Impossible (27 page)

“Yes, it is,” Tatianna said, seeming indifferent to him. “Are you an artist?” He looked like one, almost everyone there did, and she had met a lot of them in the course of her life. She wasn't easy to impress.

“Yes, I am. I'm having a show here in December.”

“What kind of work?” He explained his theories to her, and suspected she hadn't listened to a word, which would have been correct. She had heard it all before. She seemed to lack her mother's innocence, vitality, and excitement about life. He liked Sasha a whole lot better. Independent of his relationship with her mother, he would never have pursued this girl. She was far too cool and snooty for him. And he was far too old and arty looking for her. The men she went out with were preppy and traditional, and most of them worked on Wall Street. She thought the men she met in the art scene, even at her mother's gallery, were self-centered jerks. She assumed the same about him. With only a few words of conversation between them, they took an instant dislike to each other. In an effort to warm things up a little, if only for Sasha's sake, he mentioned that he knew her brother. She nodded, and seemed not to care. She realized then that she'd heard his name before, but Xavier always had crazy, badly behaved friends. Tatianna didn't.

A few minutes later, Sasha arrived to join them. She had seen them circling each other, and was worried. Tatianna looked annoyed, never a good sign. Liam looked curious about her, and Sasha was afraid he would give it away if he asked her too many questions, or was too friendly. Tatianna seemed to suspect nothing. She just didn't want to get to know him, and there was no reason why she should, that she knew of.

“Have you two met?” Sasha asked, appearing casual, as she put an arm around her daughter and stood apart from Liam, looking like an art dealer and a mother, and nothing more. And surely not his woman.

“Yes, we have,” Liam said with a warm smile at Sasha, which her eyes returned.

“Liam is one of our artists and a friend of Xavier's from London. That's how I met him. He scouted him for us. He's having a show in December. What are you up to tonight?” Sasha asked Tatianna. She looked beautiful, undeniably, but Sasha hated it when you could see her body through her dress, which one could. But she looked no different from the other young women at the party. These days they all dressed like that at her age. It always made Sasha nervous, but she said nothing. Tatianna was old enough to wear what she wanted, and do as she chose.

“I'm having dinner at Pastis, with friends,” Tatianna said vaguely, and glanced at her watch. It was a small diamond one her father had given her on his last Christmas.

“It was nice of you to come uptown for this, sweetheart,” Sasha said with a warm smile. She knew Tatianna did almost nothing on the Upper East Side, except for work. Like most people her age, her entire social life was downtown.

“I said I would.” Tatianna smiled at her mother. You could tell that the two women were close, although very different. Tatianna respected her a great deal, even if she didn't like meeting her artists. She was impressed by what her mother did, and proud of her for expanding the empire her grandfather had built. Tatianna still remembered him. He had always scared her when they lived in Paris. Xavier had liked him better.

“We're having dinner at La Goulue,” Sasha said casually. It was one of her favorite places, and Tatianna wasn't surprised. It was close to the gallery, the food was good, and it was full of life, and trendy people. She had already taken Liam there, and he liked it a lot.

Tatianna left a few minutes later, and after she did, Sasha came back to talk to Liam.

“So did you two hit it off?” She looked slightly worried. They had looked like two dogs circling each other right up until Tatianna left.

“She's beautiful,” Liam said honestly. No one could have denied that. “A little scary, though. I don't think she likes me.”

“Don't be put off by her. That's just her style. Men approach her constantly, she wears a lot of armor.” And fangs, Liam thought, but he would never have said it to her mother. He had taken a visceral dislike to her. She seemed like a spoiled brat to him. Xavier was a whole different kind of being. But even their friendship had done nothing to impress her. Liam was convinced nothing would.

They left for dinner after that. Sasha had invited a number of people she thought he'd enjoy, along with the artist whose show it was. There were fourteen of them for dinner at a long table at La Goulue, where everyone fussed over them, and Sasha. She kept a motherly eye on everyone, and saw to it that every detail was attended to, and everyone had a good time. Her caring manner defined what Liam loved about her. She was warm and nurturing and attentive to everyone. Girls like her daughter were only interested in themselves. Sasha made a real effort to make Liam feel important, comfortable, and welcome, and he loved her for it. It was what he needed most from her.

