Her Own Rules/Dangerous to Know (29 page)

He was right, of course he was. Taking a deep breath, I plunged: “She said I was a problem to you. A nuisance. That you wanted to be rid of me. She said you resented me, resented having to look after me, having to pay my tuition at Wellesley. She said I was a charity case, a nobody, just the brat of one of your—” I stopped short, unable to continue, and swallowed hard.

“Go on,” he commanded in a clipped, rather brusque tone.

“Luciana . . . She said I was just the brat of . . . of one of your whores,” I whispered.

His mouth tightened in anger, and I waited for him to explode. But he did not. He merely shook his head, looking dismayed, and muttered in a tight voice, “She's a liar, my daughter. There are times, Vivienne, when I believe she's the cleverest liar I've ever known. A better liar than Cyrus, and that's saying something. But she's very often foolhardy, stupid in the lies she tells. As she has been tonight. Yes, Luciana is a little fool.”

“I'm not a nuisance to you, am I?” I whispered.

“Of course not! Surely you must know that by now. Haven't I proved to you that I care about you, care about your well-being? And what about your party? I wanted to give it for you, and I enjoyed doing so.”

I nodded. I could not say a word. It wasn't that I was tongue-tied. Rather, I was mortified and angry with myself. I realized how ridiculous I must look to him, how untrusting of him I must appear. He had never let me down, and I knew him to be a scrupulous man, a man of his word. Naturally he didn't resent me. Nor did it matter to him what my school fees cost, or my clothes and my upkeep. Money had never mattered to him. He had so much of it, he was almost contemptuous of it. Or so it seemed to me. Certainly he gave a great deal of it away. I had been an idiot, listening to Luciana. She had driven me away because she was jealous of me and my relationship with her father. All of a sudden I thought of her jealousy when we were children. She had manipulated me tonight; worst of all, I had allowed that manipulation.

He put his hand under my chin and lifted my face to his. “Tears, Vivienne? Oh dear, what a sad ending to such a beautiful evening.”

“I'm sorry, Sebastian,” I answered, sounding choked. “I'm so very sorry.”

Wiping my damp cheeks with his hand, he murmured, “Hush, darling, hush, there's nothing to be sorry about.”

“I shouldn't have listened to her.”

“No, you shouldn't,” he agreed. “And remember, don't pay attention to a thing she says in the future. Or anything Jack says, for that matter. He's not quite as bad as she is, and he's not a liar, but he can be devious.”

“I won't listen to either of them,” I promised. I took a step forward, looked up into those bright blue eyes which were so carefully regarding me. My own expression was intense. “Please say it's all right between us.”

His sudden wide smile made his eyes crinkle at the corners. “Nothing will ever come between us, Vivienne. We're far too close, and we always have been. We're friends for life, you and I. There's a very special bond there. Well, there is, isn't there?”

I nodded. I couldn't speak. I was overwhelmed by him, by the potency of his looks, his sexuality; and I was engulfed by my own erupting emotions. I wanted him to belong to me, I wanted to belong to him in the truest sense. I tried to say something but no words would come.

Looking momentarily puzzled, he gave me a questioning glance, his eyes narrowing as he said, “You've got the most peculiar expression on your face. What are you thinking?”

I took another step nearer, leaned into him, and kissed him on the cheek. Finally finding my voice, I said, “I was thinking how wonderful you are, and how wonderful you've always been to me. And I want to thank you for my birthday party. My very special party.”

“You're very welcome,” he said.

Holding my head on one side, I gazed up into his face. “I'm twenty-one. I'm grown up.”

“You are indeed,” he said with a faintly amused smile.

“Sebastian?”

“Yes?”

“I'm a woman now.”

There must have been something unusual in my expression, or perhaps it was the inflection in my voice. But whatever it was, he stared back at me in the oddest way and for the longest moment, that puzzled look more pronounced. Unexpectedly, he took a step toward me, then he stopped abruptly.

We exchanged a long look, one so deep, so knowing, so full of longing, I felt my breath catch in my throat. Before I could stop myself, and almost against my own volition, I began to move forward, drawing closer to him.

