Читать книгу Playing With Fire - Carrie Alexander, Carrie Alexander - Страница 9

“IT WAS LIKE a fever dream,” Lara said, closing her eyes as the previous evening spun through her thoughts, a series of colorful, blurred pImages** anchored by the dark, solid presence that was Daniel. “Psychedelic. Unreal. I couldn’t grasp it.”

“Bah! You weaseled out.” Bianca Spinelli soaped her hands at the sink in her grand charivari of a kitchen. The walls were chili-pepper-red, the cabinets guacamole-green, the clay tiles on the floor and countertops all the wonderful variegated umber shades of a sunbaked Mother Earth. Folk painting in primary colors formed a border around the room. Numerous pieces of stained glass glittered in the only window. For Lara the gaudiness was both welcoming and inspiring.

“I didn’t weasel out,” she said. “It was—well, it was happening too fast.” She sat on a tipsy stool beside the breakfast bar, on the opposite side of the cheerfully crowded living area that had been fashioned out of the back half of Bianca’s art-glass studio. Double swinging doors divided the front from the back, though not so anyone would notice. The entire space was an unofficial Grand Central Station for every glass artist and creative type on Avenue B.

Lara put a black olive between her front teeth, bit it neatly in half and swallowed the salty pieces whole. Daniel lives in the East Village. Only a few streets away. The coincidence was disturbing, especially after she’d pegged him for the stuffy five-thou-per-month Central Park condominium type. Aware that he was taking shape for her, becoming more than just the prize in a sexual game, she wondered what else there was to discover about him.

“Too fast? Eh. You never were the slow-lane type—” Bianca shot her a sour look “—until recently.”

Lara grimaced. “All right, it’s true. I got scared.” By my own daring…and his.

Wiping her fingers with a napkin, she paused to admire the way she’d arranged an immense platter of antipasto. There were plump mushrooms, eggplant and tomato slices, zucchini flowers and sticks, roasted bell peppers, several varieties of sausage and thick creamy chunks of mozzarella, mortadella and provolone cheese. In addition, she’d sliced up a sweet, juicy melon and started a pan of leftover risotto warming on the stove.

Friends and customers—one and the same, in Bianca’s book—would soon begin dropping in for a nosh, a cup of wine, good conversation or a rousing debate. Mornings were reserved for Bianca’s solo studio time; afternoons, she opened up the shop, taught classes and ran what Lara referred to as either the salon or, for those times when the music was loud and the wine was truly flowing, the cantina.

Bianca had returned to scrubbing her hands free of traces of the chemical solvents used in glasswork. “You see?” she said, shaking her black wavy hair over the sink. “Moving to the upstate wilds has done you no good, Lara. Remember the days when you kept a string of men on call as need demanded? You had no qualms about…um…managing them.”

“Daniel’s different.”

“Oh? How so?”

“He’s a grown-up.” Lara unhooked her feet from the rungs and drew them up so she sat cross-legged, perched atop the stool like a stork. “Me, too. In those good old days you mention, I was newly graduated, ready to take the Manhattan art world by storm, or so I believed. I was young and crazy and rebellious. I thought independence equaled indiscriminate adventure.” In fact, she’d been trying to imitate Bianca, her mentor. “Now that I’m thirty, I’ve outgrown casual sex.” Despite their accelerated attraction, she knew that sex with Daniel would not be casual. It would be cataclysmic.

“A shame.” Bianca grinned. “Casual grown-up sex is even better.” She flung her expressive hands in the air, sending droplets flying. “Dio mio! Until a man is forty, he knows nothing about how to please a woman in bed. You don’t know what you’re missing.”

“I’m not celibate,” Lara argued, laughing. “I just didn’t want to rush. And Daniel’s thirty-six.”

“Bosh. You’re a fool to pass up such chemistry.”

“I have not passed it up. Merely postponed it.”

“Chemistry, chemistry,” Bianca sang, doing vigorous battle with a hand towel. “Good chemistry is like catching lightning in a bottle. Don’t miss out because of this silly game of yours.”

Lara smiled. “Daniel found the game provocative, I’m certain. I did tell you about the surprise I left in his pocket.”

Bianca enjoyed her own laughter so much it was contagious. “Yes, that was good.” She chortled. “And so naughty of you. I’m proud, chica. My Jennifer Lopez dress works every time, even when you insist on wearing it backwards.”

