Masquerade (17 page)

He wished, periodically, that she was his wife, that this was a typical family excursion and that afterward they would go back to their home, tuck the girls into bed, and sit together on the sofa discussing the day’s events. And then perhaps not discuss the day’s events.

Each time these thoughts came, he dismissed them. Clarissa was a married woman. He wasn’t attracted to her; he was simply attracted to the qualities she had. She was responsible, good-natured, caring, and authentic. Things Evelyn hadn’t been. Things he’d never realized were so important until Evelyn left. Eventually he’d find those qualities in the right sort of woman. He just had to keep looking.

Chapter
20

At eight thirty, Clarissa buckled two tired little girls into the backseat of the car. It had turned out to be a relaxing evening, one that felt more like a vacation than work. Slade and she had talked easily, like friends. They had discussed everything from the shortcomings of western culture to bad job stories. She had found herself laughing at his Hollywood anecdotes, at the things that went wrong during films. Now she was sad the night was over and she would go back to being just another one of Slade’s employees.

They had left the show before the dancing ended because Elaina fell asleep and Bella, during the Maori dancers’ routine, kept yelling, “It’s not nice to make faces!”

They had barely pulled out of the parking lot before Bella’s head nodded against the car seat, and she joined Elaina in slumber. Neither Slade nor Clarissa spoke for a few moments as they drove, and then Clarissa asked, “Where do you keep the matches at your house?”

“In the kitchen cupboard. Why?”

“I’m not sure if Bella was paying attention during the fire dance, but you might want to lock up all your flammable devices to be on the safe side.”

Slade
laughed and the smile stayed on his lips. “You have a knack for understanding my daughter.”

Clarissa stared out at the dark forms of the foliage growing along the road and debated whether or not she should pursue that subject. On one hand
, she was Bella’s nanny—the person he was paying to take care of her. Clarissa was supposed to look out for Bella’s welfare. On the other hand, Clarissa knew that parents rarely looked at their children objectively, and Slade wasn’t likely to listen to anything she said on that subject. Alex had never listened to her when it came to parenting.

But then Slade wasn’t Alex.

She glanced over at him, at the form of his profile. Even in the dark, his jawline looked strong, his cheekbones, nose, and forehead all perfectly proportioned.

What had she been thinking about?

Oh, yes, Alex. How Slade wasn’t Alex. How Slade was so . . . Slade.

She turned her gaze back toward the window and
thought of Bella instead of Bella’s father. She weighed the pros and cons of speaking. In the end the issue was decided by one thing. She honestly cared about Bella. “On one level I think I get her,” Clarissa said, “on another, I haven’t even begun to understand her.”

“T
hat’s normal, isn’t it? After all, Bella is a female.”

“I’m serious,” Clarissa said.

“So am I. Women are the ultimate mysteries, followed closely by quantum mechanics.”

“She’s a delightful child,” Clarissa said, “confident, charming, and extremely precocious—”

“She takes after her father.”

“But do you think it’s normal for
her to go from one scrape to another like she does?”

Slade shrugged. “She’s a kid. Kids get into scrapes. I’m sure you had your share of them when you were little.”

“Meredith says you have your own parking spot at the emergency room.”

“Only figuratively speaking.” Slade
said. “Bella’s accident-prone. She’ll grow out of it.”

Once again Clarissa debated keeping silent. Once again she didn’t. “Haven’t you ever noticed there’s a pattern to her accidents?”

“Yes, most of them involve damage to expensive items.”

“No, I mean she’s the most accident-prone when you’re not paying attention to her.”

“Well, yeah. If I were paying attention to her, I could stop her from doing whatever it is she’s not supposed to do.”

Clarissa shook her head. “I was paying attention to her when she jumped into the pool and when she broke the lamp. Meredith was paying attention when she decorated the carpet with fingernail polish. It isn’t that she’s unsupervised, it’s that when you’re not around, she’s fast.”

