Looking Glass (reposted)

Chapter Nine


She didn’t think about Noah on the way home. She took a taxi this time; the driver didn’t complain about Josie, for which Deirdre was thankful. Josie was a smart girl—she knew when her partner was upset. When Josie wasn’t happy; Deirdre wasn’t happy.

She didn’t think about Noah as she paid the driver. She didn’t think about how cold he had been the day before, calling her on her personal cell phone to set up his meeting with her. Thomas must have given it to him, since she knew the number was unlisted. She wondered how much else he knew about her that she would prefer he didn’t.

She didn’t think about him as she fumbled with her keys, trying to find the one to open the front door to her house. She avoided the possibility that his tone and his biting words had found their mark, had hurt her in her office that night. They hadn’t spoken in years; it was impossible for him to know what she was actually like these days. She was entirely a different person. She had sculpted herself anew, and the transformation was complete. And if small pockets of the old Deirdre survived, the new Deirdre kept them well hidden from prying eyes.

She had really fallen to pieces after—after everything. With nothing left of her old life, she had been able to rebuild herself in private. She was better now. Stronger. She had never become famous for her art, but she had built an empire in the art world, and she truly reigned supreme. People knew her name and respected her. They even feared her. Any remaining weakness of character was well protected behind that fortress. If she had been thinking about Noah, she would have perhaps felt uncomfortable that he had managed to disarm her there. She might have smiled at herself, thinking always of her current relationship with Noah in terms of war.

But she wasn’t thinking of Noah. Not as she fed Josie, not as she ate leftover Chinese takeout, not as she prepared for bed.

She hated herself in the morning, as fragments of the dreams flitted through her memory.

**********

It wasn’t uncommon for Noah to take a working lunch, or even skip it altogether. When he wasn’t entertaining a particularly promising client, he spent that hour reviewing inventory or payroll or the hundred other tasks that consistently overwhelmed his “to do” list. He thrived on the pressure of meeting deadlines and managing the budget, but he didn’t live for it. He lived for the find—that one volume, rare and expensive, that had eluded his grasp for ages. He lived to feel its old leather or canvas spine in his hands, hear its crisp and yellowed pages whispering as he ruffled them rapidly past his possessive fingers—just once before he sold them. He hardly ever wanted to keep one, but the find never failed to elate him. Because that sense of triumph drove him, he often worked though lunch, dealing with the tedious so he could get more quickly back to his love.

Today, however, was different. For once, he was taking a full hour for lunch. He had planned a leisurely break: he would make the short drive home, dine on cold pizza from the night before, maybe even take a little nap. Though he loved his work, the respite was a welcome and well-deserved one, in his opinion.

He was daydreaming of that hour sans suit coat and tie when his assistant buzzed him, rudely distracting him from his reveries.

“Noah, somebody’s here to see you. She says it’s important...” Poor Kelly sounded a bit distracted. Noah wasn’t surprised. Every time a female entered his office, Kelly would turn redder than his hair. Luckily, he didn’t seem to have started stuttering yet, an inevitable side effect of the sight of a beautiful woman. Noah guessed the younger man was very grateful for the heavy oak desk and large computer monitor he could hide behind.

“Did she give a name?”

Kelly didn’t reply over the intercom, but Noah could hear laughter beyond his office door. It must be quite a woman, if she could set his assistant at ease.

Noah sighed, knowing that Kelly would never return his buzz now that the mystery woman had his full attention. He would have to go out there himself if he wanted to discover her identity. Maybe he could gently push her in Kelly’s direction, since the young man would undoubtedly be taken with her. And if she was a new prospective client too, all the better. He tightened his tie and headed for the door.

Kelly was in love. He thought she had maybe said her name, but he hadn’t caught it. She was incredible, with her sleek fall of black hair and eyes so dark they were almost black. Usually eyes that dark were really brown, but he saw that hers were, in fact, actually green. He knew she must have money. Her dove gray suit, well tailored, didn’t scream wealth, but it did murmur it. A string of fat ivory pearls served to highlight her slim neck and fair skin. A few freckles added warmth and humor to her face, though, as if a naughty imp had blown a raspberry in her face. It was an angular face dominated by those dark, kind eyes that quelled even his considerable nerves.

“I bet you have a hundred men in love with you,” he said reverently but without thought and felt his face turn crimson yet again. Her laughter tinkled over him like bells of light.

“Well, perhaps not quite that many. But you must be quite the charmer yourself,” she said, mirth evident in her voice.

