That was when the first tears fell.
She thought back to her childhood, and for just a tiny slice of time, Bianca Coltrane was so lonely that she would have given anything to ease the unbearable pain. Crying, clutching the edge of the scarred vanity counter, she sank to her knees, dropping the towels as she fell. Landing naked in the nest of damp white towels, she pulled her knees to her chest and rocked.
How does anybody with so much manage to throw it away with both hands? How did I do it so easily?
It had seemed so easy, walking away from Julia and never looking back. Yes, she still felt pride when she saw her sister interviewed on TV, or saw her billboards. But that was different. She’s my smart, capable, reliable sister. She’s got her life together on her own terms, and never depended on anyone else to do it for her.
Swiping her hands across her face, trying to stem the tears, Bianca had a moment of panic. Now she would have to admit that she was wrong, that her way didn’t work, that she needed her help. And hope Julia was a bigger and better woman than she had ever been.
What if she pities me? Or shakes her finger in my face and says, ‘I told you so’? What if she treats me like a charity case? Her shoulders drooped and the tears dried. If she offers to help me, I’ll take it, whatever the cost—and I’ll be grateful for it. I need her.
Dressing, rehearsing, Bianca hoped she could sound natural when she picked up her phone and scrolled through the phone book. Stopping at Julia’s name, she chose the office number and hit SEND.
“Good morning, thank you for calling Coltrane Realty. How may I direct your call?”
The voice was feminine, cool, and genteelly Southern, and it made Bianca’s flesh crawl. She fought the urge to hang up, but took a deep breath instead and said, “Good morning. May I speak with Julia Coltrane, please?”
“May I ask who is calling?”
Knowing that the woman was only doing her job didn’t make Bianca feel any better. “This is Bianca Coltrane, her sister.”
“Her sister?”
“Yes.” Now let me speak to my sister.
“Please hold.”
Bianca imagined the woman running through the office and shouting the news to the other staffers: Julia’s got a sister! Her stomach curled when she imagined Julia hearing her name and refusing the call. If she did…
Julia stared at the phone on her desk and tried to rise above her mixed feelings. Part of her, the hurt little girl part, wanted to run to a corner of her office and bury her face. Another part, the stiffly grown-up woman who handled her own successful business on a daily basis, stared at the phone for another second and finally lifted the receiver. “Hello, Bianca.”
“Hello, Julia. How are you?”
“I’m well, and you?”
“Fine.”
Hearing her sister’s voice was strange for both women. She sounds like Mom, they thought at the same time.
“I called because…” Embarrassed, Bianca stalled. “I don’t know if you’ve seen the news lately, but I—I need your help. I need somewhere to stay.”
Damned if this wasn’t a bolt from the blue!
“I see.” Julia’s eyes went to her watch. It was nearly nine o’clock in the morning, and, if memory served, her sister was hardly a morning person. Cupping the phone in both hands, Julia held it close to her mouth, hoping her tone wouldn’t betray her surprise. “What’s going on, Bianca?”
“I’d rather not talk about it over the phone. Can we meet?”
Wondering why her sister had decided to call her, Julia decided to satisfy her curiosity. “If you’d like to come in at ten-thirty, I can see you then.”
“I’ll be there.”
Julia parked her elbow on her desk and stared at the phone, thinking back to a time when she’d adored her sister, would have cut off her right foot for her. Then she’d come to learn that Bianca would have probably taken the foot and hopped away with it. She reached for the phone and tapped in her assistant’s code.
“Akusai wa hyaku-nen no fusaku,” she murmured to herself, knowing the truth in the Japanese proverb: Don’t let yourself be taken advantage of. Knowing her sister for who she was didn’t mean she wouldn’t help her, but…
“Bianca Coltrane has a ten-thirty appointment. When she arrives, please have her complete a tenant’s application and run a credit check.” There was no point in going into this without all available information.
Twenty minutes later, Bianca had completed the requested paperwork and the credit information had returned. Julia was almost sorry she’d asked for it. She clipped the corners of the pages together and called her assistant. “Please show my sister to my office.”
The young woman had the good grace not to show surprise as she opened the office door and ushered Bianca into the office. Watching the two women appraise each other, the assistant made her own evaluation. Yes, these two were definitely related. You could see it as much in their height as in the tawny blush of their skin, in the classically molded lines of their faces, and in their matching hazel eyes. God, their parents must have been pretty people, she thought, stepping back and pulling the door closed behind her.
“Come in and have a seat,” Julia said as she walked around her desk.
Smoothing a hand over the jade green wool of her narrow skirt, Julia wondered if Bianca had dressed down for their meeting. Her beautifully tailored suit seemed a little subdued for the flamboyant woman she’d known her sister to be. And a little expensive for a woman with her credit background…She cut the petty thought off and dropped into the wingchair facing her sister. “It’s good to see you, Bianca.”
“Thanks. You, too.” Silence loomed between them, and Bianca felt compelled to fill it. “This is a lovely office. You’ve built a very nice business.”
Irritation flashed across Julia’s face. “That’s it? That’s what you came here to talk to me about? After all this time, you want to complement my business acumen and office décor?”