It seemed to me that he watched every step I took, and then without uttering a word, Sebastian reached out for me. He pulled me into his arms with such fierceness, I was startled. And he held me so tightly I could scarcely breathe.

And everything changed. I changed. Sebastian changed. Our lives changed irrevocably. The past was demolished. Only the present remained. The present and the future. Our future together. We were meant to be, he and I. At least, so I believed. It had always been so. Our course had long been set. Somehow I knew this. Moving his head slightly, Sebastian bent down and kissed me. When he moved his tongue lightly against my lips, I parted them quite naturally. Our tongues touched. My legs felt weak and I held onto him tighter than ever for support, as he continued to kiss me in this most intimate manner. Without warning, he stopped, held me away from him almost roughly and looked down into my face.

Again our eyes locked. I knew he wanted me as much as I wanted him. He had already told me so without uttering a word. And yet I detected hesitation in him.

I took hold of his hand and led him upstairs. Once inside the room, he let go of my hand and moved away from me, hovered in the center of the floor. I felt, rather than observed, his uncertainty. After a moment, he said in a strangled voice, “I came to take you back to your birthday party . . .” His voice trailed off.

“No! I don't want to go back. I want to be here.
To be with you.
That's all I've ever wanted, Sebastian.”

“Vivienne . . .”

We moved at the same time.

We were in each other's arms, holding onto each other. Eventually we drew apart. He struggled out of his dinner jacket, threw it on a chair, undid his bow tie as he walked to the bedroom door. With one hand he locked it; with the other he began to remove the sapphire studs from his evening shirt, and his eyes never left my face as he walked back to me.

I opened my arms to him. He came into them swiftly, held me close to him. He undid my zipper and suddenly my evening dress was a pile of white lace at my feet. Drawing me toward the bed without a word, he pushed me down on it, lay next to me, took me in his arms once more. His mouth found mine. He caressed every part of me, his hands moving over me with such expertise I was soon fully aroused, spiralling into ecstasy. When he entered me a moment later, I gasped, cried out and he stopped, staring down at me. I assured him I was all right, urged him on, wrapping my arms around him. My hands were firm and strong on his broad back and I found his rhythm, moved with him, inflamed by his passion and my own urgent desire. And so we soared upward together, and as we reached the peak I cried out again, as did he.

We lay together silently. Sebastian's breathing was labored and his body was damp. I went to the bathroom, found a towel, came back and rubbed him dry. He half smiled at me, pulled me to him, wrapped his long legs around my body, and rested against me, still without speaking. But there was no awkwardness in our silence, only eloquence, ease.

I let my fingers slide into his thick black hair; I ran my hands over his shoulders and his back. I kissed him as I wanted to kiss him. It was not long before we made love again and we did so without constraint.

Satiated and a little sore, we eventually lay still. After a while, Sebastian raised himself on one elbow, looked down at me. Moving a strand of hair, he said quietly, “If I'd known you were a virgin, I wouldn't—”

I pressed my fingers against his lips. “Don't say it.”

He shook his head. “It never occurred to me, Vivi, not in this day and age . . .” His sentence trickled away and he shook his head, a little helplessly, I thought.

I said, “I was saving myself.”

A dark brow lifted above those piercing blue eyes.

“For you,” I explained with a smug smile. “I saved myself for you, Sebastian. I've wanted you to make love to me for as long as I can remember.”

“Oh Vivi, and I never even guessed.”

I reached out, touched his face. “I love you, Sebastian Locke. I've always loved you. And I always will . . . all the days of my life.”

He bent down and kissed me softly on the lips, and then he put his arms around me, holding me close to him, keeping me safe.

 

The phone was screaming in my ear.

I roused myself from my half-dozing state and my memories instantly retreated. Reaching out, I lifted the receiver and mumbled, “Hello?”

“It's me,” Jack said. “I'm coming over. With the newspapers.”

“Oh God, don't tell me,” I groaned. “Lousy headlines, I've no doubt. And obituaries.”

