The Season Of Love: Beloved

Nessa ground her teeth together as Gene took her arm roughly. Charles looked as if he might attack his own brother right there. Tira caught his hand and tugged.

“I’m starving,” she told him quickly, exchanging speaking glances with a suddenly relieved Nessa. “Feed me!”

Charles hesitated for an instant, during which Gene dragged Nessa away toward a group of men.

“Damn him!” Charles bit off, his normally pleasant face contorted and threatening.

Tira shook his hand gently. “You’re broadcasting,” she murmured, bumping deliberately against his side to distract him. “Come on, before you cause her any more trouble than she’s already got.”

He let out a weary sigh. “Why did she marry him?” he groaned. “Why?”

“Whatever the reason doesn’t matter much now. Let’s go.”

She pulled until he let her lead him to the long buffet table, where expensive nibbles and champagne were elegantly arranged.

“This is going to eat up all the profits,” Tira murmured worriedly, noting the crystal flutes that were provided for the champagne, and the fact that caviar was furnished as well.

Charles leaned toward her. “It’s grocery store caviar, and the champagne is the sort they deliver in big round metal tractor trucks…”

“Charles!” She couldn’t repress a giggle at the insinuation, and just as she felt her face going red from glee, she looked up and saw Simon’s pale eyes glittering at her from across the room. She averted her eyes to the table and didn’t look in that direction again. His expression had been far different from the one he’d worn when he’d seen her in the hospital. Now it was indignant and outraged, as if he blamed her for the publicity that made him look guilty, too.

Charles did waltz divinely. Tira found herself on the floor with him time after time. People noticed her, and there were some obvious whispers, which probably concerned her “suicide attempt.” She was uncomfortable at first, but then she realized that the opinion of most of these people didn’t matter to her. She knew the truth about what had happened and so did Charles. If the others wanted to believe her to be so weak and helpless that she’d die rather than face up to her failures, let them.

“Doesn’t it worry you, being seen with such a notorious woman?” she chided when they were standing again at the buffet table with more champagne.

“Notorious women are fascinating,” he returned, and smiled. His eyes lifted to his half brother and Nessa and his jaw clenched. The two of them were going out the door and Nessa looked as if she were crying.

“You can’t,” she said, catching his arm when he looked as if he might follow them.

“She should leave him.”

“She’ll have to make that decision for herself.”

He glanced down at her with worried eyes. “She isn’t like you. She isn’t independent and spirited. She’s shy and gentle and people take advantage of her.”

“And you want to protect her. I understand. But you can’t, not tonight.”

He made a rough sound in his throat. “Damn it!”

She leaned against him affectionately for an instant. “I’m sorry. I really am.”

His arm slipped around her shoulders. “One day,” he promised himself.

She nodded. “One day.”

“Why, Charles, how handsome you look!” Jill Sinclair’s high-pitched, grating voice turned them around. “Are you enjoying yourself?”

“I’m having a great time,” Charles said through his teeth. “How about you?”

“Oh, Simon is just the most wonderful escort,” she sighed and glanced at Tira with half-closed eyes. “We’ve been everywhere together lately. There are so many charity dos this time of year. And how are you, Tira? I was so sorry to hear about your near tragedy!” She was almost purring, enjoying Tira’s stiff posture and cold face. She raised her voice, drawing attention from the couples hovering near the buffet table. “Isn’t it a pity that the newspapers made such a big thing of your suicide attempt? I mean, the humiliation of having your feelings made public must be awful. And for the gossips to say that you wanted to die just because Simon couldn’t love you back…why he was just shattered that you made him look like a coldhearted villain in the eyes of his friends. God knows, it isn’t his fault that he doesn’t love you!”

Tira was too shaken by the unexpected attack to reply. Charles wasn’t.

“Why, you prissy little cat,” Charles said with cold venom, making Jill actually catch her breath in surprise at the unexpected verbal jab. “Why don’t you go sharpen your claws on the curtains?”

He took Tira’s arm and led her away. She was so shocked and outraged that she couldn’t even manage words. She wanted to empty the punch bowl over the woman, but that was hardly the sort of thing to do at a benefit ball. Her proud spirit had all but been broken by recent events. She was still licking her wounds.