A huge smile broke across Lara’s face. “After that stunt, he’s sure to find me.”

Bianca sobered. “But how?”

“Oh, I’m sure he has resources. He met Kensington, so he might think of asking at the gallery.”

“Would they send him here? Ai-yee, I hope so. This man, I must see.”

“I don’t know. It depends how persistent he is.” Very, she thought. If she knew anything about Daniel, that was it. The intense ray-gun heat of his eyes was not characteristic of a laid-back man. “The gallery doesn’t hand out information to every guy off the street. And I go home tomorrow. Daniel may have to continue the hunt there.”

“The hunt?”

Lara wiggled her hips; the stool rocked. She grabbed the tiled edge of the counter. “Yes. He’s a hunter.”

“And you…?”

“Blame it on the chemistry,” she said with a lick of her lips. “I am dying to be caught.”

“But not encaged, hmm?”

“Nor engaged,” Lara said drolly. Bianca scowled.

Lara squared her shoulders. “You know how I feel about that.” She’d decided early on that she was the go-it-alone type. She couldn’t see subordinating her independent desires for the security of a marriage ring, as her mother and sister had done.

“Lovers, yes. Love, no. Marriage, never.” Bianca leaned her elbows on the breakfast bar, put her chin on her hands and stared broodingly into the spirals of food Lara had arranged in the pattern of a nautilus shell.

Despite the glum expression, Bianca looked as beautiful and exotic as a bird of paradise. Bright clothing, plenty of makeup, gold hoop earrings large enough to touch her shoulders. Lara had been strongly influenced by her mentor’s style and attitude, and was grateful for that. She might have turned out like her sister otherwise.

“Bianca?” she coaxed. “You’ve always agreed that I am smart to guard my freedom.”

“In your experimental twenties, yes.” Bianca pulled on her lower lip. “But one grows up and begins to appreciate the advantages of settling for stability.”

“You’re forty and you haven’t settled.”

“Forty-one. And I have become an old woman.” With a groan, she banged the heel of her palm against her forehead.

“Ha!” Lara had done her best to acquire a portion of Bianca Spinelli’s zest for life. It was a matter of attitude, not age. Of finding your bliss, to be Oprah-ish about it.

“There’s nothing like an energetic eighteen-month-old to make a woman feel ancient,” Bianca said, hoisting her daughter off the floor. She plopped little Rosa into a high chair, buckled her in and scooped a handful of crayons off the floor. “Try the yellow one, cara mia. In this house, we don’t need the dingy old grays and browns.”

Rosa gurgled happily, reaching for the stubby crayons.

“You adore being a mother,” said Lara.

“Of course.” Bianca took a dozen bright blue and pink and green ceramic plates of various sizes from an open cabinet. Nearly every item in her house and studio was colorful and handmade; she bartered with an extensive circle of artsy-craftsy friends. Lara had followed the cue in her own home, though she preferred earthen shades.

Bianca petted her daughter’s curly crop of flame-red hair. “Listen, don’t tell the bambina, but there are nights I miss my club-hopping escapades. My soul still yearns to dance even when my feet are dragging.” Suddenly she picked up Rosa, chair and all, and swung her around the kitchen. Crayons flew. “Once I was Queen of the Discotheque. Now, I dance barefoot in the kitchen with my little bay-bee-yeee!” Rosa giggled in delight.

Lara played along as Bianca danced, laughing and clapping to encourage the frivolity that was so dear to her heart.

Fourteen years ago, she’d wandered into Bianca’s little shop as an aimless teenager, having been harshly disabused of a childish notion that she could become as great a painter as her father. The flamboyant older woman had welcomed Lara with open arms, soothed her wounded pride and started her on a beginner’s pattern of stained glass that very day. The resulting piece was uneven and bumpy and amateurish, yet it still hung in Bianca’s kitchen window. Whereas the crayon drawings Lara had executed at her father’s feet were dissected for line, perspective and color sense, then discarded.

Staggering, Bianca set the high chair beside Lara’s stool. “You see? I’m out of breath.” She put her hands on her hips and bent slightly, panting. “I’ve become an old woman.”

“You need a lover, is all. A new romance would perk you right up again. And soon restore your stamina.”

