A Moment in Time (28 page)

"I have Mr. Conrad at Stonelair on line two,"
she said. "He wants to speak to you."

"Thanks," Valerie said, feeling her heart
begin to flutter. She had been hoping he'd actually call.

Daphne watched Valerie rush to her office,
then turned and went back down the corridor to her own.

Valerie closed the door behind her and took a
deep breath. She told herself that her reaction was absurd.

I'm not a teenager, she thought.
What's
happening to me?

She went to her desk and heard Elvis's tail
begin to thump against the kneehole's worn wood. "Hey, sweetie,"
she said, leaning down to give him a few strokes. Elvis gave her
hand a lick, then settled back down to his nap. She pushed the
button for line two and picked up the receiver.

"Valerie Rochelle," she said.

"Hey there," his deep voice replied. "It's
Wyn Conrad. How are you?"

"I'm fine," she replied automatically. "Busy
as usual."

"I was just wondering," he began slowly, "if
maybe . . . well, if you'd maybe like to have dinner with me?"

His voice sounded hesitant, she thought,
almost as if he were a kid asking a girl on a first date.

"I would like that very much," she said.

"Great," he said. "I thought about
seven-thirty, eight o'clock. How's that sound to you?"

"Let's make it eight. I have to make a stop
on the way."

"Okay," he said. "I'll see you about
eight."

"I'll be there."

She hung up, then slumped down in the chair
at her desk.
I can't believe this
, she thought, feeling a
little bewildered.
Mr. Wyn Conrad has actually asked me to
dinner. I wonder if he . . . No
, she told herself,
quit
thinking that way. You can't presume anything, Val. Maybe you
misread him last night. Maybe he wants to see you to set the record
straight. You don't have any idea whatsoever what he has on his
mind
.

Still, she couldn't help but smile. He wanted
to see her.

The telephone on her desk jangled loudly, and
she jumped, so lost in thought was she. She picked it up. "Valerie
Rochelle," she said.

"You've got another call from your other male
admirer," Tami said. "Teddy this time. On line three."

"Thanks, Tami," she said, slightly annoyed at
the secretary's tone. She hung up the receiver for a moment and
stared at it.
What does Teddy want?
she wondered.
And
what do I tell him if he asks to see me tonight?
Then she
remembered Colette's advice:
Tell him the truth, sooner rather
than later.
She felt her stomach begin to flutter unpleasantly.
I can't do that now. Not on the telephone,
she told herself,
rationalizing.
I'll have to play it by ear.

She picked up the receiver. "Hi," she said
cheerily.

"What took you so long?" Teddy asked in
exasperation. "I've been on hold."

"That's a nice greeting, Teddy," she said. "I
am
at work, you know."

"Sorry," he said, backing down. "I didn't
mean to sound grumpy."

You sure have sounded grumpy an awful lot
lately
, she thought. "It's okay," she said.

"I guess I've just been awfully busy, and
I've had a really rough week," Teddy went on quickly. "You know
what?"

"What?" she asked.

"Some of my clients are being a real pain in
the ass," he said, the words tumbling out in a rush. "Interests
rates are going up, the market's pretty volatile, the goddamn
soothsayers are predicting everything from Armageddon to a
fantastic bull market without end, and I'm caught in the middle of
it all."

"Lots of nervous clients, I guess," she
replied.

"God, Val," he said, "you wouldn't believe
it. These are people who've never lost a dime in the market.
They've never seen anything but prosperity, and when something goes
wrong, bam! It's like they lay everything on me. I'm some kind of
monster or something."

"I'm sorry, Teddy," she said. He
sounds so
wired
, she thought. She'd never heard him sound quite this
troubled before, and she was puzzled. He'd always seemed to take
the swings of the market in stride and to handle his clients with
ease, laughing off their nervous reactions, never taking anything
personally. "It must be very difficult for you."

"Yes," he said. "It is. Anyway, I decided not
to go away this weekend. I couldn't take a whole weekend of Ned and
Edyth Chamberlain. They're so fucking stuffy, you know?" He
couldn't tell her that he was working double-time on her mother's
behalf, nor was he going to tell her that he was entertaining her
mother and her cousin Jamie.