Nothing in her behavior that night suggested to anyone that there was something going on between them. She gave nothing away, not a look or a touch, or anything she said. She made it clear that he was important to her as an artist, and nothing else, and she was the attentive dealer. She was every bit as kind to the others as she was to him. He complimented her on it when they got back to her apartment, where he felt totally at home now. Tatianna would have been incensed to see him sprawled out, smoking a cigar, in her father's favorite chair in their bedroom. But fortunately, she couldn't see it. To Tatianna, everything that had been her father's was sacred, including her mother. She had frequently said that she was glad Sasha wasn't dating and hoped she never would. Her older brother was far more realistic. All he wanted was for their mother to be happy, whatever and whoever it took.

“Sasha, you are amazing,” Liam said, smiling at her through his smoke rings. She even let him smoke there, and said she liked the smell, which in fact, she did. Arthur had also had a fondness for good Cubans. “The opening was terrific. You managed to make everyone feel important, even me. Hotchkiss loved it.” Hotchkiss was the artist they'd been showing. “He felt like he'd died and gone to heaven. He kept telling me how lucky I am to be represented by you, and he doesn't know the half of it.” Liam laughed, and so did she.

“I'm glad you enjoyed it,” she said, looking genuinely pleased. She was a hands-on dealer, particularly with him. But it was her style to be totally involved with both her artists and her clients. She loved what she did, and was brilliant at it.

“Who wouldn't?” he said, admiring her as she put on her nightgown. She was totally at ease with him, and felt as though she had been living with him for years. “Tatianna scared me,” he confessed, as he finished his cigar, and Sasha got into bed and looked at him.

“Don't be silly. She's just a kid. That's the way she is. She's very cool. She was very attached to her father, and she's very possessive about me. I told you, she's very black and white about things. But her glare is worse than her bite. She probably thought you were just another horny artist, lusting after her. I wish she didn't wear those dresses, though. It's no wonder men stalk her.”

“She's knock-out looking,” he conceded, but he wasn't nearly as blithe about her as her mother. Sasha obviously knew her better. “She's so different from Xavier. He would talk to a homeless person and make him feel like a king. I felt like dirt under her feet.” It was a slight exaggeration, but not by much, and Sasha was sorry to hear it.

“She's a little spoiled, from all the attention she gets. She looked pretty tonight.”

“She is pretty.” But her icy style turned him off. Sasha was a brightly burning candle, lit from within. Tatianna was an iceberg, or looked that way to him.

“She's a lot like my father. He was scary, too, although I think you would have liked him.” She also knew her father would have had no interest whatsoever in his work. Emerging artists had never been his thing, right to the end, although he liked the profits her pet passion had brought them. But he had never understood or cared for the work.

“What are we doing tomorrow?” Liam asked, as he got into bed with her. He had a certain look in his eye, and designs on her body, to which she was not opposed. They had made her bed their own.

“I thought we'd go out to the Hamptons,” Sasha said as he folded her into his arms.

“Sounds good to me,” he said, and then kissed her in the dark.

“It does to me, too,” she whispered as she kissed him back, and then forgot everything but him.

She went to the gallery the next day, was pleased with the reviews for the show, and they left for Southampton after dinner. They bought groceries on the way and got there at ten o'clock. They sat on the porch, talking for a while, while Liam ate ice cream, and they chatted about nothing in particular. They went to bed early, made love again, got up and went for a walk on the beach the next morning. They were settling into an easy, comfortable way of life. And that afternoon, sitting on the beach, he talked about moving his studio to Paris, maybe in the fall. It would be easier than commuting from London every weekend, which was tiring, and expensive for him. And he wanted to be close to her during the week.

They both knew that sooner or later, people would find out about them. Bernard already had. But Liam was not trying to shove his way into her life. He accepted that their lives and lifestyles were different, but what they had shared so far felt great to him. This was definitely possible, for both of them. He thought it was terrific, and Sasha was slowly but surely becoming convinced. Contrary to her fears in the beginning, it was not impossible at all.

They went to a movie in Southampton that night, and were cozily tucked into bed afterward, giggling and talking, when they both heard a sound. It sounded like someone downstairs, and they thought it was an intruder.

“Do you have a panic button on the alarm?” he whispered to her, and she shook her head.

