Morning Song Page 7

  ‘They do if they want to get to know each other better,’ he answered.

  Her eyes flew to his face in surprise, but he was perfectly serious. ‘Why,’ she questioned in astonishment, so startled she uttered the first words which came to mind, ‘would you want to get to know me better?’

  He smiled a little, but his eyes were studious as they examined her face. ‘I’ve been asking myself that same question for the past four days,’ he answered in a moment. ‘I’ve decided it must be because you make me so angry. It’s been a long time since anyone was able to do that to me, believe it or not, and I think that qualifies you as a person worth knowing.’

  Now she really did not know what to say. Was she to be flattered because he wanted to find out more of what he disliked about her? Should she be impressed because he found her disagreeable enough to be interesting? She thought of how, a few months ago, the very thought that Shane Holt could tell her she was a person worth knowing would have been beyond her wildest dreams—and how it might still have been, had it been said in different circumstances. A few months ago, the possibility of having a hamburger with Shane Holt would have sent her into a daze of rapture, and she reflected dryly that, like all the other dreams in her life, this one, too, was tainted. And all she felt as she covered up her leftovers and stuffed the wrappings into the paper bag was a sort of vague depression.

  It was a little before eight when they arrived home, and Lauren was already sleepy. She remembered what Shane had said about using sleep as an escape, and it disturbed her, for she did not want to admit—even as a remote possibility—that he could be right. What she really wanted to do was to go upstairs, have a hot bath, and creep into the comfort of her bed, but she did not dare admit that to him ... and even to herself she suspected that the real reason she wanted to go to bed early was to avoid meeting the celebrities Van was bringing home.

  So she helped him bring in the packages, pretending an energy she did not feel, and even tried to help put the purchases away. But Shane knew the house, and the way Marie kept things, so much better than she did that she soon discovered she was doing nothing but getting in the way. After a while she wandered into the living room and settled down on the sofa, pulling up a hassock for her weary legs.

  When Shane came into the living room a few moments later the first thing he did was turn on the stereo. His selection was Handel, and Lauren was cautiously thrilled. That was one thing she had guessed right about him. His own compositions reflected a definite classical influence, and she had always imagined that his personal tastes would run towards something a little more enduring than hard rock—and that did give them at least one thing in common.

  ‘Handel was my father’s favourite,’ she commented as he handed her a glass of wine.

  ‘Van said your father was a cellist.’

  She nodded. ‘I cut my teeth on Bach, Mozart, Haydn ... I was the only kid in kindergarten who could pronounce Shostakovich.’ She dropped her eyes to the rich red depth of her glass, remembering. ‘Our house was filled with music as far back as I can remember. Verdi, Bizet, Debussy, Grieg ... My mother didn’t have a favourite; she loved them all.’ She smiled reminiscently, swirling the liquid absently in her glass. ‘Wagner, Stravinsky, Beethoven ... always music.’ Lilting music, haunting music, music that dreams were made of ... from the cradle her mind had moved in harmony with it; it was only natural that her body should soon follow.

  Shane said gently, ‘You must miss them very much.’

  She looked up, her smile was absent and sad but not bitter. ‘Sometimes more than others,’ she admitted. ‘It wasn’t so bad at first, because it seemed a part of them lived on in me every time I danced ...’ How easily she was telling him all this, how naturally her deepest feelings found expression when moved by the one common bond they shared, music. And what a relief it was to look into his eyes and find understanding there, and gentle encouragement. ‘Now ...’ But here she faltered, for it occurred to her for the first time that a discussion of her own loss might bring back painful memories for him, and that every other time she had brought up the subject of music it had resulted in a fight. She did not want to end the evening that way.

  But he only prompted, watching her steadily, ‘Now?’

  She lifted her shoulders slightly, again dropping her eyes to her glass. ‘I don’t know. I seem to think about them more lately, and there’s an emptiness there. I know it’s not rational, but sometimes I feel as though I let them down, somehow.’ And again she shrugged, embarrassed by a confession which sounded childish even to her ears, and uncomfortable that she had somehow been led into confiding in him something which was so personal she had never before ever examined it herself.

