by Fran Louise
#
Vanguard’s offices were small but distinguished, just a few blocks from Capitol Hill and with a view over Theodore Roosevelt Island. There were sixty full-time employees. I started with the executive team on Monday. Jay didn’t call, and I didn’t call him. On Tuesday, I spoke to the marketing team. Wednesday, I started with coders—still no word from Jay. I finished up with the coders on Thursday. One of them asked me out for drinks. I called Astrid and Sandra, the au pair and housekeeper respectively, and they urged me to go.
The bar was tacky and full of college-aged kids with lofty political aspirations, and we drank cheap beer from pitchers. It was exactly what I needed. I got more solid leads than I’d gotten all week in the office. I also laughed more than I had done for a while, even if it was a little forced. I’d spent all week trying, unsuccessfully, not to dwell on this aborted attempt to get closer to Jay, so it was a welcome distraction.
The taxi pulled up to the townhouse just before midnight. The lights were still on in the kitchen, but it was dark elsewhere. I took off my heels at the door and padded through to the kitchen, looking forward to seeing Nina.
He sat at the island in the centre of the kitchen, his eyes fixed on me. “Jay!” Stumbling through the door, my hand flew to my neck to steady the pulse there.
His features were thrown into relief under the dim centre light. A bronzed statue, his shadowed eyes pinioned to mine. As though I’d been starved of his presence all week, my brain went into overdrive cataloguing each small nuance. The burnished hair that he’d obviously been manhandling; the tense jaw, evenly speckled by stubble; the crow’s feet and the sensuous lines curving his tight mouth.
Speaking of a tight mouth … I could see something resembling anger simmering under his skin. The silence echoed in my head. God help me but arousal seared low across my stomach before I could control it as memories of him rearing above me surfaced—in my throat, bitter acrimony surged. The silence of the past week echoed like a deafening gong between us.
He looked me up and down with narrow eyes, taking obviously careful note of the dishevelled black dress and bare feet. His brows rose. “How was work?” he asked.
I stared at him. I realised I was probably tipsy; certainly not a hundred percent sober. “Fine,” I said.
“Where have you been?”
There was a complex, if slow, system of assessment going on in my head. Civility warred with instinct. Was that—judgement in his tone? I knew in that split second that I could avoid a scene if I wanted to, but after having been ignored for an entire week, I wasn’t sure if that was something I necessarily wanted to avoid.
Who the hell is he, pitching up here out of the blue and demanding to know where I’ve been?
My jaw clenched. “Where have I been?” I asked, my voice low. I paused for effect. “Never mind where I’ve been. I’ve been here, in your house, where you told me to be. Where the hell have you been?”
And … it was done. The words had left me, crossed the room, and slapped his face with accusation. A dubious tingle fluttered up my spine.
His features tensed, causing his jaw to flex. “I’ve been taking care of business,” he said pointedly. “Family business. So I’ll ask you again: where the hell have you been?”
“I don’t have to explain myself to you,” I said with an outraged gasp.
“Oh, you don’t?” His tone suggested this was not, in fact, an accurate assessment of our relationship. “So, we’re back to this? I ask a question and you prevaricate.”
“I’ve been working!”
“Doing what?”
“Taking care of business,” I said, mimicking his lofty tone.
“Oh, I see,” he said, without missing a beat. “What kind of business would that be?”
“None of yours, for a start.”
He smiled. There was little humour at the base of it. Quite the contrary, it seemed full of menace. “Is this normal for you, staggering in at midnight after work?”
“I’m not staggering,” I said, outraged again. I glared at him for a moment before I realised my jaw was slack. I snapped it shut. “I had a couple of beers with some of the programmers. I’m tired! I’m bringing up an eight month-old baby. You must be joking if you think I’ve got time to go out for beers every night after work.”
“Well, you certainly made use of the facilities, I’ll give you that,” he said. He got up slowly but the move was controlled. I was distracted by the sound of the soft material of his suit brushing against his limbs. “If I’d known you planned to party this week, I would have asked Astrid to move in. Then you could have just stayed out all night if you’d wanted.”
