Blogger Bundle Volume VI: SB Sarah Selects Books That Rock Her Socks

by Kathleen O'Reilly

  The jewelry designer had a kind smile, was thin, gray, with silver spectacles that he wore over owlish blues, and he knew his own stuff. He took one look at the ring and sighed.

  “Brianna Taylor Kelley of the Seventy-first Street Kelleys. I was half in love with her myself. She was like that. You saw her, and fell in love. Do you like this? It’s very good, isn’t it? I don’t know why everyone is so keen on contemporary jewelry when the old styles were so much more elegant, dignified.” His eyes lifted to Catherine’s. “Don’t you agree?”

  “Yes. Definitely. Simplicity is incredibly underrated. Everyone wants bigger, and better….” She glanced over at Daniel. “You’d better stop me before I get carried away.”

  “Hey, I get excited about numbers. Getting carried away is okay by me,” he said, and they shared a smile. Then Daniel turned to Cummings. “Do you have any idea how to get in touch with Mrs. Kelly? I’d like to return her ring.”

  “I’m not sure she’s still alive. Let me check and see what I have on file.”

  Cummings scurried away and returned a few minutes later, waving a white sheet of paper. “I have no idea if she’s still there, but this is the address and phone number that we have for her.”

  Daniel took it, and nodded. “Thanks. Hopefully that’ll be enough.”

  Then Daniel took her to lunch, and that night he took her to dinner. And as much as she did like to eat, they really did need to discuss what was happening between them because she didn’t want to get hippy-er.

  When they got back to her apartment, she decided it was time to talk.

  “You don’t have to keep feeding me, Daniel. Actually, I’m slightly insulted.”

  He looked at her, shocked, and she realized this wasn’t going to be easy.

  “Oh, oh, that’s not where I was going. I mean, I only wanted to take you out, and it was convenient—” As soon as the words were out, he winced. “Bad word choice. I’m digging a hole here. Let’s start over. What do you want?” he asked.

  What did she want?

  That was easy. She wanted the same thing almost every woman wanted. She wanted the man whom she was in love with to love her in return—simple, trivial, no big deal.

  It took every bit of her courage to meet his eyes and not look away. “Do you seriously want to know what I want? Do you want me to tell you? And if I tell you, what are you going to do, Daniel?”

  She could tell he was surprised at her tone, and she could almost see his accountant’s brain processing all the possible outcomes of this conversation. She wasn’t the same Catherine he’d met on the beach at the Hamptons. He’d given her courage and confidence, and now he was going to face the consequences of that gift.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, his eyes carefully sliding away.

  Tomorrow was her birthday. She wanted to tell him, but how did she tell that to a man who couldn’t meet her eyes?

  So tomorrow night, they’d go to dinner, go back to her place, have blood-pumping, bedpost-shaking, teeth-rattling, hoo-haw busting sex, and she’d stare up at the ceiling because for once in her life, she had a man to celebrate her birthday with, and she was dying to do those birthday things that couples do.

  “Forget I said anything. I had a long day.”

  “I’m sorry,” she told him. “I shouldn’t have brought it up.”

  He didn’t look as if he believed her, but he did look relieved that they wouldn’t be discussing it, so instead, they each had a glass of wine and she gave him her 101 reasons to love Baroque. Actually, she only got to nine.

  After that, they had sex.

  The morning of her birthday arrived, and Catherine woke up the same way she always did, with Daniel’s thigh wrapped around hers, his arm heavy on her breast.

  She grew to love the moment when the sun first hit the window because there was a difference in him then—an almost desperate intensity that he worked so hard to hide. The morning was the only time she felt as if they were something more than two people having sex. All the anxiety and analysis seemed like such a small price to pay for these moments, and Catherine got swept away again, believing that everything was going to be fine.

  That morning, when he held her, his heart beating fast and sure, she almost told him what day it was. Almost said the words because when he felt so close, when she saw her dreams in his eyes, she believed in them. That a real sort of sharing existed between them—ties, the whole emotional package—but Daniel had never said a word, so she closed her eyes, burrowed her head against his chest and kept her mouth firmly shut. Sometimes words weren’t necessary at all.