“You’re saying she does everything on purpose?” His eyebrows furrowed together in disbelief. “She’s not even five years old yet. Trust me, she doesn’t have the planning or acting abilities to pull that off.”

Clarissa co
uld hear the edge in his voice. She went on anyway. “I’m not saying it’s a conscious decision on her part. Doesn’t it seem peculiar, though, that when you’re around, when you’re around and paying attention to her, she’s not accident- prone?”

“So you’re saying I don’t give her enough attention?”

“No, I’m saying that’s what she thinks.”

Slade
tightened his grip on the steering wheel. “I give her a lot of attention. I give her everything a kid could ever want. She has more toys than Mattel.”

“Indulgence isn’t the same as attention.”

“Oh, now I’m indulgent.”

Clarissa sighed and didn’t say anything else.

Maybe it wasn’t Alex after all. Maybe it was just men. Maybe they never listened to your opinions, never cared what you thought, and never thought you were smart enough to have any real insights. Maybe men always criticized you and thought everything was your fault and then always demanded more and more until you locked yourself in a room and spent the night crying.

And there she was, back in her marriage with Alex. How many times did she have to divorce herself from him before she finally left him completely?

Slade tapped his thumb against the steering wheel. When he spoke next his voice was softer. “Okay, maybe I am a little indulgent.” He held up one hand to concede the point. “Bella lost her mother. She deserves something to make up for that.”

“Bella doesn’t see her mother often?”

“Nope.”

“Was it a painful divorce?”

Slade glanced over at her, surprised. “I thought everyone knew about my divorce. It was a hot topic for long enough.”

“I
saw your picture on the covers of magazines. I never read the stories, though.”

“I’ll fill you in then.” He leaned back against his seat and held onto the steering wheel with only one hand, as though it wasn’t a stressful thing to describe the breakup of his marriage. The edge in his voice, however,
contradicted his nonchalance. “First, there were the pictures of Evelyn out with Brad Nash. He played the lead in her show, so I didn’t think much of it; I mean, she assured me it was all business.

“Then pictures of them kissing
surfaced. That was harder to pass off as business, but she still tried. She kissed him a lot for her show. For all I knew, those pictures were taken on the set.” Slade shook his head. “Acting. It’s got to be the only profession in the world where you can see pictures of your wife kissing another man and still not know whether she’s being unfaithful to you.”

Clarissa felt a pang of sympathy for him.
“So how did you find out?”

“I followed her. You’d think after two run-ins with the
paparazzi, she’d have been more careful, but she wasn’t. And come to think of it, neither was I. There was an ugly scene at a restaurant, you know, a sort of yelling, screaming, punching Brad across the salad bar type of thing. The tabloids documented the event for posterity.”

“I’m sorry. That must have been awful.” Without thinking about it, Clarissa reached over and put her hand on Slade’s arm. And then a second later, when she realized what she’d done, she removed it.

Slade seemed not to have noticed either her gesture or her quick end to it. He shrugged. “You don’t need to be sorry for me. I’m better off without Evelyn.”

“Probably. But Bella got a whole new set of issues to deal with.”

Slade shrugged. “Bella is fine. She just needs more time to adjust.”

Well, so much for thinking Slade would listen to her. Clarissa
turned and stared unseeing at the night scenery. “It’s all well and fine if you want to let her continue to break things. I’m sure you can afford it. But one day she might actually hurt herself, you know.”

“Bella is fine,” he said again, and then added under his breath. “And to think I thought getting a nanny with a family science background was a good thing. Next you’ll b
e telling me I discipline wrong too.”

“I wouldn’t know,” Clarissa said. “I have yet to see you discipline Bella.”

“Well, I do,” he said. “Sometimes.”

Clarissa
pressed the point. “Children need to know where their boundaries are. They’ll keep pushing until they find them. I know you’d rather be nurturing than be a disciplinarian, but Bella needs you to be both. If you don’t teach her there are consequences for her actions, who will?”