“A man is easy enough to find.” Bianca waved a hand in casual dismissal. “It’s the reliable baby-sitter that’s a tough get.”

“Ooh-lo-lo,” Rosa burbled. She waved a chubby hand, looking so like her mother despite the Titian hair, that Lara had to plant a kiss on the child’s forehead.

“Ah, the mother’s eternal lament,” she said. “Listen, Bianca, why don’t I stay home tonight with Rosa?” She snapped her fingers for the little girl’s amusement. “You go out and have a good time. The bambina’s stuffy nose seems to have cleared.” Rosa had been congested the evening before, putting the kibosh on their plans to attend the restaurant opening together. For all her casual ways, Bianca was a devoted mother.

“Oh. I don’t know.” Peripherally, Lara glimpsed her friend’s covert calculations. “What about your hunter?” Bianca asked ultracasually.

“He probably won’t show. You may have the entire evening to go out and find yourself a dashing young lover. I doubt it’ll take even that long.” Men of all ages were attracted to Bianca. She oozed a warm sensuality that was like honey to bees.

For a woman who’d just complained about slowing down, Bianca was strangely hesitant to take Lara up on the offer. Lara, guessing why, aimed her knowing smile at the toddler. There had been a time when her mentor was indeed the Queen of the Discotheque. In fact, they’d both taken Manhattan nightlife by storm. Bianca’s single motherhood and Lara’s rededication to her art and the resulting move out of the city had altered them both.

“Unless you’ve already made plans?” Lara cooed at Rosa, abandoning finger snaps for patty-cake.

“No plans.” Bianca spun away. “You know how I feel about being pinned down by schedules. I go where the wind takes me. Rosa was born with a kite string instead of an umbilical cord.”

Lara didn’t let herself be distracted. “What about all that talk of settling and stability?”

“Achh. Did I say that?”

“You did.”

“Then I didn’t mean it.”

“We are both getting older.”

“Mature,” said Bianca, reaching for a bottle of red wine.

“Perhaps you should…” Lara hesitated. How could she convince Bianca it was okay to fall in love and marry when she herself had no intention of doing either? The assurances would be hypocritical, and Bianca would know it. She’d seen Lara through too many gripe sessions about the constriction of women’s role in marriage and the perfidy of husbands to be fooled now.

Bianca pulled a corkscrew out of an earthenware pot. Her glance was sharp. “Perhaps, what?”

Lara swallowed. “You could admit you’re already in—”

The shop doorbell chimed. “Buon giorno!” a male voice with a bad Italian accent called from the storefront, and Bianca’s face lit up like the Rockefeller Plaza Christmas tree. Total admission, Lara thought, if only Bianca had been looking in a mirror to see it.

Eddie Frutt came through the swinging doors, holding a bunch of sunflowers in one hand and a square envelope in the other. A large, shambling, redheaded man, he possessed a rapidly enlarging bald spot that he’d been passing off as a receding hairline for one too many years. Bianca called him Old Baldy, but kissed the top of his head every time she passed his chair on her way to the kitchen.

Eddie, who owned a shoe store across the street, greeted Bianca with a smooch. He did a sloppy Fred Astaire twirl and handed the flowers to Rosa, then waved the envelope at Lara. “I ran into a courier out front. This is for you. I want a hug in return.”

“Of course.” Lara went to him and was enveloped by his big, cushy body and strong arms. He smelled of leather and the peppermints he kept in a brandy snifter by his register. “It’s been too long.”

“Enough, Eduardo,” Bianca complained. “You’re smothering the girl.”

Eddie whispered, “She’s jealous,” to Lara, then stretched out an arm and snared Bianca into the embrace, snuggling them to his chest until Rosa yelled, “Frower!” and smacked her tray with the bouquet. Exclaiming in spicy Italian, Bianca ran to rescue the flowers while Eddie turned aside, muttering over the corkscrew. Amidst the chaos, Lara ended up with the envelope. It was inscribed across the front with her name.

Unsuspecting, she tore it across the flap and took out a plain card with an embossed border. It read, “Tonight.”

And that was all.

Daniel’s face flashed before her. He was smiling in invitation, and his eyes were the color of pussywillows, velvety with seduction. The man was pure temptation. Sex incarnate.

