Beyond the Storm (9780758276995) (14 page)

“Tell me you got something more out of tonight other than that. That on the night you met Prince Hunky you're not already thinking divorce.”

“Oh, don't get me wrong, Rev. My boy, Dom, he's one hell of a kisser. A girl could get used to that.”

“You bitch!”

“Yeah,” Vanessa said, giggling, plopping down on the bed. “I know.”

 

Vanessa Massey decided to play her cards close to the vest when it came to this burgeoning relationship, being ever-so-coy about her interest. Or at least, she would try her best to resist Dom's natural charms for as long as she could hold out. He arrived in the lobby of their hotel for breakfast the next day, then whisked her for a drive in his Maserati deep into the hills of the tiny country for a day of joyriding and getting to know each other. The next night, a romantic dinner for two occurred, made even more so by the fact he'd bought out every table and had closed the restaurant. In a matter of two quick weeks, they were inseparable, causing great consternation between the two friends. Reva had grown accustomed to having her wing girl at her side at all times, and now that just wasn't the case. A whirlwind weekend on the lush Amalfi Coast, shows in London's bustling West End, strolls down the wide, café-laden sidewalks of the Champs-Elysees, Vanessa's life went from pedestrian to princess, and she was going to enjoy herself for as long as she could. As she told Reva on a rare night back in Brussels while Dom dealt with some family business, she asked to “let me have fun with my charming Italian stallion. I'm sure he'll tire of me eventually, especially since I haven't put out yet.” That truth slipped out after five weeks of dating.

“I couldn't resist that,” Reva confessed.

Five weeks and one day later, Vanessa finally agreed with her friend.

His touch upon her naked skin was remarkable, soft and gentle, sending thrills curling up her spine. Sexy and giving, understanding a woman's body with remarkable ability, he was the ideal lover. Patient when she needed it, full of stamina when she cried for it, and after that first night barely another escaped when they weren't indulging each other's unquenchable passions. Vanessa Massey, late of Danton Hill, New York, United States of America, had ceased to exist, and in her place was this newly crowned sophisticate of the continent, adorned in the finest threads from pricey designers that Dominick could afford, which was considerable.

It was on a Thursday night four months after their initial meeting, inside her and Reva's apartment while her friend sat at the nearby bar in which they had met, smoking, drinking, and feeling jealousy consume her, that Vanessa announced she had news. They were scheduled to fly to Milan the next day and then drive up to the family villa on the upper shores of Lake Como, an eager Dom ready to introduce her. What she had to say was that she was two months' pregnant. Trepidation accompanied her telling him, like butterflies on crack, fearing the worst response possible. His reaction was anything but bad, as he took her into his strong, hairy arms. He hugged her, kissed her belly, explaining how pleased his mother would be.

“But won't she be . . . disapproving? She's so . . . staunch in her beliefs.”

“My mother knows all, and so she knows certain things before you. She knows you are to be my wife.”

Wife,
the four-letter word reverberated in her mind. But it also left an empty pang in her stomach. She should be overjoyed, but the baby growing inside her kept her steeped in reality. Dominick was, of course, oblivious to her feelings, the uncertainty that had kept her awake the week she had found out, because he had all that he wanted. In seven months' time Dominick would have even more, a child . . . an heir. Perhaps she should have seen this as a sign, possession winning out over passion. Maybe she even did. Maybe she just chose to believe in the fairy tale, for once believing in happy endings.

“We must travel to Como and tell them at once.”

“Wait . . . Dominick, there's something I have to tell you . . . really, we should wait before we make any kind of announcement . . .”

Dominick downplayed her concerns while Vanessa's head spun from the sudden change of direction in her life. She could hardly believe the little towheaded girl in the pigtails had run away from home and forged a life in Europe, met what was essentially an Italian count, and was now going to be married to him and live forever in the glamorous capitals and cities of the world. Just three years removed from high school, dreams she hadn't even envisioned were coming true. When at last she did meet the stern-faced Mama di Arghetti, as well as Dom's distant father and sisters and cousins and aunts and uncles, she'd been assured all would be well, they would have the most perfect life, he and she and their soon-to-be-born child. Vanessa still worried about his mother's reaction to the news of her pregnancy—they were Catholic and she and Dom were kind of putting the cart before the horse here. Same held true for the Arghettis, but she was here, this was real. Danton Hill ceased to exist. The first thing that happened, upon hearing the news, was Mama Arghetti touching her distended belly.

“Sí, Dominick. Sí.”

That, in Mama Arghetti's world, meant approval.