Affront zapped me like a current. “You’re the one who insisted we stay here, and now you’ve got the cheek to criticise me for going along with your plans? After you take off to New York without even a proper explanation–” I bit my tongue. My brain was tired and slightly fuddled by the beer and the outrage was sharp as a needle. “A note in a fruit bowl, Jay, and you have the gall to accuse me. I mean – is that the best you can do? Do you own a working cell phone?”
Bewilderment creased his brow. “What’s your point, exactly, Stella?”
“I didn’t even get a call from you all week to let me know what was going on,” I said. I wished I hadn’t taken off my heels. Even from two metres he loomed. “Unbelievable arrogance, to just presume we’d sit around here all week waiting for you.”
“I called you,” he countered. “I must have called you twenty bloody times. You’ve been working, haven’t you? Nina was being well taken care of.”
“That’s not the point,” I said, snapping off the words. “What do you mean, you called me?”
“Is your phone even working?”
“Of course it is!” Anger, which had been smouldering around the frayed edges of my tiredness, was doused suddenly by cold determination. My voice dropped. “It’s too late now, anyway. I don’t want to talk about this. Nina and I are leaving tomorrow.”
There was a small beat of silence. “No, Stella, you’re not,” he said. “You’ll stay until Sunday like we agreed.”
“No.” I stared at him, dumbfounded by his response. “We’re leaving tomorrow.”
“I just got back,” he said obviously.
“Yes, well, I’m sorry to rain on your parade, Jay, but we’ve been here all week. Now we have to get back to New York. You should have checked with me first if you wanted to make plans for the weekend.”
He stepped towards me and then stopped. Frustration made his jaw work. “Goddammit, Stella.”
“What?”
“I had important business to take care of.”
“I heard you,” I said. I gathered some ground up, too, swaying a little with exhaustion but refusing to be beaten. “I have important business to take care of this weekend, too. At least I’m giving you the courtesy of some warning, in person. I don’t treat people like they’re waiting staff, hanging around on call until I’ve got time to deal with them.”
The words were snatched from my mouth by an infinitesimal movement in Jay’s features. Whatever it was—whatever darkness was behind it—it seemed to snap like a cord. One minute I was brash and angry, and the next my emotions shrank into a corner like a whimpering dog. I couldn’t even have described what it was … it stung me, though. I flinched internally, the restraint in every tensed muscle in his body like a wall in front of me.
The tension, suspended, taut, stretched on and then sparked. He exhaled sharply. “We’ll talk about this in the morning,” he said after a pause.
I breathed out, too.
He glanced away from me. “Go to bed,” he said, “before one of us says something we regret.”
I swayed like a long-distance swimmer emerging from the water. My attention absorbed the surroundings again, taking in the silence. Alarm pricked my sub-conscious. “Where’s Astrid?”
“I sent her home.”
“Where’s Nina?” I said in a much more urgent tone.
&
nbsp; “She’s asleep,” he said, and his even tone told me he didn’t appreciate my reaction.
I didn’t care about offending his sensibilities. He knew nothing about babies. It might be an unreasonable anxiety—Jay might be her father—but he wouldn’t have known what to do if something had happened.
“You had no right to do that, to send her home,” I said, picking up my shoes. “I left her with Astrid, not you. I’m going to check on her.”
A sound of frustration escaped him. “She’s fine. If you were so bloody worried why did you spend all night in a bar?”
“Enough!” The word left me of its own accord. I looked up; he towered over me, his expression autocratic, but I didn’t back down. I yanked myself back mentally from his reach. “The two things are not related,” I said. “And even if they were, you don’t get to make that kind of decision yet, not where Nina’s concerned.”
“I’m her father whether either of us likes it or not.” His voice rasped with control. “Do you hear me, Stella?”
