Vixen (17 page)

Then, like a wish come true, she felt him lean toward her. She held her breath.

“See?” he whispered, tucking her hair behind her ear. “I
told
you Ginnie looks more like a man than Keaton.”

Clara wanted nothing more in that moment than to press her lips to his. But then she thought of her aunt, and of reform school, and of her new life as a budding socialite here in Chicago. She thought of the mysterious notes she’d been receiving, threatening to expose her, to drag her back into her old New York life. Was he here, this elusive notesender? Was he watching her?

Clara shivered and turned her attention back to the screen.

Marcus and Clara left the theater and strolled through the city. All of Chicago seemed to be out on a romantic date—they passed couple after couple holding hands and eating ice
cream and kissing. She’d had no idea Chicago was such a
young
city. It made her long to be a part of the action, not just observe it from a sober distance.

In New York, her dates had always been fast-paced, more about the next activity than the person she was with. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been with a boy when she hadn’t felt pressure—pressure to pretend to be someone else, pressure to be somewhere more important. Even though she was still in Country Clara mode with Marcus, she felt strangely herself. Natural. Calm. Being with Marcus was almost like hanging out with a friend—if her friend had been an incredibly gorgeous man and had made her stomach flutter with butterflies.

“I have an idea,” Marcus said. “What would you say to ending this da—” He stopped himself. “This night, I mean—”

“Were you going to say the
D
word?” she teased him.

“I was about to,” Marcus said, adjusting his hat. “But then I realized that this is the farthest thing from a date.”

“Of course,” Clara agreed, though a small part of her wished he did consider it a date, even though she would have protested. It certainly felt like one. A
good
one.

“Right. Erm, what was I saying?” Marcus let out a nervous laugh, and Clara found it kind of endearing.

“Something about ending this
D
word …?”

“Right! I think it would only make sense to end this night with a nightcap.”

“Marcus, you know I don’t drink,” she said, even though he had read her mind. She was dying for a martini. “Not only is it
illegal
, but we are both
teenagers
.” She peered at her wrist. “And I have to be back before my curfew.”

“Nice watch,” he said, picking up her bare wrist.

She burst out laughing, and he joined in. The streetlight cast a yellow glow over his smooth cheeks. His blue eyes were like magnets, sucking her in. “And with me, your curfew is null and void. Mrs. Carmody trusts me implicitly—unlike you.”

Clara tried to suppress a smile. She seemed to be doing that a lot around him. “That’s because you seem to have a way with women.
Fooling
them, that is.”

“But you’re not like other girls, Clara,” he said. “Don’t you think I know that?”

There was a sincerity in his voice, in his piercing, direct gaze. What did it mean? “I don’t know.”

“Come on, let me take you home.” He charged ahead of her down the street.

“Wait!” she called out, and he turned to face her. Disappointment creased his forehead and made lines around his mouth. “One drink.”

“I don’t want to force you to do anything you don’t want to do.”

She could see that he meant it. “I’ll even go to the Green Mill, if you promise not to tell my aunt.”

He walked back toward her. “I have something a little different in mind. Someplace where we can actually talk.”

“Talk?”

“Yes,
talk
. Why, did you have something else in mind?”

Boys like Marcus never wanted to just talk. But Clara didn’t want this date—or whatever it was—to end. And maybe Marcus really
was
different than she’d imagined him to be. After all, if anyone knew a thing or two about unfair reputations, it was her. “Talking is fine with me.”

A few blocks later, Marcus stopped in front of a bakery called Bebe’s Buns.

“Follow me,” he said, leading her inside the small shop.

If it hadn’t been for all the chocolate and popcorn she had just eaten, Clara would have been salivating over the glass display of baked goods: row upon row of cookies, cakes, pastries, and pies. The scents of vanilla and cinnamon and sugar wafted through the room.

“Bebe!” Marcus exclaimed to a petite woman with puffy blond hair who was wearing a baker’s apron. He leaned across the counter and gave her a European-style double-cheek kiss.
“Est-ce que nous pouvons entrer?”

“For you, anytime,” she said, winking, and lifted up the counter. “And you must be Patricia, right?” She beamed at them.

Clara stood there, confused.

“That was a month ago, Bebe.” Marcus beckoned Clara
forward. “Come on, it’s this way,” he said, walking through a set of doors that led into the kitchen.

Clara followed him, even though she felt like a perfect little fool. Marcus pointed to a handwritten sign that read
THIS WAY TO THE DARK SIDE
over a broad arrow.

At the very back of the kitchen, he opened a metal door. Beyond was a small, dark room, illuminated by strands of white Christmas lights. Old movie posters hung over the brick walls. Eight small tables lit by candlelight stood around a little platform where a bass player and a pianist played a mellow cross between jazz and blues.

Even for a New York girl like Clara—who had seen and done it all—this place was totally copacetic. Her cheeks hurt, and she realized it was because she’d been smiling nonstop since … since when? It felt like forever.

They sat at a dark corner table and ordered cocktails (Scotch on the rocks for him, a Buck’s Fizz for her). Clara was going to put up the expected protest, but then rationalized that even a country girl would give in to a taboo taste of champagne.