A few weeks later on a night back in Brussels, when Dominick was away on business and Vanessa had a rare moment free in which to spend time with the only friend who had stood by her through thick and thin, through the skinny jeans phase to the newly purchased maternity clothes, Reva sat her down in their old flat and proceeded to warn her of the perils of success. Of money. “The problem with having big dreams is, they can come true.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

Reva took a drag on her filthy cigarette, blowing the puff of toxic smoke away from her expectant friend. She refilled her glass of flat champagne, poured more Perrier for Vanessa. “You arrived in Europe three years ago with the hope of finding yourself. What I have to ask you may not want to hear, or answer. Have you done that, Vanessa? Do you know who you are, and what you want? Or have you just become what Dominick wants? Or worse, what Mama Arghetti wants.”

The wedding occurred on the shores of Lake Como, and practically every person in town was invited for the daylong feast. Dominick led the celebration with glasses of chilled Prosecco and his mother followed suit with plate after plate of pastas and cheeses and meats. They settled in the Trastevere neighborhood of Rome, where Dominick went back to work for the family's company. They grew and sold olives and sunflowers and their oily by-products, and apparently prospered quite well thanks to their international appeal and reputation for fresh products. For Vanessa, she felt a bit like a modern-day Rapunzel, relegated to the quiet of the urban apartment, watching from the window as the crowded trams passed by, the noisy bleat of horns they made as pedestrians crossed in front of them. Still, it was life outside her window, leaving her trapped. She was still only five months' pregnant; the wedding having been rushed for appearances' sake, they didn't want her showing too much in front of the nosy villagers. Nor did they want to wait months and have the wailing sounds of a baby overtake those of the priest at the ceremony.

One night, with Dominick still out, Vanessa spied the first bit of spotting.

She knew immediately what was happening.

She called Reva first.

She told her to call Dominick.

She did, reluctance filling her newly empty soul.

While she waited for Dom to come rescue her from her tower, she admitted to Reva that she was afraid, deeply and deathly. “You were right, Rev, you told me to be careful of those dreams coming true. I've been living in a bubble, a very rich and fancy one. But there's no different, rich or poor, sometimes bubbles pop and pierce your heart and you wake up and what's left is an awful bloody mess of a life,” she said, staring down at the bed in which she lay, the bed she shared with the man who'd created those dreams. Who, with love and with tenderness and an urgent desire pulsing through him, had created the child within her.

Dominick arrived home an hour later, sweaty, concerned, then rushed her himself to the hospital by motorcar. But by then it was too late.

Way too late.

“M
y God, he didn't . . .”

“What? Divorce me because I miscarried his first child and heir? Come on, Adam, what kind of fool would I be not to recognize a man of such bad character?”

He heard the words, but there was a biting, cutting commentary behind them. Like there was more to her story.

“Of course Dominick saw me through the difficulty of that night and beyond. He helped me recover both physically and emotionally from the trauma, and trust me, that's what it was. I was a devastated wreck. I even got a month's holiday at the villa up Lake Como, with his mother doting on me every single second, almost cloyingly. She wouldn't leave me until I ate, then sat by me while I slept the days away. Even Reva came and stayed for a week, Dom financing her trip. He understood and he cared.”

“Okay, so what happened? How'd it end?”

“Simple. I never got pregnant again,” she said with the barest hint of emotion, as though distancing herself from the words even as she spoke them. “Oh, the doctors, all kinds of Italian and Swiss specialists, they ran a battery of tests that made me feel simultaneously like a guinea pig and a baby-making machine, given no other purpose on this earth than to bear Dominick's prized Junior. Reva was of course right, in the midst of the whirlwind romance, I hadn't found my true self at all, and in the process of marrying Dominick and becoming Mrs. di Arghetti I'd lost all sight of the reasons why I'd escaped to Europe. If I wanted to just play housewife and pump out babies, I could have easily done that in Danton Hill . . .” She suddenly stopped talking, her mouth closing like a steel trap.

Adam sat there in the hard-backed chair in the kitchen, one leg curled underneath him, the other jutting upward; his arms crossed over his chest. As though he was trying to hide from the truth being revealed, while seeking heat and comfort, fighting off a noticeable chill that had pervaded the room all during Vanessa's story. The highs of their courtship, the lows of her not finding herself, they had left him drained. His emotions remained on the edge because he didn't know how . . . or why the story ended. He wanted to embrace her, but somehow he couldn't move. The timing was all off, anyway, her confession only half complete and hanging between them like something unattainable, something untouchable. To reach for her now would be to smother her against the words that still floated in the fragrant scent of the candle. He recalled her word for Mama Arghetti: cloying. Now he decided to give her air.

“Dominick was as patient as he could be, even while he was determined to get me pregnant again. He would come to my bed . . . often, like we were something out of a Victorian novel, existing separately, until the night bore down on us. That's when he would knock, enter, and . . . enter. But the routine wore thin as the months, then years progressed, and finally after six years of marriage . . . well, there was no baby, no heir for him to hold up to his expectant family.” She laughed. “Sorry, poor choice of word.”

