Native Affairs (51 page)

Jennifer really tried not to look, but found this impossible. She kept sneaking glances at the young woman, who was seated at Lee’s left She seemed familiar, and then Jennifer realized, with a start, that this was the same girl pictured with Lee in the photograph in his living room.

Jennifer examined her again, a few minutes later, and changed her mind. It wasn’t the same person.

This one was a slightly distorted reflection in a mirror, like, and at the same time not like, the original in the photo. The cascading, waist-length black hair was the same, but this girl was slightly heavier, with a broader face and blunter features than the first She was very pretty, but she was not the girl in the picture.

But then, who was she? There was a strong family resemblance—she had to be a relative of the girl in the photo, the likeness was too close. Jennifer burned with curiosity, and something like despair. Whoever she was, she was Indian, and Jennifer wasn’t.

Harold Salamone got up on the dais to welcome the new players and wish the rest of the organization a prosperous year. Jennifer had heard it all before and studied her surroundings while the owner made his speech. The grand ballroom was huge, with an overhanging balcony surrounding the entire room, which was carpeted in red plush and dominated by a magnificent chandelier suspended from the ceiling by a golden chain. Salamone was talking from the stage, which had been converted to a speaker’s platform for the executives. The rest of the organization was seated at banquet tables scattered about on the ballroom floor. A large central area had been left clear for dancing, and a small orchestra was setting up in the pit below the stage. Waiters roved through the throng, taking drink orders and carrying silver buckets of champagne and other wines. It was a glittering, picturesque group, and Jennifer felt privileged to be part of it.

After Salamone, a few others spoke, and then the music began as dinner was served. Jennifer ate sparingly, her stomach in a knot, ever mindful of the man two tables away, as if the two of them were alone in the room.

The band played between courses, and Jennifer danced with John and with Dolores’s escort, Craig Davenport Just before dessert she went to the powder room and on the way back ran straight into Lee and his date as they came off the dance floor.

There was no avoiding an introduction. Lee, ever the gentleman, presented the women to one another. His companion was Dawn Blacktree.

Harold Salamone came up to talk to Lee as they stood there, and Jennifer was left to converse with Dawn alone. She learned that Dawn was indeed the sister of the young woman in the picture at Lee’s house. The latter had been Lee’s high school sweetheart, until she was killed in a fall from a horse \when she was seventeen.

This information did not make Jennifer feel better. Lee’s bond with this girl was sure to be very strong. And to make matters worse, she couldn’t even dislike Dawn, who was friendly and pleasant.

Joe Thornridge’s wife came up to ask Dawn something, and Jennifer found herself in a three-way conversation with Lee and Harold Salamone. She smiled a lot and wished she were elsewhere. Finally, Mr. Salamone took his leave.

“May your time with us be very happy, and your career here a success,” he said to Lee, grasping both of Lee’s hands in his. Lee thanked him, his lips twitching, and put his hand over his mouth as the older man walked away.

It was a few seconds before Jennifer realized that Lee was laughing. His shoulders were shaking, and there was a wicked gleam in his dark eyes.

“What is it?” she said.

Lee coughed to cover his mirth. “I’m fond of Harold, I really am,” he said, “but I can hardly keep a straight face when he talks to me. Everything he says sounds like the inscription on a greeting card.”

This was so true that Jennifer found herself squelching laughter, too. Salamone was a master of banalities, and the more she thought about it, the funnier it became. She and Lee turned away from one another, unable to look at each other for fear of breaking up, like a couple of teenagers overcome with forbidden hilarity in church.

Jennifer finally risked a glance at him, and he was regarding her with a devilish expression.

“May all your troubles be little ones,” he began, and Jennifer clutched at his arm to stop him. She was off again, gasping, tears coming to her eyes, certain that any moment now they would be attracting attention. After all, what the hell could be so funny that it would reduce the two of them to hysterics in the middle of a banquet?

