“Lily-child,” Fazire spoke and started to float and Lily knew what that meant and she was having none of it.
Lily shook her head and when she heard Tash cooing to Mrs. Gunderson somewhere in the house, she said one word to Fazire, knowing he’d know what she meant, “Tash.”
Then she ran, ran out the front door, ran down the street, ran passed the pier, along the seafront path, straight to the bandstand and stopped. She stopped her feet, her heart and her thoughts and she started walking, fast, breathing heavily, making her body work hard so her mind wouldn’t. She walked until she felt she would drop then she turned toward home.
Later that night, when Fazire and Tash were both asleep, she tried Nate again.
He answered his mobile and in the background she heard what sounded like a busy club or restaurant.
“What is it Lily?” he asked instead of greeting her, obviously seeing her name displayed before answering his phone.
“I just wanted to say –” she began tentatively, not sure what she wanted to say but needing to say it all the same.
Then she heard, in a purring, female voice that was very close to the phone, “Nate, our table’s ready.”
Nate didn’t even try to cover the mouthpiece when he responded, “In a minute, Georgia.”
Lily’s legs buckled from under her and powerless to stop herself, she dropped and sat on the bed. It felt like it took a year for her to turn her head and look at the clock on the bedside table.
It was passed ten at night and Nate was out with Georgia, his old girlfriend, a woman Jeffrey had thought he was ready to marry. He was away from Lily the week before their wedding, in London, out on the town with another woman.
“Lily.” She heard her name sound in her ear as if from far away but she had herself together enough to note that Nate’s voice sounded impatient.
“It –” she cleared her throat, her body numb, her mind blank and she had no idea her voice betrayed exactly how broken she felt, “it’s nothing, Nate. Enjoy yourself.”
Then she’d pressed the button to hang up even as she heard him start to say her name again.
Her mobile rang in her hand almost immediately but she opened and closed it, disconnecting Nate without a word. Then she turned it off. The house phone rang and she picked it up out of its bed, hit the button for on then hit the button for off and then on again, listening to the insistent ring tone until it grew urgent and even longer and then it was silenced. Then she rolled on her side in the bed, pulled the pillow over her head and again, keeping her thoughts at bay with an extreme effort of will, she cried herself to sleep which was, she was realising, the only way she could get to sleep.
The following morning at the store, Maxie cornered her.
“What on earth is going on?”
It took effort but Lily lifted her eyes to Maxine’s. “Nothing,” she lied through her teeth. “Why do you ask?”
“Why do I… why…?” Maxie spluttered. “You’re marrying your dream man in two days and you look like hell. I’m sorry to say it but you do. You look pale, your eyes are all puffy. You should know, Fazire called me –”
“Don’t listen to Fazire. He doesn’t know what’s going on,” Lily broke in.
“Do you know what’s going on?” Maxie flashed back.
Lily responded automatically, “Nate’s an important man, a lot of people depend on him. He hasn’t had a holiday…” Lily stopped.
She had no idea when he’d last had a holiday. She had no idea about a lot of things about Nate.
What she did know was that he was guarded. What she did know was that he had secrets. What she did know was that, eight years ago he demanded that she move in and then promised her the world. Two weeks later, when she needed him the most, he broke all his promises and let her go. Now, eight years later, the same thing happened with slight differences. And, two months later…
What?
He’d warned her, she knew. He’d kept himself removed. He’d kept his distance. He’d planned for a time when she wouldn’t be in his life, nearly told her there would be a time but, besotted fool that she was, believing in genies and dreams and wishes, she hadn’t listened.
For the first time in years, she felt her confidence lying about her in tatters. She felt that she hadn’t lived up to whatever promise Nate had seen in her when he got her back. That this brilliant, rich, sophisticated, impossibly handsome man could never find what he needed in her.
Never.
“Just, please, Maxie. Let’s not talk about this. I’m getting a headache,” Lily finished on another lie something she was doing with alarming frequency these days.
Maxine bustled up close and looked Lily in the eyes. “Don’t give me that headache business, I know something’s not right and –”
Before she could finish, Lily’s mobile rang. It was sitting, face-up on the counter and both Maxie and Lily’s eyes swung to it.
The display said, “Nate Calling.”
Both Lily and Maxie reached for it. Luckily Lily got to it first for she knew Maxie, in her current mood, would probably make hideous matters far, far worse.
Lily hopped off her stool and swiftly rounded the counter, flipping open her phone and putting it to her ear.
“Nate?” she answered.
“Don’t you ever fucking hang up on me again and turn off the phones.”
Lily halted dead in her getaway from Maxie as Nate’s furious words hit her ear, his rage vibrating through her body like a lethal current.
He was the one who was out with an ex-girlfriend. He was the one who humiliated her on her own family room couch or, more to the point his, he’d bought it, but still, it was in her house and she hadn’t had the old one carted away. He was the one who was sneaking cigarettes in the garden at midnight. He was the one who wasn’t speaking to her. He was the one who was tearing her heart to shreds.
Lily could take it no more, she snapped.
“How dare you!” she shouted into the phone.