“You got it, kid.”

“You're going to be besieged by the press,” I muttered. “Perhaps you
are
better off coming here. Maybe you should bring Luciana with you, Jack.”

“She ain't here, Viv. She's skipped it, gone back to Manhattan.”

“I see,” I said and sat bolt upright. “Well, that's not surprising.” Sliding my legs out of bed, I continued, “I'll put coffee on. See you in about half an hour.”

“Make that twenty minutes,” he answered brusquely and hung up.

C
HAPTER
F
OUR

I
t was quite obvious that Jack was in one of his peculiar moods. His face proclaimed it to me before he had walked even halfway across the kitchen.

“Good morning,” I said, carrying the coffeepot over to the table and putting it down. When I received merely a curious, gruntlike mumble from him, I added sharply, “So, we're maungy this morning, are we?”

The use of this word caught his attention at once, and he glanced at me rapidly.
“Maungy.
What does that mean?”

“You've heard it before so don't pretend you haven't. It was a favorite of Gran's. She often used to call you maungy when you were a snot-nosed little boy in short pants.”

Ignoring my acerbity, he said evenly, “I don't remember,” and flopped into the nearest chair. “And I don't know its meaning.”

“Then I'll tell you,” I answered, leaning over the table, peering into his face. “It means peevish, bad tempered, or sulky, and it's a Yorkshire word from the West Riding where my great-grandfather came from.” I paused, said in a lighter voice, “Surely you haven't forgotten Gran's marvelous stories about her father? She never failed to make us laugh.”

“George Spence. That was his name,” Jack said, and then grimaced. “I need a life-saving transfusion. Strong coffee. Immediately, sugar.” He reached for the pot, poured cups of coffee for both of us, and took a gulp of his.

“Jack, don't start the day by calling me sugar. Please. And so that's
it,
is it? You have a hangover.”

“A beaut. Hung one on. Last night. When I got back to the farm.”

His occasional bouts of drinking were nothing new and had worried me off and on, but I had stopped trying to reform him, nor did I chastise him anymore, since it was a futile waste of time. And so I refrained from commenting now. I simply sat down opposite him, eyeing the newspapers as I did. “How bad are
they?”

“Not as bad as we expected. Quite laudatory, in fact. Not much muckraking. You're mentioned. As one of his five wives. Front page stories. Obituaries inside.”

I pulled the newspapers toward me. Jack had brought the
New York Post,
the
New York Times,
and the
Daily News,
and as I spread them out in front of me I saw that they were more or less saying the same thing in their different ways. A great and good man had been found dead, circumstances suspicious. All three papers decried his death, sang his praises, mourned his passing. They carried photographs of Sebastian and they were all fairly recent ones, taken in the last couple of years. He looked wonderful—distinguished, handsome and loaded with glamour, dangerously so. But that had ceased to matter.

Skipping the
Post
and the
News
for the moment, I concentrated on the
Times.
The front page story by the reporter who had spoken to me on the phone yesterday was well written, careful in its details, cautious in its tone, and scrupulous in its accuracy. Furthermore, I was quoted verbatim and without one word I'd said being altered or paraphrased. So much for that. And certainly there was nothing sensationalized here.

I turned to the obituary section of the
New York Times
. A whole page was devoted to Sebastian Lyon Locke, scion of a great American dynasty, billionaire tycoon, head of Locke Industries, chairman of the Locke Foundation, and the world's greatest philanthropist. There was a simplified version of his life story; every one of his good deeds was listed along with the charities he supported in America, and there was a fund of information about the charity work he did abroad, especially in Third World countries. It had obviously been written some years earlier, as most obituaries of famous people were, with the introduction and the last paragraph left open, to be added after the death of the particular individual had occurred.

Glancing at the end of the story, I was surprised to see only four names. I was mentioned as his former ward and his ex-wife—as if the others had not existed—along with Jack and Luciana, his children, and Cyrus Lyon Locke, his father, whom I'd completely forgotten about until now.

“Oh my God! Cyrus!” I cried, lowering the paper, looking over the top of it at Jack. “Have you been in touch with your grandfather?”

