Casteel 03 Fallen Hearts (4 page)

"Hired just for us," Logan said. I looked at him, wondering if that weren't true.
"That will be all, Donna. Thank you." I watched her leave while Logan went into the bedroom and whistled.
"Talk about bedrooms for a princess," he said again. He was standing by the king-size four-poster bed with an arching canopy of heavy lace.
"And a bed meant for royalty," I teased, taking his hand and drawing him beside me.
He bounced on the mattress. "Great." He got up instantly and went to the large dressing and bathroom area and then wandered in and out of the walk-in closets while I began to get undressed for my shower. "I don't think there's a better honeymoon suite in any hotel in the country," he said.
"Well, I'm not sure, Mr. Stonewall. We'll have to test that out, won't we?" I felt flushed all over. Here was my own husband. I was eager for our marriage to be consummated. Although I was not coming to him a virgin, I was a virgin with him and I longed to know him as my first lover--had longed for that for over ten years. And now here we were, and he seemed nervous, uncertain of how to turn his boyish love for me into the mature passion of a man for a woman. I waited for him to take me in his arms, to prove with his body the love I saw shining through his eyes.
"I sure hope the one in Virginia Beach will be just as fancy!" Logan said. He turned and looked at me, now standing clad only in bra and panties in front of
"Are you going to shower and change?" he asked.
"I thought I'd lie down and rest a bit. Don't you feel a bit tired, sweetheart?" I made my eyes go soft and dreamy, willing him to desire me.
"No, I'm too excited to rest. I think I'll just go down and talk to Tony," he said.
"If that's what you want to do," I said, trying to hide the disappointment in my voice.
He kissed me quickly and left. This wasn't the way I had planned our afternoon. I was longing for him to take me in his arms and to drive away all the ghosts of my love for Troy that haunted this house. I needed to be with him here, only him, my true pure shining springtime love. I needed Logan to prove to me that passion could be found, forever in the arms of my husband. Why did my husband seem more interested in exploring than experiencing the boundless love we felt for each other? I sat down before the vanity and looked at myself in the mirror. Suddenly I had to laugh.
"I can't believe you, Heaven Leigh Stonewall. You're actually jealous of a house. And that's silly, isn't it?" My image in the mirror didn't respond.
After I showered and dressed, I went down the corridor to Jillian's suite of rooms. It had been well over two years since I had left her that day, framed before her arching bay windows, the sunlight pouring through her hair. I had come to despise her and had actually intended never to see her again.
Martha Goodman greeted me in the sitting room. She had been seated in the high-back French Provincial chair just to the right of the door to Jillian's bedroom, knitting. The moment she saw me enter, she smiled and rose to greet me.
"Why, Heaven. It's so good to see you again," she said, extending her hand. "Congratulations on your marriage. Mr. Tatterton told me of your impending arrival."
"Thank you, Martha. How is . . . my
grandmother?" I inquired. "Does she realize I have returned? Does she know I was married?" I asked with some interest.
"Oh, I'm afraid not. Mr. Tatterton did not prepare you for this visit?" she asked. I shook my head. "She's different, Heaven, quite different."
"How so?" I asked.
"It's best you see for yourself," she said, almost in a whisper. "Mrs. Tatterton is at her vanity table, preparing for guests," she added, tilting her round face to the right and nodding sadly.
"Guests?"
"People she says she has invited to watch an old movie in her private little theater."
"I see." I looked toward the bedroom door. "I'd better get this over with," I said and knocked gently on it. After a moment I heard Jillian's voice. She sounded softer, younger, happier.
"Yes?"
I looked at Martha Goodman, who closed her eyes gently and nodded before returning to her chair, and then I entered.
Jillian sat at her marble-top vanity table, dressed in one of her loose-fitting ivory floats trimmed with peach lace. She looked like a circus clown. Her hair was dyed a bright yellow and stuck up in thin, stiff strands. Her face looked like cracked porcelain, her cheeks blotched with bright red rouge. Eyeliner was slashed across her lids, the line drooping at the crinkly corners of her eyes. Her lipstick was thick, vibrant, caked at the corners of her mouth.
But when I looked past her, to her mirror, I saw to my horror a blank oval of bare wall. The gips in the mirror that had once hung over the vanity table had been removed Jillian sat before the empty frame staring into a memory of herself
I looked to her bed and saw dress after dress laid over the quilt. Dozens of pairs of shoes were on the floor beside the bed. Dresser drawers were left open with undergarments and stockings dangling over the sides. All her jewelry boxes were open. Glittering necklaces, bejeweled earrings, diamond and emerald bracelets were scattered over the top of the dresser. The room looked as though it had been ransacked by a madwoman. I didn't know what to do. Jillian had deteriorated far more than even I could have imagined.