“Either of us?” I balked. A minor detail ... Elizabeth’s voice hissed inside my head. My expression hardened. “If you were trying to impress me with your paternal skills this week, let me tell you: you didn’t.”
“I left you with a housekeeper and an au pair. I’d hardly say you were abandoned,” he said in a low tone.
“Just let me check on her,” I said, impatient now.
In truth, I felt a little guilty. This was the first time I’d been out socially since she’d been born. I jogged upstairs and tiptoed into the bedroom. My heart was beating fast, too fast for the minor exertion. I was angry—worried now—but mostly angry. The unacknowledged resentment building up all week had found a small hole in my defences. I could feel the pressure seeping out, the hole threatening to burst open.
Damn him for striding back in here as though all of this was my fault! Why had I even gone out tonight? I’d given him ammunition against me, something to deflect from his poor behaviour. Stalking off and not even bothering to let me know where he was. I’d been a guest in the house of a stranger all week, my daughter tended by well-meaning employees, to boot.
Whether he realised it or not he’d made it perfectly clear what kind of priority Nina would have in his life going forward.
Nina was fast asleep, in the determined way only babies can sleep. Exhaling, I dropped my heels on the floor and leaned on the cot bars, staring at her wordlessly. I took in her clean, innocent smell, letting it wash through me with relief. Her chest worked furiously, up and down; her lips were pouted and defiant even in sleep. She was so like Jay it broke my heart.
He’d seemed defiant in sleep, too, last weekend when I’d stolen into his bed. Could that only have been a week ago?
I turned with some fatality to see him standing in the doorway. My gaze lingered on his now wary eyes. They did nothing to diminish the force of his stubborn jaw. Tired, overloaded with ambivalence, I said “I’m going to bed,” and glanced away.
“Which bed?”
The question resounded in me with the force of a blow, low in the stomach. “This one, in here,” I said. I didn’t meet his eye, pulling back the comforter on the large guest bed.
He sat down and regarded me evenly. Lean and long, he was incongruously male in the nursing chair. His hair gleamed gold in the half-light, his tawny gaze insufferably arrogant. I unzipped my dress. He considered me, waiting for my dress to fall to the ground.
“Jay,” I said, my tone a warning as tension coiled at the back of my throat.
“I’m not leaving,” he repeated.
Frustration exploded in my chest. “What do you want?” When he didn’t answer, I exhaled, suddenly out of energy for the day. “I have work in the morning. I don’t have time for this.” I let the dress fall and stepped out of it. Ignoring his intense gaze, I crawled into the bed in my lingerie.
“I’m not leaving,” he reiterated.
I cracked one eye open and regarded him. “You’ll have all day tomorrow with Nina, if that’s what you want,” I said groggily. “I’ll pick her up at four to go to the airport.”
“We need to talk,” he said, and I could feel the provocation in his voice like a blunt instrument poking into my side.
“You told me to go to bed,” I said. I shifted, unable to get comfortable. “You said we could talk in the morning, so let’s talk in the morning. Or next week.”
“We need to talk before you leave.”
I sighed, a heady mixture of impatience and anger causing me to yank the covers back. Only Nina’s presence stopped me from raising my voice. “It doesn’t suit me to talk right now,” I hissed, “the same way it didn’t suit you to talk all this week, even though that’s what we’d agreed.”
I glared at him, incensed by the cool indifference in his maddeningly attractive face. “I don’t have time for this crap, Jay. I’ll be lucky to get four hours sleep tonight. I have to finish up my interviews tomorrow, and then I have to get back to New York so that we can handover the keys to the SoHo apartment. I have a busy life, and I don’t have time to play second fiddle to yours.” I pulled the covers back again and shut my eyes. “Your daughter shouldn’t have to play second fiddle to anyone, now that we’re on the subject.”
It was silent for a long time. My whole being prickled with awareness. The breath seemed to accumulate in my lungs, my windpipe suddenly too tight to permit normal passage of air. I shifted, turning my back to him and glaring at the cot in an effort to calm myself.
Was he really just going to sit there all night?