All the blood drained from Lara’s face.

Tonight, she thought, strung taut with anticipation.

One word was enough.

“THERE’S A LIMO,” Eddie Frutt bellowed from the storefront. “A limo for Lara!”

“A limo, a limo for Lara,” echoed the group gathered around the long farmhouse table. The elegant white-haired woman stationed by the bedroom door passed on the word. “Your limo has arrived, Miss Gladstone.” Genevieve peered through her half-moon glasses and gave a small shake of her head, looking appalled. “No. Not the red leather. Try the plain black shoes with the chains. You’ll look like an S and M Holly Golightly.”

“Did Daniel come to the door?” Lara said, hopping on one foot as she changed shoes. Bianca’s bed was occupied with onlookers. Getting Lara ready for her big date had turned into a neighborhood event.

The question was relayed to Eddie, who guarded the front door like a concerned father. The answer made its way back via Genevieve, who had once been an editor at Vogue and now ran a vintage clothing store in Little Italy. With an unerring fashion instinct, she’d supplied Lara’s dress.

“No Daniel. Just the chauffeur.”

“Ooh, a chauffeur,” said one of the gang on the bed. “How bourgeois,” chimed another voice. “But fun,” said a third.

Bianca handed over a silver beaded purse, another loaner since Lara hadn’t come to New York expecting to be swept off her feet. They embraced. Lara said, “You’re sure it’s okay for me to leave after I offered to baby-sit—”

Bianca grabbed her face and smacked a kiss upon both cheeks. “Go. Have a good time.” She pushed Lara toward the door, clearing discarded shoes and trampled scarves with a sweep of her foot. “Gah, I feel just like a mother sending her daughter to the prom!”

A smattering of applause broke out when Lara was paraded through the living space. Eddie enveloped her in another of his big hugs when she reached the studio. “But something’s missing,” he said worriedly, holding her out to look her over. “Little black dress. Gloves. Pearls. Bow in the hair. I know. The sunglasses. I might be balding and middle aged, but I saw Breakfast at Tiffany’s too, ya know.”

“Sunglasses at night? That’s overkill,” Bianca said. “You have no subtlety, Eddie.”

He made a comical face. “Isn’t that the point?”

“I knew it.” Lara tore the silly black silk bow out of her hair, leaving in the rhinestone pins. “We’ve gone over the top.”

“No, no, leave the gloves,” Bianca urged as Lara went out the door, tugging at them.

The chauffeur waited at the curb, holding the door open on a long black limo. Lara stopped. Her stomach did a flip. She turned back to Bianca and Eddie, who were watching arm in arm from the lighted doorway, along with the crowd pressing behind them and up against the studio windows.

I can’t back out with everyone watching, Lara thought, bolstering herself. The front of the glass studio was painted with bright, boisterous graffiti that distracted from the chipped cement and gritty windows. The place was on the shabby side of humble, but it was her safe home in the city, far more comforting than her parent’s expensive town house in Gramercy Park.

“I don’t know this guy from Adam,” she blurted. “I don’t even know his last name. What am I doing, getting into his limo? This is crazy.” She offered up a smile, recognizing the drama. “Crazy, I tell you!”

Eddie’s brows knitted. “Maybe she’s right….”

“Savage, ma’am,” said the driver. “Daniel Savage. I have his address for you. He said you might be concerned.”

“Oh. That was thoughtful of him.” She took the card and stepped over to press it into Bianca’s hand with a hollow laugh. “In case I disappear, you’ll know where to start looking.”

“This is romantic,” Bianca reassured her. “Don’t look so worried.” She pinched one of Eddie’s love handles so he’d stop frowning. “You’re going off with a chauffeur, not a white slaver.”

Lara muttered, “Uh, yeah, thanks for bringing that up,” but she allowed the driver to escort her into the car. It was luxurious, with a tastefully done interior of soft gray leather and burled walnut. As the limo slipped away into traffic, she turned and waved to Bianca and Eddie and all the rest, who were cheering—or jeering, given their individual levels of cynicism—as they watched her go. She stripped off the gloves as soon as she was beyond Bianca’s scope.

All well-equipped limos had ice buckets. In this one, a freshly opened bottle of champagne nestled into a bed of crushed ice. A thin trail of vapor curled from the bottle’s neck, inviting her to partake. Lara reached for the crystal flute, then decided that she was tipsy enough without aid. Tonight she’d need her wits about her.

