Dark Angel (Casteel 2)

representing the Tatterton family, and we have set certain standards you must live up to. You'll need an allowance so you can entertain your friends, and buy whatever your heart desires. You'll be well taken care of."

I had fallen into a bewitched state, caught up in this charming fantasy of riches, where I could buy anything I wanted, and the college education that had always been so far out of reach was suddenly close, within grasp.

"This woman Sarah that you mentioned, the girl your father married shortly after Leigh died, what was she like?"

Why did he want to know that? "She was from the hills. She was tall and raw-boned, and her hair was bright auburn, and her eyes were green."

"I don't care what she looked like, what was she like?"

"I loved her until she turned against . . . " and I started to say "us" before I stopped abruptly. "I loved her until she ran off because she found out Pa was dying."

"You must strike the name of Sarah from your lips and your memory. And hope never to see her again."

"I don't know where Sarah is," I hastily said, feeling strangely guilty, wanting to defend Sarah, who had tried, even though she had failed . . .

"Heaven, if there's one thing I've learned in forty years, it's the fact that bad seeds have a way of turning up."

I stared at him with forebodings.

"One more time, Heaven. When you become a member of this family, you have to give up your past. Any friends you may have made there. Any cousins or aunts or uncles. You will set your goals higher than being just another schoolteacher who buries herself in the mountains where nothing will improve until those people decide they want to improve. You will live up to the standards of the Tattertons and the VanVoreens, who do not turn out average citizens, but exceptional ones. We commit ourselves, not only in words, but in deeds, and that means both sexes."

What kind of man was he to demand so much? Cold, mean, I thought, trying very hard to conceal my true feelings, even as I wanted to stomp and rage and tell him just what I thought of such cruel restrictions.

And I guessed, or so I thought at the time, just what had made my mother run away. This ruthless, demanding man! Then, like the true scumbag Casteel I was, a slithering, sneaky thought squirmed through my brain. Even Tony Tatterton couldn't read my thoughts. He wouldn't know what letters I wrote to Tom and Fanny. He wanted to be a dictator, well let him want. I would play my own game.

Humbly I bowed my head. "Anything you say, Tony." And with my back straight and my head held high I headed up the stairs. Bitter thoughts kept time with my steps. The more things changed, the more they stayed the same. I was unwanted, even here.

Five Winterhaven

. THE VERY NEXT DAY TONY TOOK OVER MY LIFE AS IF neither I nor Jillian had anything at all to say about it. He set schedules for every minute of my day and stole some of the thrill I might have experienced if he'd have gone more slowly toward creating a princess out of a scullery maid. I needed time to adjust to having servants at my beck and call; time to learn my way about a house almost as complicated in design as the maze outside. I didn't like Percy drawing my bath and laying out my clothes, leaving me no decisions to make. I didn't like the o

rder that clearly stated I was not to use the telephones to call anyone in my family.

"No," he said forbiddingly, looking up from his study of the stock market page, "you don't need to say goodbye to Tom again. You told me you'd already done that."

I felt stunned by events that happened too quickly to control, and when I murmured a few words of complaint, he stared at me with astonishment. "What do you mean, I move too fast? It's what you want, isn't it? It's what you came for, isn't it" well, now you have what you've dreamed about, the best of everything. You'll have to begin school right away. And if you think I am sweeping you along in a tidal current, that's what life is all about. It's not my way to tread slowly, or carefully, and if you and I are to establish a nice rapport, my way had better become your way."

When he smiled, and looked me over, I tried not to feel resentful.

While Jillian slept the mornings away and spent another few hours behind closed doors performing her "secret beauty rituals," Tony drove me to small shops where clothes and shoes cost small fortunes. Not once did he ask the prices of sweaters, skirts, dresses, coats, boots, anything! He signed sales slips with the debonair air of one who would never run out of money. "No," he said, when I whispered it would be nice to have colored shoes to match all the outfits. "Black, brown, bone, blue, and one pair of gray-andred shoes isenough variety in colors, until you need summer white. I'll leave unsatisfied some of your desires. No one should realize every dream all at once. We live on dreams, you know, and when there are none, we soon die." Darkness clouded the clear blue of his eyes. "I made the mistake once of giving too much, too soon, holding back nothing. Not this time."

We drove home that early evening with the back seat loaded down with parcels, enough clothes for three girls. He didn't seem to realize that already he'd given too much, too soon. I, who had dreamed of beautiful, expensive clothes all my life, was overwhelmed. And still he didn't think I had enough. But then, he was comparing my closets with Jillian's.

It hurt many times the way Jillian either ignored me completely or gushed over me with enthusiasm; I was never comfortable in her presence. Often I had the sense that she wished I'd never showed up. At other times I'd see her sitting quietly on her bedroom sofa, playing one of her eternal solitaire games, and from time to time she'd glance my way. "Do you play cards, Heaven?"

Eagerly I jumped to the challenge, happy that she wanted to spend time with me. "Yes, a long time ago a friend taught me how to play gin rummy." That friend had also given me a brand-new pack of Bicycle cards "borrowed" from his father's pharmacy store.

"Gin rummy?" she asked in a vague way, as if she'd never heard of the game. "That's the only game you play?"

"I learn quickly!"

She started that very day to teach me how to play bridge, which was her favorite game. She explained the points of each face card, gave me detailed instructions on how many points you needed to open, and how many you needed to respond to your partner's opening bid; it wasn't long before I realized I'd have to buy a book on bridge and study it in private, for Jillian went much too fast.

But she was enjoying teaching me, and for an entire week she gloated every time I lost. Then came that telling day when we were seated behind our little computerized game board that would play with one, two, or three players (or none at all--it would play against itself), and to Jillian's complete chagrin, I won. "Oh, you were just lucky!" she cried out, her hands rising to her face to press her cheeks together.

"After lunch, we'll play another game and see who wins then."

Jillian was beginning to need me, to want me, to like me. This was the very first time I'd eaten any meal with Jillian but dinner, served in the dining room. Here was one of the richest women in the world, and surely one of the most beautiful, and she lunched on tiny cucumber or watercress sandwiches and sipped champagne.