Authors: Linda Schmalz
“I think he always has,” Julia said, thinking of John in the early days. “But despite that, he married me and supported the children. He’s loved Elizabeth as his own.”
“Ah yes, Elizabeth,” Sam said. “Will you ever tell her about me?”
“Well, Sam, Elizabeth is only eleven. Perhaps when she’s old enough to understand, I can tell her about you.”
Sam looked to the window. “I can never meet her?”
“I don’t see how, Sam. John wouldn’t want you in my life.”
“What about what I want?” Sam held her tight. “Julia, don’t leave me. Let me be in your life.”
“You’ve always been in my life, Sam,” she sighed, admitting the truth to herself as well as Sam. “I’ve always loved you.”
“But you won’t be with me and I can’t know my daughter. What the bloody-devil am I supposed to do with that? I don’t understand you, Julia.”
“Sam. I’ve built a life from the foundations laid for me from my time with you. It’s all I could do. Don’t you know how much I would love to just run off with you somewhere and live out my days in your arms? I’ve dreamt of it Sam, nearly every day of my life. But it can only be a dream. I can never disrupt the life I’ve built for John and the children. I’m not like that. I couldn’t live with the hurt I would cause.”
“What about my hurt? I lived without you for so many years, wanting and missing you.”
Julia sighed. “I share that hurt. You must know that.” Julia glanced at the glaring red numbers on the alarm clock. “I have to get back.”
He didn’t answer as she kissed him and held him close. “Maybe someday, sometime, we’ll be able to be together. I wish I could promise you that. But it isn’t now, or anywhere in the near future.”
“We
will
be together, Julia. I know it. You’ll come back to me, somehow.”
“I’ll always hold you in my heart Sam. I always have. I see your face all the time in the media and I smile. I hear your voice and remember how you made me laugh.”
“I’ll do it again, Julia. We’re not over. I’ll never be over you.”
Julia kissed him one final time, holding her lips to his as long as she could. She didn’t want to forget this feeling or this moment. He kissed her back, pulling her close. Reluctantly she slowly pulled away. “I’ll miss you.”
He let her go. But his words haunted her as she walked out the door.
“You’ll come back to me Julia, you
will
.”
Deirdre stepped from her dressing room as she finished buttoning her peach-colored, silk blouse. She smoothed out the simple wrinkles in her matching skirt and looked hastily around the darkened room for her flats. In her search, she accidentally bumped into the nightstand, causing a glass vase of flowers to tip over, the crash of which provoked that which she hoped to avoid. Spencer woke up.
He sat up, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes, yawned and looked around the room. Deirdre stood frozen, holding one shoe.
“What time is it?” He rubbed his neck and Deirdre’s eyes fell to his muscular chest that served as her pillow last night.
She glanced at her diamond and crystal watch.
“Six a.m.”
Spencer grinned as he extended a hand to her. “Where the devil are you going all dressed up Dee? Come back to bed.”
She tried to ignore his offer, while memories of last night and the security of lying in Spencer’s arms rendered that impossible. She turned away and put on her shoe. “Sorry, but I must go. I have to plan Mother’s funeral.” She fought back tears, those dastardly telltale signs of emotion that put her in this situation in the first place. How had she allowed herself to cry in front of Spencer last night? Why such weakness? She must have been out of her mind with grief to let him make love to her. After all, she loved Sam. Spencer was but a moment’s indiscretion. Yes, that’s all last night had been.
Spencer’s jovial expression fell. “Oh yes, that’s right…the arrangements. I’m so sorry about your mum.” He reached across the bed, turned on a lamp and took her hand, the silk sheet falling away from his torso to his hips. She recalled the way his hips felt beneath her hands as they moved above her. “But it’s dreadfully early, Dee. Nothing will be open at this time.”