Then Jillian spotted me and smiled widely, a demonic smile that made her clownish appearance even more frightening and pathetic.
"Leigh," she said, with forced cheerfulness. "Thank goodness you're here. I'm going absolutely mad trying to decide what to wear today. You know who's coming, don't you?" she added in a loud whisper. She looked about the room as though there were other people within who could hear. "Everybody who's anyone. And they're all coming to see my theater."
"Hello, Grandmother," I said, ignoring her mad ramblings. I thought that if I didn't go along with it, I might snap her out of it. Instead, she sat back and glared at me as though she had heard other words.
"What do you mean, you don't want to attend? I purposely invite influential people to Farthinggale so they and their sons will meet you. You should be interested in boys your own age. It's not healthy for you to . . . to be around only Tony."
"Grandmother, I'm not Leigh," I said. "It's Heaven; it's your granddaughter," I added, stepping farther into the room. "I have gotten married, Grandmother. His name is Logan, Logan Stonewall, and we've come back to Farthy because Tony's making us a gala reception."
She shook her head, obviously not hearing a word I was saying.
"I told you, time and time again, Leigh, not to come to my bedroom half dressed. You're not a child anymore. You can't parade about like that, especially in front of Tony. You should have more self-respect, be more discreet. A lady, a real lady, doesn't do this sort of thing. Now, go finish dressing."
"Jillian." I thought if I used her Christian name, she might acknowledge me. I knew how much she hated being thought of as a grandmother. "Leigh's gone; Leigh's dead," I said softly. "I'm Heaven."
She blinked heavily and pulled herself into a stiffer sitting position.
"This is the last time I will put up with this," she croaked. "You are turning everybody against me. But everybody knows the truth, Leigh, the truth about your vile seductive behavior. Jealous? Me?" she huffed. "Jealous of my own daughter? Ridiculous." She turned and looked into the imaginary mirror and smiled a serene self-confident smile. "You will never be able to compete with my beauty, Leigh, a mature woman's beauty. You're still a child."
She studied herself in the imaginary mirror and then began brushing her hair again. "Yes, I know what you do, Leigh," she continued. "Tony's complained about it and I've seen you do it, so don't try to deny it. Your body's developing. I'm not going to deny that. After all, you're my daughter. You will be beautiful, vibrantly beautiful, and if you listen and work hard on your coiffure and your makeup, take care of yourself the way I do, why, you'll be as beautiful as I am someday." Suddenly she stopped brushing her hair and pounded her brush on the vanity. "What do you expect Tony to do? Of course he'll look at you, but that doesn't mean what you think it means. I've seen you brush your body up against his seductively, oh, yes, I have."
"Jillian "I couldn't believe she was still blaming my mother for all that had happened. "You're mad, old woman, quite mad! My mother never did any of that! It was you! You who caused it all. My mother was pure and innocent! I know she was!" I was shaking with rage. I wouldn't believe my own mother had provoked Tony. Wouldn't, couldn't believe that! "It was your jealousy that killed my mother. Even your madness cannot change that."
She stopped speaking and straightened up sharply.
"Why are you looking at me like that? You never knew I had been following you, did you? You never knew I was there, just outside his door, in the shadows, watching. But I was . . I was. I couldn't bring myself to go in and put an end to it, but I was there. I was there," she whispered.
I stared at her. Could what she was saying be true? Could my mother have seduced Tony? I refused to believe. And yet . . . yet . . . I had seduced Troy. I knew the passion that ran in my blood; was it my mother's passion I had inherited? Perhaps that was what the Reverend Wise had seen in me when he predicted I would destroy all that I love and all who love me.
I rushed out to Martha Goodman, who sat calmly in the high-back chair, knitting.
"You've got to stop her!" I exclaimed. "She's going mad in there, making herself up over and over with layers and layers of rouge and lipstick."
"Oh, she'll get tired soon," Martha said smiling softly. "I'll talk her into her medication, convincing her it's a vitamin that will help keep her young forever, and then I'll scrub her face clean and clean up the mess and she'll take a long nap. Don't worry."
"But doesn't Tony understand how bad she's gotten? Haven't there been doctors?"