"I've never met them," she said.

"Oh, I forgot," he replied. "Anyway, so what
time are you coming over?"

"Coming over?" she said. "I-I made other
plans. You'd told me you weren't going to be here."

"Other plans?" he exclaimed. "What do you
mean, 'other plans'?"

Valerie couldn't help but feel irritated. Why
was it he expected her to be at his beck and call on weekends? At
least those weekends when it was convenient for him to see her? "I
meant exactly what I said," she said firmly. "You said you'd come
up early because you couldn't be here over the weekend. I made
other plans."

"Then change them," he said.

She felt like exploding, but she forced
herself to keep her voice even. "No," she said. "I've made other
plans, and I don't want to change them. I don't like hurting
people's feelings."

"What about my feelings," he said
angrily.

"Teddy," she said, with more than a hint of
exasperation in her voice, "you weren't going to be here.
Remember?"

"And what other people?" he snapped, ignoring
her. "Where're you going? What're these big plans of yours?"

"I don't like being cross-examined," she said
testily.

She could hear him heave a big sigh. "I-I'm
sorry, Val," he said, his voice calmer, though still distressed. "I
just really had a bad week, that's all."

"I'm sorry, too," she said, "but I'm not
responsible for your bad week, and I don't want it taken out on
me."

"Please forgive me," he said. "I didn't mean
to be so . . . demanding." He paused for a moment, then said, "I
guess it's best this way anyhow. I need to get some sleep. Really
rest up from all the pressure."

"It sounds like it," she said. "Maybe an
early night would do you some good."

"Maybe so," he agreed. "I haven't been
getting much sleep lately. Why don't you come over after you've
been . . . well, wherever it is you're going?"

"I don't think so, Teddy," she replied.

"Ah, come on, Val," he said. "Just you and
me. Late tonight. It'd be like having a late date."

"No, Teddy," she said. "I told you I've
already got plans, and I don't want to change them. Besides, I'm on
call this weekend, so I'd better have an early night."

"You're always on call," he groused.

"No, Teddy, I'm not," she said.
He sounds
like a petulant child
, she thought. "You know very well that we
take turns at the clinic."

"You said you had plans," he argued. "So you
can do something else, but you can't see me?"

"Look, Teddy, I don't want to argue about
this. You told me you weren't going to be here this weekend, and I
made plans. It's as simple as that. Why can't you live with
it?"

"Where are you going?" he asked heatedly.

Valerie really didn't want to tell him. He
wasn't fond of Eddie and Jonathan, and she didn't want to have to
listen to his asinine comments about them. And telling him she was
going to have dinner with Wyn Conrad made her feel queasy. He would
probably explode. Then it occurred to her, as it had repeatedly
over the last few weeks, that Teddy had a right to know what she
was doing. After all, they were engaged, for the time being at
least.

Once again, she reminded herself of Colette's
encouraging words, then drew a deep breath and plunged right in
with the truth. "I'm going over to Eddie and Jonathan's for a
drink," she said. "Then I'm going to dinner at Stonelair." There,
the truth was out.

"You're what!" he exclaimed in
astonishment.

"Do I really have to repeat myself,
Teddy?"

"I can't believe my ears," he snarled. "I
mean, I can believe you're going over to Eddie's. For some reason,
you've always liked that old fag, but—"

"Stop right there," she said furiously.
"Don't you ever belittle him like that again. You sound like some
stupid twelve-year-old boy posturing in the locker room. Eddie's
never been anything but nice to you, and he's been a real friend to
me."

"Ah, come on, Val," he said, a bit
contritely. "You know I didn't mean any harm. I don't mind
Eddie."

"That's certainly not the way you sound," she
said.

"Yeah, well, what I can't believe is that
you'd go out to that weirdo's at Stonelair."

"I don't care what you believe," she snapped,
still angry. "I've made plans, and they're not subject to your
approval. Neither are the people I choose to see."

There was silence for a moment as Teddy
digested her remark. Valerie felt as if all her senses were
heightened, and she could feel her skin tingle.
The heat of the
argument
, she decided.
And telling Teddy what I actually
feel. Funny, now I really don't feel so bad. Maybe Colette was
right. Maybe I should be honest more often
.

