“Ah, my Elizabeth. I wish you’d give up these big plans. You don’t have it in you to work so hard.” His I-know-everything voice used to reassure her. Now it set her teeth on edge. “Relax and get an easy job somewhere if you need more to do. I have career enough for both of us, you know this.”
She wasn’t going to engage him more on that topic. “I thought you wanted to slow down someday.”
“Yes, someday, but not now, not while I have this in the works.”
Despair hovered on the edge of her already bad mood. Always something in the works, always the next big, bigger, biggest thing, none of it ever having anything to do with her. “I’ve been doing a lot of soul-searching.”
“Yes?” His voice was suddenly tight.
“I want you to come visit here when you’re back from—”
“Visit? Ma petite, I will have been gone too long from the restaurant as it is.”
“It’s really important to me, Dominique. To us. After our last fight we need to know exactly where we are and what we want going forward.”
His sigh made her want to curl up fetal. “Always the dramatic complications, Elizabeth. I know exactly where I am and what I want. I want the restaurant and I want you. It’s you who needs to decide. Going to this little town, what can that possibly accomplish?”
“I think it can accomplish a lot. Getting away from New York, and our life.”
“My life. That’s the problem. You have not built a life there. You stay packed and ready to run.”
She rolled to her back, stared up at the ceiling. Always her fault.
“I should get off the phone, chérie, Samuel is sitting here, and I can’t be rude. I’ll think on it and call you later, okay?”
“Yeah. Okay.” He wouldn’t call later. The promise was his way of getting out of the conversation.
“Bonne nuit.”
“Good night.” She punched off the phone and heaved her acrylic self up, pushed out of bed and trudged to the front window, hollow and dissatisfied. She hadn’t been able to explain to him why she’d come here, what she was feeling. Nor had he asked. He hadn’t even seemed surprised she’d left New York. Hadn’t asked when she’d be back, hadn’t wanted to know about her design. Whereas she knew all about his damn truffles, his restaurant, his menus, his tastes, his goals, his dreams and his every habit.
Below her Stanley’s blue minivan pulled into the driveway, chirped into the garage. He’d been excited about her fabric pattern and her career and he didn’t even know her. Her own boyfriend should be a cheerleader, a supporter, someone who believed in her more than she believed in herself. And he thought she should be panting to marry him? She should want to marry Stanley instead.
He came into view, alone, holding a cell phone to his ear; behind him the garage door started its groaning trip down. The rest of the family must have stayed on in Hendersonville. Elizabeth smiled just at the sight of him, admiring his height and athletic build, the feeling of solidity and steadfastness he projected. The door landed with a final thud, sending the neighborhood back to silence except for the rasping mating call of the cicadas. Would they take any female who showed up, or were they selective? If there were a lot on one branch, did they hold a cicada speed-dating event?
Anything was easier than the way humans paired off.
“I know. I know, darling.” Stanley’s voice was low, tender. Elizabeth sighed enviously. He was so irresistible to her, this man who adored his wife. “I miss you too, sweetheart. It won’t be long, though. I’ll be here another week, then we can be together.”
Elizabeth blinked. Turned the words over in her head. Here another week and then they could be together? But Megan was already—
“Mmmm.” He laughed, a deep, sexy sound she’d never heard him use. “I love when you do that. Yup…okay, I will. Say hi to them for me. Tell them I’ll be home soon…Sorry, what?”
Elizabeth retreated from the window until the rocker hit the backs of her knees and she sat with a thump that stung the backs of her bare thighs. He’d be home soon? Wasn’t he home now?
There had to be some explanation. Maybe he was planning a surprise for Megan and was pretending not to be at the house?
But he’d said he missed her. One more week and he’d see her again.
Elizabeth tried to breathe through the wave of sickening certainty, still hearing Stanley’s voice through the window, though the words were now indecipherable.
Was this what David meant when he said he looked forward to her finding out more about Comfort?
