Victor, Laura and Fazire were casting strange, knowing glances amongst themselves but Lily knew better than to ask. Though she had to admit she found it peculiar that Fazire was participating in this behaviour, especially with Victor. Fazire had warmed a bit to Nate but never to Victor.
When the quiet and now openly concerned Victor and Laura left Sunday afternoon, Lily gave Nate his head until he left Tash’s room after she’d read herself to sleep and he headed straight to his study.
Lily followed him, knocked on the closed door and entered at his word. He barely glanced at her when she walked in and she felt her blood run cold.
“Nate?”
“What is it, Lily?” he asked, not lifting his eyes to hers after his first brief glance, his question sounding as if he didn’t much care about her answer and her cold blood slowed as ice crystals formed.
“Is something the matter?” Her voice was timid and unsure and his head came up at the sound of it. She felt a flicker of hope at the warm look she thought she caught in his eyes but then he shuttered them.
“I’m busy, Lily. We’re getting married next Saturday and then away for two weeks on honeymoon. I’ve a tremendous amount to do.”
This seemed plausible and Lily gave him a relieved but weak smile and walked to the side of his desk and stopped, wanting to touch him but for the first time in a long time, afraid.
“Can I do something to help?” she asked softly.
At this, for some reason, he laughed without humour, the sharp bark of it was harsh and it grated against her already frayed nerves.
“You could leave me to it,” he suggested when he was done with his anti-amusement, his eyes on her and they were hard and blank, telling her clearly she was an unwelcome distraction.
Lily remembered that look. She had seen that look. He’d levelled it on Danielle on numerous occasions.
Her heart stuttered in her chest but she nodded and slowly moved away. Very slowly. Snail’s pace slowly. Moving slowly while hoping he’d call her back for a kiss, a touch, something, anything.
He did not.
He also did not turn to her when he finally came to their bed.
He was gone before she awoke, he didn’t wake Tash but he did leave a short, unaffectionate note for Lily (and a longer, very affectionate note for Tash) saying he left early for the office.
That afternoon, sitting behind the register in a quiet moment at Flash and Dazzle, she’d phoned him at the office.
He’d said he’d never miss another one of her calls and he hadn’t. She expected her calls came at times when he was busy but he always took them as, she now knew, he always took Tash’s calls when she phoned him when she got home from school.
“Mr. McAllister’s office,” Nate’s secretary Jennifer answered.
“Hi Jennifer, it’s Lily. Can I speak to Nate?”
Jennifer was quiet for a moment and Lily felt the now familiar stutter in her heart. These past weeks, Lily had chatted to Jennifer and although they’d never met, they’d built a rapport.
This time, however, Jennifer didn’t invite even a short chat, instead, she said softly, “I’m sorry, Lily. Mr. McAllister said he was not to be disturbed under any circumstances.”
Lily swallowed and nodded even though Jennifer couldn’t see her.
“That’s okay,” Lily replied, trying to do it brightly and fearing she failed. “Can you tell him I phoned?”
“Definitely,” Jennifer assured her.
When Lily got home from Flash and Dazzle, she found that Nate’s edict of not being disturbed didn’t apply to Tash who was, as ever, awash with news of her telephone conversation with her father. Although this wasn’t news from Nate, as Lily suspected Nate couldn’t get a word in edgewise and wouldn’t try anyway. It was more Tash’s news said in the form of, “I told Daddy…” and, “Then, when I described it, Daddy laughed.”
Instead of Nate taking Tash’s calls and laughing with her making Lily feel content, it made her fear and alarm turn to anger which she nursed quietly under Fazire’s watchful glare all night.
Nate didn’t make it home for Tash to read to him, nor did he call to say he’d be detained.
Lily monitored her daughter closely to see if her very astute senses were noticing anything different between her mother and father. However, Nate was shielding Tash from this and treating her exactly the same even while his behaviour to Lily was significantly different.
As Lily shut down the house for the night, Nate still not home, Fazire approached her in the hall.
“Lily-child –” he started gently, his eyes soft on her.
“No, Fazire,” she held up her hand as if to ward him off, “not now.”
Then before he could press as Fazire was wont to do, she’d run up the stairs. She got ready for bed but didn’t get in it, instead she paced. And she waited. And her mind tumbled over its thoughts, none of them good.
Very late, she heard Nate enter the house but he didn’t come up and, as minutes ticked by, she went in search of him.
She found him in their back garden, now lushly appointed with planters, pots and beds brimming with flowers and greenery, all of this well-tended by a weekly gardener. She was stunned to see him standing at the balustrade by the cliff looking toward the Victorian pier, smoking a cigarette. Not since their night on Laura and Victor’s stoop had she seen him smoke a cigarette or even smelled it on him.
She stood just outside the new French doors to the garden and called, “Nate?”
His body jerked and his head snapped around to look at her through the darkness. She was just as stunned that she’d surprised him. He was always alert to anything but most specifically her. Sometimes she felt he knew she was approaching a room even before she’d cleared the door.
She couldn’t imagine what had him so lost in thought but she wanted to know, needed to know and damned well was going to know.
She walked across the garden and stopped in front of him.
“You’re smoking.” Her voice was a soft accusation.
“Yes, Lily, I’m smoking. And you’re standing in the garden wearing your pyjamas,” he replied as if her transgression was as bad as his.
“When did you start smoking?” she ignored his comment.
“When I was nine,” he responded immediately, nonchalantly sharing a piece of his history with her like he did it every day and this information hit her like a blow.
Dear God, who started smoking when they were nine? She thought but he didn’t allow her to respond, he went on.