Kelly couldn’t help but laugh—the idea was too ridiculous for any other reaction. Still, she had said it without any meanness in her voice. He wished his on-again-off-again girlfriend could see him now with this amazing woman.

Then Noah opened the door, and all the warm laughter in her demeanor was replaced with icy control. The easy comfort she had brought into the room fled, the tension all but visible.

Uh-oh, Kelly thought, hoping he hadn’t made a grave mistake by informing Noah of her presence. Maybe it would have been better to say his boss was out. He watched the interchange with terrified fascination.

“Noah, I hope I am not disturbing you.”

“You are.”

“Well, I apologize for the interruption, but I need to speak with you. I will keep it brief.”

“Yes, that would be best. What’s with the dog?”

“Josie is my partner,” the woman stated evenly.

“Partner?” Noah scoffed. Kelly realized his boss was making a colossal mistake. Didn’t he see that faint blue tinge to the woman’s pupils?

“Yes. My partner. Excuse us, Kelly. It was a pleasure to meet you,” the woman said, leading Noah into his own office.

“No, no. The pleasure was all mine, Miss...” Kelly trailed off weakly. He couldn’t remember her name.

“Steel,” his boss gritted out, and slammed the door behind him.

Kelly decided it would be a good time to go out and grab a burger.

“What are you doing here?” Noah asked as soon as the door was shut.

“I beg your pardon,” Deirdre said frostily. “It was important that I speak with you today, and this was my only opportunity to get away from the office.”

“To intrude upon mine? Whatever,” he brushed aside his displeasure to deal with the matter at hand.

“So, go ahead. Enlighten me. What could possibly be so important that it couldn’t wait until after my much-anticipated lunch break?”

A slight cooling iced her eyes even further. After a moment of allowing him to see her unperturbed, she spoke.

“I spoke again with your father this morning. He thought it important to tell me that he has a showing in a few months.”

“Yeah, I know. What’s so all-important about that?”

“He is afraid he will not be able to complete the number of new works necessary.”

Noah heard what she was really saying: his father would not be leaving the hospital this time. He knew it, had known it for a while. But the fact that she knew it and pitied him for it grated.

“I have agreed to finish the quota for him.”

He stared at her, dumbfounded.

“You don’t do art any more. You can’t fucking see!”

“Ah. So you had noticed. I had wondered.”

“Hard not to. It was in all the goddamn papers. And the fucking mutt is a dead giveaway.”

Deirdre’s hand dropped protectively to Josie’s head, soothing both of them.

“You might want to adjust your comments about my dog,” she warned lightly. “In any case, I had thought that you might want to know that I will be taking a leave of absence from the galleries. And since I don’t have suitable working space in my house, Thomas has agreed to let me stay in his apartment until the showing.”

“No. No fucking way,” Noah protested. His father had moved to Chicago two years ago, when he had been diagnosed with lung cancer. Somehow, he had managed to convince Noah that it would be mutually beneficial to allow him to move into the spacious apartment above his exclusive rare book shop. “It was nearly impossible to find decent light in gloomy Chicago,” Thomas had complained. Noah had capitulated because he thought he would be better able to keep an eye on Thomas if he lived only upstairs from where he worked, since the old man refused to go to a nursing home.

Equitably, Deirdre agreed. “It is your right as landlord to refuse to give me keys. But do not think it is going to stop me from finishing this for Thomas. And you will have the pleasure of telling him.” She smiled, and Noah felt a chill rush over him, as if her breath came straight from the arctic regions of her heart.

He forced his shoulders to relax, took a moment to sit at his desk. His chair was massive. It was his throne, from which he ruled his kingdom—the store. Here, he was in complete control. Most people felt dwarfed by the size of it, he knew. That effect, of course, was lost on Deirdre. But Noah liked the feeling of control he gained as soon as he sat there.

“I’ll tell you what. I’ll let you sub-let the apartment upstairs—under the condition that you report to me every time you visit my father. I don’t want you poisoning him against me.”

“I would never dream of it,” she said breezily.

Couldn’t she, just once, react? he though coldly as he handed her the extra key from his desk and informed her that Kelly would show her the way. She turned at the opened door and informed him his loyal assistant had fled.

“How the hell do you know?” he said irritably as he rose from his position of control at the desk.

“I would have heard him, of course, when he said hello.”

“Of course.” Thinking longingly of his long-awaited lunch break, he led her upstairs.