  She could feel his eyes on her, but she did not meet them. And then he said thoughtfully, ‘Sometimes grief is a chain reaction. One loss reminds us of another, and another, and pretty soon we can’t see what we have for crying over all we’re missing.’

  And then Lauren looked at him. ‘Is that what happened to you?’ she asked softly.

  She could not believe she had been so cruel—or so stupid.

  A veil fell over his eyes, and the muscle in his jaw tightened. She was prepared for it then—the coldness, the withdrawal, the anger. But he only said, taking a sip of his wine, ‘It’s chilly in here. How about a fire?’

  Without waiting for her answer, he set his glass on the mantle and knelt to light the fire which Van had laid that morning. Lauren, chagrined and desperately needing to atone for her thoughtlessness, tried to move the subject gently back to neutral ground. ‘Who’s your favourite composer?’ she asked.

  To her great relief, he took her question in the spirit it was meant, and answered easily. ‘I like piano compositions. Chopin and Liszt are my favourites, I guess.’

  She smiled secretly to herself, because she would have guessed as much. Somehow knowing that she had been right about him in some ways completely erased the disappointment of the discovery she had made about how wrong she had been about him in others.

  And then he surprised her by asking, ‘Who’s yours? No, let me guess.’ He stood and took his wine from the mantle, coming over to her at a relaxed pace. ‘Gershwin,’ he decided, sitting beside her on the sofa.

  She shook her head, smiling. The real answer was, of course, Shane Holt, but on this occasion she decided, wisely, to settle for second best. ‘Johann Strauss,’ she told him.

  The woodsmoke was crisp and fragrant, and the crackling logs provided a harmonious counterpoint to the sleepy background music. The smile in Shane’s eyes was relaxed and pleasant as he said, ‘All right, everyone’s entitled to one mistake. Let me try for two out of three.’ He leaned across her to turn down the lamp, and when he straightened up his arm rested casually about her shoulders. The orange and yellow flames danced dreamily on his face and everything else receded into the dim background as he looked at her thoughtfully. ‘You like pink champagne,’ he decided in a moment, ‘designer gowns from New York houses, red roses in a cut glass vase, mountain sunsets, going barefoot, satin sheets ...’

  Lauren interrupted him with a startled laugh. ‘Whoa, that’s more than three!’

  He grinned. ‘How am I doing?’

  ‘Terrible,’ she told him, her eyes sparkling with the sudden flush of the wine and the firelight and the simple pleasure of being relaxed with him for once. ‘Besides, you cheated. Everyone likes designer gowns, but who can afford them? Same with mountain sunsets—what’s not to like? But I hate pink champagne.’

  His finger gently caressed the edge of her jaw, and his eyes were rich with a warm, relaxed smile. ‘But I was right about the roses and going barefoot. What do you think of satin sheets?’

  She swallowed hard, very much aware of the light touch of his finger on her face and. the warm prickling sensation which was beginning on her neck and travelling down her spine. But she returned lightly, placing her glass on the table, ‘I think you just put that in to be cute.’

  ‘I’
m never cute.’ His finger was absently tracing the curve of her earlobe now, and the touch caused her breath to quicken foolishly; she felt warm all over. Nervously, she brushed at her hair just above his fingers, and he took the hint. His hand left her ear to rest casually upon the back of the sofa again, and she cautiously relaxed.

  ‘‘Is something wrong with your wine?’ he enquired.

  ‘It makes me sleepy,’ she told him, and moved a few inches away from him on the pretext of arranging her legs more comfortably on the hassock.

  But that strategy had the exact opposite effect from what she had intended. He glanced at her jeaned legs, stretched out straight before her, and commented, ‘That’s very bad for you, you know.’ He set his glass on the table beside hers and slipped his hand beneath her knee, bending it upwards until her foot rested on the hassock. ‘Didn’t your doctor show you the exercise?’ She nodded, wishing he would remove his hand. It was too easy to imagine that gesture as lover-like, and everything he had done today seemed to have been designed purely to confuse her.

