The Carlton Club (47 page)

“No,” Robert said simply.

“Oh,” she said, hungrily kissing his lips because she couldn’t resist, because of what he had told her. He wanted to be her lover. Nothing else. Nothing less.

Robert answered Charlie’s kiss by making love to her again. It was what she wanted, what her body demanded, what her heart needed. It was what they both wanted and needed, and as they made love again, they told each other of that need, that passion, that consuming desire.

Afterward she lay with her head on his chest. After several silent moments Robert felt the dampness.

“Charlie?” he asked, lifting her head so that he could see her face. And her tears.

“I never cry,” she sniffed.

“Until today. These don’t look like tears of joy.”

“I miss you already. Again. I missed you after our trip in June. Last time we said goodbye we didn’t see each other for six months.”

“You needed those six months,” Robert said firmly.

To get over Eric, Charlie thought. To be ready for this. For Robert. Yes, I needed the time. But not anymore.

“It won’t be another six months. I thought maybe just six days.”

“Six days,” Charlie repeated happily.

“There aren’t any good transcontinental flights after about mid afternoon. So, if we plan to work all day Friday, we should meet at some point midway: Dallas, Kansas City, Chicago.”

“Chicago,” Charlie said. “Or anywhere.”

“We’ll do Chicago this weekend. We can stay at the Drake and watch the snow fall on Lake Michigan. And, if we leave our room, we can see the Impressionist Exhibit at the Art Institute. OK?”

“Sounds wonderful,” she purred. It all sounded wonderful, but the two words that sounded the best, the words that echoed in her brain, were this weekend. It meant there would be another weekend. Next weekend. And the next.

Four hours after Charlie’s initial attempt to drop Robert off at the airport, they sat again in front of the United terminal.

“I’ll call you when I get to Philadelphia,” he said.

“It will be two in the morning your time.”

“Is eleven too late to call you here?”

“No. No time is too late. Or too early.”

“I’ll call you then.” Robert leaned over to kiss her before he left the car.

“Don’t make the mistake of kissing me like you did last time,” she whispered, kissing him back. “Or you’ll never get home.”

“Was that a mistake?”

“You know it wasn’t. It was wonderful,” she said. “So wonderful.”

After Robert disappeared through the automatic doors, Charlie drove to her apartment. She was filled with a wonderful sense of peace.

Maybe it’s because I finally know where I belong, she thought as warm tears splashed onto her cheeks for the third time that day.

Wednesday January nineteenth marked the end of a week of unseasonably warm San Francisco weather. Leslie awakened to the sound of rain pounding against her window. The large, wet drops were hurled against the pane by a bitter winter wind. Leslie smiled as she gazed at the gray-black clouds and the rivulets of rain water swirling down the street below.

It reminded Leslie of Seattle. Gray, enveloping, cozy.

Besides, her spirits that rainy morning were pure sun. Eric was returning from New York after a three day—three night—business trip. It was their longest separation. And it was too long despite the phone calls. Work permitting, she would be at his penthouse to welcome him home when he arrived at seven.

The cold, mercilessly soggy day resulted in cancellations of the late afternoon appointments in Leslie’s internal medicine clinic. Could they possibly reschedule with Dr. Adams next week? her patients wondered. It was so cold, and the roads were so slick.

It meant that Leslie was at Eric’s penthouse by dusk. She made herself a mug of hot chocolate and watched the gray mistiness of the day yield to the black emptiness of the winter night. The transition was breathtaking, somber but serene. By five-thirty the ominous darkness of night was dotted with the bright city lights, a galaxy of yellow-white stars in the blackness.

Cozy.

It took Leslie a minute to identify the harsh noise that intruded her silent night. An alarm? No. It was the buzzer for the intercom that connected the penthouse with the security guard in the building’s lobby. Leslie had seen Eric use it once when Charlie dropped by with some contracts.

Leslie depressed the black button.

“Yes?” she asked.

“Mrs. Lansdale is here. She says that Mr. Lansdale is expecting her,” the guard said.

“Oh. Yes, of course. Please send her up,” Leslie said.

Eric’s mother was expected next month. Was this a surprise visit? From everything that Eric had told Leslie about Florence Lansdale it would be very unlike her to make a surprise visit.

Slightly flustered, her peace suddenly disrupted, Leslie hastily turned on the lights in the dark living room. The room was immaculate as usual. Leslie glanced at the Tiffany clock on the mantel. Five-forty.

I guess I can entertain Eric’s mother for an hour and twenty minutes, she thought uneasily. Unless she had already decided not to like me.

Leslie stood by the door and opened it promptly as the doorbell chimed.

“Hello,” said the young woman with dark red hair and inquisitive eyes who extended a ringless hand to Leslie.

“I’m Victoria Lansdale. You must be Leslie.”