His gall was unbelievable, turning up out of the blue like this—no call, no warning—and just expecting me to fall into line with his plans. The truth was that I’d been booked to go back to New York on Sunday, and hand over the keys to the apartment on Monday evening, but I’d pushed up my schedule this week after it had become clear that Jay was officially AWOL. I wasn’t going to change everything back now that he’d deigned to grace us with his presence, no matter how bad it made me feel to take Nina away from him.
After a very long while, the sound of fabric brushing eased into the silence. His scent, that taunting cologne, disturbed the air. He moved into my view and I shut my eyes like a mischievous child. He was at the cot. I counted ten seconds, twenty, thirty seconds … what was he doing? I was just about to open my eyes, unable to stand it, when the fabric of his suit bristled again. He shut the door over carefully without another word.
Childishly, my eyes crowded with indignant tears in the ensuing silence.
#
It was hot when we arrived back in New York. I stood at the front door of the apartment block in SoHo breathing heavily. It had to be a hundred degrees in the hallway. A car seat, a pram, four bags of diapers, bibs, dummies, baby bottles, breast pumps and other baby paraphernalia sat at my feet. I stared up at the fifth floor, barely visible from where I was standing. A plastic box of toys, a baby bath and three very heavy cases to go. It wasn’t even the weight or the bulk of my belongings. It was getting back up these damned stairs each time.
I’d just reached the fifth floor again and was considering the humongous cases when I heard the front door slam far down below. The sound of Nina’s gurgling filtered upstairs. I leaned over the banister. “Sorry, Mon,” I shouted, “this is taking forever, but I’ll be done in another fifteen, I promise. Are you okay?”
Nina hollered with random enthusiasm. I laughed despite myself, then frowned as I bumped the case down two or three steps, both the case and me coming to an unstable and abrupt halt. Footsteps rounded the fourth landing.
I stared in abject surprise when Jay appeared.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, the case almost sliding from my grip.
He didn’t respond to the belligerent question. All six feet and three gilded inches of him seemed to resonate in the dank hallway like a deity. Nina was in his arms, beaming at me in delight.
“Where’s Monica?” I asked, dousing them with my pedestrian whi
ne.
His dark eyes swept over me, the case, and seemed to sum up the general situation as one he didn’t approve of. “I sent her home,” he said.
Annoyance flared in my chest. “Why?” The case wobbled again and I grasped at it.
He sighed and strode towards me. “Let go of that.” To my utter chagrin, he picked up the case as though it were filled with shredded paper, carrying it efficiently down to the fourth floor and setting it down. Nina remained contented and entertained in his other arm, clapping her hands at me as if to illustrate how clever her daddy was. “Take Nina and I’ll get the rest of the cases,” he said dispassionately. “You can start packing the smaller stuff in your car. I’ll be ten minutes.”
It took him eight. I caught him jogging up the stairs on his third pass, and stared up at him in amazement. Had he flown up this morning for this? We’d barely even exchanged more than two words yesterday when I’d left; I hadn’t expected to see him until next weekend.
After completely abandoning us with no explanation last week, suddenly he was father of the year? I should have been grateful but I was too busy trying to hold my head above water in a sea of swirling resentment. I’d expected a whole week to get some perspective back before facing him again.
He arrived at the side of my double-parked Prius as I was squeezing in the pram.
“No, that’s not going to work,” he said. I watched, miffed, as he began rearranging the contents of the trunk, transferring items to the back seat. It became obvious very quickly to both of us that there was no way the cases and the bags and the pram and car seat were making it in together on the same trip.
“How did you get it all here?” he asked.
I glanced at him. “Brian and Monica helped me,” I said, awkward.
His mouth tightened. “Have you taken the lease already? Your friend mentioned it’s in Harlem.”
“No.” I kept my response short. I knew it wasn’t the safest, most salubrious area in the city, but it was cheap and the square-footage was impressive. It was also closer to day care and the office than Brooklyn, my next choice if this apartment didn’t work out.