Simon was talking to a man near the door that Charles was urging her toward. He paused in midsentence and looked at Tira’s white face with curious concern.

Before he could speak, Charles did. “Never mind adding your two cents’ worth. Your girlfriend said it all for you.”

Charles prodded her forward and Tira didn’t look Simon’s way. She was barely able to see where she was going at all. Until Jill’s piece of mischief, she’d actually thought she could get through the evening unscathed.

“That cat!” Charles muttered as they made their way to the bottom of the steps.

“The world is full of them,” she breathed. “And how they love to claw you when you’re down!”

None of the valets were anywhere in sight. Charles grumbled. “I’ll have to go fetch the car. Stay right here. Will you be all right?”

“I’m fine, now that we’re outside,” she said.

He gave her a last, worried glance, and went around the house to the parking area.

She drew her wrap closer, because the air was chilly. Once, she’d have made Jill pay dearly for her nasty comments, but not anymore. Now, her proud spirit was dulled and she’d actually walked away from a fight. It wasn’t like her. Charles obviously knew that, or he wouldn’t have rushed her out the door so quickly.

She heard footsteps behind her and her heart jumped, because she knew the very sound of Simon’s feet. Her eyes closed as she wished him in China—anywhere but here!

“What did she say to you?” he asked shortly.

She wouldn’t turn; she wouldn’t look at him. She couldn’t bear to look at him. The humiliation of having him know how she felt about him was so horrible that it suffocated her. All those years of hiding it from him, cocooning her love in secrecy. And now he knew, the whole world knew. And worst of all, she loved him still. Just being near him was agony.

“I said, what did she say to you?” he repeated, moving directly in front of her so that she had to look at him.

She lifted her eyes to his black tie and no further. Her voice was choked, and stiff with wounded pride. “Go and ask her.”

There was a rough sigh and she saw his good hand go irritably into the pocket of his trousers. “This isn’t like you,” he said after a minute. “You don’t run and you don’t cry, regardless of what people say to you. You fight back. Why are you leaving?”

She lifted tired eyes to his and hated the sudden jolt of her heart at the sight of his beloved face. She clenched every muscle in her body to keep from sobbing out her rage and hurt. “I don’t care what anyone thinks of me,” she said huskily, “least of all your malicious girlfriend. Yes, I’ve spent most of my life fighting, one way or another, but I’m tired. I’m tired of everything.”

Her lack of animation disturbed him, along with the defeat in her voice, the cool poise. “You can’t be worried about what the newspapers said,” he said, his voice deep and slow and oddly tender.

“Can’t I? Why not? They believed every word.” She inclined her head toward the ballroom.

His features were unusually solemn. “I know you better than they do.”

She searched his pale eyes in the dim light from the house. Her heart clenched. “You don’t know me at all, Simon,” she said with painful realization. “You never did.”

He seemed to stiffen. “I thought I did. Until you divorced John.”

Her heart stilled at the reference. “And until he died.” Defeat was in every line of her elegant body. “Yes, I know, I’m a murderess.”

His face went taut. “I didn’t say that!”

“You might as well have!” she shot back, raising her voice, not caring if the whole world heard her. “If Melia had died in a similar manner, I’d never have believed you guilty of her death! I’d have known you well enough to be certain that you had no part in anything that would cause another human being harm. But then, I had a mad infatuation for you that I couldn’t cure.” She saw his sudden stillness. “Don’t pretend that you didn’t read all about it in the paper, Simon. Yes, it’s true, why shouldn’t I admit it? I was obsessed with you, desperate to be with you, in any way that I could. It didn’t even matter that you only tolerated me. I could have lived on crumbs for the rest of my life—” Her voice broke. She shifted on trembling legs and laughed with pure self-contempt. “What a fool I was! What a silly fool. I’m twenty-eight years old and I’ve only just realized how stupid I am!”

He frowned. “Tira…”

She moved back a step, her green eyes blazing with ruptured pride. “Jill told me what you said, that you blame me for making you look like a villain in public with my so-called suicide attempt, as well as for John’s death. Well, go ahead, hate me! I don’t give a damn anymore!” she spat, out of control and not caring. “I’m not even surprised to see you with Jill, Simon. She’s as opinionated and narrow-minded as you are, and she knows how to put the knife in, too. I daresay you’re a match made in heaven!”