  IT WASN’T QUITE the best birthday ever. Catherine was with Daniel in the appraisal room, silently working, examining documents and comparing numbers. The steady shuffle of paper broke the silence. His sandalwood cologne tickled her nose and made her body ache in places that she couldn’t satisfy in public.

  “Happy birthday, dear,” her mother cheerfully called to her, giving her a kiss on the cheek.

  Oops. Catherine wasn’t such a five-star hypocrite that she was going to pretend to be unhappy about this accidental outing, so she took a quick glance across the room to see how this was going over.

  Not well. Daniel raised his head, watching her, his eyes boiling, but Catherine wouldn’t second-guess her decision now. She looked the other way. In Catherine’s book of emotional involvement, small as it was, birthdays fell firmly into sharing and ties.

  “We’re kidnapping you and taking you to lunch. Sybil and Brittany are downstairs waiting. I have reservations at Lever House at one.”

  Lever House. Wouldn’t that be nice? Catherine smiled, as if it were her favorite place.

  “I’ll be back after lunch,” she told Daniel. It was sort of a passive-aggressive way to deal with the situation. You made this bed, not me, so if you’re unhappy that you’re lying in it alone—metaphorically—it’s all your fault. That was about as tough as she got considering he really hadn’t done anything wrong.

  Daniel cocked his head. “I didn’t know today was your birthday. Happy birthday,” he said, in that perfectly controlled voice. If it wasn’t for the cold simmer in his eyes, she’d have never known he was mad.

  Too bad.

  Lunch was fabulous. The restaurant was decorated in a sort of cubism-meets-impressionism way, designed to reflect the sunlight seeping in through the windows. Catherine had a divine meal of salmon doused in lime and cilantro, and her mother supplied red velvet cupcakes for dessert, because she knew her daughter’s weaknesses well. After twenty-seven birthday celebrations, her mother had never disappointed her yet.

  “So what are you going to do today?” asked Sybil. “If you don’t have plans, we could go out. Hit WD-40, or there’s a new pub by the university.”

  Catherine glanced up from her empty china plate. “I don’t really feel like celebrating. Maybe on the weekend.”

  Her mother gave her a sharp look.

  “You sure?” asked Sybil.

  “Positive,” said Catherine. “Got to work.”

  Her mother’s look grew sharper.

  “How’s the audit going?” Sybil braced her chin on her palm.

  “We’re this close to cracking the case,” said Catherine, bluffing her way through it all, and she noticed her mother didn’t say a word.

  Sybil and Brittany made their excuses and left. Catherine sat with her mother, drinking her second martini, not that she usually drank martinis, but Andrea Montefiore had very specific ideas about how birthdays should be celebrated, which is where Catherine inherited her birthday-diva-ish-ness from.

  “How are you doing?” her mother asked.

  “Well. The audit’s well. We’re halfway through November.”

  Her mother sipped at her martini, studying Catherine over the rim of the glass. “Is it really going that well?”

  Catherine picked at the last cupcake crumbs on her plate. “I don’t know. Some days I think everything will be fine, and sometimes I don’t know what to think.” />
  “I’m glad you’re doing it. So is Charles.”

  “Really?” Catherine perked up at that.

  “Oh, yes.”

  “Why doesn’t he tell me that?”

  “He will when he’s ready. Give him time. He takes longer than most. It took him about thirty-five years before he told me he loved me.” She looked at her daughter meaningfully. “I love you.”

  “Thanks, Mom,” Catherine said, taking the last crumb from her plate.

  “What else is going on?” asked Andrea.

  “Nothing,” answered Catherine casually, looking her mother straight in the eye.

  “Is that why my daughter has a hickey on her shoulder?”

  Catherine looked down, saw where her shirt had slipped an inch to the side and quickly shoved the fabric in place.

  “Curling iron,” she said automatically.