“Patricia?” she asked, trying to sound casual. “So is this the secret spot you use to impress your dates?”

“Once upon a time,” Marcus answered. “But those days are behind me.”

“How far behind you, exactly?”

He shrugged. “It sounds worse than it is. Yes, I have gone out with a lot of girls, but there are very few girls I meet whom I am actually interested in.”

There was a couple at each table in the room, kissing or cuddling or both. She had never been a fan of public displays of affection, but something about the ambiance made Clara wish she were there with a lover, too.

Marcus started to reach for her hands across the table, but stopped himself, letting his hands rest on his glass instead. “You’re not like all those other girls.”

If you only knew
, she thought.

“So tell me. Do you miss home?” he asked.

“I do.” She took a sip of her drink, to prevent herself from saying too much.

“Have you been in touch with your parents? Your friends?” His cool blue eyes searched hers for an answer. “I can’t imagine what you must be going through—to have left that all behind, so far away.”

There was something so open in his face. As if he really cared about her. And when had she ever been out with a boy who cared about anything other than himself? She took another sip of her drink. “Want to dance?” she asked.

Marcus frowned. “Clara, I can see in your face that you’re sad about something. I saw it the moment I first met you.”

Clara had a brief, crazy impulse to tell him everything. She
was
sad. Or at least, she had been. Which was why being with him confused her so much—it felt as if all the sadness weighing on her from before had been replaced with something lighter, a fizziness just like the champagne bubbling up in her glass.

“You’re right.” She sighed deeply. “I miss so many people I left behind—my best friends, for one thing. They were like sisters to me. Of course, some people are easier to leave behind than others.”

“Like who?” Marcus asked, cocking his head.

“Oh, you know.” Clara peered down at her drink.

Then she felt Marcus’s hand on hers, wet from the condensation on his glass. His touch—which she had been longing for all night—made her forget everything. His fingers were strong, and his grasp made her feel safe.

“I know it must have been hard to betray your upbringing and come here,” he said, intertwining those delicious fingers in hers, “but I’m really happy that you did.”

The line could have come off as corny, but Marcus’s eyes seemed anything but. “Me too,” she said softly.

“Now do you want to dance?”

“Let’s just sit here for a little while more,” Clara said. She wanted to stay like this for the entire night, quiet, hand in hand, skin kissing skin.

After Marcus dropped her at home, Clara walked into the house like a googly-eyed zombie. She knew exactly what this feeling meant, and it was not good. But what was worse was that she couldn’t snap out of it.

She was falling for Marcus Eastman.

Marcus had definitely not absolved himself from his playboy reputation. But over the course of the evening, she’d realized there was something different about him, different from New York men. He wasn’t jaded.

Clara slumped down in front of her vanity mirror. What had happened to the willpower she’d begun the evening with?

She heard Gloria’s door sigh closed. What was
she
still doing up at one-thirty a.m.? At least Clara wasn’t in her cousin’s shoes—she would rather be stuck with her own hair-pulling confusion than Gloria’s sad future. Destined to live a lousy little life with her lousy little husband-to-be—just like her aunt Bea. Dreadful.

That was the thing about Marcus: He didn’t want to control her. He just wanted to be with her. Marcus wanted her to be herself. Or rather, her country self. It was so confusing.

Clara stepped out of her skirt, shrugged off her sweater, and woozily flopped onto her bed in her cream silk slip.

Something as sharp as a knife dug into her back.

Clara jumped up. She hoped, prayed, it wasn’t what she thought it was. Not now, not tonight. She didn’t want to let anything ruin her perfect evening—perfect because of Buster Keaton and champagne and Marcus’s deep blue eyes.

But she couldn’t avoid it. She tore open the now-familiar-looking envelope:

Something else inside the envelope fluttered to the floor.

A photograph.

On the back, in the left corner, handwriting:

She flipped it over.

There she was, in a speakeasy near Times Square. Her hair had been chopped into a pixie bob that was barely visible beneath a beaded headdress, and she was wearing a plunging, sparkly black toga dress. Her head was tossed back as if she had just heard the most hilarious joke, and she was wielding a long cigarette holder like a conductor’s baton. A silver flask glinted in her other hand. She remembered that night vividly. The Cad had taken her out to see a Broadway show and then had rented a suite overlooking Central Park, at the Pierre. That was the night she had slept with him for the first time.

The beginning of the end.

They’d begun the night in a group, but who had taken the photograph?

She studied the photo again. It wasn’t so much that she looked the epitome of a full-blown flapper, which she did.
But she was radiating something—sheer happiness?—that outshone even the lights of the marquee behind her.

Clara slipped the photo back inside the note and resealed the envelope. She stashed it in the back of her drawer with the others.

At her vanity, she began to slather thick globs of cold cream onto her cheeks. The full moon hung outside the window, its pearly glow pooling on the surface of the mirror.

She had been happy tonight, hadn’t she? It was so hard to tell. Once, happiness had seemed so steady and sure, so solid. But now it was transparent—something that ran through her fingers like water.

She looked again at her reflection in the mirror.
Who are you, Clara Knowles? Which identity are you wearing now?
But her face was like the moon, just another whitewashed orb, blank and unrecognizable, lost in the darkness.