“So he stopped coming to your room?”

“No, he continued our lovemaking, believing he had more power over nature than I did and could magically convince my body to produce . . . to reproduce,” she said. “But guess what? No baby . . . there would be no Vanessa either.”

“He divorced you because you hadn't been able to have a child?”

She nodded, wiping away a stray tear. She appeared annoyed that she'd shed yet another tear for her failure. “And never would. The doctors all confirmed that it was unlikely I would carry a baby to term.”

“My God . . . Vanessa, I don't know what to say.”

“That's okay, Dominick spared me no words—in both English and Italian. He claimed I deceived him, that I must have known that I couldn't have had children. He said I knew how important children were to him and his family and still I married him. How important they were to his mother—his precious Mama Arghetti. She had plenty of words for me too, but she barely knew any English so I escaped her wrath by the sake of never having learned Italian. Still, her tone barely needed translation. It was clear mother and son were in agreement about what to do with me.” She paused, suppressing a misguided laugh. “I'm not sure how to say it in Italian, but annulment was the term they bandied about.”

“After six . . . seven years of marriage? You can't annul . . .”

“The Arghettis' money could, and it did. Marriage wiped off the books, and so Dominick Paolo di Arghetti was free to marry again for the first time, while I was quickly, quietly shipped back to Brussels and Reva's tiny apartment and the stale smell of cigarette smoke. In all that time, while my fairy tale was exploding, Reva was a steadying force. Her cigarettes saw me through some dark nights.” Vanessa coughed, as though those hazy, smoke-filled memories swirled around her right now. “It's funny, Adam, you and me.”

“How's that?”

“You and Sarah Jane, me and Dom. We both ended up with people who wanted only what they wanted, or had been told by their parents what was expected of them. Their own lives were defined, in order, by money and identity and perception, by family, and ultimately, by self-love. No room there for anyone else, certainly not an outsider who couldn't provide them with a future. If Dominick had told me right off the bat that all he wanted was someone to sire him the next great Arghetti son . . . I don't even know how I would have responded to him. Probably I would have held at that blackjack table. Maybe I might have had the satisfaction of beating the dealer.”

“Where is Dom now, do you know? It has been ten years.”

“Oh, he's married now to a nice Italian woman, slightly plump with hips ideal for childbearing. Three kids and counting, including two boys. You can't compete with that, no way, no how. Not that he ever told me about his new family, but in Europe, in the bars and cafés, even the casinos

. . . you just hear things. Look, I'm sure Dominick is a good, doting father, and maybe he's even a decent, giving husband. But the rumors of him getting action on the side have increased since the arrival of the kids. So, who knows? All I learned was that he's a lousy human being.” She paused, drank a healthy gulp of the white wine, which fortunately came from California, and then said, “There's more, though.”

Adam shook his head emphatically, essentially shutting down this tortured, sad trip down memory lane. “Not now, there isn't. Vanessa, you should give yourself a break. We can resume your tale later. Right now you've put yourself through too much already today, both physically and emotionally. Give your body and your heart and your soul a well-deserved break. Give them a chance to heal.”

“Hasn't happened yet. I don't see that happening in just these few hours.”

“Don't be surprised,” he said, offering up his best smile. “This night has already seen magical things happen. I doubt we've seen the last of them.”

“Fine, Adam, play the romantic, but me . . . I could use a cigarette.”

“Now you're joking,” he said.

“Yes, I'm joking. Sort of. Maybe. Probably I'm just channeling Reva, suddenly envious of the life she still lives. Not a care in the world, no responsibility, no headaches. Or heartaches. See, Adam, I haven't lost everything, my sense of humor is as intact as my cynicism,” she said. Then she rose from the table, surveying the dirtied dishes before them. “So, while we wait to see what other rabbits you'll pull out of this farmhouse's hat, why don't I clean up this mess.”

“I think those can wait till morning. New light, clean house . . . fresh start.”

“Smooth line. You should have been in advertising, Adam, not finance. Look, doing the dishes is busywork and right now that's just what I need, something mindless. Didn't you ever learn that cleaning is considered a form of therapy? There were days my mother practically slept with the vacuum she was so stressed. I guess I inherited that from her.”

He did as requested, stating he would see about the fire, maybe it needed another log. He paused, got no response from her as she made her way to the sink; he wasn't even sure Vanessa heard him. He walked out of the kitchen, but not before stealing a look back at her. She was busy at the sink, not a whistle to be heard while she worked. Though her back was to him, he could tell from the slump of her shoulders and the listless way her arms went about cleaning that her smile had dissipated. For a moment he considered the impact this strange day had had on her, whether she had suffered some internal injury from the accident that hadn't yet revealed itself. About to return to the living room, he paused once more. What he thought about were the letters upstairs in the cupola and the gravestone outside, and the loneliness that permeated the walls of this house. Were they contributing to it, or helping to fill the house with fresh sounds of life?

