Banjo Man (7 page)

“Laurie O’Neill, I am
so
glad you came. Not that I doubted you would.” He laughed. “No, not for one second. But boy, was I glad to see you walk through that door! Ummm …” He hugged her tight, nuzzling his chin into her neck until she giggled to hide the rush of desire that flooded every part of
her. “Oh, you smell so good. Feel so good. And”—he held her away at arm’s length while his eyes traveled slowly over her body—“and look so good, all soft and silken.”

His words hushed to a whisper against her hair, and for a second Laurie forgot where she was, and felt herself spinning in space.

Then she heard chairs scraping against the floor and the lively chatter of the crew, and she pulled away, laughing. “Hey, you are a crazy man.”

“Yup. Crazy. Wild. Wild about you! Can I take you home and nibble on your ear for a while? Just for a day or two?”

“No! Hush!”

“Okay, then how about your nose? Your lips? Your chin?”

Laurie’s soft laughter was edged with arousal. “Stop it, Banjo Man! Are you always like this after a show?”

Rick turned to the crew and flung out his arms in mock innocence. “Gang, am I always like this after a show?”

“Yes!” came the chorused reply.

“Don’t believe them!” He spun back and caught Laurie around the waist, almost lifting her off her feet. “No, it’s you. You have me flyin’ high, darlin’! Come on, let’s say good night to these traitors and head for my place.”

Before she could say a word, Rick had grabbed her hand and led her out of the theater.

The night sky was black and endless, pierced by a million pinpoints of starlight. It hung so close above the quiet city that Laurie was sure she could reach up and touch it. A perfect night.

They walked along in silence for a moment, Laurie’s hand curved inside Rick’s, enjoying this single point of contact, its innocence and promise.

Rick’s voice, husky with desire, broke the stillness. “Will you come home with me?”

Laurie didn’t answer.

“We could get a bite to eat. Sit and talk. Whatever you want.”

Silence. And the pounding of her heart in her ears.

“Laurie? What do you say, sweet thing?”

“I think I’d better get back to the apartment.” Her thin voice sounded strained and sad.

Rick was silent, his brain reeling off arguments, persuasions, often-used lines. He kept them trapped behind his tight, clenched jaw, wanting her, yet knowing how easy it would be to frighten her away.

“Rick, I really do have to go to work tomorrow. And it’s late—”

“I know, darlin’. Trouble is, part of me says, ‘Go slow, take it easy with her,’ and another part of me”—he licked his dry lips—“well, I’m dyin’ to take you in my arms and love you!”

The black night air pressed down, heavy and still, upon them. Laurie shivered. She tried to clear the cobwebs from her head, to still the feelings welling up within her.

“Rick, I can’t. I’m not ready.”

“I know.” He drew a deep, harsh breath, filling his head with the cool air, trying to get the earth to steady beneath his feet. “Okay, then, home it is! My Jeep’s parked around back. Just ten minutes and you’re back safe in your ivory tower.”

“Rick!” There was no hiding the hurt in her voice.

“I’m sorry.” He squeezed her hand tightly, hating himself. “I
am
sorry, Laurie. It’s late, and I’m beat, and the show gets me wild sometimes.”

Leading her to a stripe of moonlight, he stopped, his gaze resting on her face. “Sometimes you have
to listen to my words with half an ear, and to my heart for what I’m really saying. ‘Always interpret everything in the most favorable sense.’ Isn’t that a kind of convent maxim, or something?”

“I’m not sure, but I’ll take your word for it.” She grinned, knowing she was being teased. She cocked her head to one side, meeting his dark glance and feeling the immediate quickening of her pulse. Impulsively she added, “The one thing I do know for sure is that you were great on that stage. I loved the show, Rick; it was wonderful! In fact,
you’re
wonderful.”

Rick looked down on her face long and hard, his eyes tracing the moonbeams as they played across her smooth cheekbones and danced in the shadows of her hair. The restraint in his voice was tinged with a low and sensual desire. “That is exactly what I intend to prove to you, sweet thing, and not on any stage, either!”

“A guinea pig! A porcupine!” Laurie snapped, glaring at the window in the senator’s office.

“What? On Independence Avenue? I don’t believe it.”

“No, Paula.” Laurie groaned, turning around and tugging at her hair with both hands. “No, it’s
me.
My hair. I look like a guinea pig that’s slept wrong.”