"Of course there have, my dear. The doctors recommend she be institutionalized, but Mr. Tatterton won't hear of it. There's no harm. Actually, she's happy most of the time."
"She doesn't remember me, then, does she?" I turned back toward her bedroom.
"Not now, no. She talks about your mother a great deal," Martha said and looked down at her knitting, and I understood that she had overheard much ugly truth in my grandmother's mad babbling.
I left Jillian's suite quickly, actually fleeing from the images she had resurrected. When I returned to our suite, I searched for and found my mother's fat photo album. I studied her school pictures again, hoping to reaffirm my own belief that she was beautiful but innocent, wild but pure. If only for a moment, one moment, I could truly look into those blue eyes, I thought, I would know the truth. But did I want to know it?
"Don't tell me you're still cloistered in these rooms." Logan startled me as he strode into the room. I hadn't realized how long I had been sitting there, thinking about the past. I closed the photo album quickly.
"No," I mumbled. "I spent some time with my grandmother." Then I turned to my husband and put a bright smile on my face. "So, what has Tony shown you?"
"All of it," Logan said, shaking his head with admiration. "All of this paradise called Farthinggale Manor. I can't believe there's an indoor pool! That maze, the lake, those stables, acres and acres of beautiful land, and a private beach."
"Tony gave you the grand tour."
"I'll say. Of course, he's very proud of it, proud of what it is, proud of what he has made of it, and proud of what it can continue to be," Logan added. "He's a fascinating man, shrewd, very clever about business and about politics. I never realized what Tatterton Toys really is until he explained it just now."
"Is that so?" I sat back, a half smile on my face. Logan was acting like a bedazzled little boy.
He smiled and I threw my arms around him and kissed him. It was a long, passionate kiss. His embrace tightened and I felt the tingling that made me press my body closer to his.
"Every time I kiss you," I murmured into his ear, "I remember our first kiss. Remember?"
"Yes. I do remember," he whispered, but I had been the forward one. He had walked me home and stood there on the trail. I was so thrilled with the way he had fought for me that day that I couldn't wait for him to get up enough nerve to take me into his arms.
"You said, 'Logan, would it be all right and not too much like Fanny if I kissed you just once for being so exactly what I want?' And then you kissed me, but so passionately. . ."
I turned away from him.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing," I said. Then I gave him my most seductive smile.
"We have some time before dinner," I cooed flirtatiously.
"To start the honeymoon," he added, smiling widely, licentiously.
"Oh, Logan, I . . ."
He took me into his arms and kissed me. Then he began to undress me. I closed my eyes and let the sensuality of his touch erase all my thoughts. I let myself go completely to the will of our bodies together.
As Logan and I moved beside each other his kisses and caresses pulled me down into a sea of tenderness. And when he entered my body, the light of his love chased away all the shadows of my dark forbidden love. This was how it would be now, Logan and Heaven, Logan touching me, Logan kissing me, Logan caressing me, Logan making love to me with such tenderness. Not the wild forbidden passion I had known with Troy, not the sort of all-consuming love that made the world disappear and left you clinging only to love like a life raft in a turbulent sea, but the safe, gentle, lapping waves of love that were comfortable, soothing, like a warm pond in summer, like my life with Logan was meant to be.
Afterward, Logan fell asleep curled in my arms. In the dim haze of twilight I looked around me. Here I was, again at Farthy, having just made love to my husband. Years ago, within these walls, had my mother pressed her young body just as eagerly against her mother's husband to begin my maddening existence?
I closed my eyes. I understood how it was that ghosts lived on. They lived on in us, haunted us by making us thirst for the same things. My mother lived on in my desires. But my desires were pure, wholesome, for now I desired only my husband and would never desire anyone else. I nestled against Logan's warm, peaceful, sleeping body.

WHEN I AWOKE THE NEXT MORNING LOGAN WAS GONE. THE sun through the window sheers awakened me, and I turned to my new husband for morning hugs and kisses, only to be greeted by an empty pillow. "Logan?" I called. I quickly leapt from the bed and ran to the bathroom, tapping gently on the door. "Logan?" No sound greeted me, no rushing shower, no sweet morning songs from a happy husband at his morning ablutions. When I was a little girl, I always dreamed of the happy morning scene of my husband shaving, while I sat on the tub watching his masculine rituals. And already that morning had been stolen from me--and on the first morning of my honeymoon! And I thought I knew who had stolen it--the one who seemed to want always to steal my love and keep it for himself alone--Tony.