Back in the living room, Adam gazed around at the white ghosts of the furniture. The fire had indeed diminished to mere remnants, now only a hint of the enervating heat that once was—not unlike the two of them, he noted. But for the first time since arriving at the farmhouse, he really took in his surroundings, trying for a glimpse into the lives of the people who called this place home. No photos of the Barton family adorned the mantle, nor did any paintings or other accoutrements decorate the walls. The covered furniture again left him unsettled; this was very much a home in transition, not unlike his and Vanessa's lives. Perhaps the Barton children had only done so much with closing up the house after their father had died. Turn off the phone, he guessed that made sense. Keep the heat and electricity turned on for convenience's sake. Piece together all of this evidence and an answer to the mystery inside this house still failed to reveal itself.

Sparking the sizzling embers with the metal poker, waiting for the new log to catch on fire, Adam found his mind drifting. Thinking again about Vanessa and all the heartache she'd been through. As difficult as the breakup with the Stockdale family had been—and that's what it was, a separation from each generation, not just from Sarah Jane—nothing compared with losing the child you were expecting, your husband, and the life you had forged together. He'd never committed to Sarah Jane, not even gotten close to proposing to her, but Vanessa, she had believed the fairy tale and jumped into the prince's arms without blinders. And fallen hard off the lily pad. Her marriage had ended, by his count, eleven years ago, right about the time he'd joined KFC. What he most took from that time in his life was . . .

“New York,” he said aloud, as though the mere mention of the city he called home summoned up images of a chance encounter, a mistake. With one half of Vanessa's story told to him, he had been granted a greater insight into what that night eleven years ago had been about. When he and Vanessa had met again under circumstances that could only be called coincidental. Or maybe not? For some reason, Vanessa Massey kept sneaking into his life, making an impact when only a dent was called for. First the prom, then the night in Manhattan, finally the car accident that had landed them here. Did there really exist a deeper connection between them? Was there something to this notion of having known her before . . . ?

Was that what had kept him, all these years, from locking down his desires?

Still, Vanessa had seen far worse. He might have missed out on dreams, even let them elude him voluntarily, but she had both achieved and then lost hers.

Adam liked to joke about having the proverbial two-point-five kids, but that didn't mean he never envisioned himself as a father. And not that his chances were over, he could still meet a woman and fall in love, and she could . . . he stepped dead in his tracks as the most tortured image rushed into his mind like a dam unleashed. A woman, any woman, just as long as she bore him a child . . . he shuddered, realizing how that made him sound, made worse by the fact that in his mind he immediately pictured Vanessa as that woman. Was that what today's twist of fate was all about, finding a tomorrow, possibly one with her? While the world spun outside, what exactly was happening inside the confining walls of this farmhouse? Was it a passing reunion, one more fling between two people who found momentary attraction, or was there more to her and him and the future and yesterday and too many unasked or unanswered questions?

Could what they started today be just that, a start?

Or was today like before, another random exchange of heat and anger? Meant to bury their pain as much as their previous encounters had? Lonely souls, broken people, the world was full of them, all them looking to prove something to themselves and to others. I matter, I'm important, I feel better now, I feel wanted. Was that all? An affirmation of self, fulfilled with the aid of the first available body? Was that how he would be able to justify the intimacy they'd shared today?

Adam felt conflicted. The fireplace taken care of, with fresh, warm crackling filling the house, he found himself standing in the hallway somewhere between the living room and the kitchen, caught between the past and present, and he couldn't decide which way to venture. That word stirred him, awoke something in him.
Venture.
That was the strange name written on the letters. Mr. Barton had written them, but why? Who was Venture, and what did he have to say to her in all those letters? Had he loved her? Had he lost her?

Adam found himself with a decision to make. Should he be like Aidan Barton and keep his feelings sealed in an envelope? Should he just sit and wait for Vanessa to return to his side, let her finish the story of her life, or should he throw caution to the wind, rush upstairs, and tear open the letters, return to the kitchen and sweep her off her feet and announce he was never letting her go? The other option, of course, was to open wide the front door and never look back, never to be heard from again, not in the lake-scented land of Danton Hill or the life of alluring, beautiful, broken Vanessa Massey. For some reason, the day's puzzling vents had made him question the big picture, the important questions. Life-changing questions. Maybe smashing his car into an accordion and sticking his forehead with a piece of glass like he was a pincushion had made him wake up and smell the acrid cornfields. His car was totaled, not unlike his career and maybe his life, and the only thing left was what he'd come back to Danton Hill to find. So he remained just where he was, still caught between then and now.