  ‘Then why don’t you do them?’

  Still his hand was cupped lightly about her knee, and she could feel his eyes upon her, but she kept her own eyes on her hand. Those fingers, strong and gentle, had created the music which had moved her soul, that was the voice she had loved for so many years without knowing and this was the touch which had haunted her secret daydreams. You’re star-struck, she told herself derisively, and deliberately stretched her leg out flat again. Grow up.

  She responded, a bit more sharply than she should have, ‘I don’t want to.’

  ‘That’s a self-destructive attitude.’ And, to her surprise, instead of dropping his hand, he moved it lightly up her thigh and across her abdomen until his fingers circled her waist and rested there. Where his hand had brushed muscles tensed and circulation throbbed, and she felt a quickening of her breath, an alertness and a wariness, and she wanted to look at him but she did not dare.

  He solved that problem for her by taking her chin gently between thumb and forefinger and tilting her face upwards to look at him. Her eyes were wide and bright in the firelight as they scanned his, and the rosy colour in her cheeks was more than a reflection of the flames. In his eyes she found only a gentle smile, and the light brush of his finger across her lips made his intention perfectly clear. Yet, she was in a quandary. This was Shane Holt, who could have any woman he wanted. This was the man who, only a few days ago, had called her an interfering brat and expressed the wish never to see her again. What was he doing, and why? Shane Holt, vital, attractive, talented, with the world at his feet, could have no interest in an immature, unattractive ex-dancer and present nothing, and she turned her face away quickly, dropping her eyes, just as he started to move closer.

  He took this second rebuff in his stride, just as he had the first. He straightened up casually, reached for his glass of wine, and took one or two leisurely sips. Automatically, Lauren did the same. She no longer felt sleepy; in fact, she doubted whether she would sleep at all tonight. Every nerve fibre of her body had suddenly come alive, and she seemed to be more aware of everything around her than she had ever been before in her life. The music seemed clearer, the fragrance of the fire more resonant, the colours—violet and orange and yellow—it generated more translucent and surrealistic, and its crackling and popping sound more melodious. The wine tasted sharp and sweet, and it somehow mixed with the fragrance of his cologne and the slight salty taste the brief touch of his finger had left on her lips to form a subtle aphrodisiac, one whose effect she fought off determinedly. Although his posture beside her was relaxed, still he sat much too close, and the very air around her seemed to throb with electricity.

  Then he said mildly, ‘Perhaps you would be good enough to tell me just one thing. How do I keep getting my signals crossed?’

  Lauren gulped, rather than sipped, her wine, and then took a short, rather unsteady breath to clear her voice. Some part of her told her she was being foolish, this was the chance of a lifetime to live out a fantasy and forget for a moment the harsh reality and that, above all things was what she wanted. But another part warned her that she would be even more foolish to put her faith in dreams again, and so she said trying to sound natural, ‘I don’t know what you mean.’

  ‘The least you could do,’ he returned calmly, ‘is not lie to me. You know perfectly well what I mean. I know you’re attracted to me—unless everything I ever learned about body language has been a lie, you’ve been telling me that since the first night we met.’ Her colour rose, for of course that was true, and she quickly took another swallow of wine to hide it. He went on, watching her carefully, but with no change whatsoever in the easy inflection of his voice, ‘Aside from the fact that I’m mean, arrogant, rude and overbearing—why do you cringe every time I touch you?’

  Obviously, she was not going to be able to avoid this very unpleasant conversation. She wished she had the courage to just get up and leave him here—but, truthfully, she did not want to do that either. She forced a little laugh and glanced at him. ‘That has nothing to do with it.’

  ‘Good,’ Shane said soberly. ‘Because I’ve been trying very hard the past few days to put our rather rough start behind us, and to perhaps give you a little time to discover I’m not really as twisted and ugly as you thought at first.’

  Her eyes flew to him and her heart wrenched to see nothing but sincerity on his face. She despised herself for ever having uttered such heartless words, for only now was she beginning to suspect how she might have hurt him. She would have given anything to have taken them back, but apologies never erased harm already done. And all she could do was say quickly, ‘No, that’s not...’ And then she dropped her eyes, suppressing a sigh of embarrassment and misery. ‘It has nothing to do with you, okay? It’s me.’