The corner of Bianca’s mouth ticked when she frowned. “I’m just trying to be polite. What do you want from me? You were the one who ran off to Japan.”
“Yeah,” Julia said, “but you were the one who just left me hanging—over a man. When Mom died, you told me…you promised me you would always be there. Then when John died, you didn’t make it any better. You just took your little money and danced off.”
“I didn’t dance anywhere.”
“Life has always been a party for you, Bianca, and you put the party before me.”
“You put an ocean between us, Julia, and I swear I wouldn’t be here now, if…”
“If you had any other alternative?” Julia looked sad. “I was hoping that maybe you came here because I’m your sister and you knew you could trust me to help you work out this mess.”
Bianca’s shoulders rolled back, and her eyes narrowed. “Why does it have to be a mess?”
“You called me today—for the first time in how many years? And I’ve seen your credit report.” Julia stood and reached across her desk. She picked up several sheets of paper and flapped them a time or two before letting them fall back to her desktop. “Where were you yesterday that you can’t go back to today, Bianca?”
“I knew this was a mistake.” Too embarrassed to be insulted, Bianca shouldered her purse and headed for the door.
Julia beat her sister to the door and held it shut. “There’s a man in this mix, right?” When Bianca just stared, Julia nodded. “Sit down, Bianca. Let’s see what we can work out.”
“I don’t want to sit.”
Hand to her throat, Julia took a deep breath. “We need to talk.”
“About the last five years? No, Julia. Between us, we started digging this chasm when Mom passed. It was bad enough when we went through her things and found our original birth certificates. Knowing we had different fathers, and that our mother hid it from us, was worse. I did promise that I would always be there for you—you are my sister.”
“But you broke t
he promise because a man and a party were more important, and I should have just understood?”
Wishing she was standing anywhere except in front of her sister, Bianca shook her head. “I never said that.”
“You didn’t have to. Your actions spoke for you. You loved me, you just didn’t like me.”
“That’s not true, it never was.” Hurt, Bianca’s eyes clouded. “Between us, we just kept digging holes, and you could never let it go.”
“Let it go? You’re right, but there is so much wrong with you even thinking you can say that. Why should I just let it go? There was a father I would never have known because Mom had my birth certificate amended so that you and I would appear to have the same father—less for her to explain, I guess. But ultimately, I wound up abandoned by her, him, and then you.”
“Julia, you’re acting like this is my fault.”
“Fault? Damn it, you never understood! This doesn’t have anything to do with fault and casting blame where we’re concerned. I needed you!”
“You told me you decided to go to school in Chicago because you found your real dad there, and you wanted to get to know him. He was an orphan—but you found him, and he reached out to you.”
“You really want to believe he just reached out and embraced me, and that we all lived happily ever after, don’t you? I found him because he wanted me to.”
“You never said anything…”
“He thought I might be a compatible donor.” Bitterness shadowed Julia’s eyes. “He wasn’t searching for his long-lost daughter, trying to make me or himself whole. I wouldn’t have found him if it hadn’t been for his kidney disease.”
“Julia…”
Julia’s raised hand cut Bianca off. “He wasn’t a bad man, just a weak one, and in the end, he loved me in his own way, but…I don’t know.”
“But you had a chance to get to know him. You had four years with him.”
“I buried him, too, Bianca, right after my graduation. And I did it without my sister.”
“Then you took off for Japan…”
“And you didn’t see anything wrong with it; it got me out of your hair. Like I said, you loved me; you just didn’t like me enough to care about anything going on with me.”
“Ah, Julia, I always cared. I’m sorry. I was sorry then, and I’m sorry now.” Wishing she had never made such a shambles of their relationship, Bianca was at a loss.
“Sorry is a start.”
“I thought we crossed over this for the final time when our stepfather died, and we agreed that our being sisters was good, but it wasn’t great.”
“And you still called me today, because you just didn’t get it.”
“I didn’t have anyone else,” Bianca said.
“Neither did I.” Visibly struggling with her emotions, Julia looked at her sister.
“How do I apologize for being so self-involved that I abandoned anybody as hurt as you must have been? Julia, I didn’t know what else to do. I didn’t know how to make it better for you, so I made it better for me. You seemed to be handling everything, at least on the outside.”
“On the outside; right. I guess I can forgive, but forgetting is harder. So I guess if we’re really ever going to get over it, I can’t make the same mistakes you did, can I?”
Bianca’s lashes fluttered, and it seemed tears would fall, before she opened her eyes. “I think I get it now. Is it too late for me to say that I’m sorry, that I want to do better?”
“Why?” Julia asked. “Are you afraid I’m going to un-sister you or something?”
“This wasn’t easy, Julia. I had to remind myself that you were my sister and that when Mom died we stood for each other when there was nobody else. I had to remind myself that you owed me nothing and I was pretty much asking you to help me hold on to everything. When you said you would see me, I just hoped.”
“Then let’s keep hope alive, okay?” Julia grinned when Bianca’s face softened and a slow smile came to her lips. “Let’s get some lunch. Benedetti’s is downstairs.”
“Really?” Bianca’s brow furrowed. “Just like that?”
