Falling Angel (23 page)

Now it was Ben’s turn to laugh. “You always were perceptive, Bernadette. Even from thousands of miles away.”

“I have an offer to make that may ease your heart. A little distance, through time or travel, can provide a balm to the soul.”

“I’m all ears.”

“Come to Paris for the summer, while your exhibit is up. The Parisian artists need an infusion of new ideas from the Wild West. You will lecture at your alma mater and hold workshops during your stay. Say you will come. I have an e-ticket waiting to send you and a generous stipend.”

“For you, Bernadette, I would walk across burning coals. Only this sounds a lot more enticing.”

She laughed her throaty laugh again, and the deal was sealed.

After talking a little about the details and promising to call the next day, Ben hung up and gave a whoop into the empty hallway. His voice echoed eerily back to him. Too excited to return to his work, Ben paced the hallway, his mind racing as he thought of the necessary preparations he would need to make for his trip. Bernadette was right. A summer in Paris was an ideal opportunity for him to get away. Caught up in the magnificence of that great city, a Mecca for artists the world over, and diverted by a demanding teaching schedule, he would be able to forget Cara and their failed romance. He could look up old friends, revisit his former stomping grounds.

An image of himself walking along the banks of the Seine near the Ile de la Cite came into his head. He frowned. That wasn’t right. He tried again, picturing himself at the Museum D’Orsay, the converted railway station that now housed some of the greatest Impressionist art of all time. Again, the same thing happened. Shaking his head, he imagined ascending a spiraling staircase that smelled of wood and floor polish to his apartment in one of the white stone buildings with wrought iron balconies and ornate facades that comprised the urban heart of the city.

It was no use. Each time he conjured up an image of himself in Paris, he couldn’t help but picture Cara beside him, laughing, looking around her with that childlike face full of wonder as they walked together hand in hand.

.   .   .

Cara gave a yelp of frustration as she stood before the full-length mirror on her bedroom door. She yanked again at the zipper of the party dress the bride had insisted she wear for the wedding, but it remained obstinately stuck. Taking a deep breath, she carefully zipped it down again and tried once more. She hated the lime green dress, which was supposed to coordinate with the pink and green color scheme of the wedding. The color didn’t suit her at all, made her skin appear pale and sallow. And the once snug-fitting dress that she had bought over a month ago now hung off her in shapeless folds. She knew she had lost weight from her already thin frame over the past few weeks, as she tended to do when under stress. She knew she should take better care of herself. But since her fight with Ben she’d had no appetite. With a violent tug, she managed to force the zipper half-way up her back, where it proceeded to stick yet again. She’d have to ask Ann for assistance. Which reminded her; the particular pair of earrings she’d planned to wear had last been seen gracing Ann’s earlobes.

“Hey, Ann! Have you seen my amber earrings?” she called down the hall.

“Huh uh,” Ann responded from the bathroom where she was indulging in a long soak. Cara frowned. She was sure she had seen Ann wearing them. Giving up on the zipper for the moment, she marched into Ann’s room to look.

Ann’s bed was unmade and the rumpled sheets gave off a stale odor. Piles of clothes lay heaped about the floor. Crossing to the dresser, Cara scanned the scattered trinkets on top.

She spotted one of the earrings immediately. The glinting yellow stone in its silver setting was tossed into a small glass dish along with some loose change and safety pins. The other was nowhere to be seen.

From the top dresser drawer, lacy underclothes frothed like sea foam. It was more than likely that the earring had fallen into the open drawer and was buried amongst Ann’s lingerie. Opening the drawer further, Cara picked squeamishly through the flimsy garments. As she pulled at a black stocking, a small, rectangular piece of paper fell onto the floor. Bending to retrieve it, Cara felt suddenly sick to her stomach.

It was the business card Ben had given her the first time they met. The one she had searched so frantically for after running away from his condo.

The one she had mentioned to Ann, who had denied ever seeing it.

She was still standing by the dresser, card in hand, when Ann breezed into the room wrapped in a bath towel. When she saw Cara she started in surprise. “What are you doing in my room?”

“I was looking for my earrings, that you borrowed without asking.” Card held up the card. “Where did you get this?”

Ann glanced at it and shrugged, averting her eyes. “I’ve never even seen it before.”

“That’s a lie. You stole it out of my coat pocket, didn’t you?”

Ann shrugged again, staring intently at a frayed spot in the carpet.

“I can’t deal with this right now. I’m late already.” The thought of the cab that was probably waiting outside for her at that very moment made Cara suddenly feel frantic. She pulled at the zipper again and swore.

“Here, turn around,” Ann said. Although the last thing she wanted was to accept help from Ann, Cara turned reluctantly. With a quick tug, Ann finally managed to pull it up.

“Thanks,” Cara said abruptly. She scooped her earring out of the tray and dangled it in front of Ann’s face. “By the way, you owe me an earring.” She left Ann’s room, closing the door a little harder than she’d intended.

“Cara! Don’t you want to talk about this?” Ann opened the door and trailed behind her as she stormed down the hall.