His face clenched visibly. “And you don’t care that I’m with another woman tonight, instead of with you?” he chided, hitting back as hard as he could, with a mocking smile on his lips.

Her face went absolutely white. But if it killed her, he’d never hear from her how she did care. She smiled deliberately. “No,” she agreed softly. “Actually I don’t. All this notoriety accomplished one good thing. It made me see how I’d wasted the past few miserable years mooning over you! You did me a favor when you told me what you really thought of me. I’m free of you at last, Simon,” she lied with deliberation. “And I’ve never been quite so happy in all my life!”

And with that parting shot, she turned and walked slowly to the driveway where Charles was pulling up in front of the house, leaving Simon rigidly in place with an expression of shock that delighted her wounded pride.

After what she’d said, she didn’t expect Simon to follow her, and he didn’t. When Charles had installed her in the passenger seat, she caught just a glimpse of Simon’s straight back rapidly returning to the house. She even knew the posture. He was furious. Good! Let him be furious. She was not going to care. She wasn’t!

“Take it easy,” Charles said softly. “You’ll burst something.”

“I know how you felt earlier,” she returned, leaning her hot forehead against the glass of the window. “Damn him! And damn her, too!”

“What did he say to you?”

“He wanted to know what she said, and then he gave me his opinion of my character again. But this time, he didn’t know he’d hit me where it hurt. I made sure of it.”

Charles let out a long breath. “Why can’t we love to order?” he asked philosophically.

“I don’t know. If you ever find out, you can tell me.” She stared out the dark window at the flat landscape passing by. Her heart felt as if it might break all over again.

“He’s an idiot.”

“So is Jill. So is Gene. We’re all idiots. Maybe we’re certifiable and we can become a circus act.”

They drove in silence until they reached her house. He turned off the engine and stared at her worriedly. She was pale and she looked so miserable that he hurt for her.

“Go inside and change your clothes and pack a suitcase,” he said suddenly.

“What?”

“We’ll fly down to Nassau for a long weekend. It’s just Saturday. We’ll take a three-day vacation. I have a friend who owns a villa there. He and his wife love company. We’ll eat conch chowder and play at the casino and lay on the beach. How about it?”

She brightened. “Could we?”

“We could. You need a break and so do I. Be a gambler.”

It sounded like fun. She hadn’t been happy in such a long time. “Okay,” she said.

“Okay.” He grinned. “Maybe we’ll cheer up in foreign parts. Don’t take too long. I’ll run home and change and make a few phone calls. I should be back within an hour.”

“Great!”

It was great. The brief holiday made Tira feel as if she had a new lease on life. Charles was wonderful, undemanding company, much more like a beloved brother than a boyfriend. They padded all over Nassau, down West Bay Street to the docks and out on the pier to look at the ships in port, and all the way to the shopping district and the vast straw markets. Nassau was the most exciting, cosmopolitan city in the world to Tira. She never tired of going there. Just now, it was a godsend. She hated the memory of Jill’s taunting words and Simon’s angry accusations. It was good to have a breathing space from them, and the publicity.

They stretched their stay to five days instead of three and returned to San Antonio refreshed and rested, although Charles had confessed that he did miss his car. He proved it by rushing home as soon as the limousine he’d hired to meet them at the airport delivered Tira at her house.

“I’ll phone you in the morning. We might have a game of tennis Saturday, if you’re up to it,” he said.

“I will be. Thanks, Charles. Thanks so much!”

He chuckled. “I enjoyed it. So long.”

She watched the limousine pull away and walked slowly up to her front door. She hated homecomings. She had nothing here but Mrs. Lester and an otherwise empty house, and her work. It was cold compensation.

Mrs. Lester greeted her with enthusiasm. “I’m so glad you’re home!” she said. “The phone rang off the hook the day after you left and didn’t stop until three days ago.” She shook her head. “I can’t imagine why those newspaper people wanted to drag the whole subject up again, but I guess the shooting downtown Tuesday afternoon gave them something new to go after.”

“What shooting?”

“Well, that man the attorney general had paroled—you remember?—was in court to be arraigned and he went right over the table toward the judge and almost killed him. They managed to pull him away and he grabbed the bailiff’s gun. They had to shoot him! It’s been on all the television stations. They had the most awful photographs of it!”