She removed her hand and turned away. She could not look at him without memories of last night resurfacing. How easy it would be to slip back under the sheet and wrap up in his embrace and relive the tenderness with which they made love. Spencer turned out to be an amazing lover, taking his time with her, exploring every inch of her body, kissing her over and over as if he’d never get enough of her. Why couldn’t Sam be this affectionate? Spencer made her feel wanted, whereas Sam’s lovemaking seemed hurried and perfunctory as if merely a chore, something to do and finish with as quickly as possible.
She pushed those thoughts aside. Her poor mother was dead and she must focus. Yet it was grief that drove her into Spencer’s arms, so perhaps grieving for Penny wasn’t the right thing to be doing either. Deirdre chided herself for falling so easily into Spencer’s arms last night. Then again, when she awoke with her head on his chest and his arm draped protectively across her body, realization and shock dawned.
Tears threatened at the thought. No, this couldn’t be. She must be wrong. Spencer could not possibly love her. Perhaps, like any other hot-blooded male, he simply took advantage of being in the right place at the right time? Deirdre’s head ached with grief and confusion.
When she didn’t respond, Spencer reached for his clothes, confirming Deirdre’s assumption that he would rush off. Why should she care? She would forget last night and never be so awfully weak again.
She straightened her skirt again and looked away. “If you’d like tea before you go, just ring the maid. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I must check my hair.”
Spencer halted buttoning his shirt. “Tea? What are you talking about, Dee? And your hair looks gorgeous, as always. If you can wait five seconds, I’d like to go with you. You shouldn’t do this alone.”
He had to be joking. He wanted to go with her?
“Alone?” she nearly laughed. “Are you joshing me? I haven’t done anything alone in years. God knows, half of the society matrons and a third of Parliament will want to plan Mother’s funeral.” Deirdre didn’t bother to hide her sarcasm. “Now really, Spencer. Don’t you have a tennis lesson to teach or something?”
He glanced at the clock and shot her a quirky grin. “I don’t usually teach at six in the morning.” He walked to her side of the bed. They stood face to face. She could count every freckle on his sun-kissed face.
He reached over and stroked her cheek. “Deirdre, your mother is dead. That’s an awful thing to deal with, whether the prime minister or God himself should lend a hand. I’m sure, given Penny’s status in society, that her funeral will be no small affair. You need someone on your side to support you. And I’m sure Sam won’t make it back in time.” He paused. “Has he reached you?”
Deirdre remembered her unsuccessful attempts to contact Sam. She sat down on the bed, a wave of fatigue overwhelming her. Spencer sat next to her and placed an arm around her waist.
“Let me help you, Dee.”
She looked into his pale blue eyes, almost the color of her own. “You’ve been very…kind…to me, Spencer, but honestly, you don’t have to do this.”
“Do what?”
“Act like you care because we slept together.”
Spencer removed his arm from her waist. “Oh, is that it?”
“Yes. You can go, really. You don’t have to play the role of concerned lover. I really don’t need anyone.”
Spencer rose and began to pace, his face a fireball of fury. She bristled under his words.
“Do you honestly think that that’s all you mean to me, Dee? That all I’ve ever wanted from you was a quick lay and then it’s off I go to teach tennis or write my book?”
She answered softly. “I don’t know, Spencer. Isn’t that what you want to do?”
He pounded one fist into the other. “Jesus Christ, Deirdre, no! Last night was no sympathy fuck! I wanted you because…well, I want to help you, to stop your tears, to make you feel better. And I want to be with you. I have for so long.”
He turned and knelt in front of her. “Dee, I’m not abandoning you, not now, not even if you say you never want to see me again. I can’t.” He took her hands in his. “Don’t you get it, love?”
She stroked the side of his cheek. Was it possible that, for the first time since she met Sam, she actually felt emotion for someone else? Or had she felt this all along for Spencer and chose to ignore it, so blind was she in her quest to win Sam?
“Dee, I’ve stuck by you because I love you. Even though you married Sam, I still loved you. I went away when you married, but I came back. I can’t stay away from you.” He kissed her, softly, sweetly and she allowed it. She realized how much she would miss him if he left her.
