torrents of joy. Could this be anything but forever-and-ever love?
Then, a mere 363 hours and 17 minutes-by Steve's deranged calculation-after they had first scrunched up in the backseat of the Jeep, it ended. When Steve tried to join Renee in the cafeteria, she was sitting with Angel Castillo, the burly fullback on the football team. Baseball season was over; spring football practice was starting; and Steve had been discarded like a splintered Louisville Slugger.
In the nearly twenty years since, he had refrained from even once telling a woman that he loved her. How could he? The risk of pain was too great. And now he was standing mute in the face of Victoria's challenging glare.
Victoria resisted the urge to pull him out of his chair and throw her arms around him. He had never looked so hopeless and so huggable. So different from the smart-ass she first met in court. But she steeled herself against showing any emotion other than indifference. She wouldn't reveal what she felt. How could she? She couldn't even define it herself. She didn't know what propelled her toward Solomon. But he had been right about one thing: I kissed him. I grabbed him and kissed him deeply, passionately… dangerously.
So reckless. So irresponsible. So unlike her. She desperately wished she could take it back.
Or did she? With the boats creaking in their moorings and the moonlit sky swirling above, she'd molded her body to his, a yin-and-yang perfect fit. The kiss had left her disoriented and dizzy and frightened. She wanted to write it off to gin and stress and exhaustion. But in truth, she had no idea what was happening to her. Was she subconsciously trying to sabotage her relationship with Bruce? Did she have a self-esteem problem? Did she feel she didn't deserve someone so right? So damn-near-perfect it could sometimes be daunting just being with him?
Working it over now, she thought she was figuring it out.
I'm in love with Bruce and in lust with Steve.
Thank God she'd been around enough to know all about the lust factor. Relationships built on passion last about as long as the fever that accompanies the flu. When was the last time she had succumbed? Maybe six years ago-a lifetime, it seemed-there'd been Randy, a teaching pro at a tennis club in Boca Raton. Australian. Sun- bleached hair. A laugh like surf crashing on rocks. And a sexual athlete. Thank God her chiropractor's bills were covered by insurance.
She was waiting tables the summer between college and law school. .. and totally in love. Or what she mistook for love. Postadolescent lust was more like it. All those steamy nights in Randy's shoebox apartment with its wheezing air conditioner, mildewed shower curtain, and retro water bed. And one night of tears.
She remembered the pain, finding another woman-a married tennis pupil, of all the lousy cliches-riding the waves in Randy's bedroom. His confession was without guilt or remorse: “Not my fault the sheilas want to have a naughty with me.”
Thinking back, the men after Randy seemed like a procession of faceless gray suits. Lawyers, CPAs, brokers. Ambitious young men in pinstripes. Impatient men who often pushed the relationship too quickly. She remembered Harlan, a brainy tax accountant, popping the question on their third date. At that moment, they were stuck in a mob at Joe's Stone Crab, waiting for a table. How do you politely reply-“Are you out of your bean-counting mind?”-when some tourist is standing on your foot and the maitre d' is announcing, ‘Grossman, party of five!'”
“Why do you want to get married?” she had asked, befuddled.
“Because I love you,” Harlan had replied. Then, sheepishly, “And my firm favors married guys in selecting partners.”
“So, I'm sort of a talking point on your resume?”
Romantic love, she believed, was a myth that preyed on our illogical need to fulfill fantasies. It was, by definition, irrational. Just look where it got her mother. Romantic love was like a vacation suntan. It faded quickly.
What she had with Bruce she called “rational love.” It was based on logical factors. Intelligence, kindness, sensitivity, empathy. And one more thing: Bruce was the first man in her life-including her father-who didn't disappoint her in a major way. So, romantic love be damned. She cherished and adored Bruce, but in a different way. It was a love based on so much more than passion, she told herself. Then, just to be sure, she told herself again.
“I have to know you can handle this,” Victoria said.
“Handle what?”
“Our working together without you getting all moony-eyed.”
“Aw, c'mon, I'm a big boy. If you say the kiss didn't mean anything, I'm cool with that.”
“You sure?”
“Totally.”
“Good. From now on, we're living by Lord's Laws. No touching, no flirting, no kissing. Nothing but business.”
“You got it,” Steve agreed. He had a sense of loss, which was weird, because how can you lose what you never had?
“Now, let's get down to Gables Estates and let you burglarize our client's closets.”
“Ready when you are.”
Victoria started packing her briefcase. “So, what do you think of Jackie?”
“Seems nice. Has a good laugh.”
“Think she's pretty?”
“Sure.” Where was this going?
“She thinks you're hot.”
“Yeah?”
“You want her number?”
Steve would not let her see his pain. “Sure. She like stone crabs?”
Victoria laughed. “Jackie says some guys take a girl out for stone crabs and expect a b.j. afterward.”
“They wait till after?”
“You two have the same sense of humor. This could work out.”
“Great.”
“I don't want to push you into anything if you're reluctant.”
“No. I'd like to see her,” Steve said, knowing it was a lie. “As long as you don't mind.”
“I think it'd be great,” she lied right back.
Twenty-seven
OUT OF THE CLOSET
The rich are different, Steve decided. They have bigger closets.
Katrina Barksdale's wood-paneled two-story coliseum was larger than Steve's bedroom. Strike that. The shoe section was larger than his bedroom.
He heard the purr of a dehumidifier and smelled a lavish mixture of aromas. The tang of cedar, the richness of leathers… the scent of money. Katrina's closet was a cool and peaceful sanctuary, dripping with silks and linens, minks and wools. Every pair of shoes had its own Plexiglas drawer, tastefully lighted like a sculpture in a museum. Designer clothing hung on a motorized track that circled the room like a toy train. You punched in the key of a designer-Armani, Saint Laurent, de la Renta, Moschino-then a garment code, and the track hummed contentedly as it delivered to your manicured hands a suede jacket or lacy skirt or velvet blazer.
Steve had told Katrina Barksdale he needed to take photos, which was true, as far as it went. He'd left her downstairs with Victoria, sipping wine and preparing for trial. He spent the next twenty minutes in the master suite with a digital camera, creating a 360-degree view, from the four-poster, silk-canopied bed-where Charles had expired, breathless but erect-to the arched entryways of the mammoth his-and-her closets. Then he tackled his