Paula yelped with laughter, then settled her face into a more solicitous expression. “Now, dear,” she said soothingly, “the color is just gorgeous, but the cut … well, it is a bit odd. But then, I don’t suppose they have a wide choice of beauticians in a convent.”

“Beauticians?” Laurie echoed with a wry grin. “No, this was strictly do-it-yourself haircut time. You’d reach up to feel your hair, and anything long enough to grab, you cut off. At night. In the dark.”

“No mirrors?”

“Vanity.”

“No long, lazy shampoos and manicures?”

“Sloth.”

“Oh, my.”

“Oh, my is right! Just look at this mess. I made an appointment for noon at a little beauty parlor near my bus stop, but now I don’t think I can even last till lunchtime. It never really bothered me before, but I took a good look at myself over the weekend, and suddenly I can’t wait to make some changes.” She didn’t mention that the self-examination had been prompted by her discussions with Rick.

Paula shook her head, smiling. But she understood the younger woman’s sudden self-consciousness. “I know what you mean, dear. First time I found some gray, I rushed out and bought the biggest bottle of hair color I could find.”

“Did you feel better … prettier?”

“No.” Paula grinned. “It turned my hair green. But I do understand. Here”—she reached into a desk drawer and pulled out a small, square kerchief—“if it makes you feel better, you can borrow this until noon. Now, work!”

At five before twelve, Laurie was rushing out the door of the Rayburn Building just as Rick rushed in.

“Oh, excuse me,” he apologized automatically, stepping aside to let the strange woman in the babushka go by. Then he did an abrupt double take. “Laurie? What in the world are you doing? I know …” He waved her to silence. “It’s a costume party, and you’re going as a Russian peasant. Lovely! I’ll go as Zorba the Greek.” He pulled open the front of his shirt, lifted his arms, and did a quick little folk step.

“Funny, Mr. Westin. Very funny,” Laurie scolded, narrowing her eyes in mock anger.

“No?” he asked, slipping an arm around her waist.

“No. And you have to let me go. I have an appointment.”

“But I want to take you to lunch. There’s a new Japanese restaurant just a few blocks away.… What appointment?”

“A haircut! I can’t stand myself for one minute longer.”

“Oh, sweet thing, I could stand you for a moment … an hour … an eternity.”

“Rick!” Laurie blushed furiously, and pressed a finger to his lips.

He kissed her fingertip, smiling gently into her wide gray eyes. Then he lifted both hands and pushed the scarf back off her hair. His thumbs rested on the curves of her cheeks as his fingers wove into the thickness of the burnished strands. “Lovely hair. Lovely woman.”

“Not so lovely yet,” she whispered, half-mesmerized by the warmth of his touch. “But I’m working on it.” Then she shook off his spell and hurried onto the street. “I’ve got to go! I’m going to be late.”

“Where are you going?” he asked, matching her step.

“A little place I found called Carol’s Cut ‘N’ Curl.”

“What?” He grabbed her arm, linking his through hers and changing her direction. “You come with me. I’ll take you to Larry at Innovations. He does my hair.”

Laurie rolled her eyes and grabbed a handful of the dark, wild hair at the back of Rick’s neck. “You mean someone
does
this mane? I thought it was untamable.”

“I only give that impression,” he said, grinning and pulling her close.

*     *     *

Innovations was all mirrors and lights, raised platforms, and ice-cream colors. The women had billowing clouds of hair or short punk cuts, inch-long lacquered nails, and the most beautifully dramatic clothes Laurie had ever seen outside the pages of a magazine. Laurie gulped, smiled shyly, and kept her eyes on Rick’s back as he led her through the maze to a raised station set apart at the back of the salon.

He knocked once on the wall. “Larry?”

A handsome man with an enormous moustache poked his head around the corner. “Rick? Hi! What are you doing here?”

Laurie caught a glimpse of a woman’s startled face, framed by what seemed like thousands of tiny rollers. She smiled, and the woman smiled back, shrugging lightly.

Rick’s next comment caught her full attention. “Larry, this is Laurie O’Neill. A special friend of mine. Think you could fit in a haircut sometime soon?”

“No problem. Mrs. Lehman is almost ready to go under the lights, right, darling? In the meantime Laurie can go change in the dressing room.” He pointed imperiously to a small curtained alcove. “Smocks are on the hangers.”

