Charade

by Sandra Brown

  By the time Jeff withdrew, he had instructions to consult Sherry and forge ahead with their shooting schedule. Last night’s doubts about the viability of Cat’s Kids seemed ludicrous now. They’d lost Chantal, but there were so many other special children who needed the program.

  No matter what obstacles she encountered—bureaucracy, negative press, self-doubts—she must never call it quits. Cat’s Kids was an entity larger and more important than she. Alex had helped her see it in a new perspective. In the overall picture, her personal setbacks were insignificant.

  Just before noon, Jeff returned to her office with a message memo. “Your favorite novelist just phoned.”

  Her heart did a cartwheel as she reached for her telephone. “Which line?”

  “Unfortunately, he’s not holding. He said to tell you that he was in a hurry and only had time to leave a message.”

  Looking as nervous as the herald bringing bad news to the short-tempered queen, Jeff handed her the memo. “He was calling from the airport. Said they’d already announced his flight.”

  “Flight?” Her buoyant spirits sank like lead. “He’s leaving town? Where’s he going? For how long?” It was all written on the memo, but Jeff imparted the message verbally.

  “All he said was that he’d be gone for several days and would call you when he got back.”

  “That’s it?”

  Jeff nodded.

  She tried to keep her expression impassive, her voice stoic. It was an effort. “Thank you, Jeff.”

  Obsequiously, he backed out of the office and closed the door.

  Cat neatly folded the memo, then stared at the square of lined paper as though it might offer an explanation that had thus far been withheld. It didn’t.

  She was crushed. She had hoped they’d have dinner together tonight. It had been only a few hours since she’d left him, but she yearned to see him.

  That weakness made her angry with herself. He was certainly showing no signs of yearning. Here she sat, shackled by the blues, feeling like the only girl in the senior class who didn’t have a date for the prom, while he was taking flight. Literally.

  Her dejection quickly turned to pique. What had sent him out of town in such a hurry? Business or pleasure? What had been so damned important that he’d hotfooted it out of town without even taking the time to say goodbye?

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Alex wasn’t particularly fond of New York City, but it fascinated him. It was a city of superlatives, epitomizing despair, dirt, and destitution, and glitz, glitter, and glamour. His reactions to it were always extreme, never lukewarm. He saw things within the same city block that could either exhilarate or disgust him.

  He and his agent were having dinner in a small mom and pop restaurant on the West Side. Earlier in his relationship with Arnold Villella, on about his third trip to the Big Apple, Alex had eschewed the outrageously expensive meals at The Four Seasons and Le Cirque.

  “If I can’t pronounce it or don’t know its origin, I won’t eat it,” he’d told his agent. Villella had called him a philistine but thereafter allowed Alex to choose where they dined.

  Occasionally, if they had something special to celebrate, Alex permitted Villella to treat him to a late-night hamburger at 21. But Oswald’s Cafe, overseen by the robust Hungarian immigrant himself, had become one of Alex’s favorite places. The roast beef sandwiches were piled high with rare, tender shavings and served with a dark, grainy mustard so hot that it brought tears to the eyes.

  Tonight, he wolfed down his sandwich while Villella tinkered with a bowl of goulash.

  “You were hungry,” the agent observed. “Didn’t they feed you on the airplane?”

  “I guess. I don’t remember.”

  He remembered very little of the short flight from San Antonio to Dallas-Fort Worth, the brief layover, the nonstop to La Guardia, the cab ride into Manhattan, or anything else that had happened since last night.

  Hot, juicy, noisy, tender, raunchy, gentle, frantic, slow, terrific, mind-blowing sex played hell on his memory.

  He pushed aside his plate, and when the waiter came for it he ordered coffee. He was halfway through it when he realized that he and his agent hadn’t exchanged a word in five minutes.

  Villella had remained patiently silent. When dealing with penurious publishers, he had the instincts of a barracuda. But with the authors he represented, he was nurturer, disciplinarian, father confessor—adjusting his role to fit the needs of his clients.