“Yes,” Leslie breathed. Who is Victoria Lansdale? How does she know about me? “Come in.”

“Eric isn’t expecting me until tomorrow. You probably know that. Anyway, when the rains hit Palm Springs this morning, I decided to come a day early. Where is Eric?”

“On his way back from New York. He should be here about seven.”

“Oh. Well, this way I get to meet you,” Victoria said cheerfully. “Eric said you would be working, uh, on call tomorrow night.”

“Yes,” Leslie said. That’s right, she thought. Who
are
you? “Let me take your coat. Would you like something to drink?”

“Thank you. Sure. Are you having something?”

“Hot chocolate,” Leslie admitted.

“That sounds perfect. And just about strong enough. I need my wits about me when I see Eric.”

Leslie frowned.

“Because I haven’t seen him for almost eleven years,” Victoria explained, responding to Leslie’s perplexed expression.

“Oh, I see,” Leslie said slowly as if Victoria’s explanation helped. But of course it didn’t. Nothing was clarified.

“Not,” Victoria continued, her airy voice suddenly somber. “Not since Bobby—”

Victoria stopped abruptly and covered her mouth with her hand. Her eyes widened, then narrowed.

“Oh, my God,” she whispered. Her voice was barely audible through her hand. “You don’t have any idea who I am, do?”

Leslie shook her head apologetically as she handed Victoria a mug of hot chocolate.

“I’m afraid I don’t.”

Victoria’s calm friendliness vanished, replaced suddenly by agitation and worry. She put the mug on the coffee table and started to move toward the closet to retrieve her coat.

“I’d better leave.”

“Victoria, wait! I don’t understand.”

“Of course you don’t. Eric hasn’t told you a damned thing.”

“Why don’t
you
tell me?” Leslie urged uneasily. There was something she need to know. Some hidden knowledge. Would she want the knowledge after she had it?

“Oh, no. If Eric hasn’t told you yet, it’s for a reason. I don’t want to make him angry. You know Eric’s temper.”

Eric’s temper? No, I don’t know Eric’s temper, Leslie thought. Just like I don’t know about you. Or Bobby.

“Victoria. Please. You’re here now. He knew you were coming.”

“Tomorrow. When you would be working.”

“Victoria,” Leslie persisted firmly. “Who is Bobby?”

Victoria stared at her,
beyond
her to a distant memory, her eyes sad and thoughtful as she remembered her beloved son. Eric couldn’t deny Bobby’s memory. He shouldn’t deny that Bobby existed.

“You have a right to know,” Victoria said finally, shuddering inside. Eric would be furious, but it was her story, too. She had every right to tell Leslie.

Victoria returned slowly to the living room. She sat down on the cream-colored couch, wrapped her fingers around the warm mug of hot chocolate and sighed heavily.

Then, with great effort and emotion, she told Leslie the whole story. Beginning with Charlie and Eric. Victoria knew the details of Charlie’s background and of her sometimes joyous, sometimes troubled relationship with Eric. Victoria told Leslie that it was during one of those troubled times that she, Victoria, became pregnant with Eric’s child. With tears in her eyes Victoria told Leslie about their wonderful son. And about how they lost him.

As Leslie listened, waves of emotion swept through her: bewilderment, grief, anger. Some of Victoria’s words echoed and reechoed in her head.

Charlie was Eric’s fiancée. Charlie loved Eric. Eric loved Charlie. Did they still love each other?

Bobby had Reye Syndrome. Now she knew why Eric had resisted coming to the hospital with his hand laceration. Why he had refused an anesthetic. Why he was reluctant to hear about the details of her work and his eyes filled with pain when she told him about the abused little boy. Why he couldn’t hold Michael.

Charlie. Victoria. Bobby. Beloved by Eric. Part of Eric then and part of Eric now. Part of Eric’s relationship with Leslie. It explained so much.

And he had never told her.

“I always wondered if Eric and Charlie would get together eventually,” Victoria said quietly. “But—”

“Victoria.”

At the sound of his voice, Victoria stopped speaking and looked up. He stood at the far side of the room.

“Eric,” she whispered, recoiling slightly. How long had he been there? Certainly long enough.

Leslie stood up to face Eric. She saw the anger—rage—in his eyes as he glowered at his ex-wife. It was the temper that Victoria knew and that Leslie had never seen.

After a moment, Eric shifted his gaze from Victoria to Leslie. His expression changed. The anger dissolved and was replaced by anxious concern.

“Leslie,” he began helplessly. The ice-cold stare in her eyes—a look
he
had never seen—deepened his concern. How much damage had been done?

“I have to go,” Leslie said urgently, suddenly feeling claustrophobic
. I have to get out of here. I have to think about what I have learned. I have to try to make sense of it.