He opened his mouth, and she held up her hand. “Please,” she whispered, “no more. I’m making a fool of myself as it is.”

“And the road ahead paved with the fulfillment of your dreams,” he recited rapidly.

Jennifer was helpless. She fell against him, and he grabbed her to steady her. After a moment she sobered, noticing the tenderness in his eyes.

“You really do like me, don’t you?” he said softly. “You wish you didn’t, but you do.”

Jennifer’s silence was her answer.

“I know the feeling,” he said, releasing her. They stared at one another, an oasis of stillness in the bustling, crowded room.

Joe Thornridge arrived to break the spell. “Hi, Jennifer,” he said. “What’s this guy been telling you?”

“Not much,” Jennifer replied, realizing that that was possibly the biggest lie she had ever uttered.

“What’s the matter with you, Chief? You boring this girl? I know a good one. Tell her about the time your knee gave out in the men’s room at Grand Central Station.”

“I think she could live without hearing that one, Joe,” Lee said faintly.

“Aw, come on,” Joe said, not to be dissuaded. “The Chief is, uh, using the facilities, if you know what I mean, when his leg folds up, and he goes crashing down between the sinks, flat out on the floor like a sack o’ corn meal.”

“Joe...” Lee said warningly.

“And so,” Joe went on, warming to his tale, “Lee’s all alone in there, can’t get anybody to help him, and just has to wait for somebody to show.”

Lee rolled his eyes, giving up.

“And guess who the first person to come in is?”

Jennifer was unable to guess.

“A cop!” Joe said, chortling. “In he walks and sees old superstar here grovelin’ on the floor, mumbling about some trick knee. Thought it was some new form o’ perversion, didn’t he, Lee ol’ boy?”

“If I killed him right now, how much time would they give me?” Lee said to Jennifer.

“Well, excuse me,” Joe said, offended.

“It’s all right, Joe,” Lee said, clapping his friend on the back, “that just reminded me of something I’ve been meaning to tell the little Mrs. over there. About the time you and Carl Danbury got those two stewardesses and—”

Joe interrupted with an observation about some people having no sense of humor and walked off, throwing Lee a black look over his shoulder.

Lee turned to Jennifer immediately. “Dance with me,” he said.

This was a prospect too inviting to be denied. But just as Jennifer nodded, agreeing, the band switched from the slow numbers it had been playing to a heavy metal rendition of a popular rock tune, with a steady, underlying sensual rhythm.

Jennifer stopped short, intending to demur. But Lee’s fingers closed around her wrist, and she looked up into his eyes. They contained an unmistakable challenge.

“Come on,” he said softly. “You can’t go back on it now.”

Jennifer hesitated, but couldn’t resist answering his unspoken dare. He wanted to dance? She would dance, all right.

Once they got out on the floor, all her inhibitions left her. Lee was as graceful dancing as he was playing football, and she matched him move for move, never breaking eye contact for a moment. As the music swelled, surrounding them, Jennifer felt it in her blood, carrying her away on a tide of reckless abandon. She leaned into Lee, shaking her shoulders, and saw the flicker of response in his eyes, as the crowd around them began to whistle and close in for a better look. He danced more provocatively, testing her, and she followed him, unwilling to back down. More people caught on to the show, and by the time the music ended, Lee and Jennifer had brought down the house, concluding to applause and wolf calls that left little doubt as to the nature of what had happened.

Jennifer walked straight off the floor, looking neither right nor left, until she reached her table and slid into her seat Dolores was there, staring at her, dumbfounded.

“What’s the matter, Dolores, you look like you need a drink,” Jennifer said calmly.

“A drink!” Dolores yelped. “After that little scene, what I need is a cold shower. My God, Jen, what were you thinking of, to dance with him like that? I was ready to phone for the vice squad.”

It wasn’t easy to shock Dolores, but Jennifer had apparently done it That was some sort of milestone. It also told Jennifer that if generally liberal Dolores reacted this way, the response in more conservative quarters (like the mind of Harold J. Salamone) might be somewhat greater.