They were, and Laurie quickly hung up her skirt, blouse, and blazer and put on a hot-pink, shapeless smock that ended about six inches above her knees. She dashed back across the salon to Larry’s station.

At her reappearance, the other woman obediently departed, and Laurie found herself the center of attention.

“Come sit down here.” Larry patted the chair, quickly smothered Laurie in a wide plastic cape, and spun her around for a better look. “I say, I
think we’ll start with a shampoo and some good conditioning, and then we’ll see what we’ve got here. Okay?” he asked, already tipping her toward the sink. “I like to keep my hands on my client’s hair from start to finish,” he explained. “Lets me get to know the hair intimately, if you know what I mean.”

“Yes, of course.” Laurie laughed, breathless with a sudden rush of excitement that hit her like a feather pillow right in the stomach. “Yes, whatever you say.”

And then there was no way to say anything. There was just the pleasant heat of the water, the cool splash of the shampoo, and the luxurious feel of his strong, practiced hands massaging her scalp. For a second Laurie stiffened, her body reacting with surprised alarm to the almost sensual pleasure. But she couldn’t fight it, and the tension that had held her for weeks and months left her, flowing out through the top of her head and away, till she was floating, her eyelids closed, the dark lashes that seemed dipped in gold resting against her pale cheeks.

She was aware of the heat of the water again, and the contrasting chill of the conditioner, but she kept her eyes closed, thinking of nothing. Drifting. The men’s voices, Larry’s and Rick’s, were deep, mellow echoes in the small cubicle, and then Rick began to hum a fragment of a tune, and the sweetness of his voice carried her further away.

It was so peaceful. A peace so simple, so different from the willed, disciplined peace she had spent so long struggling for, in vain.

Her eyes snapped open. “Oh, I almost fell asleep. I’m sorry.…”

Larry seemed unaware of her confusion, but Rick smiled, reaching out to tug at the ends of her
wet hair. “Hey, just enjoy it. This is going to be fun.”

After toweling her hair, Larry stood back, eyeing Laurie with fierce concentration. “Let’s see, now,” he mused aloud, circling around the chair, studying Laurie from every angle while she frowned and shifted uncomfortably.

“Is it hopeless?” she asked softly, sure that it was.

“Hopeless? Good grief, girl, you sound like you never take a good look in the mirror.
You’re
beautiful, but whoever gave you this haircut did the damnedest job I’ve seen in the ten years I’ve been cutting hair.”

Honesty compelled her to answer. “I … I’m afraid I cut it myself, Larry.”

“What? Another of those do-it-yourself-ers? The bane of my existence,” he growled, his moustache twitching with disapproval.

Laurie met Rick’s laughing dark eyes in the mirror. But if he thought she was going to offer any further explanation, he had another think coming! With feigned bravado she tipped up her chin, smiled at her reflection, and tossed back, “That’s why I’ve come to an expert. Do your thing!”

Rick gave her a sexy wink and a silent nod of approval.

Larry picked up his scissors, and Laurie turned her full attention to her own reflection in the glass, curious and excited to see the “new her” emerge.

Larry started in then, snipping and clipping layers of burnished floss, letting the cut hair float to the floor like petals shaken from a flower. A moment’s work revealed the shell-like curl of her ear. Another moment and he had bared the pale, vulnerable nape of her neck. Her neck itself seemed longer, a delicate column of translucent skin that begged for a touch, a kiss. His scissors flew, and
her high, proud cheekbones were dramatized as surely as if a stroke of color had been applied. He tugged the hair forward over her brow, gave it a swift, shivery cut and let it fall in a bright fringe above her gold-tipped eyelashes.

Laurie felt goose bumps go up her arms. Was this her, this girl being transformed in the mirror? It seemed suddenly impossible. For five long years, there had been no mirror. No girl.

The girl she had been before the convent was a child. A child who spins in a mirror before a school dance, wearing a new dress of pink lace, and thinks she is beautiful. A girl who thinks there will be no end to parties and dances and boys from the prep school across town to pick her up and bring her corsages.

The girl who entered the convent wore a white bride’s gown, and then a black habit, and put away mirrors, and memories, and all those foolish feelings. That girl wasn’t really a girl anymore; her youth was irrelevant in the timelessness of the convent.

And this girl … the one facing her wide-eyed in the mirror now? Could she somehow unlock the child who had been locked away five years ago, find her, free her, and let her grow into a woman? Could this woman be happy? Could she fall in love?