“You have my daughter in that house and if something happened, I couldn’t get through. You kept her from me for seven years, Lily. Don’t you ever play that fucking game again.”
Lily’s body went rock solid and she fired back, “I cannot believe you just said that to me.”
He ignored her. “I’ll be home tonight.”
“Don’t bother,” Lily retorted acidly.
“I’ll be home tonight,” he repeated then he hung up on her.
Lily stood with the phone to her ear, anger, humiliation and pain coursing through her so strongly, it took long moments before she realised Maxine was standing right in front of her.
When Lily’s eyes focussed on her, Maxine looked no longer angry and determined to get to the heart of the matter, Maxine looked scared.
“What just happened, sweetling?” she asked, her voice soft, gentle, coaxing.
At her friend’s tone, the fight slid out of Lily and her vision dissolved as tears flooded her eyes. Maxine’s arms went around her, holding her tight.
“I don’t know,” she whispered. “I don’t know.” Then she repeated it again, then again.
“Hush, sweetling. Hush,” Maxine murmured and stroked her hair.
When Lily pulled herself together, Maxine gave her a lilac, lace-edged handkerchief to dry her eyes and let the matter drop but the frightened look never left her face.
By the time Lily got home, terrified that Nate would already be there, her lie about the headache had come true. It wasn’t a migraine but it was close.
Fazire, she noticed immediately, was blustering and ready to blow but he took one look at her and, as he’d done countless times before, he ushered her to her room. He got her a cool drink, some tablets, ran her bath and then kept Natasha occupied so she wouldn’t miss her mother while Lily battled the pain.
Lily took the pain killers, took her bath, closed the curtains and went to bed with a cool flannel at her brow, fighting against the headache until the medicine worked and she
finally found sleep.
“Lily?” It was Nate’s voice, gentle, questioning and she thought for a moment she was dreaming.
Then she opened her eyes and saw his muscular thigh on the bed. Of course Nate noticed immediately she was awake, even though she’d closed her eyes nearly as quickly as she’d opened them.
“Fazire says you have a headache.” Nate’s voice was so soft, he was talking in a way that it seemed he thought his words were alive and could cause her harm.
“I’m fine.” Lily kept her eyes closed and her voice neutral.
“Is it a migraine?” Nate asked and she felt his fingers tucking her hair behind her ear.
Lily squeezed her eyes tight at his soft, sweet, familiar touch and the pain shot back into her temple so she was forced to train her body to relax.
She couldn’t keep up with him and she didn’t have the strength to try. She suspected that even though he’d lost interest in her, he didn’t want the mother of his child’s brain to explode.
“I’m fine, Nate. It’s not a migraine.” She lifted her hand to the flannel, threw it aside and turned so her back was to him, all this she did without looking at him. “Go to Tash. She misses you.”
“Can I get you anything?” He’d not been deterred by her turning her back to him, now he was stroking her from neck to waist, pushing the covers out of the way to do so. She wanted to move into his hand, wanted it so much she could taste it in her mouth, feel it in every pore of her skin. Instead, she steeled herself against it.
“No. Like I said, I’m fine.”
“Lily –”
“Go away, Nate.” She wanted to sound exasperated but instead she sounded something else and even to her own ears, she was pretty certain she sounded defeated.
He didn’t go and he also didn’t say anything more. What he did was shift on the bed so he could sit and stroke her back. She held her body tense. Feeling the tears in her throat, she swallowed them down. She was no match for his attention (this was Nate) and slowly, her body relaxed, and, finally, she fell back to sleep.
When she woke again, it was the dead of night. Nate’s front was pressed to her back, his arm was wrapped tight around her and he’d buried his face in her hair.
Lily laid there a second, allowing herself, for one last time, to pretend.
Then she pulled away, got up and quietly exited the room. After missing dinner, she found she was hungry and made herself a sandwich. Then she went to the family room, turned on the TV and ate. She didn’t watch the TV, however. Her mind was on other things. It was on her beautiful house, her beautiful appliances and furniture, her beautiful new car, her bank account filled with more money than she could ever spend.
Nate had done an excellent job. She could live without him and, in doing so, give their daughter a beautiful home, drive her around in an expensive car and make certain she had everything her little heart desired.
He hadn’t been angry that, in her turning off the phones, he couldn’t get through to her if something had happened.
It had all been for Tash, she realised, pain and bitterness searing through her.
All of it.
In fact, she wouldn’t be surprised if he had told Danielle to tell her he was dead all those years ago, tired of the naïve, clinging farm girl and ready to cut her loose. She’d probably been an interesting diversion, an inexperienced virgin. Men liked that. But once he’d got what he wanted, the interesting part obviously became not so interesting.
But finding that he had a child and also finding that Lily was going to put up a fight, a fight that it would be difficult for him to win (considering what she now convinced herself was his behaviour, his lies, his deceit, just like his brother and sister), he went about winning it another way.
And he enjoyed the spoils of victory in the meantime.
But when she’d told him she loved him, that was something he didn’t need, didn’t want and immediately and remorselessly, he threw it away.
