Chapter Twenty #2
“Courage failed you, Juliet?” Sebastian asked softly. No accusation or recrimination.
And yet she knew he understood. “Yes. And good sense rushed at last to my rescue.”
“Are you sending me away, Juliet? Again?”
Was she? She considered. “No. As I did thirty years ago, I am staying away. Though from this, not necessarily from you. Ours was never a public affair, Sebastian. Whatever it is between us now, it should remain private.”
He had always possessed the kind of gaze that burned away the layers of protection. She felt it turned on her now and realized she was not afraid.
“Friendship, you mean?” he asked.
“Yes. If it survives.”
“And more than friendship?”
She smiled and turned to meet his gaze. “Seriously, Seb?”
Although she was affectionately amused and inviting him to share the joke, he didn’t laugh. His eyes were unexpectedly serious. And steady. She felt her own smile falter.
He lifted his hand to her cheek, startling her by the tenderness of the caress.
No one had caressed Juliet for a very long time.
Solomon kissed her cheek. Occasionally, Connie hugged her.
But they were not lovers. She did not think she could bear Sebastian’s touch.
She did, though it deprived her of breath.
“Juliet,” he murmured. “Our years are never wasted.”
“What do you mean by that?” she demanded. Too aggressive—hiding the unsteadiness of her voice.
“I mean… Your son-in-law taught me a lesson.”
Juliet blinked. “He did?”
“He told me to stop playing games. They have become so much my nature over the years that I play them without thought. As soon as I found you, I should have walked into your shop and made myself known. I didn’t.
I had to do it subtly, giving myself—and you—an easy way out.
How can I be an honest man if I have forgotten honesty?
A trustworthy man if I have forgotten trust? ”
“You were never a bad man. And believe me, I’ve learned to spot them.”
The hand at her cheek slid to her shoulder and gripped.
“I know the broad gist of your thirty years, Juliet. I daresay you can guess mine. We need not be ashamed of the details, not with each other. Never despise yourself for surviving. I must live with what I have done too. But can’t we look forward? ”
“I am contented. I have a life and an honest business that is working for me. You have an important position in the Foreign Office, where I do not fit.”
There, she had said it, without sounding over-humble, too. I do not fit. Not I would ruin you. Though they meant the same thing.
“And so you offer me a private friendship? That might become something more?”
“In private. If you can ever see past this raddled old body.”
“Stop it,” he said fiercely. “I saw you as soon as you walked into your daughter’s dining room. It has always been you, my Juliet.”
Quite how it happened she didn’t know, but both his arms were around her and his mouth was on hers in the first kiss of thirty years. A sob rose into her mouth and was swallowed in a wash of agonizing sweetness and regret.
“Now,” he said unsteadily, “I will tell you my terms. No more hiding. I have had enough of that in my life, and I won’t do it with you again.
If you are my friend, we are friends in public.
If I am your lover, we own up to it. If we marry, you are my wife, my hostess, of whom I am proud. Whom I have always loved.”
Her jaw dropped. “Wife? Are you insane? Hostess?”
“You’re a natural. You always were. Whom do you think your Constance learned it from?
We need do nothing, of course, that makes you uncomfortable.
I have enough money to retire tomorrow, if it’s what we choose.
All that is for future discussion. For tonight, may we just start the way I would like to go on? In honesty?”
He stood up, and for a bewildered moment, she thought he was going to storm off. But he held his hand down to her.
“Shall we return to the party?” he asked softly. “As old friends?”
She stared at him, her heart thundering. But her stomach was quiet, the knot untied and fading.
As though she were stepping off the edge of a cliff, she took his hand and rose.
*
Edith had begun her Vivaldi piece, and most of the company had stopped to listen, even those clutching a plate in one hand.
Constance, standing by the window beside Solomon, felt her heart swell with pride. To her admittedly untrained ear, Edith was playing beautifully, as well as she ever had. Constance crossed her fingers that there would be many more engagements to come from this evening.
For herself, the party was something of a revelation.
It was an unusual mix of people, perhaps, but they all seemed to be curious about each other rather than hostile or condescending.
More than that, Solomon’s trusted managers, associates and friends, had all brought their wives and seemed disposed not only to tolerate her but to approve of her.
Almost as if they had decided long ago that she was good for Solomon.
I am, she thought. I make him happy.
Surreptitiously, hidden by her wide skirts, she slid her hand into his. “Thank you for making me do this.”
He didn’t speak, merely squeezed her fingers, and she felt one of those reasonlessly happy moments begin to bloom. A movement at the door caught her eye and she froze.
Her mother had just entered the room, on the arm of Sebastian Kellar. They paused just inside the doorway, and he handed her into the nearest vacant chair. He snagged two glasses of wine and gave one to Juliet. Contance could not take her eyes off her mother.
“She came,” she blurted.
“Do you mind?”
“Mind?” she said brokenly, “Oh, Sol.” Emotion blinded her and she swung away to face the window rather than her guests.
Solomon held on to her hand. “What is it?” He stood very close, his voice urgent, intense. “This was always up to her. You wanted it to be so.”
“But look at her,” Constance whispered, tears trickling down her cheeks. “She…sparkles. Solomon, she’s happy.”
And, of course, he understood. How unbearably tragic, and yet how wonderful it was, that this was the first time she had ever seen her mother truly happy.
Solomon’s arm wound around her waist, and she knew he was smiling as he rested his cheek against her hair. Life was full of joy and had to be embraced.