  Her mother laughed. “Nice try. That might work if I didn’t know that a curling rod hasn’t touched your hair since 1994, when you went to the homecoming dance with ringlets. Hideous,” she said with a shudder. Her mother waited, as if Catherine was going to elaborate more.

  Her mother waited in vain.

  “You’re not going to tell me, are you?”

  “No.”

  “Is that why you don’t want to go out tonight? Do you have other plans?”

  “No.”

  “I wish you could tell me. I wish you trusted me enough to share with me the things that daughters are supposed to tell their mothers.”

  “I share,” said Catherine, but it wasn’t easy to. She’d never been a sharer, and not just with her mother, either. She liked to keep things to herself. Privacy. Discretion. Nothing wrong with that.

  “But you won’t share the story behind the hickey?”

  Her mother watched her with that look that mothers get when they know exactly what’s going on, but they want you to say something, but you’re not, and they know you’re not. Mexican standoff, Montefiore-style.

  Her mother took the empty olive pick from her martini glass, and then slipped it between her lips. Catherine watched the tiny piece of red plastic, as if that pick were the most fascinating thing in the world.

  “Do you want me to guess?” her mother finally asked, and Catherine acknowledged her mother was a much better Catherine mind-reader than Daniel.

  “No.”

  “I could,” said her mother.

  In other circumstances, Catherine would have broken down at that point, knowing that the truth was out there, and her mother knew. Catherine would have gushed on in a girly way about how cool things were, and how she thought he was really great, and how she thought he thought she was really great, but she wasn’t sure yet, and it was too soon to tell.

  But those weren’t the circumstances.

  “Don’t try to guess, Mother.”

  “Be careful. If anyone else notices, it won’t be pretty. Gossip travels fast and people see more than you think.”

  “I don’t want to talk about this,” she said. Today was her birthday.

  “If you need to talk…”

  Not going there. Catherine knew this was nothing more than sex for Daniel, she knew this affair was never going anywhere, no matter how much she wished, and frankly, that was a humiliation she didn’t want to share with her mother—or anyone, actually.

  Her mother polished off the remains of Catherine’s martini and settled the check. On the cab ride uptown they discussed the latest Michael Kors satchel, which could be found for $47.99 on Canal Street, how much the Magna Carta was going to snag at auction, how her mother was going to Miami for Labor Day, and they didn’t talk about Daniel at all.

  DANIEL CLEARLY didn’t understand Catherine’s dysfunctional nature. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  Yes, that was the first thing he said to her when she walked into their workroom. Not “How was lunch?” not “Welcome back,” but, yes, that he thought she should have told him about her birthday.

  “It’s not something that you blurt out,” she said.

  “You could have told me.” He looked hurt, disappointed. With her mother, not sharing secrets was Catherine’s fault, but if she wasn’t sharing with Daniel, it was because she loved him and he didn’t love her. If he wouldn’t give her his heart, then was it so petty for her to withhold some piece of herself?

  Maybe, but Catherine guarded herself more carefully than most.

  “I don’t want you to think I’m, you know, expecting something from you because I’m trying very hard not to.” She felt this was a nice opportunity for him to say that he’d been rethinking the situation, and she waited for those very words.

  He pushed a hand through his hair.

  “A birthday’s a huge thing to me, and I’d rather you not know about it, because if you knew, then you’d think you have to make a big deal out of it, because I expect a big deal, and I don’t want you to feel like you have to.”

  His mouth tightened. “You could have told me, especially if it’s important to you. I should know those things.”

  Catherine sighed. It was her birthday, and his feelings were hurt? Where was the justice in that?

  “It’s my birthday. There.”

  Daniel faced her. “We’re in this thing—”

  “Affair,” she said, choosing to clarify exactly what he’d said.

  “Relationship,” he corrected.

  Relationship? That was the one word guaranteed to set her off because today was her twenty-eighth birthday, and she had wavered over whether to say anything, and now she knew that she picked wrong, and he was upset about it, and her mother had seen a hickey—a hickey, for crying out loud—that he was responsible for, and she’d had two martinis and a cupcake, which she probably shouldn’t have after the cheese plate they had ordered, but today was her birthday.