“Leslie, let me explain.” Eric followed her to the foyer.

“Victoria already explained. I appreciate that she told me. I needed to know, Eric,” Leslie said flatly, her voice as cold and lifeless as her eyes.

“Leslie, we need to talk about this.”

“We needed to talk about it a long time ago.”

“We need to talk now.”

“I can’t,” Leslie whispered, her voice breaking slightly.
I love you. I hate you. Why did you do this to us? Why didn’t you trust us?

“I’ll come over later,” Eric suggested hopefully.

“No, Eric. Just leave me alone for a while. Please.”

After Leslie left, Eric returned to the living room. He sat heavily on the couch with his head in his hands. He was lost in his own thoughts, his own turmoil. He had forgotten about Victoria. After several minutes, he became aware of her, standing across the room, stiff and erect. She was steeling herself for his fury.

Eric looked at her with surprise, his eyes defeated not enraged.

“Don’t blame me for this,” she warned, the strength of her warning undermined by the shakiness of her voice.

Eric sighed. It was an effort to speak. Impossible to be polite. And he didn’t want to argue. “Why are you here?”

“Because I’ve made a decision and I want you to know about it. I doubt you’ll agree with it—in fact it may make you angry—but that doesn’t matter as much as my needing to have made the decision itself and needing to let you know.”

“Just tell me.”

Victoria stood even straighter and lifted her chin. “I’ve decided to stop blaming myself for Bobby’s death. It’s taken me a very long time to permit myself to do this. But I have. And I
have
to.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I didn’t think you would. And if you want to keep blaming me, if it helps you to keeping blaming me,
fine.”
Her heart pounded as she waited for his fury, his outrage that she would dare to forgive herself for the unforgivable.

She didn’t see fury, not yet. She saw surprise and sadness and pain.

“I never blamed you for Bobby’s death,” he said quietly.

“Of course you did. And why not? I blamed myself, too. I was the one who gave him the aspirin even though his temperature wasn’t terribly high and he wasn’t all that sick.”

“But it was what we always did,” Eric said. “And, always before, it had been safe. I don’t blame you, Victoria. I never did.”

“You were
so
angry. You wouldn’t look at me, talk to me.”

Eric drew a breath and forced himself to remember that desperate time. The details were as lost now as they had been then in an aching blur of frantic fear and unspeakable grief. “I was angry at what was happening to our son. Angry and terrified. If I didn’t look at you or talk to you, I suppose it was because I had nothing left to give. I was consumed with worry about Bobby. Overwhelmed by it. I’m sorry you ever blamed yourself and that my actions in any way contributed to the guilt you felt. It was not your fault.”

“Thank you,” she said softly, stunned and grateful that this was so far from the confrontation she had feared. “I’m glad I came, except for the timing. I’m very sorry about Leslie. I shouldn’t have told her. I
am
to blame for that.”

“No,” he said heavily. “You’re not. I have no one to blame for what happened with Leslie but myself.”

He stared at the half empty mugs of hot chocolate. How typically Leslie. What he would give to be sitting with her now, drinking hot chocolate, telling her how much he had missed her, holding her. Loving her.

Apparently Mark hadn’t heard the telephone ring. He usually heard it, even when he was in his study with the door shut. Kathleen waited a few moments. When he didn’t emerge from his study she went to the closed door and tapped lightly. No response. Finally, her heart fluttering inexplicably, she turned the knob and looked in.

“Mark?”

Mark spun around in his swivel desk chair.

“Kathleen! I didn’t hear you,” he said breathlessly.

“Absorbed in your work as usual,” Kathleen said brightly. But she wondered, Why does he act so alarmed? What are those papers on his desk? Is he really trying to prevent me from seeing them? “You didn’t hear the phone, either. It’s for you. It’s the hospital.”

“Oh. Could you tell them to hold for another minute? I’ll take it in the bedroom,” he said.

“Sure.” As Kathleen retreated her heart ached. He was obviously waiting for her to leave the room. Why?

Ten minutes later Mark appeared in the kitchen.

“It’s an angioplasty,” he said. “I’ll be back in four hours.”

The grandfather clock in the living room struck nine as Mark kissed her briefly on the cheek.

“Drive carefully, Mark. It’s beginning to snow.”

After Mark left, Kathleen sat by the kitchen window of their Beacon Hill home and watched the flakes of snow. They fell silently, gracefully, illuminated briefly by the archaic street lamps before disappearing into the blackness. A fleeting moment of brilliance. Then darkness. Death.

I have to do something, she thought. It was the same thought she had every day. Over and over. But what could she do? She didn’t know what was wrong.

She could hope that everything would—miraculously—be better again. That was what had happened after their trip to Atherton in October. It had been so unexpected. So welcome. In those few blissfully happy weeks, they had fallen in love again.