Petals on the Wind (Dollanganger 2)

"What's wrong, Catherine?" Paul asked. "You come home to me and bring along another man, so maybe you don't have to

explain at all. I can guess."

Quickly I put out my hand to seize hold of his. "Stop! Don't say anything!' Falteringly and very slowly I began to tell him about his sister's visit. I told him I knew now that Julia was still alive, and though I could understand his motivation, he should have told me the truth. "Why did you lead me to believe she was dead, Paul? Did you think me such a child I couldn't bear to hear it? I could have understood if you had told me. I loved you, don't you ever doubt that I did! I didn't give to you because I thought I owed you anything I gave because I wanted to give, because I desperately needed you. I knew better than to expect marriage, and I was happy enough in the relationship we had. I would have been your mistress forever--but you should have told me about Julia! You should have known me well enough to realize I'm impulsive, I act without thought when I'm hurt--and it hurt terribly that night Amanda came and told me your wife was still alive!

"Lies!" I cried. `Oh, how I hate liars! You of all people to lie to me! Besides Chris, there was no one I trusted more than you."

He'd stopped strolling, as I had. The nude marble statues were all around, mocking us. Laughing at love gone awry. For now we were like them, frozen and cold.

"Amanda," he said, rolling her name on his tongue as something bitter and fit to be spit out. "Amanda and her half-truths. You ask why--why didn't you ask why before you flew to London? Why didn't you give me the chance to defend myself?"

"How can you defend lies!" I bit back meanly, wanting him to hurt as I'd hurt that night when Amanda slammed out of the theater.

He walked away to lean against the oldest oak, and from his pocket he drew a pack of cigarettes.

"Paul, I'm sorry. Tell me now what your defense would have been."

Slowly he puffed on the cigarette, and exhaled smoke. That smoke came my way and weaved around my head, neck, body--and chased off the scent of roses. "Remember when you came," he began, taking his time, "you were so bitter from your loss of Cory, to say nothing of how you felt about your mother. How could I tell you my own sordid story when already you'd known too much pain? How was I to know you and I would become lovers? You seemed to me only a beautiful, haunted child--though you've touched me deeply--always you've touched me. You touch me now, standing there with your accusing eyes. Though you are right. I should have told you.' He sighed heavily.

"I told you about the day Scotty was three, and how Julia took him down to the river and held him under the water until he was dead. But what I didn't tell you was she lived on. . . . A whole team of doctors worked on her for hours on end trying to bring her out of the coma, but she never came out."

"Coma," I whispered. "She's alive now, and still in the same coma?"

He smiled so bitterly, and then looked up at the moon that was smiling too, sarcastically, I thought. He turned his head and allowed his eyes to meet with mine "Yes, Julia lived on, with her heart beating, and before you came along with your brother and sister I drove every day to visit her in a private institution. I'd sit beside her bed, hold her hand, and force myself to look at her gaunt face and skeleton body. . . . It was the best way I had to torment myself and try to wash away the guilt I felt. I watched her hair become thinner each day--the pillows, covers, everything covered by her hair as she withered away before my very eyes. She was connected to tubes that helped her to breathe, and a tube was in her arm through which she was fed. Her brain waves were flat, but her heart kept on beating. Mentally she was dead, physically she was alive. If she ever came out of the coma, she'd never speak, move, or even be able to think. She'd have been a living dead woman at the age of twentysix. That's how old she was when she took my son down to the river to hold him under the shallow water. It was hard for me to believe a woman who loved her child so much could drown him and feel his struggles to live . . . and yet she did it just to get back at me." He paused, flicked the ash from his cigarette and turned his shadowed eyes to me. "Julia reminds me of your mother. . . . Both could do anything when they felt justified."

I sighed, he sighed, and the wind and flowers sighed too. I think those marble statues sighed along as well, in their lack of understanding the human condition. "Paul, when did you see Julia last? Doesn't she have any chance at all for a full recovery?" I began to cry.