  Catherine’s eyes narrowed; her mouth tightened. “Are you changing the context of this relationship now?” she asked, putting one hand on her hip, her most aggressive “so-there” gesture, that really wasn’t aggressive at all.

  He waited.

  She waited.

  This was his big moment. The opportunity to tell her that things had changed, and that yes, he wanted something more. But when he looked at her stubbornly, she knew that nothing had changed.

  They were having sex. A lot of sex. Lots of really, really, really great sex, but there was no emotional commitment of any kind because he was still involved with someone else.

  Catherine resumed working, one damned invoice at a time.

  Oh, yeah, this was the best birthday ever.

  THAT NIGHT, Daniel took her out on a date. It would have been nicer if he had asked her politely, with a smile on his face, but instead he told her, his face tense, his voice clipped.

  Guilt was a powerful motivator.

  Over dinner, he gave her a box. Small, gift-wrapped, and she felt even smaller, not quite the birthday princess moment she had been wishing for.

  “I don’t want you to do this,” she said, handing the unwrapped box back to him, because she didn’t want to know what was inside the box, because if she knew what was inside, then she’d want to keep it, like she wanted to keep him, too.

  “If I had known—if you had told me—this is what I would have done. Please,” he added, and they both stared at Pandora’s box on the table.

  Eventually, Catherine couldn’t deny him—she never could deny him anything, which was a large part of the problem—so she opened the box. It was a necklace from Oliver Cummings’s shop, a diamond teardrop falling from a delicate gold chain. It was the most breathtaking piece of jewelry she’d ever seen, and coming from someone who had appraised the engagement ring given from Ferdinand I to the Princess Maria Luisa of Rome, that was saying a lot.

  “It actually wasn’t that hard to pick out something for you,” he said, almost proudly. “Oliver didn’t help me. I want you to know that. I did that on my own.”

  “I love his stuff,” she said, not taking her eyes off th
e stone. The drop was such an anomaly, the artistic representation of both water—meaning life—and tears, the symbol of both pain and humanity. It wasn’t cold, like the emerald cut or the brilliant cut, and had depths that reflected beyond the surface. It was brilliantly perfect.

  “Do you like it?” he asked, and she lifted her eyes to his, smiling.

  “It’s beautiful,” she said, more of a sigh, exactly like a birthday girl should do. She wanted to say more, wanted to tell him why it meant so much to her, but she wasn’t sure exactly where the line was tonight.

  “You can put it on. If you want. If you like it,” he said awkwardly.

  With nervous fingers she lifted out the necklace, and tried to finesse the clasp, but he was watching her, and her fingers felt clumsy.

  “Do you need help?”

  “Do you mind?” she asked politely.

  “No. Not at all,” he said. He walked behind her, his hands at her neck, lifting her hair. The necklace settled into place, exactly as if it belonged there, and his fingers lingered, exactly as if they belonged there, until the waiter interrupted, and Daniel returned to his seat, exactly as if he belonged there.

  “Thank you,” she said, her fingers going to the necklace every few moments, feeling the fragile chain, afraid she would break it somehow.

  “Anytime,” he told her, and Daniel didn’t say things he didn’t mean, didn’t do looks that he didn’t mean, either, and she smiled nervously. Warm and scared, all at the same time.

  After dinner, Daniel took her to a nightclub downtown. Not a loud place, but old-fashioned, quiet, with lots of dark corners for couples to be alone. A pianist accompanied a female singer with a deep, throaty voice.

  He ordered a bottle of wine, and they spent the time reviewing the audit, but as he was talking, his fingers crept across the table, brushing hers, lightly once, and then, taking her hand. She knew he liked touching her, she knew he fought very hard not to and she loved those times when he couldn’t help himself.

  A shadow appeared over their table, a couple, cute and sparkling, and full of zest.

  “Daniel?”