Almost Always: A Love Unexpected Novel (21 page)

I saw Mr. Royce's eyebrows shoot up but he let Kason continue on uninterrupted.

"Archie's hunches usually turn out to be true. He thought they'd be right in your neighborhood and he and his men made contact with an amazing number of shopkeepers. Everyone knows Marjorie and Don and you'd be amazed at the cooperation they gave him. It was all a matter of tracking the serial numbers. Once the bills started showing up, Archie was able to zero in on a couple of places and drill down to who was passing the bills."

"Was it someone we know, like you thought?"

"Yes, unfortunately it was. It was Vito Caperelli."

"Oh no. He was Dad's friend."

"He was broke. He was into the local numbers game way over his head. Apparently, Mrs. Caperelli couldn't resist telling her crummy brother-in-law all about you and I. He saw an advantage and took it. Working with your father, he knew all about the union trouble and probably thought we'd assume, as we did, that they were behind it. It might have worked if they hadn't dropped your mother's nickname."

"But mom would have recognized Vito!"

"He hired three guys from out of town. He paid them off, paid off the numbers guy and still had cash to spend. That's how he got nailed."

"Mrs. C?"

"The only thing she's guilty of is being a terrible gossip. Archie says she's broken up. She blames herself."

Kason filled his father in on the whole story including my father's continuing clashes with the union and how he and Archie intended to get to the bottom of that situation as well.

"You know, if I hadn't met Annalise I'd probably tell you to walk away from the whole mess. You're putting yourself in a vulnerable position. But," he smiled my way, "I have met her. All I can say is if there's anything I can do to help . . ."

"Thanks, Dad. And I may call on you. The guys stirring up all the trouble aren't from New York. They're from Chicago. Your influence might be useful here."

Thirty three

We were sitting on the stuffy sofa in our hotel living room. The early afternoon sun slanted through the buildings and onto the lake outside. I snuggled against Kason's shoulder and basked in what I considered a major accomplishment. There were no material things I could give him, but I had brought his father back into his life. To me, it was important. It balanced us, just a little.

He didn't look at me when he began to speak. "When I was in college, I decided that I couldn't really love a woman. The ones I met were so unbelievably shallow or so painfully stupid or both that I wasn't able to get beyond it. Women—girls really—pretty much threw themselves at me the entire time I was at Wharton. My father's success, my academic track record . . ."

"Your mouth-watering good looks," I couldn't help add.

"Thank you, yeah I suppose that too. Those were the qualities the women saw and that was why I attracted their attention."

"Well, all those things are part of you, aren't they?"

"A very superficial part. I couldn't put labels on what it was I wanted. I just knew I hadn't found it." He sucked in a deep breath. I could see him will himself to go on. "And, although I didn't really admit it to myself, my mother's death had left me with . . .  God I hate this term . . . fear of abandonment. It was, and still is, a deep scar."

This was it. Elsa.

"When we met, I knew she was utterly different from any woman I'd ever known. For one thing, she seemed completely unimpressed by me and not at all attracted."

"I find it hard to believe any woman could fail to find you attractive." He ignored my comment.

"We shared a study group and those can get very intense. You get cases assigned and as a group, you have to present your findings. One weak link or one mess up and you're dead. At the same time, the MBA program is cutthroat—a lot like law school. Graduating at the top of the program is critical."

"I wasn't concerned about that because I had already made up my mind which direction I was headed in. I wasn't going to be looking for any job; I was going to start my own firm. Elsa," he seemed to almost choke on the name, "was talented without being ego driven. Frankly, in spite of her brilliance, I didn't think she had the guts to succeed."

"By the time we graduated, Elsa and I had become good friends. I had already decided she'd be a great addition to my team and that working for me would be a good way for her to cut her teeth in the business and maybe harden up a bit. She became my right hand. She seemed to know what needed to be done before I told her and her business sense was totally in sync with mine."

"We were together constantly. One day, I just realized I was in love with her. It hit me hard. When I admitted it to her, she just told me she'd been waiting for me to get my head out of the clouds long enough to see it." He grinned ruefully and flexed his fingers in front of him. Then he got up and stood by the window, half in shadow and almost turned away from me.

"We had it all. The world was ours. We mapped out a perfect life, planned all of the things couples plan. Her parents were elated, my father was mostly indifferent."

Kason gazed out at the lake, graying in the fading afternoon.

"When she died, all those plans were buried under a mountain of snow. I was directionless. I threw myself into work, as people tend to do, and that translated into the fortune I have today. I treated every deal as if it was the last deal I'd ever do. I worked, literally, as if there was no tomorrow. Because, for me, there wasn't."

He walked back to me and stood in front of me, taking both of my hands in his.

"I hope you can understand now. I promised you that I would tell you why I ask you to live without expectations. Because . . . because expectations hurt. Expectations get crumpled under a semi on a slick highway or buried under an avalanche in the Alps."

