Family poor, I’m not, I thought, but I couldn’t imagine ever telling him why.
The instant we entered the house, Mrs. Wakefield appeared, as if she had been beamed down from someplace upstairs. I didn’t see her standing there near the bottom of the stairs until Liam said, “Hi, Mrs. Wakefield.”
She stepped forward.
Unlike Mrs. Fennel, Mrs. Wakefield looked plump, with a soft face nearly absorbing her two hazel-brown eyes. She wore a light brown one-piece dress with a dark brown belt. I saw no jewelry except for her modest wedding ring. Her gray hair was nicely styled, neatly trimmed at her jawline. I had no idea what her age was, but she had very little in the way of wrinkles or even crow’s-feet. There was something almost alabaster about her complexion. It reminded me of smooth soapstone, her features gently chiseled so that her nose was well proportioned to her thick, rosy lips and plump cheeks. Not pretty and not unpleasant-looking, she struck me as someone who guarded her plainness, avoiding too much makeup or any cosmetic emphasis that would attempt to make her more striking by emphasizing her best qualities. There were no best qualities. “Comely” was the adjective that came to mind, for someone with a good appearance, not homely or plain and yet not outstanding, and probably never the cause for a man to have a second look.
When she stepped forward, however, it was as if those eyes widened and rose to the surface of their eye sockets almost like a telescope expanding, the lenses focusing. Her lips tightened, as did the muscles in her neck. I saw her shoulders rise like the shoulders of a hawk preparing to pounce. She was studying me very hard, her lo
ok full of suspicion and distrust. I imagined that this was the sort of reaction she first gave any young woman Liam brought to the house.
“This is Lorelei Patio, Mrs. Wakefield. The young lady you heard my father rave about,” he added in an attempt to ensure that she had a good impression of me. However, I could see that she wasn’t easily influenced. Her face didn’t change; it was almost a mask.
“Yes, I have heard a great deal about you. So much, in fact, that one wonders if it could possibly be true.”
“Time will tell, Mrs. Wakefield.”
“It always does.” She turned to Liam. “Will you be joining your father for dinner tonight? He has a guest. Your sister is going somewhere after work.”
“Oh. No, we have reservations,” Liam said. “Who’s my father’s guest?”
“He’s in his office,” she said as a response, and started away.
“Mrs. Wakefield?”
She paused. Although she looked at Liam, I could feel that she was really looking at me. She held a tight smile on her face, the sort of smile that bore no warmth but designed itself more to hide a minor annoyance. At least, I hoped that whatever it was, it was minor.
“Yes, Liam?”
“Lorelei will be using the brown guest room to prepare for our dinner engagement.”
“It’s not brown, Liam. It’s beige. How many times have I told you that?”
“Whatever, it looks brown to me,” he said, smiling.
She raised her eyes toward the ceiling and continued down the hallway.
“It takes a little time for her to warm up to someone new,” Liam said. “But once she does, she’s about as faithful as a golden retriever.”
“Golden or beige retriever?” I asked.
He laughed, took my hand, and led me up the stairs to the guest room. “If you need anything, just pick up the phone, press intercom, and hit three. That’s me. Everything else you need is in the bathroom. Take a rest. Before we leave, we’ll have a cocktail in the den. I’d better go down and see my father. He hasn’t had a guest for dinner in some time.”
“I hope it’s not Naomi Addison,” I said.
He laughed. And then he thought a moment, looked worried, and hurried out. As soon as he did, I dropped myself onto the bed and looked up at the ceiling. The circles embossed over the faux finish seemed to turn first clockwise and then counterclockwise. I closed my eyes. I wasn’t tired, exactly. It had just been a day filled with new sensations, new images and feelings. They had come at me so quickly and were so abundant that I was feeling like someone who had overeaten. I wondered if my capacity to be more sensitive, to hear and see and taste everything to its fullest, could ever be overloaded. Maybe that was why Mrs. Fennel and my father had wanted me to spend less time experiencing the world outside our world. The darkness I had lived within drove me to seek colors, brightness, warmth, and softness. Perhaps they had feared that I would hunger and thirst for so much of it that I would explode. It was the way I felt right now.
Liam’s kisses, his gentle embrace, the sound of his laughter, and the light of his smile danced on the insides of my eyelids. I thought I could replay every second, every moment of our time together, from the first time his fingers touched mine to the moment he just let my hand go. At this very second, I was happier than I had been, maybe ever. I felt guilty being happier with Liam than I had been with Buddy, but my time with Buddy had been too clandestine. Along with our joy had ridden the fear of being discovered, of me being exposed as a traitor. Whether or not I was deluding myself, I felt free here, free to be who I believed I really was.
I almost fell asleep thinking about all of this, but I gathered myself and took a long, delightful shower under a large rain head that splattered my body with a torrent of warm, soft water. The towels were soft and large. I wrapped myself in one and sat at the vanity mirror, drying and then brushing out my hair before pinning it back and up. I wore just a little lipstick. There was nothing much to do about my face, which at the moment looked as if it was stuck in a constant blush.
Liam had emphasized “casual,” so I slipped on a pair of sateen skinny ankle pants with a pair of backdrop kindle buckle boots and a long-sleeved lamb’s-wool antique-cream sweater. I thought it would be perfect for the cooler evening air. When I had gone shopping with Naomi, I had bought myself a pair of deco disc rusty torch earrings. I thought they looked good with my hair up. I wore no other jewelry. I had nothing else, actually. Just as I finished, I heard a knock on the bedroom door.
“Perfect timing,” I called, expecting it to be Liam. To my surprise, when I opened the door, I was facing Mr. Dolan.
15
“I don’t mean to disturb,” he began. I thought he looked stunningly handsome in a black velvet sports jacket, a black shirt, and a red tie. Daddy had a sports jacket like his, I thought.