  He enquired simply, ‘Do you have some sort of hang-up about men?’

  ‘No!’ she answered immediately, but again she could not maintain the eye contact for more than a minute. Miserably, she stared into her wine, the lovely glow of the evening fading fast. She, mumbled, inching a little away from him to give veracity to her words, ‘I just don’t like to be touched, okay?’ Especially not by Shane Holt, perfect and unattainable, who could remind her by only his presence that she was worthless, unfeminine and undesirable, that she had nothing to offer a man such as he and was unworthy of his notice.

  He said firmly, ‘No, it’s not okay.’ He turned to place his empty glass on the table and then back to her again. His lone was matter-of-fact and she was too miserable to look at his eyes. ‘Actually, it presents quite a problem. You see, I’m a very demonstrative person. And as long as you’re within three feet of me, you’re going to get touched.’ To prove it, he slipped his arm about her shoulders again and refused to take the hint when she tried to inch gently away.

  She retorted lightly, ‘Then I guess the thing to do is to make sure to keep more than three feet between us.’

  His fingers tightened slightly on her shoulder. He said quietly, ‘For God’s sake, Lauren, look at me.’

  She did, startled and confused, and his expression was serious, as was his tone as he asked gently, ‘Why are you doing this to yourself? What are you so afraid of?’

  ‘I’m not afraid of anything,’ she answered, and of course he knew it was a lie. She sighed, trying to reach for something closer to the truth which would satisfy him without making her more vulnerable than she already felt. ‘Look, it’s just that I have a lot on my mind right now, a lot of adjusting to do ...’

  ‘Let me help,’ he suggested softly.

  She caught her breath, examining his face for some sign of lightness or teasing, startled to find neither. She blurted, without thinking, ‘Why should you care?’

  His sigh was of barely restrained impatience. ‘Because I’m not really a bastard and I just do, all right? You have got one rock-bottom self-image, lady, heaven knows why, and it’s something we’re going to start to work on right now.’ T
here was a firm decision in his tone as he took both her shoulders and turned her to face him. ‘So,’ he suggested mildly, ‘you’d better get used to the possibility of being touched.’

  Some of that awful seriousness had gone out of his voice, and she thought she could deal with him more easily on this level. She said lightly, ‘I don’t deny my self-image could use a little improvement, but I don’t think there’s anything you can do about it. So if you don’t mind ...’ Lauren looked meaningfully at his hands, which still gripped her shoulders.

  ‘On the contrary,’ he replied softly, and there was a strange, provocative look in his eye. ‘There’s a great deal I can do about it.’ Then he released her shoulders and extended his hand palm upwards to her. ‘Give me your hand,’ he demanded. ‘We’ll start with a little touch therapy.’

  She hesitated, alarm striking her with a very definite uncertainty about his intentions, and when she glanced at him there was a twinkle of amusement in his eye. ‘Come on,’ he urged, closing his fingers about her hand. ‘I promise I won’t do anything obscene ... not for a while yet, anyway.’

  Lauren laughed nervously. ‘That’s supposed to be reassuring?’

  ‘No,’ he replied, ‘that’s supposed to be stimulating.’ Her laugh was more natural that time, and Shane brushed his hand lightly across her hair, smiling. She thought he was teasing, and that he would surely let the joke drop, and she was surprised when he increased the light pressure of his fingers on her hand and guided it gently to his face. ‘The first step,’ he told her, ‘in learning to accept pleasure is learning to give it.’

  ‘Where did you learn that?’ she retorted lightly, trying to draw her hand away. ‘E.S.T.? Nude encounter groups?’

  His eyes were perfectly bland. ‘Would you prefer nude encounter? It’s just as effective.’

  ‘And just as ridiculous,’ she replied, making a real effort now to free her hand, only to have his fingers tighten about it in response. Her cheeks were hot and her heart was tripping rapidly in her chest.