Slade
clenched his jaw. “It’s easy enough for you to dispense parenting advice. You’re not a single parent. Every time I punish Bella, she cries for her mother. I feel like I’m wounding her all over again. You wouldn’t be much of a disciplinarian either if you had to go through that.”

They were only a short
distance away from the resort. Even that was suddenly exhaustingly far away.

For several moments
Clarissa didn’t respond; she just sat watching the black ribbon of road in front of them. I know what your life is like, she thought. I know how hard it was to sit down and divide your possessions with someone who hurt you, to divide things that couldn’t be divided, so you ripped them apart. You ripped your whole life apart and then had to find some way to tell your daughter that the fabric of her life had been torn, inexorably tattered, and she couldn’t do anything about it.

The truth lay on her lips, waiting to be spoken. In another moment she
would have told him everything. He spoke instead. “You have a way of making me say things I regret later.” He took his attention away from the road long enough to gaze at her. The darkness of the night made his gaze seem even more intense. “I know you mean well. I shouldn’t have snapped at you.”

“Bella is a darling little girl,” Clarissa said. “She needs a father and not a Santa Claus to take care of her. Will you just promise me you’ll think about what I’ve said?”

“Sure. I’ll think about it.”

She knew he wouldn’t. His words were said to brush her off.

Still, she had tried.

When Slade and Clarissa got to the hotel, they carried their sleeping children inside. Clarissa held Elaina close, breathed in the smell of her—the fleeting scent of childhood.

An overflow crowd from one of the meeting rooms mingled in the hallway and dance music drifted into the lobby. A party. And by the looks of the people in the hallway, another not-so-undercover cast party. Clarissa pushed through the crowd without stopping, making her way to the elevator. A middle-aged woman who knew Slade waylaid him and insisted he come say hello to her daughter.

He glanced over the top of Bella’s head at Clarissa. “I’ll be a few minutes,” he said, then followed the woman into the room.

A few minutes? Did that mean he expected her to wait for him or was she done tending Bella? Clarissa stood in the lobby holding Elaina and debated the question. Then, because Elaina was growing increasingly heavy, Clarissa walked over to the elevator. If Slade needed her, he knew where to find her.

She reached for the elevator call button, trying to keep from bumping Elaina’s head in the process.

“That’s a heavy load you’re carrying,” Landon said, walking toward her.

“I’m used to it.”

“You’re about to fall over.” He reached out to take Elaina. “Here, let me help you.”

“That’s all right. You
don’t—” Before she could get out anymore, he lifted the little girl out of her arms.

“See, isn’t that much better?”

“Thanks,” she said, feeling a bit awkward.

The elevator door opened, and
she and Landon stepped inside. He pushed the button for her floor. Before the doors closed all the way, she caught a glimpse of Slade walking across the lobby toward the elevators. He’d seen her and Landon get into the elevator together and he didn’t look happy about it. Which meant she would hear about this later. She sighed out loud.

“Long day?”
Landon asked.

“I guess.”

“You need more time to relax.”

“Don’t we all?”

“Why don’t you put your daughter to bed and come join our party?”

Clarissa
shook her head. “I couldn’t leave Elaina alone like that. She might wake up and need something.”

Landon
gave her a long, appraising look, then nodded slowly as though he’d figured her out. “You’re one of those women who worries too much, aren’t you?”

“Maybe.”

The elevator door opened and they stepped out. “Which room is yours?”

“
Eight-twenty-one,” she said.

They headed in that direction, walking slowly in the brightly lit hallway. “You could check in on your daughter every once in a while, you know.”

“Thanks, anyway,” she said.

He made a
tsking sound with his tongue. “There you go again, worrying too much.”

They walked the rest of the way to her room in silence. When they reached the door she
held out her arms to retrieve her daughter. “Thanks for carrying Elaina for me”