He looked at me with such sadness that I wanted to weep for him.

"I know that this isn't what you want to hear. But I told you at the beginning and I'm telling you again now. If you can be happy with what I have to give you, I promise I'll be very good to you. I know that the time may come when you won't be satisfied with those limitations. When that day comes, I'll deal with it with as much grace as I can muster."

I took a deep breath. I had thought about how I would handle this all weekend long. It was time. "Kason, I do understand. And, within your . . . limitations . . . I'd like to continue to see you and enjoy you."

His face lit up, victorious. But I wasn't through.

"However, I'm going to have to impose some limitations of my own."

"I guess that's only fair."

"And it may be that you can't live with them. That's a risk
I
have to take." I paused to hold on to my composure under the look he was giving me. It was enough to tear my resolve to pieces.

"Go ahead."

"First, you have to stop using your money to 'help' me or my family. I am grateful for all that you've done, but I want you to bow out of the union situation with my father. He's a big boy and he can take care of himself."

"Second, I'm going to be working now and making a decent living. No more wardrobes, no more jewelry. I can dress myself. If I have the time to take a trip, I understand you have a plane and I won't refuse to fly in it. But tone down the indulgences, please. It makes me uncomfortable."

"Third, we're going to limit the time we spend together. You know that you're the most amazing, mind-blowing lover I could ever hope to have. But sex isn't everything. I can't be in your bed every night and have a real life away from you. And I need a real life away from you if I am to continue to enjoy you. You can't be
my
life if there's no chance
we'll
ever have a life."

He waited a moment before he spoke. "So, what's the limit? On the time we can spend together?"

I hadn't really gotten that far in my thinking.

"Really, Annalise," he pressed, "Twice a week, three times a week? If I don't see you one week can I get four days in a row?" He spat the questions out with some bitterness. It clearly wasn’t what he wanted.
Well too bad. It isn't really what I want, either
.

"A few times a week. Don't get petty about it. I'm not going to keep a calendar and check off days."

"Does lunch count or are we just talking actual dates ?"

"Kason, please."

He was pissed that he couldn't have everything his way. But I could see him soften.  I wasn't being unreasonable, after all. How could he expect me to turn my very existence over to a man who adamantly rejected a future?

"Very well, then. But one last thing."

"Shoot."

"You have to keep the stuff I've already bought for you."

"Okay."

"And I think I ought to be able to give you gifts. What's the use of having money if I can't spend some on you?" I had to laugh at the little boy way he almost whined that out.

"What's wrong with flowers . . . or chocolate?"

"Hmmpff," he pouted.

"Most men would be thankful that I'm not a gold-digger."

"I'm not most men."

"That much I know." I pulled him down beside me on the couch and kissed him with affection and desire. "It won't be so bad, you'll see. Let's just enjoy each other."

He pulled me tightly against his chest and breathed against my hair. "Let's not waste any time. Let's start enjoying right now."

So began the edgy dance that would carry us along for many weeks.

Thirty four

My life at Clemson's Bookmark, on both floors, was more than I could have expected. Manhattan was a different world than Brooklyn. I had grown up in New York City, but Manhattan made me feel like a country hick. I had many occasions to be thankful for the wardrobe Kason had supplied me for our trip to Chicago. It made me feel less a rube when I walked down the busy streets full of finely dressed professionals hustling about their daily lives. Of course there were bums and eccentrics garbed in all sorts of outlandish outfits, but I wanted to fit in with the purposeful men and women who dressed like they were going somewhere.

When Jenn finally made it into the city to see my apartment on her winter break she couldn't believe my luck. Mom had helped me brighten it up with some colorful prints and the worn, but still nice rag rug from my bedroom was just the trick to liven up the living room. I had fresh flowers in every room. True to form, Kason had held me to my word on accepting flowers and sent me fresh bouquets several times a week.

"So you're still with Kason." It wasn't a question. It was more of a challenge.

"I wouldn't say 'with'. We're still seeing each other." I tried to sound casual as if going out with a gorgeous wealthy man I was crazy about was just another every day part of my life.

"C'mon. You're talking to me here, ‘Lise. Truth time."

"That is the truth. We made a deal. He won't commit farther than next Monday and I won't let live my life one day at a time. Let's say I'm on a diet—a Kason Royce diet."

"So how often do you see him and what do you do?"

"Twice a week, sometimes three times. A lunch now and then when he can get away from his desk. There's a big push at the end of the year in the world of high finance."

"And?"

"And . . . we eat at one fantastic restaurant after another. He's got a box at Lincoln Center and season tickets to everything whether he uses them or not. I had two days off in a row and we flew to Bermuda for a 48 hour getaway. See all these flowers? I could open my own funeral home. Check the refrigerator. Bet you won't recognize some of the chocolates in there. I hardly have room for actual food."