His lips searched hers for an answer. She pulled away gently, and gazed into his pleading eyes.
“After all this time,” Spencer said. “Could you love me at all? Even just a little?”
Deirdre rested her head on his shoulder. “If I knew what love actually was, maybe I could. I think my parents loved me, but it always felt so conditional. As long as I behaved, ran with the right social crowd, graduated from the right schools, married the right man.”
“
Sam
. I remember your parents doting on him when we were young.”
Deirdre chose her words carefully. How to explain? “No, I really wanted and loved Sam.” She steeled against tears. “He just doesn’t love me back.”
Painful silence and truth sat between them. Spencer’s lack of response proved that he’d known this truth about Sam all along.
“You tried once to warn me not to marry him.” Deirdre remembered. “As I was picking out flowers right before my wedding. Do you remember that? You were so angry with me, and I just didn’t understand.”
“I was trying to warn you without warning you.” Spencer laughed softly. “Sam never knew how I felt.”
Deirdre took Spencer’s hand. “No, and you would never tell. You were such a good friend to him, and to me.”
“A friendship with you was all I could hope for.”
A knock at the door startled them both.
“Yes?” Deirdre called.
The door opened and Lydia’s head peeped around the corner. The maid startled and her face flushed scarlet to discover Deirdre and Spencer side by side on the unmade bed.
“Telephone, ma’am.” Lydia said. “It’s
Mr. Lyons
.”
Deirdre’s heart raced, but Spencer squeezed her hand. She turned to him. He offered a smile of courage, hope and new beginnings.
“Tell Sam to forget my calls, Lydia.” She turned to Spencer. “Tell him he’s too late.”
“Yes, ma’am.” Lydia left and closed the door.
Spencer turned to Deirdre. “Are you absolutely sure you don’t want Sam here?”
Deirdre wiped a stray tear and smiled. For the first time in her life, she knew exactly what she wanted.
And it was not Sam.
Sam hurried up the steps of the grandiose mansion and through the front door. Winded and coughing, he dropped his luggage in the foyer.
Lydia appeared in the hallway.
“Ah. Lydia. Good morning.” Sam fought to catch his breath as he pulled off his wet raincoat and handed it to the housekeeper.
“Nice to have you back, sir.”
He offered a smile to the woman who so dutifully served him and Deirdre. “Any chance you know where the lady of the house is?”
“She’s in the drawing room, Mr. Lyons.”
“Thank you.” Sam cleared his throat and coughed again.
“Are you ailing sir? Can I get you some tea?” Lydia’s plump face filled with concern.
“No, no tea, and yes, I’m fine, thanks.” Sam ignored the chills that racked his body. He looked toward the drawing room. “How is she?”
Lydia’s face flushed as she stammered an answer. “Ah- very well, sir, considering.” She looked away. “I really must tend to my duties.”
“Of course.” Sam walked along the hallway to the room on the far right. He opened the massive wood doors. Deirdre sat on a serpentine-backed Queen Anne sofa. A fire roared in the antique, marbled fireplace lending warmth to the ostentatious, yet comfortable, room.
Deirdre turned on hearing Sam’s footsteps.
“I’ve arrived, at last.” Sam bent to kiss her cheek. To his bemusement, she turned away. He pulled up a chair and sat, the warmth from the fireplace quelling his chill.
“You have every right to be upset with me, Deirdre. I should have answered my calls, but I was at the opera and then-” he paused, remembering Julia.
“Yes, the concierge said you had your phone off the hook.” Deirdre finished his sentence for him, her voice flat. “Why was that?”
She seemed numb. Sam anticipated her to spew anger mercilessly at him, and yet, she remained calm. Her features appeared soft, so different from the cool and classic beauty he regarded as his wife. Perhaps it was her new hairstyle, the way it now cascaded in ample waves to her shoulders. When did she start wearing it that way?