Goddamn it.
Elizabeth jumped up, thudded down the stairs, banged open the door and strode over to stand opposite Stanley, reminding herself to be calm, reminding herself not to jump to conclusions, even ones that seemed incredibly obvious, reminding herself that he was innocent until proven guilty, that to assume could make an ass out of—
“Elizabeth.” He glanced at her face, said a quick good-bye, punched off the phone. “Your car isn’t here.”
“I moved it to David’s.”
“Oh, right. I remember now.” He put the phone leisurely in his pocket. “Why don’t we sit down and talk?”
“Okay.” She was shaking as she sat at the patio table where he’d been so sweet with his son, in the yard where he’d been so loving and romantic with his wife. He sat opposite, smiling easily. His calm was creepy. She’d seen some TV show where a charming, attractive psychopath confronted by his accuser had pulled out a gun and shot him. Smiling.
“I didn’t realize you were upstairs.”
“Who were you talking to like that? It wasn’t Megan.”
His smile faded. “I don’t think that’s your concern.”
“No. I guess it isn’t.” She closed her eyes. A bee buzzed by her ear, and she ducked instinctively. Was this when the gun came out? She almost didn’t care.
“Ah, Elizabeth.” Stanley blew out a long breath. “I wish you hadn’t heard. But since you did, I’ll tell you that Megan knows. This is an arrangement that suits both of us.”
Her eyes opened as if the bee had stung her. “She knows?”
“She doesn’t suffer. You’ve seen me with her, I adore her, and she knows that, believe me.”
Elizabeth stared at him, trying to make sense of…anything. “Then why someone else?”
“Human nature.” He adopted a politely regretful expression. “One person can’t complete another, there are always holes left to fill. You know that from your troubles with Dominique. I need her as much as I need Megan. They complement each other. Together they make me happy and fulfilled.”
Oh my God. Her dreams were crumbling around her. “What about what they might need?”
“I give them both all my love. I give my kids in both families all my love.”
“You have other kids?” She felt like crying. Lolly, Deena and Jeffrey betrayed, too. “Do they know?”
“No.” His lips thinned. “They’re not old enough yet to understand.”
“That their father is cheating?”
“It’s only cheating when it’s done in secret.”
“It’s a secret from your kids.”
He smiled again, gentle, patient Stanley having to explain something so simple to such a fool. “Most parents will tell you they have plenty of secrets from their kids. We’re entitled to some grown-up privacy. No one is neglected; I have to be gone anyway for my job. This way I’m not a lonely married man hanging around hotels being tempted by other women.”
“But your wife is a lonely married women. And the other…person is probably lonely too.” She couldn’t believe this. Stanley, her beautiful masculine ideal of a father, husband and man. It was like the head of Homeland Security turning out to be a terrorist.
“The travel demands of my job make my abse
nce inevitable. That has nothing to do with the way we found to make—”
“You found.”
The gentle smile stretched thinner. “I wanted to keep my family together. I didn’t want to keep some mistress hidden away, or get diseases from random encounters, but I needed some way to cope with the isolation. Megan and I rushed into marriage. She’ll tell you the same. We’re wonderful lovers and friends, but we’re not soul mates, we don’t complete each other. I couldn’t settle for that.”
“But she—”
“I’m honest with both women, Elizabeth. I’m faithful to both of them, I married both of them.”
“You’re a bigamist?” She was sick. Absolutely sick. With his wide, I’m-so-honest eyes, he had the smug vapid look of people in fundamental religions or cults, people sure their completely warped reality was absolutely normal and right. She’d missed that look earlier. Because she so desperately wanted to believe in what she thought he was.
“If they accept the situation, which they both do, then who am I hurting, Elizabeth? You?”
She winced. “As a matter of fact, yes. I believed you were better than this.”
“Better than what, being able to make two families happy?”
“Megan is not happy.”