“I have a thing somewhere, but I don't know where it is,” she whispered back. They could definitely hear someone moving around, and then heard a step on the stairs. Liam glanced around her moonlit bedroom, grabbed a poker from the fireplace, and yanked her bedroom door open, as they heard a step right outside. And as he pulled the door toward him, he flipped on the light, and stood in her bedroom doorway, stark naked, with the poker in his hand. He found himself less than a foot from Tatianna, staring at him with a stunned expression. There was a young man just behind her, on the landing. She screamed the moment she saw Liam, and so did he. It was a scene beyond belief. The young man with her took a step toward him, as Sasha leaped out of bed and came to stand right behind Liam. She was also naked, and astounded to see her daughter. Tatianna had said nothing about using the house that weekend. She thought her mother no longer went there at all. Sasha hadn't mentioned her recent trips there, and had no desire to explain Liam's presence in her life.

“My God, Mother, what are you doing?” She burst into tears, and the man with her discreetly headed down the stairs. He had instantly figured out what had happened, and decided to remove himself from the scene, a wise decision. “Are you
insane
?” And then she turned to Liam, sobbing, “What the fuck do you think you're doing in my father's bed? What are you both thinking? Don't you have any respect for Daddy?” she screamed at her mother. “How can you bring him here? How could you? Is this what you do when you're in Paris? You just run around screwing your artists?” Without thinking, for the first time in her life, shaking from head to foot, Sasha slapped her daughter, and Tatianna slapped her back, as Liam groaned and set down the poker. He was shaking, too, and ran into the bedroom to put something on. All he was able to find in the chaos of the moment were his jockey shorts, which wasn't a vast improvement, but it was better than standing there with his privates hanging out. He hadn't had time to put on clothes when he thought he was protecting Sasha from a burglar. He would have preferred to face a man with a gun than Tatianna.

“Everyone calm down… please…,” he urged both crying women, to no avail. Tatianna was still screaming at her mother, in a state approaching hysteria. “Just stop! Let's go downstairs and talk,” he said in the calmest voice he could muster. Neither of them listened, and then Tatianna turned on him again.

“Get out of my parents' house, you bastard! You don't belong here!” He was at a total loss for words, in the face of her fury. He had never been in a situation like this. Thank God Beth hadn't walked in on him with Becky, or it might have been worse, although he couldn't imagine anything much worse than this, being attacked by Sasha's irate daughter, and the horrified look in Sasha's eyes. It was awful.

“Don't speak to him that way,” Sasha was shouting at her. “He's my guest.”

“He's not your
guest.
He's your
lover.
And you're both disgusting.” She spat the words at her mother, turned on her heel, and ran down the stairs, and within seconds they heard the door slam, and the car she'd come in drive away. If she'd been planning a romantic weekend, she had gotten something very different, and so had Liam and Sasha. Sasha sat down on the stairs, put her face in her hands, and sobbed, as Liam put his arms around her. This was not the way she had wanted Tatianna to find out about them. She was devastated, and cried for hours.

“She'll never respect me again, Liam. She thinks I dishonored her father's memory, and I suppose I have,” she said, looking morbidly depressed and badly shaken. “She called me a whore and a slut. Oh my God…I can't believe this happened.” Neither could he, and there was very little he could do, except comfort her, to make it better. He thought Tatianna had behaved like a monster, no matter how surprised or upset she was. She had said things to her mother that could never be forgotten or taken back, even if Sasha chose to forgive her, which knowing Sasha, he was sure she would.

“This is none of her business,” he told Sasha firmly, once he got her back to bed, which took hours. He wasn't even sure if he should be in the bed with her, but she needed him, so he decided to stay. “You haven't done anything wrong. You're a grown woman, your husband has been gone for almost two years. You have a right to a life without him. You were in the privacy of your own home, with a man who loves you. You have nothing to apologize for,” he said, and kissed her gently. “She owes you an apology, Sasha. What she said to you was inexcusable.” And even if Sasha did, he had no intention of excusing it, or forgiving her, anytime soon. She had called him a piece of shit and a two-bit gigolo, which had cut him to the quick. He would have liked to slap her too, but of course he didn't. For Sasha's sake, if nothing else. There was no point adding fuel to a fire that was already blazing out of control. But they were both smarting from Tatianna's verbal attack on them, and her outrage at finding her mother with Liam, in what had once been her parents' bed.