Now that she knew her place, now that he’d made it blatantly clear with that debacle in the very room she was lounging in at that moment, he knew he had her where he wanted her. He’d hold her in the night, take from her when he wanted and leave her when he didn’t.
She was still nothing but a naïve, Indiana farm girl and not for the likes of him except for the tedious fact that she was the mother of his child.
Understanding this made it easier, she told herself (but she didn’t really believe herself). She knew where she stood. She knew why he wouldn’t give her what she needed, why he wouldn’t give her anything of himself.
Because it wasn’t hers to have.
Maybe, she hoped, one day he’d give it to Tash.
On this thought, she fell asleep on the couch only to be woken what seemed like minutes late, because she was being lifted in the air.
Automatically, her hands moved around Nate’s shoulders.
“What…?” she began, vaguely noticing he’d turned off the television and the light.
“You sleep with me.” Nate’s voice was back to harsh, gone was the softness he’d shown her when she had the headache.
“I don’t think –” she started again as he cleared the room and headed for the stairs. She tried to push out of his arms but they went tight as steel bands.
“You sleep with me,” he repeated, again roughly and in a tone that would accept no denial.
“Let me down,” Lily demanded and he did, on the ground level landing but he took her hand and dragged her up the next two flights of stairs. As they were close to Fazire and Tash’s rooms, Lily didn’t make a peep and didn’t pull away.
Once they were in their room, he closed the door and dragged her straight to bed where he brought them both to a halt.
“I don’t understand why you –” Lily turned to him but he interrupted her again.
“What will Tash think if she sees you sleeping on the couch?” Nate snapped.
It felt like he’d punched her in the stomach and at the same time, her heart shattered.
“Of course,” she murmured, “Tash.”
It was all for Tash. Looking back at the last two months, she knew that everything he did was for Tash. A mother and father, living together, for Tash.
She made her decision. Surprisingly this time it wasn’t difficult.
She yanked her hand from his and crawled into bed on his side where he’d stopped them, making her way to her own and settling, her back to him.
He joined her in bed, flicked the covers over them and hooked her about the waist, dragging her across the bed and into the warmth of his body.
She tried to pull away but in her ear, he hissed, “Lie still.”
“Tash doesn’t care how we sleep, Nate,” Lily snapped back, her tone bitter. She gave an almighty pull and slid away. Then she waited, tense, for him to pull her back.
He didn’t.
She didn’t fall asleep but she heard (she thought, but she was wrong) when he did. Then, hours later, when it was time, she got up, took her clothes, her makeup and everything she needed and locked herself in the bathroom and didn’t come out until she was ready to face the day and to face Nate.
When she opened the bathroom door, it was Nate who was pacing. He was wearing dark blue pyjama bottoms, what he’d been wearing last night when he’d dragged her to bed, and he was pulling a hand through his hair.
Upon the door opening, he stopped and swung to her. His hand didn’t fall but stayed at the back of his neck and he stared at her. Not like she was a bug under his scrutiny, not blank, not detached, but she couldn’t tell what she read on his face and she no longer cared. She tried not to care about how beautiful he was, standing there with his muscular chest, tight stomach, black hair, dark, intense eyes and powerful frame but she couldn’t. Perhaps, she thought distractedly, with practice she’d be able to do that. One day.
His eyes looked her up and down and then settled on hers and they stared at each other what seemed hours but was probably minutes
.
Finally, he dropped his arm.
“We have to talk,” he told her.
She shook her head and walked into the room, dumping her cosmetics on her dressing table, she turned to him.
“The time for talking is over,” she replied, feeling strangely that even though it had been only a few days since the time she would have begged him to talk to her, did beg him to talk to her, it felt like forever ago. She walked to the door but he stopped her with a hand on her arm, his fingers closing around it painfully as he swung her to face him.
“You’re going to listen to me,” he demanded.
She yanked her arm away and when he moved to regain hold, she clipped in a horrible voice, a voice she’d never heard pass her lips in her life, “Don’t you touch me.”
At her tone, Nate went completely still.
Lily went on, speaking in that voice. “I’m going to marry you tomorrow like you want, for Tash. I’ll sleep in the same bed with you and we’ll pretend we’re a cosy family. You can go to London and do whatever you need to do with whatever women there you need to do it with and I’ll…” she faltered, not knowing what to say, then rallied and told him honestly, “Do without.”
“Lily –” he broke in but she kept going.
“I’ve done it before, I’ll do it again. This will be fine. It’ll all be fine and Tash will never know.”
“Listen to me –”
“She’ll never know!” Lily spoke fervently but kept her voice low so neither Tash nor Fazire would overhear. “No one will ever know,” she said like she was trying to convince herself.
Then, feeling she made her point, she turned and had her hand on the door handle, sensing escape, but she was thwarted as he swung her back around, his arms closing around her tightly, bringing her up against his body and to her shock, his face went into the hair at the side of her neck.
“Lily, I want to tell you about –”
Her body became stiff as a board.
“Take your hands off me,” she said.
He took his arms from around her but her hope that he was doing as she asked was dashed when he immediately framed her face with his hands.