  Arnold Villella had agreed to represent Alex before he had published a single word. Most of the agents he had queried returned his first manuscript unread, their policy being that they didn’t represent unpublished writers. Catch-22 of the publishing industry: You couldn’t get published without an agent, and you couldn’t get an agent without having been published.

  But Villella had telephoned him in Houston on a Friday morning during a thunderstorm. Alex had a hangover, and Villella had to repeat himself several times before Alex could hear the message above the crashing thunder outside the window and inside his skull.

  “I think your writing has promise. You have a raw but unique style. I’d like to represent you if you’re interested.”

  Without delay, Alex flew to New York to meet the one person on the planet who believed his writing had promise. Villella was quick and inquisitive. He was opinionated and blunt. But not unkind.

  When he discovered Alex’s drinking problem, he had refrained from praying and said only that he had been associated with quite a few talented writers, many of whom were alcoholics. “While alcohol might have enhanced their imaginations, it was ruinous to their writing careers.”

  Upon returning to Houston, Alex checked himself into a rehab clinic, and, as he worked on revising his original manuscript, words seemed to eke from his pores along with the alcoholic poisons that had polluted his system.

  Villella had earned his unqualified loyalty and trust. He was the only person in whom Alex confided, the only one who could criticize him without his taking umbrage. There was very little about him that Villella did not know, yet the agent had never passed judgment on him or his misdeeds.

  “I’m sorry, Arnie,” he said now. “I’m not very good company tonight.”

  “You’ll get around to it,” Arnie said.

  “Around to what?”

  “To telling me why you flew up here unexpectedly and asked me to avail myself for dinner.”

  “I hope you didn’t have other plans.”

  “I did, but I can always juggle my schedule to accommodate my most important client.”

  “I’ll bet you say that to all your clients.”

  “Of course I do,” he replied candidly. “You’re all like demanding children.”

  “I’ll bet I’m the worst behaved, though.”

  Villella was too polite to agree but raised his hands, palms up, to indicate that Alex had spoken the truth. “How’s the book coming?”

  “Fine.”

  “That bad?”

  Alex laughed with chagrin. “I’m trying to keep it in perspective. I continually remind myself that this is just the first draft.”

  “It won’t read like a final one.”

  “I hope to God not.” He hesitated, then said with uncharacteristic shyness, “In spite of the rough spots, I think it might be good, Arnie.”

  “I don’t doubt that it’s excellent. This is your most intricate and provocative plot so far. It’s destined to be a bestseller.”

  “If I don’t fuck it up.”

  “You won’t. Relax. Have fun with it. It’ll come.”

  “Are we talking about the book or sex?” Alex teased.

  “I’m talking about the book. What are you talking about?”

  Arnie’s intuitive question swiped the grin from Alex’s face. He signaled for a refill of coffee and, after it had been poured, closed his hands around the steaming mug.

  “You’re wound up tighter than an eight-day clock,” Arnie observed. “Wh
at’s wrong? You’re not having relapses of depression, are you?”

  “No.”

  “No more of those blackouts?”

  “No. God no.”

  Villella referred to those hours—sometimes days—that Alex had lost to alcoholic blackouts. He would regain consciousness without being able to account for the period of time he’d been “gone.” He would have no memory of what had taken place, where he’d been, what he’d done. It had been terrifying.

  “This has nothing to do with drinking. I’m sober.” He noticed a release of tension in his agent that Villella probably wasn’t even aware of.

  “Then if you’re not anguishing over the book, not wrestling with the bottle, what is it?”

  “I’ve been with a woman.”

  Villella blinked rapidly, and Alex could guess the reason for his agent’s surprise. Villella knew about his sexual exploits. Most of them.

  “This is different,” he mumbled, glancing around self-consciously.

  “Oh?” The agent’s mood was suddenly upbeat. “This lady has tapped in to more than your keg of testosterone?”