“Megan has a lot to deal with, three kids, my mother, me away so often.” He reached across the table to take her hand, which she put in her lap. “And now you.”
“Don’t make this my fault.”
“You’re extra income, but also extra work. That’s just fact. But even without the pressure, Megan tends to the melancholy anyway. It’s part of what I love about her, her incredible sense of peacefulness. She grounds me, she makes me feel safe and calm, but she is probably a little depressed. I’ve urged her to see a doctor, try medication, go back to school, find a career, but she wants to be home with the children. It’s a hard life to choose, but it’s her choice. It’s not like I keep her prisoner.”
The neckband of Elizabeth’s top was squeezing out her air. She wanted to claw at her throat and tear it off.
This was exactly how she felt when Dominique would calmly point out all the ways she was being unreasonable and stupid and above all, wrong. When he’d argue the sun went down before it went up, or that the ceiling was actually the floor. It seemed the more sure she was that she stood on solid ground, the calmer he’d get, the more lethal his arguments, the more easily he could shove her over into quicksand.
“What you’re doing is wrong.” The lame accusation was all she could manage.
“By whose standards? Yours? Do they apply to me and my family?”
“Society’s.”
“And you, living with your boyfriend without marriage? Ditching your family at age seventeen and going from one man to another?”
She wanted to sock him, then whoever had wasted no time catching him up on her moral failings. Probably Vera.
“You’re breaking the law.” The quicksand was up to her lips, making it difficult to speak.
“Extramarital sex is against the law too, in many states. And it was once against the law for women to vote. It was once a law that white people could own black people. It’s against the law now in most states for gays to marry, but that’s changing, slowly. Laws change, people change, realities and human understanding and needs evolve.”
Tears of frustration rose in her eyes. She stood. “I can’t talk to you about this anymore. You’re twisting everything I say.”
“I’m stating facts.”
She strode past him, no idea where she was going, just sure she had to get away from this man before he became like Dominique and convinced her Comfort was in Antarctica.
“Elizabeth.”
She stopped reluctantly, didn’t turn around.
“This is our private matter. I’m asking you not to spread it around.”
“I have no plans to.” She fisted her hands. “For Megan’s sake.”
“Fair enough.”
She managed to walk until she was out of his sight, then broke into a run down the driveway, cold leg muscles protesting the speed after yesterday’s repeat marathon. Could she believe in nothing? Would everything she admired or treasured get smashed sooner or later? Was that real life?
She preferred fantasy. She wanted Megan alive with passion telling her Shetland story, she wanted magical and mysterious Gillian to be real, she wanted men to choose honorably, as Calum had, not install the Mrs. Calums, First and Second.
As soon as Elizabeth reached the street she knew where she needed to go. Call me a sadist, Ms. Detlaff, but I look forward to watching you get to know Comfort. She sprinted for David’s house, banged on the door, waited, panting. He’d said he knew why Megan was unhappy. He must know.
Forever later he opened.
“Well if it isn’t Ms.—” He did a double take. “What’s wrong?”
“Can I come in?”
“Of course.” He moved back, gestured her in. “What happened?”
She started to cry, from her disappointment and frustration and from the kind concern in David’s voice. “Something…completely unexpected.”
“You want to tell me?”
“I just promised Stanley I wouldn’t.”
“Stanley.” The way he spat out the name convinced her he did know. “I saw his car come back and saw him talking to you.”
“So…you know about—” When he nodded she broke down completely. “How can he cheat on Megan like it’s—”
“Shh.” David grabbed her arm, turned to look behind him.
The bathroom door in the back opened. Ella came into the front hallway, face pale and blank.
Elizabeth drew in a sharp breath. “Tell me it’s not her.”
“It’s not.” David led her toward the dining room table. “I’ll pour you a drink.”
“Christ, David. Is alcohol your cure for everything?”
“Pretty much.” He glanced at Ella, who had followed them like an automaton. “Looks like you’ll need one too.”