“What’s there to talk about? You stole Ben’s card out of my coat. You never told me when he called. What else have you done? Did you tell him I was out with David on Monday?”

One look at Ann’s face and Cara had her answer.

“I was only trying to help,” Ann said.

Cara was so angry she couldn’t speak. She felt like slapping Ann’s peaked, unhappy face. Instead, she grabbed her bag and left, slamming the apartment door.

On the landing, she stood for a minute in a state of shock as the full extent of Ann’s sabotage attempts dawned on her.

She flashed back to coming home to the answering machine message from Ben after her date with David, the night the car battery died. Ann hadn’t been there when she got home, which was no doubt the only reason the message was still on the machine. Ben had insisted that he had called her several times before and even spoken with Ann. It was obvious now; Ann had erased the previous messages from Ben and kept silent about her conversation with him. With a sinking feeling, Cara realized that Ben also had probably called as promised after their lunch at the park on Monday. If Cara had received that call, the odds were that she would not have gone out with David. But rather than calling him, she had allowed her insecurity to get the better of her. She hadn’t trusted him, and had taken his silence as a sign that he wasn’t interested.

No doubt Ann had relished the task of informing Ben that Cara was out with David. And Ann clearly had hidden the newspaper article about Ben’s art opening from her intentionally.

Cara’s face burned as she thought of the ugly way she and Ben had parted. She was glad that the wedding plans had taken up the majority of her time since then, so she had hardly had time to eat or sleep, let alone think about what had happened.

Even so, memories of that night continued to invade her consciousness at unexpected times, like a bad smell seeping into a locked room.

He had been so angry with her. And yet she had to believe that he still cared about her; otherwise why would he have kissed her?

What a mess she had made of things! Why hadn’t she just explained to him what had happened with David? It could have become a funny anecdote that they could laugh about later. Instead, she’d allowed Ben’s criticisms to spark her own anger and defensiveness.

Struggling to maintain her composure, Cara walked downstairs to the waiting cab. She hadn’t felt this heartsick since the breakup with Barry, which had resulted in her move to Seattle. Now she had that same overwhelming urge to flee, to pack up and get out of town.

Chapter Twenty Two

“Volunteer Park, please,” Cara told the cab driver, a turbaned Sikh with a long white beard. He nodded silently and pulled away from the curb as she settled back against the vinyl seat.

Now that the thought of leaving Seattle had entered her mind, Cara found she couldn’t let it go. The idea of beginning again somewhere else was very tempting. She could use the money she had saved over the past seven months to start her own event planning business. It would be hard, with no connections. But it may be harder still to stay in a place where she felt she had already screwed up her fresh start. Besides her job, there was nothing that tied her to Seattle. Her friendship with Ann had been damaged beyond repair. She had proven as duplicitous as Cara’s former best friend in Illinois, the one who had cheated on her with Barry.

If she stayed, she would need to find a new place to live. She couldn’t share an apartment with Ann any longer.

Cara liked the city; even the dreary winter had possessed a certain Gothic charm. Another year or two and she could see herself calling this place home. That’s why it was better to leave now, before she began to put down any serious roots.

Cara looked out the cab window at the crush of cars. Inside them, strangers sipped coffee from paper cups, grimaced at the traffic, or yammered distractedly into cell phones. Each in their own little bubble. Seattle was a city of lone wolves. Why else would someone like Ben have ended up here?

After checking on the arrangements at Volunteer Park, where the wedding ceremony was to be held, Cara dropped by the bride’s house, an old Victorian situated on a quiet, tree-lined street near the park.

The bride’s mother opened the door, her face creased with worry.

“Oh, I’m glad you’re here. Maybe you can talk some sense into my Tanya.” Cara followed her upstairs into the master bedroom.

Dressed in her Vera Wang gown, with a veil that looked as though it had been lifted from a film set in the Elizabethan era, Tanya stood before a full-length mirror, tears streaming down her face.

“The jerk!” she wailed. “I swear he’s as drunk as a skunk. On my wedding day! He reeks! I can’t believe I’m getting married to this guy! And my makeup’s ruined!”

Tanya’s mother stood next to her daughter making inarticulate soothing sounds and wringing her hands. Cara handed the bride a box of tissues and told her she would call the makeup artist to come and do a touch-up. She then headed downstairs to do damage control.

The tuxedoed groom sat on an immaculate white couch in the drawing room, head in his hands.

“I screwed up,” he said. “My buddies kept promising we’d go home after one more shot. Tanya, I’m sorry!” he called mournfully in the direction of the stairs, before sinking his head into his hands again.

“Everything’s going to be fine,” Cara soothed. “She’ll forgive you. She’s just got wedding-day jitters.” She handed him a glass of water and a couple of Aspirin before heading into the kitchen to brew a strong pot of coffee.

Her cell phone vibrated urgently. It was Ingrid. Cara quickly filled her in on the morning’s drama.

“Christ,” said Ingrid. “If it’s not one thing it’s another. Try to keep them from tearing each other’s throats out till they get to the park, could you? By then they’ll be so caught up in the drama of the day they’ll forget to be mad and hung over. At least we can pray they will.”