  “Yes. I mean no,” he corrected himself querulously.

  “Well, which is it?”

  “She’s not a bimbo. Not just a piece of ass. She’s…Hell, I don’t know what she is.”

  Villella folded one small hand over the other and settled them on the edge of the table, ready to listen. Alex continued to fidget. Finally Villella said, “This isn’t like you.”

  “No shit.”

  “I can see you’re deeply troubled. You hardly have what I would describe as a jovial, happy-go-lucky temperament, but I sense in you a desperation I haven’t noticed since you first came to see me. Is this woman rejecting you?”

  Images of Cat flashed through his mind: an inviting smile, an enticing glance, an encouraging response. Sweetness and sex. Wildness and whimsy. In turn, demure and demanding. His slightest touch had elicited sighs and murmurs of pleasure. Reprises of them echoed inside his head.

  In a voice that grated like sandpaper, he answered, “No. She’s not rejecting me.”

  “Then I fail to see how this budding relationship can be anything but enjoyable and healthy.”

  “It’s her name.”

  “Her name? What do you mean?”

  “It’s Cat Delaney, Arnie. I’ve slept with Cat Delaney.”

  Villella gaped at him, wheyfaced with disbelief. “Good God, Alex. What can you be thinking? I thought you’d had your fill of headlines. Yet you’re seeing a woman who attracts media attention like a magnet. A woman who—”

  “I know,” Alex said impatiently, cutting him short. “I know it’s crazy.”

  “Not only crazy, my dear boy. Extremely dangerous.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  It was difficult for Cat to keep her cool.

  When she turned onto her street and saw Alex parked in front of her house, she practically floorboarded the accelerator. But by the time he met her halfway up the walk to the front door, she’d mustered some dignity and pride. She said an aloof hello.

  “Have a nice trip?”

  “So-so.”

  “Where’d you go?”

  “New York.”

  “How was it?”

  “Like New York.”

  “You left on the spur of the moment, didn’t you?”

  “Urgent business.”

  “Of course. The publishing industry is famous for its emergencies,” she said sarcastically.

  She unlocked her front door and stepped inside, then turned to face him, blocking his entrance, just as she’d done the first time he’d appeared at her doorstep.

  After their night together, she’d experienced the giddiness unique to newfound romance. In contrast, he’d skipped town. If an emergency had prevented him from speaking to her before he left, he could have called during the last several days. But he hadn’t.

  And now he was hardly displaying the lighthearted delirium of Gene Kelly in Singin’ in the Rain. These were inauspicious signs that he hadn’t felt the warm fuzzies after being with her that she had felt after being with him.

  He looked tired and haggard. There were dark circles around his eyes, as though he hadn’t slept since she’d left him in his bed three days ago. She struggled with the impulse to place her arms around him and keep them there until his hounded, haunted look disappeared.

  “Did you go to that little girl’s funeral?” he asked.

  “How’d you know?”

  “I called the TV station and was told you’d gone to a funeral and would be out for the remainder of the day. Bad scene?”

  “Very. During the service, I kept thinking back on the day Chantal legally became their daughter. Everyone was so happy. They had a backyard barbecue to introduce her to their family and friends. The same family and friends were gathered at their house today.” She sighed sadly.

  “But there were no balloons or streamers. No gaiety. It wasn’t quite the same.” She stared into near space for a moment, then brought him back into focus. “What brings you by, Alex?”

  “We need to talk.”

  His tone of voice and solemn expression were warnings that what he wanted to talk about was nothing she wanted to hear.

  “Can I have a rain check? I’d be a lousy hostess right now. The funeral did me in. Another time would be better.”

  “There won’t ever be a good time for this.”

  Cat could think of only one problem that would be this imperative and this grim. Her black mourning dress suddenly felt like chain mail. A crushing pressure seized her chest.

  “Let me guess,” she said. “You forgot to mention one tiny detail the other night before we slept together. You’re married.”