“That old coot! He's more dead than alive. Rotting in Bar Harbor. In that mausoleum of a place. It ought—”

“But have you
talked
to him?” I cut in. “Does he
know
about Sebastian's death?”

“I spoke to Madeleine. Yesterday. Told her everything. The old coot was sleeping.”

“Did you tell her to bring him here for the funeral?”

“Certainly not. He's too old.”

“How old is he?” I asked, frowning. Cyrus's age escaped me for the moment, but he had to be in his eighties.

“He was born in 1904. So he must be ninety. And he's too old to travel.”

“I don't know about that . . . look, he should come, Jack. After all, Sebastian was his only son.”

“His last surviving son,” Jack corrected me.

“So what did Madeleine say?”

“Not much. As usual. Gave me her condolences. Talked about Cyrus being frail. But not senile. I can't stand her. She's the voice of doom. Even when she's wishing you well.”

“I know, impending disaster does seem to echo in her voice. And I'm sure what she said about Cyrus is true, that he's not senile. Cyrus Locke has always been a remarkable man. Quite remarkable. A genius, really.”

The phone rang, interrupting our conversation. I went to answer it.

Picking up the receiver, I said, “Hello?” and then glanced over at Jack. Covering the mouthpiece with my hand, I murmured, “Talk of the devil. It's for you, Jack.”

“Who is it?”

“The voice of doom with an Irish accent.”

“Hello, Madeleine,” Jack said into the phone a split-second later. “We were just talking about you. And Cyrus. Vivienne wants to invite you to the funeral, Madeleine.”

I glared at him, silently mouthing, “It's not my funeral.”

Ignoring me, he listened to Madeleine for a few minutes, said good-bye, and hung up. He lolled against the door jamb with a thoughtful expression on his face. “I left this number at the farm. With Carrie. Mrs. Crane's niece. She came in to help. Until her aunt gets back. Tonight.”

“Thanks a lot,” I said, and sighed, threw him a reproving glance. “Tell me, Jack, why is it you have the need to put the burdens of this family on me most of the time? This is not my funeral. It's your responsibility. Yours and Luciana's.”

“Forget Luce. All she wants to do is run. Back to London. To that twerp of a British husband of hers.”

“Isn't he coming for the funeral?”

“Who?”

“The husband. Gerald Kamper.”

“Who knows. But
he
wants to come. The old coot. Grandfather.” Jack made a face. “To the funeral of a son who loathed him. Can you beat that?”

“I knew he'd wish to be present.”

“Merde,” Jack muttered half to himself.

“It'll be all right, we'll manage well enough,” I reassured him. “And it
is
only natural he wants to attend his son's burial.”

“
Only natural!
Don't be so
stupid!
There's nothing natural about Cyrus Locke. Just as there wasn't anything natural about Sebastian. He had no feelings. Neither does Cyrus. Faulty genes, I suspect. And the old coot's a monster like his son was. Better he remain in Bar Harbor. With his secretary-housekeeper-mistress-jailer. Or whatever the hell she is. I—” Jack stopped and grinned in that awful, ghoulish way of his, and added, “We won't be able to keep him away. Cyrus wants to be sure.”

“Sure of what?”

“That Sebastian's really dead. That he's three feet under. Kicking up daisies.”

“Oh, Jack.”

“Don't
oh Jack
me in that pathetic way. Not this morning. You did it yesterday. All day. No tears either. I've had enough. You're just a sentimentalist, kid.”

“And you're the most unpleasant person it's ever been my great misfortune to know. You disgust me, Jack Locke. Sebastian's dead and you act as if it's of no consequence, as if you don't care.”

“I don't.”

“Talk about Cyrus being unnatural.
You
certainly are.”

“Chip off the old block, eh?” He laughed hollowly.

“You make me sick. Sebastian was a wonderful father to you.”

“Go and tell that to the Marines! You should know better. He was never a father to me. Never cared about me.”

“He did.”