A florist’s paper cone rested on the seat beside her. She picked it up and peeled back foil and tissue. Calla lilies. Beautiful. They were strong flowers, sleek and smooth and assured.

“Me, too,” she said, stroking a lily, glossy on one side, soft on the other. “For tonight, me too.”

A minute later, she realized that the limo wasn’t leaving the East Village. She’d expected to rendezvous with Daniel at an expensive restaurant, but instead they were pulling up to an area of typical side-by-side row houses, the fronts flushed a rosy gray in the dimming light. The process of gentrification had recently struck. Or possibly stalled out. Most of the houses were nothing special—grimy two-and three-flats, showing their age. Several had been renovated and upgraded with freshly painted trim and handsome matching urns at the stoop.

The limo circled twice, looking for a parking spot. A flotsam of vehicles clogged the streets. Even the illegal spots were taken, though the fire hydrant would soon be clear because one unlucky soul’s car was being towed.

“Ma’am, I’m sorry,” the driver said at last, giving up on his only possibility—six empty feet between an oxidized red Trans Am and a rusty Buick. “I’m going to have to let you out on the street.”

“That’ll do,” Lara said, smiling at her pretentions. So much for Cinderella’s stylish arrival at the ball. “Just point me in the right direction.”

“I’ll do better than that.” Disregarding traffic, he put the limo in park and stepped outside. Lara hurriedly scooted across the seat as horns blared.

“Move the effing car,” yelled a burly, tattooed guy, obviously practiced at leaning on his horn and flipping the bird simultaneously. Not a talent singular to New Yorkers, but one they’d clearly perfected.

Despite the increasing chorus of complaint, the chauffeur insisted on escorting Lara past the trash at the curb and up the steps of her destination. He rang the doorbell, muttered an apology, then raced back to the limo just in time to shoo away a wino with his eye on the silver ice bucket.

Which was why Lara was laughing when the door opened.

Daniel—Daniel Savage, she thought with pleasure—smiled at her, his eyes burnished like pewter in the soft glow of the entry light.

“You came,” he said. “I’m so pleased.”

She sobered, puckering her lips into a flirtatious moue even though she was kinda sorta awestruck inside. “What girl refuses a limo?”

“And you’re so very beautiful,” he continued as if mesmerized, “I think I’m forced to kiss you.”

Her eyes widened, but in the next instant she was in his embrace and his lips were on hers, kissing the pucker right out of them. It happened too fast for her to react. No time to savor the flavor of his warm mouth. No time to absorb the woodsy, masculine scent of him. No time to appreciate the sensation of being pressed against his wide, hard chest.

He kissed her quickly but fully, and then he was drawing her inside the close, dim entry of the brick row house and she was looking around, gaze darting like a chickadee, landing everywhere but on his face. The dark woodwork needed refinishing. A jagged crack ran though the only window—a small, square, stained-glass panel near the door. The limited space was crammed with mailboxes, crumpled takeout flyers, inline skates, hats, jackets and a bike frame that had been stripped of its wheels.

“You live here?” she said, incredulous, his kiss burning on her lips.

“A humble abode, but mine own.” To one side was a long narrow staircase that turned back on itself when it reached the second floor. On the right a door opened off the foyer, emanating light and warmth and cooking smells. Daniel shut the front door and herded her toward the open one. “Let’s take our kisses privately for a change, shall we?”

She arched her brows. “I’m making no promises.” But her body said otherwise. It had reacted instinctively to his.

He put his hand on her shoulder, pausing her at the threshold. “You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to.”

That’s just it, she thought. I want to do it. I want to do…

She looked into Daniel’s molten eyes. Everything.

“Then no dishes for me,” she joshed, her throat too dry to laugh.

His hand skimmed to her waist. “I never make my guests do dishes.”

“Even if they stay all night?”

“Hmm…” He smiled slightly. “If you’re planning to stay all night, then I guess you can help me.” His mouth lowered to her ear and with a flick of his tongue against her lobe he set her teardrop earrings swinging. “To make the bed.”

She shivered, sliding him a provocative glance beneath lowered lids. “If that’s to be the case, Daniel, I’d much rather help you unmake it.”