  “No. I’m not married. And that’s all I’m going to say while standing out on the front porch.” He sidestepped her and went inside.

  Once the door was closed, she confronted him. “You’re not currently married, but an ex—”

  “I’ve never been married.”

  “Hmm. This is worse than I thought. When was your last blood test?”

  He placed his hands on his hips and glowered at her. “Give me a break.”

  If he didn’t have a wife tucked away somewhere, and no ex was hounding him for usurious alimony, and he wasn’t carrying a deadly virus, that left only one option. He was building up to a classic brush-off.

  Damned if she’d give him the satisfaction. Squaring her shoulders, she tossed back her hair and went on the offensive. “Look, Alex, I think I know what you’re going to say, so let me spare you the trouble, okay?

  “I was emotionally fragile the other night and needed some TLC. You provided it. We’re consenting adults. We practiced safe sex. We were sexually…compatible.”

  She paused to draw a deep breath, and hated that it sounded shaky. “But you don’t want a lasting relationship. No commitment. No strings.” Spreading her arms wide, she added, “Hey, that’s cool. Neither do I.”

  She removed her earrings and stepped out of her pumps, thinking that those simple, ordinary actions would make her nonchalance more convincing.

  “So you can stop looking like you’re about to hurl chow on my Oriental rug. I’m not going to stamp my foot and make demands. I don’t have a father who’ll march you to the wedding altar with a shotgun in your back. I’m not going to slash my wrists, boil your bunny rabbit, or come after you with a butcher knife. This is not going to turn into a fatal attraction for you.” She managed to form a cold, stiff, insincere smile. “So relax, okay?”

  “Sit down, Cat.”

  “Why? Did I leave out a line of your carefully rehearsed monologue?”

  “Please.”

  She dropped her earrings onto the hall table, led him into the living room, switched on a table lamp, and, folding her legs beneath her, curled up in the corner of the sofa. Picking up a throw pillow, she hugged it to her chest as a child would a teddy bear, for protection and comfort.

  Alex sat
down on the ottoman in front of the sofa, spread his knees, and stared at the floor between his feet. He looked like a prisoner watching the gallows being built outside his cell window.

  Propping his elbows on his knees, he pressed his thumbs into his eyesockets and remained in that doomed-man posture for several moments before lowering his hands and looking at her.

  “I wanted to sleep with you the minute I saw you,” he said bluntly.

  Mentally, she took a step backward and examined his statement from all angles. On the surface it sounded very romantic, but she didn’t trust its simplicity. “I suppose I should be flattered. But I’m waiting for the ax to fall. What is it, Alex? Didn’t I live up to your expectations?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  He shot to his feet and began to pace. Another bad sign. Men only paced when delivering bad news.

  He stopped abruptly and turned toward her. “There’s a lot of garbage in here.” He tapped his finger against his temple. “A lot of shit went down before I left the Houston PD.”

  “I already know about your drinking problem.”

  “That was the effect, not the cause. I still haven’t sorted it all out. I’m working on it, but it wouldn’t be fair—”

  “Don’t fall back on that standard, trite b.s. about unfairness!” she cried. “Get to the point.”

  “Okay. Bottom line. I can’t become involved in any sort of meaningful relationship right now. I thought you ought to know that before we get too deep.”

  For several moments she sat there huddled against the cushions, the pillow clutched to her chest. Then, tossing it aside, she vaulted off the sofa. Her heels made dull thuds on the floor as she marched to the front door and opened it wide.

  He sighed and plowed his fingers through his hair. “You’re pissed.”

  “Wrong. I’d have to give a damn in order to be pissed.”

  “Then why do you want me to leave?”

  “Because there’s not enough room in this house for me, you, and your gargantuan ego. The two of you must go. Now.”

  “Shut the door.”

  She slammed it shut. “How dare you presume that I would be shattered by this. How dare you presume that our sleeping together meant more to me than it did to you. What gave you the idea that I wanted ‘any sort of meaningful relationship.’ with you?”