Her chagrin was intensified by the return of Craig and John to their table. John glanced at Jennifer briefly and then looked down, fiddling with his napkin. Jennifer felt a sharp stab of sympathy for him. After all, she was his date, and she had just made a spectacle of herself with another man.

Jennifer felt the heat of a flush staining her skin and brushed damp tendrils of hair away from her face. “Excuse me,” she mumbled, pushing back her chair. The men half rose out of their seats as she walked quickly through the ballroom until she reached the cool safety of the marble-floored entry hall.

The reception area was almost empty, as the party was in full swing. The clerk behind the desk glanced at her without curiosity, and one of the hostesses, who recognized her as being with the Freedom, merely nodded and walked on. Jennifer sank gratefully into a chair next to a large potted plant, and closed her eyes.

She had to get a grip on herself. This kind of behavior would never do. She was a mature, responsible, professional woman, not some love-struck adolescent tormented by spring fever. She knew how she felt about Lee, but the rest of the world didn’t have to. If she kept on this way, the state of her affections would remain about as secret as tomorrow’s headline on The New York Times.

She opened her eyes to see Lee standing in front of her, regarding her thoughtfully.

“Go away,” she said and closed her eyes again.

“I intend to,” he answered. “And you’re coming with me.”

Jennifer’s eyes flew open.

“Let’s ditch this place,” he said, “and go for a ride.”

“No.”

“Why not? They’re all getting loaded in there; nobody will miss us.”

“I think Dawn and John might notice the empty seats if we leave, Lee.” And draw their own conclusions after our recent performance, she added silently.

“Then we’ll tell them a lie,” he said simply.

She eyed him suspiciously.

“We’ll say something has come up, that we have some work to do.”

“Lee, anybody who swallows that will be ready to open a wooden nickel depository in the morning.”

He grinned, sensing her weakening resistance. “Come on,” he coaxed. “Live dangerously. We’ll come back later. Play hooky, for a little while.”

His terminology was appropriate. He sounded exactly like one of her junior high buddies trying to convince her to skip school.

“You know you want to,” he added softly.

Truer words were never spoken, Jennifer thought.” He took her silence for assent, and she trailed after him, watching him stop at her table, and his own, to volunteer some story which undoubtedly no one believed.

She realized that he didn’t care, and, with some surprise, that she really didn’t, either. Her desire to be with Lee completely overrode the concern with appearances or propriety which might once have influenced her.

When he returned, she followed him wordlessly outside.

* * * *

Lee took her back to his house, switching off a burglar alarm with a key as they entered. It was spotless, as always. He had mentioned that he had a cleaning service come in once a week, and Jennifer had noticed that he himself was very neat.

“I want to show you something upstairs,” he said, leading the way. Jennifer went with him to the second floor, consisting of two large bedrooms, one of which was obviously Lee’s, and another which looked as though it were used as a guest room. Jennifer glanced into the master bedroom as they passed. It was curiously plain, almost Spartan—an oversized bed and a color television on a stand the only touches of luxury. There was one whole wall of built-in closets, and another of floor to ceiling shelves filled with books.

At the end of the hall there was a short staircase, which led to the loft she’d glimpsed from below.

“The builders customized this for me,” he commented as they ascended. “There are a number of artists in the complex, and they use the addition as a studio.” He smiled over his shoulder at her. “I use it as a playroom.”

Jennifer paused on the threshold of an immense circular room with a cathedral ceiling. Brightly colored, hand-woven rugs were scattered on the polished oak floor, which gleamed with a rich luster. The room contained an impressive grand piano and three complicated-looking telescopes, their noses trained outward, poking through full-length, concealing drapes. There was also a plush couch set in a nook, with a companion coffee table covered with books and magazines. At the far end of the room stood a draftsman’s table with an arc lamp anchored to shine on its inclined surface.