"And?"

"And . . . each evening we spend together ends in atom splitting, planet shifting, nuclear meltdown worthy sex."

"Sleep over?"

"Sometimes, if I don't have to work. Mostly I come home, though. It's a little easier on me. He lives at the Dakota, you know. It's only a dozen blocks."

"How convenient."

"Yes and I see where you're going with that. I thought maybe there was some clever engineering going on with the job, too. At the beginning when Mr. Clemson talked about his grandson being behind the whole computerized book catalog, I thought maybe Kason had pulled some stunt. But last week I actually met Boyd Clemson. He's genuine, and a nice guy, too."

"Looks like you've come to an arrangement that works. Good for you."

"It works . . . to a point. Kason still takes up most of my conscious thought, though. The more I'm with him, the more I want to be with him. But I've got to keep control of it or I'll lose myself like I almost did before. I can't let him make me crazy, Jenn."

"What about other people? Is this thing with Kason exclusive?"

"We've never discussed it. Bizarre, huh? But I think that
exclusive
would definitely fall under the category of some sort of forbidden expectation of commitment."

"Maybe you
should
see someone else. Get a perspective on normal."

"Jenn, other guys aren't even alive to me anymore."

"That's not healthy or fair to you. You think that limiting yourself to seeing Kason a few times a week somehow gives you control but that's an illusion. He runs you just as if he had you 24/7."

"I can't imagine wanting anyone but Kason to touch me."

"Who said anything about touching? But if you don't at least expose yourself to other men, you could be on this merry-go-round with Kason Royce forever. Or at least until he gets tired of you and trades you in on a more cooperative model."

That thought ran cold through my blood. The thought of Kason doing to some other woman the things he did to me was almost unbearable. And that bit of self-discovery brought me up short. Jenn was right, the devil's bargain I had made was an illusion.

"Jenn," I said wretchedly, "I don't know what to do. I'd rather cut off my right arm than never to see him again. But you're right. I think the only thing I've accomplished anything by limiting the time I spend with him is to make me more miserable."

"So, if I may ask, what do you do on the nights you don't go out with Kason?"

"I read. I surf the internet, watch movies."

"Uh-huh."

"I brood?"

"That's a better way of putting it."

"What do you suggest?"

"Sweetie, you're in Manhattan. You're young, you've got plenty of pocket money and everywhere you look there's something to do. Do it! Do something else for a change."

I took Jenn's advice to heart. When Boyd Clemson dropped in the following Thursday, I asked him if he'd like to grab a sandwich at Zabars. I didn't know anything about the guy other than he was a few years older than I, sharp as a tack and really easy on the eyes.

Truthfully, I enjoyed his company. It was a nice change from the intensity I experienced with Kason. Boyd was about as laid-back and easy going as they come. He told me that his family had been in the publishing business for generations but his grandfather had sold the company back in the sixties for a tidy sum. His father had turned his considerable inheritance into a charitable foundation to promote the arts.

"I am what is disdainfully known as a 'trust fund baby'. Gramps putters around his bookstore. I putter around the world. When the trusts were set up, someone unwisely made them big enough to squash any motivation to work, but small enough to prevent any meaningful business investment," he told me over a pastrami sandwich and Dr. Brown's soda.

"You sound happy enough with your life."

"I am! I am content as hell. Kind of like a neutered Tomcat. I've been effectively castrated of ambition so I am free to devote myself to getting fat and complacent."

"You're not at all fat."

"I was speaking metaphorically."

We strolled a few blocks after lunch, digesting and talking Boyd was a big theater buff and enjoyed finding the most obscure off-off Broadway productions.

"I can make a big impact by hooking the unknowns up with Dad's foundation. It makes me happy to do it. I love theater. It's so much more 'real' than film."

I told him about my stint as stage manager for the Mahkeenac Little Theater. "I had a great time. I was amazed at how talented the actors were. I'd never seen any amateur theater before and I was just blown away by how good they were."

"The actors I know aren't paid much more than volunteers anyway. Some of the productions are just a pure labor of love."

Boyd started visiting the shop more frequently after our lunch and I began to look forward to seeing him once or twice a week. He was a self-taught computer whiz kid and helped me over more than one 'bump' in the new catalog system.

"I've always had lots of time and state-of-the-art equipment. Plus, geeky-ness runs in our family," he explained.

Boyd had a girlfriend who was in her last year of college and away in Spain for a semester abroad. That suited me fine. I wasn't interested in him as a potential boyfriend anyway. I just wanted to spend some time with someone who didn't make me crazy like Kason did. When Boyd asked me to pinch hit for a stage manager who'd broken his ankle, I was happy to oblige. I didn't realize it at the time, but my simple favor to my new friend would catapult my relationship to Kason into a brand new dimension.