Tira actually gasped. “For heaven’s sake!”

“Mr. Hart was right in the middle of it, too. He had a case and was waiting for it to be called when the prisoner got loose.”

“Simon? Was he…hurt?” Tira had to ask.

“No. He was the one who pulled the man off the judge. The man had that bailiff’s gun leveled right at him, they said, when a deputy sheriff shot the man. It was a close call for Mr. Hart. A real close call. But you’d never think it worried him to hear him talk on television. He was as cold as ice.”

She sat down on the edge of the sofa and thanked God for Simon’s life. She wished that they were still friends, even distant ones, so that she could phone him and tell him so. But there was a wall between them now.

“Mr. Hart wondered why you hadn’t gotten in touch with him, afterward,” Mrs. Lester said, hesitating.

Tira glanced at her breathlessly. “He called?”

She nodded and then grimaced. “He wanted to know if you heard about the shooting and if you’d been concerned. I had to tell him that you were away, and didn’t know a thing, and when he asked where, he got that out of me, too. I hope it was all right that I told him.”

Simon would think she went on a lover’s holiday with Charles. Well, why shouldn’t he? He believed she was a murderess and a flighty, shallow flirt and suicidal. Let him think whatever else he liked. She couldn’t be any worse in his eyes than she already was.

“Give a dog a bad name,” she murmured.

“What?” Mrs. Lester asked.

She dragged her mind back to the subject at hand. “Yes, of course, it’s perfectly all right that you told him, Mrs. Lester,” Tira said quietly. “I had a wonderful time in Nassau.”

“Did you good, I expect, and Mr. Percy is a nice man.”

“A very nice man,” Tira agreed. She got to her feet. “I’m tired. I think I’ll lie down for a while, so don’t fix anything to eat for another hour or so, will you?”

“Certainly, dear. You just rest. I’ll have some coffee and sandwiches ready when you want them.”

Would she ever want them? Tira wondered as she went slowly toward her bedroom. She was empty and cold and sick at heart. But that seemed to be her normal condition. At least for now.

Chapter Four

It was raining the day Tira began taking her sculptures to Bob Henderson’s “Illuminations” art gallery for her showing. She was so gloomy she hardly felt the mist on her face. Christmas was only two weeks away and she was miserable and lonely. Only months before, she’d have phoned Simon and asked him to meet her for lunch in town, or she’d have shown up at some committee meeting or benefit conference at which he was present, just to feed her hungry heart on the sight of him. Now, she had nothing. Only Charles and his infrequent, undemanding company. Charles was a sweetheart, but it was like having a brother over for coffee.

She carried the last box carefully in the back door, which Lillian Day, the gallery’s manager, was holding open for her.

“That’s the last of them, Lillian,” Tira told her, smiling as she surveyed the cluttered storage room. She shook her head. “I can’t believe I did all those myself.”

“It’s a lot of work,” Lillian agreed, smiling back. She bent to open one of the boxes and frowned slightly at what was inside. “Did you mean to include this?” she asked, indicating a bust of Simon that was painfully lifelike.

Tira’s face closed up. “Yes, I meant to,” she said curtly. “I don’t want it.”

Lillian wisely didn’t say another word. “I’ll place it with the others, then. The catalogs have been printed and they’re perfect, I checked them myself. Everything’s ready, including the caterer for the snack buffet and the media coverage. We’re doing a Christmas motif for the buffet.”

Media coverage. Tira ground her teeth. The last thing in the world she wanted to see now was a reporter.

Lillian, sensitive to moods, glanced at her reassuringly. “Don’t worry. These were handpicked, by me,” she added. “They won’t ask any embarrassing questions, and anything they write for print will be about the show. Period.”

Tira relaxed. “What would I do without you?” she asked, and meant it.

Lillian grinned. “Don’t even think about trying. We’re very glad to have your exhibit here.”

