Heaven (Casteel 1)

suppa. About six Cal came in, looking fresh enough to make me wonder if he did anything all day, and then he was smiling broadly. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

How could I tell him that he was the one I instinctively trusted, that without him here I couldn't stay on another minute? I couldn't say that during our first time alone together. "I don't know," I whispered, trying to smile. "I guess I expected you to look . . . well, dirty."

"I always shower before I come home," he explained with a small, odd smile. "It's one of Kitty's rules--no dirty husband in her house. I keep a change of clothes to put on after I'm finished for the day. Then, too, I am boss, and I have six employees, but I often like to pitch in and do the trouble-shooting in an old set."

Feeling shy with him, I gestured to the array of cookbooks. "I don't know how to plan a meal for you and Kitty."

"I'll help," he said instantly. "First of all, you've got to stay away from starches. Kitty adores spaghetti, but it makes her gain weight, and if she gains a pound she'll think it's your fault."

We worked together, preparing a casserole that Cal said Kitty would like. He helped me slice the vegetables for the salad as he began to talk. "It's nice having you here, Heaven. Otherwise I'd be doing this by myself, as before. Kitty hates to cook, though she's pretty good at it. She thinks I don't earn my way, for I owe her thousands of dollars and I am in hock up to my neck, and she holds the purse strings. I was just a kid when I married her. I thought she was wise, beautiful, and wonderful; she seemed to want to help me so much."

"How'd you meet her?" I asked, watching how he tore the lettuce and sliced everything thin and on an angle. He showed me how to make the salad dressing, and it was as if his busy hands set free his tongue, almost as if he were talking more to himself than to me as he chopped and sliced. "You trap yourself sometimes, by thinking desire and need is love. Remember that, Heaven. I was lonely in a big city, twenty years old, heading for Florida during spring break. I met Kitty quite by accident, in a bar my first night here in Atlanta. I thought she was absolutely the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen." He laughed hard and bitterly. "I was naive and young. I had come for the summer from my home in New England while I was still going to Yale, had two more years to go before I graduated. Alone in Atlanta I felt lost. Kitty was lost too, and we found we had a lot in common. After a while, we married. She set me up in business. I'd always planned to be a history professor, can you imagine? Instead I married Kitty. Haven't been on a university campus since. I've never been home again, either. I don't even write to my parents anymore. Kitty doesn't want me to contact them. She's ashamed, afraid they might find out she didn't finish high school. And I owe her at least twenty-five thousand dollars."

"How'd she make so much money?" I asked, half forgetting what I was doing.

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nbsp; "Kitty goes through men like castor oil, leaving them weak emotionally and drained financially. She told you she married first when she was thirteen? Well, she's had three other husbands, and each has provided for her very well--in order to get out of a marriage each must have found abominable after a while. Then, to give her credit, her beauty salon is the best in Atlanta."

"Oh," I said, with my head bowed low. His confession was not what I'd expected. Yet it felt so good to have someone talk to me as if I were an adult. I didn't know if I should ask what I did. "Don't you love Kitty?"

"Yes, I love her," he admitted gruffly. "When I understand what makes her what she is, how can I not love her? There's one thing, though, I want to say now, while I have a chance. There are times when Kitty can be very violent. I know she put you into hot water on your first night here, but I didn't say anything since you weren't permanently harmed. If I'd said something then, she would be worse the next time she has you alone. Just be careful to do everything as she wants. Flatter her, say she looks younger than I do. . . and obey, obey, and be meek."

"But I don't understand!" I cried. "Why does she want me, except to be her slave?"

He looked up, appearing surprised. "Why, Heaven, haven't you guessed? You represent to her the child she lost when she aborted your father's baby and ruined herself so she can never have another child. She loves you because you are part of him, and hates you for the same reason. Through you, she hopes one day to get to him."

"To hurt him through me?" I asked.

"Something like that."

I laughed bitterly. "Poor Kitty. Of all his five children, I am the one he despises. She should have taken Fanny or Tom--Pa loves them."

He turned to put his arms about me, and tenderly he held me the way I'd always wanted to be held by Pa. I choked up and clung to this man who was almost a stranger; my need to be loved was so great I grasped greedily, then felt ashamed and so shy I almost cried. He cleared his throat and let me go. "Heaven, above all, never let Kitty know what you just told me. As long as you are valuable to your father, you have value for Kitty. Understand?"

He cared. I could see it in his eyes, and with trust that he'd always keep confidences to himself, I had the courage to tell him about the suitcase in the basement and what it contained. He listened as Miss Deale would have listened, with compassion and understanding.

"Someday I'm going back there, Cal, to Boston, to see my mother's family. And I'll have the doll with me, so they'll know who I am. But I can't go unless I have found--"

"I know," he said with a small laugh, his eyes sparkling at last. "You must take with you Tom, Keith, and Our Jane. Why on earth do you call your little sister Our Jane?"

He laughed again when I told him. "Your sister Fanny sounds like a real character. Will I ever meet Fanny?"

"Why, I sure hope so," I said with a worried frown. "She's living now with Reverend Wise and his wife, and they call her Louisa, which is her middle name."

"Aaah, the good Reverend," he said in a solemn, slow way, looking thoughtful, "the richest, most successful man in Winnerrow."

"You don't like him?"

"I am always suspicious of any man that successful--and that religious."

It was good to be with Cal in the kitchen, working alongside him and learning just by watching what he did. I'd never- in a million years have believed a week ago that I could feel so comfortable with a man I hardly knew. I was shy, yet so eager to have him for my friend, for a substitute father, for a confidant. Every smile he gave me told me he'd be all of that.

Our casserole baked in the oven, the timer went off, and my biscuits were ready, and Kitty didn't come home, nor did she call to explain why she was late. I saw Cal glance at his watch several times, a deep frown putting a pucker of worry between his eyes. Why didn't he call and check?

Kitty didn't return home until eleven, and Cal and I were in the living room watching TV. The remainder of the casserole had long ago dried out, so it couldn't taste nearly as good to her as it had to us. Still, she ate it with relish, as if lukewarm food gone dry didn't matter. "Ya cooked this all yerself?" she asked several times.

"Yes, Mother."