He gathered me in his arms and kissed the top of my head. "Don't cry for her, my beautiful

Catherine. It's all over for Julia now; she is finally at peace. The year we became lovers, she died less than a month after we started. Quietly she just slipped away. I remember at the time you looked at me as if you sensed something was wrong. It wasn't that I felt less for you that made me stand back and look at myself. It was a blend of painful guilt and sorrow that someone as sweet and lovely as Julia, my childhood sweetheart, had to leave life without once experiencing all the wonderful, beautiful things it had to give." He cupped my face between his palms, and tenderly kissed away my tears. "Now smile and say the words I see in your eyes, say you love me. When you brought Julian home with you, I thought it was over between us, but now I can tell it will never be over. You've given me the best you have within you, and I'll know that even when you're off thousands of miles, dancing with younger and handsomer men . . . you'll be faithful to me, as be faithful to you. We'll make it work, because two people who are sincerely in love can always overcome obstacles no matter what they are."

Oh . . . how could I tell him now? "Julia's dead?" I asked, quivering, deep in shock, hating myself and Amanda! "Amanda lied to me. . . . She knew Julia was dead, and yet she flew to New York to tell me a lie? Paul, what kind of woman is she?"

He held me so tight I felt my ribs ache, but I clung just as fast to him, knowing this was the last time I could. I kissed him wild and passionately, knowing I'd never feel his lips again on mine He laughed jubilantly, sensing all the love and passion I had for him, and in a happy, lighter voice he said, "Yes, my sister knew when Julia died; she was at her funeral. Though she didn't speak to me. Now please stop crying. Let me dry your tears." He used his handkerchief to touch to my cheeks and the corners of my eyes, then held it so I could blow my nose.

I'd acted the child, the impulsive, impatient child Chris had warned me not to be--and I had betrayed Paul who trusted me. "I still don't understand Amanda," I said in a mournful wail, still putting off that moment of truth I didn't know if I could face. He held me and stroked my back, my hair, as I clung with my arms about his waist, staring up into his face.

"Sweetheart, Catherine, why do you look and act so strange?" he said in his voice that had gone back to normal. "Nothing my sister said should rob us of taking what joy we can from life. Amanda wants to drive me out of Clairmont. She wants to take over this house so she can leave it to her son, so she does her best to ruin my reputation. She's very active socially and fills the ears of her friends with lies about me. And if there were women before Julia drowned my son, that was lesson enough for me to change my ways. There was no other woman until you! I've even heard it rumored that Amanda has spread it about that I made you pregnant and your D & C was actually an abortion. You see what a spiteful woman can do-- anything!"

Now it was too late, too late. He asked me again to stop crying. "Amanda," I said stiffly, my control about to break. "She said that D & C was the same as an abortion. She said you kept the embryo, one with two heads. I've seen that thing in your office in a bottle. Paul, how could you keep it? Why didn't you have it buried? A monster baby! It isn't fair--it isn't-- why, why?"

He groaned and wiped his hand over his eyes, to quickly deny everything. "I could kill her for telling you that! A lie, Catherine, all a lie!"

"Was it a lie? It could have been mine, you know that. For God's sake, Chris doesn't know--he didn't lie to me too, did he?"

He sounded frantic as he denied everything, and sought once more to embrace me, but I jumped backward, and thrust forth both arms to ward him off. "There is a bottle in your office with a baby like that inside! I saw it! Paul, how could you? You, of all people, to save something like that!"

"No!" he flared immediately. "That thing was given to me years ago when I was in med school--a joke, really--med students play all sorts of jokes you'd find gruesome, and I'm telling you the truth, Catherine, you didn't abort." Then he stopped abruptly, just as I did, with my thoughts reeling. I'd betrayed myself!

I began to cry. Chris, Chris, there was a baby, there was a monster just like we feared.

"No," said Paul again and again, "it's not yours, and even if it were, it wouldn't make any difference to me. I know you and Chris love each other in a special way. I've always known it, and I do understand."

"Once," I whispered through my sobs, "only once on one terrible night.

"I'm sorry it was terrible."

I stared up at him then, marveling that he could look at me with so much softness and so much respect, even knowing the full truth. "Paul," I asked