"I don't know what's happening to us, Val,"
Teddy finally said, his voice soft and hurt.

"I think we'd better continue this
conversation another time," she said. "I'm too angry to talk to
you."

"Well, I think we'd better continue it now,"
Teddy countered, "because I'm getting really worried."

"No," Valerie said, "not now." He was already
trying to put her on the defensive, and she wasn't going to have
it. "We'll talk tomorrow, Teddy."

"Val, I don't think—" he began.

"We'll talk tomorrow," she repeated.
"Good-bye, Teddy."

"Val—"

She quietly replaced the receiver in its
cradle, then, elbows on the desk, she held her head in her hands.
What have I done?
she thought. For a brief moment, she
thought that she should pick up the phone and call Teddy back.
I
should apologize and assure him that I'll spend time with him
tomorrow
. Then she remembered his remark about Eddie, and her
anger returned. No way, she decided.
If he's miserable, it's not
my fault. He deserves it for being so thoughtless and
nasty.

The telephone on her desk jangled again, and
she picked up the receiver. "Yes?" she said.

"Mrs. Sutherland is here with Happy," Annie
said, a note of glee in her voice.

"I'll be right out," Val replied.
Just my
luck
, she thought
. That vicious old Mrs. Sutherland with her
equally vicious little Happy, a yapper and a biter and a whiner. He
was just like his mistress.
She rose to her feet and took
Happy's chart from the pile of today's patients on her desk.
Elvis's tail thumped against the kneehole again. Leaning down, she
gave him a few strokes. "Oh, Elvis," she said, "today's got to get
better. It can't get worse."

Arielle pulled the chintz drapery panel aside
and gazed out the window of the guest house toward the swimming
pool and tennis court in the distance. No sign of life about,
except for a groundskeeper who was trimming hedges. Her eyes
wandered to the mansion itself as she slowly sipped champagne from
a crystal flute. "Oh, look, Lolo," she said. "Bibi and Joe are
back. I thought I heard the car."

Lolo stepped up behind her and craned his
neck over her shoulder toward the window, following her gaze. He
spotted the familiar figures he'd often seen in Palm Beach, walking
toward the terrace at the rear of their pristine white mansion.
"They're not coming out here," he said, stating the obvious.

"No," she said. "The chauffeur said they
would expect us for cocktails at six o'clock, so I guess until then
we should stay out here. Bibi's a real stickler for protocol."

She felt Lolo's arms encircle her waist and
his warm breath on her neck. "Good," he said. "We can have a little
fun before dinner."

She let the drapery fall back into place and
turned in his arms, facing him. She set her champagne glass down on
a table. "Let's move away from the window," she said. "I'd hate for
that old dragon lady to see us in our underwear."

"She can't see us from there," he said,
nuzzling her neck with his lips.

"She'll probably have binoculars trained on
the windows at all hours," Arielle said.

Lolo chuckled. "That's loco, Arielle," he
said, snapping the waist of her flesh-colored bikini panties.

"Believe me," Arielle retorted, "Bibi's just
loco enough to do it. She's probably even got this guest house
bugged."

Lolo drew back and looked at her with genuine
concern. "Do you really think she would do a thing like that?"

Arielle shrugged. "Who knows?" she replied.
"I wouldn't put it past her. I do know that she puts up a good
front, acting real prim and proper, but underneath all her stupid
old-lady Chanel suits, she's really a horny old cow. Joe probably
hasn't been able to get it up in years."

Lolo laughed. "
You're
loco, Arielle,"
he said, pulling her body up against his, relishing the feel of her
silk panties and bra and firm tanned flesh against him.

"Maybe," she said, "but I'm sure not stuck
with an old stuffed shirt like Joe Whitman." She pressed her pelvis
against his crotch, then brushed her lips lightly across his. "Why
don't we have some more champagne?" she said softly.

Lolo kissed her, then loosened his arms from
around her. "That's a good idea," he said. "I'll get it." He picked
up her glass, then walked over to the elegantly draped table, where
his champagne flute sat nearly empty next to the sweating wine
cooler.