“Just like that,” Julia said, then shrugged. “Do you still like spaghetti?”
Knowing an apology when she heard one, especially when it came with marinara sauce, Bianca didn’t have the will to resist. “I crave it.”
“Then I’ll buy. And we can talk.”
Their table was small, and concentrating on the menu used up a few minutes and ordering took a little more time. When the waiter walked away, they were left with a basket of breadsticks…and each other.
Turning her water glass, Julia waited, but when Bianca began to toy with the cheese shaker, her patience came to an end. “You want to tell me how this happened?”
“No.” Bianca seemed fascinated by the cheese shaker.
“Fine.”
Bianca set the cheese aside and sighed. “Okay,” she finally said. “Yesterday, my business was trashed, the man I was living with dumped me and everything he thought belonged to me on the street. He cut off all the bank accounts we shared, so I have no money. I spent last night in some no-name motel out by the airport.”
“I knew there was a man in the mix…” Julia stopped when Bianca’s lips tightened. “What’s his name?”
“Kelvin.” Bianca’s voice thickened. “Kelvin Michael Payne, also known as KPayne.”
“Never heard of him.”
“Didn’t seem to matter when he was throwing me out…”
“Oh, right.” Julia would have said more, but the look in her sister’s eyes and the arrival of food stopped her. Bending her attention to her plate, Julia stole fleeting glances at the woman her sister had become. Beautiful in all the ways that usually counted, there was something different, something chastened about her. Has she gone through something like this before?
Across the table, Bianca gathered the final bits of pasta. When she looked up, Julia was watching her. “What? Do I have something on my face?”
“No, I was just thinking that it was time for us to do business.”
“Julia, I’ve just told you my predicament.” Bianca lowered the napkin. “I don’t think I have the energy to go through any more angst and recriminations over our relationship.”
“Nobody’s asking you to. I just want…to make it right between us. Maybe I didn’t exactly make it easy before, but now I can at least help. Will you let me?”
“Right now, I’m between a rock and a hard place.”
“I know, but let me show you what I think might work.” Julia flipped open the narrow presentation folder she’d brought from the office and pushed it across the table. “I did some checking while I was waiting for you.”
Bianca opened the folder and gazed at the pictures inside. They represented an eighth floor, one-bedroom condominium, facing the city’s east side—hardwood floors, high ceilings, a terrace. She looked up and stared at her sister. “This is really nice, but I could never pay for it. I was hoping you would have something a little more…affordable.”
“There you go, assuming things. You didn’t give me a chance to tell you what it goes for. Koketsu ni irazunba koji o ezu, my sister.”
“What?”
“Japanese for ‘If you do not enter the tiger’s cave, you will not catch its cub.’ ”
Bianca closed the folder. “That sounds a lot like ‘nothing ventured, nothing gained.’ ”
“Exactly.”
“Did you forget who I am? I know high-end when I see it. I know what a place like this goes for, and I know I can’t afford it—and it doesn’t matter whether you say it in Japanese or in English.” Bianca pushed the folder across the table.
Julia pushed the folder back to her. “You’re right, this is a really nice place. I own it, and under ordinary circumstances, I would never consider renting it. But for you, I’m more than willing to make the offer. The rental cost may be more than you’ll ever want to pay, but at least ask me what the cost is.” She lowered her v
oice. “At least ask me.”
Bianca fingered the folder, then looked inside again. “Okay, what’s the cost?”
“Be my sister again.”
“You’re joking. That’s it?”
“That’s it, no joke,” Julia assured her, nodding in the face of her sister’s disbelief. “That’s what I’ll charge you for rent. Just be my sister, my real sister, again.”
“I—I think I’d like that.” Bianca’s smile suddenly slipped. “We don’t have to do each other’s hair or have sleepovers in matching pajamas or anything, do we?”
“Well, that’s just stupid,” Julia sputtered. “I didn’t say let’s go crazy. I said let’s be sisters again.”
“Are you still going to be pushy? Oh, God, and nosy, too?”
“No more than usual. I just think that if we can be sisters again, maybe we could even become friends—with time and practice, of course. That would be enough for me.”
“Sisters again…” Bianca toyed with her fork, buying time as she made up her mind. “Right now, there is nothing in the world that I would like more.”
“I’m glad, and don’t forget, because I plan to collect.”
“How are you going to write that up in a lease?”
“Am I going to have to?
“I promise, you’ll have my rent on time.” Bianca smiled. “Because as much as you need to collect it, I think I need to pay it.”
Julia grinned and lifted her glass of iced tea. She laughed when Bianca touched her glass with her own. “Here’s to sisters,” they said together.
CHAPTER 4
Bianca sat in the middle of the double bed, scribbling her way across another page of her notebook, knowing that her time in the dingy motel room was nearly at an end. Flipping sheets of paper back and forth, she studied the tasks she’d outlined, and it didn’t take long to settle her priorities. I need to eat and pay bills. Business wins.
She flipped open her cell phone, and, for a minute, was almost afraid that KPayne had somehow managed to cut her phone off, too. But he didn’t pay this bill; she did. KPayne didn’t run everything.
Wayward Dreams Page 5