“Stanley’s cheating? On Megan?” Ella spoke slowly, staring at Elizabeth, her dark hair and lack of color evoking Snow White.
Elizabeth looked to David in desperation. “I don’t…”
“I heard you say so.” She sounded on the verge of hysteria. “Is it true?”
David nodded grimly.
Ella’s mouth opened, worked impotently. A painful gasping sound evolved into a burst of laughter. She bent over the dark chunky table and gave in.
Elizabeth turned murderous. “Shut the hell up, Ella. This is not funny.”
“She doesn’t think so either.” David had pulled out a bottle of bourbon from the built-in cabinet; he poured healthy slugs into two glasses. “Drink this.”
Elizabeth slapped her palm on the table. “Stop laughing, for God’s sake.”
Ella held up one hand, asking them to wait, planted the other on her heaving chest. When she gained control and lifted her face, shiny tear trails glistened on her cheeks. “I’m sorry.”
“Not a problem.” David held out a second glass to her.
“Breathe.”
“I don’t think I remember how.” She laughed again, a short uncomfortable burst. “They were the perfect couple, Barbie and Ken, with their dream house and perfect kids, cuddling like they were still on their Malibu honeymoon. Now it turns out he’s been doing Skipper on the side?”
More guffaws, now clutching her stomach.
“David. Make her stop.”
“She has to let it out.” He pulled Elizabeth to a chair and sat her in it. “Sit and drink. She’ll stop on her own.”
“I don’t want to drink.”
“Fine. I do.” He downed Elizabeth’s bourbon, pushed Ella’s glass insistently toward her.
“I don’t want mine either. God, oh God.” Ella gasped out a last giggle and dropped into the chair opposite Elizabeth, still holding her abdomen. “All those years after I married I spent pining for what I could have had, what I thought I shoul
d have had with Stanley. All that time thinking Megan got what I deserved. And all this time guess what? She got a worse hell than mine. Jesus!”
Elizabeth wanted out of there, out of David’s house, out of North Carolina. She wanted to go home. To New York.
No. She didn’t want to go to New York. Home to Milwaukee?
Not there either. That bridge had burned to ash. There was no place like home, and she didn’t have one to go back to. All she has was Comfort, which had just imploded.
“Well now.” David sat between them, at the head of the table. “Isn’t this cozy. Me and two beautiful hysterics. You sure you don’t want your drink, Ella?”
“How did you find out, David?” Elizabeth asked.
“About Stanley?” He drained the second bourbon. “About a year ago I was visiting Comfort and went next door looking for Megan. I overheard Stanley talking to his other wife.”
“Other wife?” Ella emerged from her stupor to stare in horror. “Tell me you mean that figuratively.”
“The other marriage is illegal, but no one seems to care.”
“That is beyond twisted.” Ella cringed. “Promise me it’s not someone in Comfort.”
“I promise you it’s not someone in Comfort.”
“Thank God for that.” Ella fished a tissue out of her shorts pocket and blew her nose, wiped smudged mascara from under her eyes. “I thought Megan was just a cold fish, or that she hated the sight of me because of my past with Stanley. I should have recognized myself—one of the walking dead. I should have known that’s who she was.”
“Don’t beat yourself up. No one knew.”
“Except you.” Elizabeth’s instinct kicked in at the careful look on David’s face, and the way he immediately reached for the bottle. There was emotion between David and Megan. Was he the “someone” Megan had been dating when Stanley noticed her? Comfort had turned out to be a regular soap opera. Or maybe David was right, and life was life no matter where you were.
She didn’t want David to be right.
“I can’t believe it.” Ella shuddered. “Stanley. Some Prince Charming.”
“Give me a break.” David finished pouring, turned to Elizabeth. “Oh God, you’re looking misty too.”
“He did seem pretty wonderful.” Elizabeth sighed wearily. “They seemed so happy together.”
Knit in Comfort Page 16