Tira had worried about Simon’s reaction to the showing, since he was a partner in Bob Henderson’s gallery. They hadn’t spoken since before his close call in the courtroom and she half expected him to cancel her exhibit. But he hadn’t. Perhaps Mrs. Lester had been mistaken and he hadn’t been angry that Tira hadn’t phoned to check on him. Just because she hadn’t called, it didn’t mean that she hadn’t worried. She’d had a few sleepless nights thinking about what could have happened to him. Despite her best efforts, her feelings for him hadn’t changed. She was just as much in love with him now as she had been. She was only better at concealing it.

The night of the exhibit arrived. She was all nerves, and she was secretly glad that Charles would be by her side. Not that she expected Simon to show up, with the media present. He wouldn’t want to give them any more ammunition to embarrass him with. But Charles would be a comfort to her.

Fate stepped in, however, to rob her of his presence. Charles phoned at the last minute, audibly upset, to tell her he couldn’t go with her to the show.

“I’m more sorry than I can tell you, but Gene’s had a heart attack,” he said curtly.

“Oh, Charles, I’m so sorry!”

“No need to be. You know there’s no love lost between us. But he’s my half brother, just the same, and there’s no one else to look after him. Nessa is in shock herself. I can’t let her cope alone.”

“How is he?”

“Stabilized, for the moment. I’m on my way to the hospital. Nessa’s with him and he’s giving her hell, as usual, even flat on his back,” he said curtly.

“If there’s anything I can do…”

“Thanks for your support. I’m sorry you have to go on your own. But it’s unlikely that Simon will be there, you know,” he added gently. “Just stick close to Lillian. She’ll look out for you.”

She smiled to herself. “I know she will. Let me know how it goes.”

“Of course I will. See you.”

He hung up. She stared at the phone blankly as she replaced the receiver. She looked good, she reasoned. Her black dress was a straight sheath, ankle length, with spaghetti straps and a diamond necklace and earrings to set it off. It was a perfect foil for her pale, flawless complexion and her red-gold hair, done in a complicated topknot with tendrils just brushing her neck. From her austere getup, she looked more like a widow in mourning than a woman looking forward to Christmas, and she felt insecure and nervous. It would be the first time she’d appeared alone in public since the scandal and she was still uncomfortable around most people.

Well, she comforted herself as she went outside and climbed into her Jaguar, at least she didn’t have to add Simon to her other complications tonight.

The gallery was packed full of interested customers, some of whom had probably only come for curiosity’s sake. It wasn’t hard to discern people who could afford the four-figure price tags on the sculptures from those who couldn’t. Tira pretended not to notice. She took a flute of expensive champagne and downed half of it before she went with Lillian to mingle with the guests.

It didn’t help that the first two people she saw were Simon and Jill.

“Oh, God,” she ground out through her teeth, only too aware of the reporters and their sudden interest in him. “Why did he have to come?!”

Lillian took her arm gently. “Don’t let him know that it bothers you. Smile, girl! We’ll get through this.”

“Do you think so?”

She plastered a cool smile to her lips as Simon pulled Jill along with him and came to a halt just in front of the two women.

“Nice crowd,” he told Tira, his eyes slowly going over her exquisite figure in the close-fitting dress with unusual interest.

“A few art fans and a lot of rubberneckers, hadn’t you noticed?” Tira said, sipping more champagne. Her fingers trembled a little and she held the flute with both hands, something Simon’s keen eyes picked up on at once.

“Nice of you to come by,” Lillian said quietly.

He glanced at her. “It would have been noticeable if I hadn’t, considering that I own half the gallery.” His attention turned back to Tira and his silvery eyes narrowed. “All alone? Where’s your fair-haired shadow?”

She knew he meant Charles. She smiled lazily. “He couldn’t make it.”

“On the first night of your first exhibition?” he chided.

She drew in a sharp breath. “His half brother had a heart attack, if you must know,” she said through her teeth. “He’s at the hospital.”

Simon’s eyes flickered strangely. “And you have to be here, instead of at his side. Pity.”

“He doesn’t need comforting. Nessa does.”

Jill, dressed in red again with a sprig of holly secured with a diamond clip in her black hair, moved closer to Simon. “We just stopped in for a peek at your work,” she said, almost purring as she looked up at the tall man beside her. “We’re on our way to the opera.”

Tira averted her eyes. She loved opera. Many times in the past, Simon had escorted her during the season. It hurt to remember how she’d looked forward to those chaste evenings with him.