“I've told you before. I'm repeating myself.
He couldn't love anyone. “

“He loved me,” I announced and sat back, glaring at him.

Jack laughed harshly, and there was a disdainful expression on his face when he exclaimed, “Here we go again! He was crazy to get you into the sack. That I'll readily concede. He had the hots for you. Even when you were just a kid. He couldn't wait to get into your panties.”

“That's not true.”

“Sure it is. We used to call it the Gradual Seduction of Vivienne. You know, like the title of a play.”

“Who?”

“Luciana and I.”

“What do you mean? Why?”

“Because for years
we
watched
him
watching
you.
Fascinating. The fat cat waiting to pounce. On the little mouse. Waiting for you to get a bit older. Smarming all over you. Catering to you. Flattering you. Showering you with gifts. Softening you up. Getting you ready for him. He couldn't wait to seduce you, Viv. We knew that. Luce and I. He did it as soon as he dared. As soon as it was safe. When you were finally twenty-one. The night of your twenty-first birthday party. Jesus, he couldn't even wait until the next day. The big seduction scene had to be that night.”

“Jack, listen to me, it wasn't like that, honestly it wasn't. Sebastian did not seduce me.”

Jack threw back his head and guffawed. “Trust you to always defend him. No matter what.”

“But it's the truth,” I protested.

 

Shaking inside, filled with a fulminating rage, I vacated the kitchen. I left Jack sitting at the table drinking his third cup of coffee and smoking a cigarette. Seemingly he had started that bad habit again.

I went into the library and, seating myself at the desk, I began to read my piece for the London
Sunday Times
Magazine section, trying to calm myself as I did.

And then automatically I picked up a pencil and began to edit, doing the kind of fine tuning that was important to me in my work as a journalist. I was so furious with Jack my adrenaline was pumping overtime. But my anger gave me the extra steam I needed, enabled me to push my sadness to one side, at least for the time being. Within two hours I had finished the editing job. I sat back relieved, not to mention pleased with myself.

When Belinda pushed open the door a few minutes later I was taken by surprise. She was not due for another hour and I gave her a puzzled look as I greeted her.

“I'm early because I thought you might need me for something,” she explained, walking over to my desk, sitting down in the chair next to it. “I brought all the newspapers, but I guess you've seen them already.”

I nodded. “Jack arrived with them three hours ago. By the way, is he still occupying my kitchen?”

“No, he's set up camp in my office, where he's talking on the phone, making the arrangements for the funeral and the memorial service.”

“I'm glad to hear it. I had the dreadful feeling he was going to start acting like the flake he can be at times. That he'd goof off, leave everything to me.”

“He's speaking with the pastor of the church in Cornwall right now,” Belinda explained. “Talking about Friday for the funeral.”

“We agreed on that last night. And he wants to have the memorial next week. On Wednesday, to be exact.”

Belinda looked at me askance. “I wonder if that gives us enough time? I mean, to inform everybody.”

“Honestly, Belinda!” I shook my head, smiling faintly. “The days of the carrier pigeon and the tribal drum are long gone. They're extinct. All we have to do is give the announcement to the television networks and newspapers. Or rather, have the Locke Foundation do it, and the whole world will know within twenty minutes, I can guarantee it.”

She had the good grace to laugh. “You're right. I sound like an imbecile, don't I?”

Paying no attention to this remark, I went on quickly, “There is one thing you can do for me, Belinda, and that's field any calls from newspapers for me today. I really don't feel like speaking to the press. I need a little quiet time by myself.” I glanced at my watch. “Lila's supposed to come to clean today, isn't she?”

“Yes, she is. But not until one. She had a dental appointment at eleven. She called me yesterday to say she might be a bit later than usual.”

“No problem.”

“About the press, Vivienne, don't worry, I'll deal with them. If they insist on talking to you though, at some point, shall I have them call back tomorrow?”

“Yes. No, wait a minute, I have a much better idea! If Jack's still here, pass the press over to him. And if he's gone back to Laurel Creek Farm, give them the phone number there. He's as capable of dealing with them as I am.”

With these words I escaped.