Danielle Steel: Zoya

“I'm not sure I'm ready for more than that anyway. I may never be. I loved Simon very much.”

“I know that.”

And then, in a small voice, “But I think I love you too …” It was so odd, she had never expected this, but she liked being with him. She had every Monday, and she had come to rely on him and respect him.

“I won't ask you for more than you want to give. I understand that.” She couldn't ask any more of him. He seemed to understand everything she was feeling. And then, feeling braver, he smiled gently at her. “Will you go away with me one day, when you're ready?”

She looked at him for a long time, and then slowly nodded her head. “I don't know when that will be. I'm not ready yet.” Although his kisses the night before had stirred her deeply. But she was not yet ready to be unfaithful to the memory of her husband.

“I'm not pressing you. I can wait. Maybe even for a lifetime.” They both smiled. He was so different from Simon, with his buoyant impatience and excitement about life, and Clayton with his gentle, aristocratic ways. Paul Kelly was his own man, with his own style and situation.

“Thank you, Paul.” She looked up at him gratefully, and without saying another word, he leaned over and kissed her.

“Let's have dinner whenever we can.” He looked happy and hopeful.

“Won't Allison mind?”

He looked sad for a moment. “She won't even notice.”

Zoya kissed him that time, a kiss to heal the hurt of years of loneliness. They were both lonely people now, yet their time together was always lively and happy. The decisions they made with Simon's business were important ones and she loved telling him about the store. Sometimes she made him laugh for hours, telling him about her more outrageous clients … or about little Matthew.

Paul walked her back to the store afterward, and they were both shocked to realize it was almost four o'clock, and more than ever, he didn't want to leave her.

“Can you make dinner Friday night, or shall we leave it till Monday?” He didn't press her as he looked down at her happily outside the store. She knew Sasha was going away for the weekend, and she suddenly wanted to see him before they met again in Simon's office.

“Dinner would be lovely.” Her eyes touched his with green fire and he smiled.

“I must have done something right in my life to be so lucky now.”

“Don't be silly.” She laughed and then kissed his cheek as he promised to call her. She knew he would, and she would call him too, even if only on the pretext of business.

But the roses that arrived for her that afternoon were far from businesslike. They were two dozen white roses, because she had once told him that she loved them. And she'd long since known that he seldom forgot anything. The card read, “Not stolen moments, darling Zoya, only borrowed. Thank you for the loan of you, for each precious moment. Love, P.” She read the card, and smiled as she put it in her handbag, and left her office again to tend to her clients. But there was no denying Paul had added something to her life. He had added something very precious, something she had almost forgotten … the touch of a hand, the look of a man who cared about her and wanted to be there for her. There was no telling now where life would lead them one day. Perhaps nowhere. But in the meantime, she knew she needed him, just as he needed Zoya. And as she went back to work, she walked with a lighter step. She didn't even feel guilty about it.

“Who did you see at lunch today?” her assistant asked curiously as they got ready to close the store. It was rare for Zoya to leave the store for lunch. But she only laughed as her eyes danced as they hadn't in months.

“Spencer Tracy,” she answered confidentially.

“Sure,” the girl smiled in answer. But she had. It was true. She had seen Spencer Tracy … and Paul Kelly.

CHAPTER

48

Paul and Zoya continued to meet every Monday afternoon in Simon's offices after that. They worked hard, and dined late, and whenever they could both get away, they went away for a quiet weekend, to walk on the beach and talk about their lives, and make love, but their friendship was always more important to them than the lovemaking. And then they went back to New York, and their real lives, and the people they belonged to. She didn't let it interfere with the rest of her life. There was too much else they both had to do. And she never deluded herself about marrying him. There was no hope of that. He was her friend, a very special one, and as they sat through board meetings year after year, they prided themselves on the fact that no one ever knew about how much they meant to each other in private, not even her children. Matthew liked him very much, and Sasha tolerated him. She was too busy with her own life now to care much about what her mother did, and she never appeared to be aware of their involvement. And of course, Nicholas was still away, fighting with the RAF in Europe.

President Roosevelt died on April 12, 1945. And three weeks later the war ended in Europe, and Zoya rejoiced as tears streamed down her cheeks. Her son was still alive. He came home on the day he turned twenty-four, and two days later, the war ended in the Pacific as well. There were endless celebrations, and parades down Fifth Avenue. Zoya closed the store, and she went home to see Nicholas, standing at the window of their living room, watching people dance in the streets, with tears running down his face.

“If Dad had only lived to see this day,” he whispered to her as he watched the jubilation in the streets, and Zoya looked up at her handsome son tenderly. He looked more than ever like Nicolai, particularly now in his uniform. He had become a man in his years away, and she wasn't surprised when he told her he wasn't going back to Princeton. He wanted to begin learning what he needed to of the empire Simon had left behind him. Paul taught him all that he needed to know of it, and Nicholas was stunned by the money that had been left to him. Sasha knew also that she would be inheriting a great deal of money the following year, although she did not yet know how much. But Nicholas was aghast when he saw the way she behaved when he stayed with Zoya briefly. She was out until the early morning hours every night, came home drunk most of the time, and was rude to everyone who tried to talk to her about what she did, particularly Nicholas, but also Zoya. He was furious when he talked to his mother about it late one night. Sasha had come in early that night, and was already passed out cold in her room. A boy in uniform had dropped her off and he was so drunk he could hardly walk as Nicholas almost threw him out.

“Can't you do something about her, Mama? She's totally out of control.”

“She's too old to spank, Nicholas, and I can't lock her in her room.”

“I'd like to try it,” he looked grim, but the next morning when he talked to his sister it was to no avail. She was gone again that night, and didn't return until well after four o'clock in the morning.

She was even more beautiful than she'd been before, she was too young for her excesses to hurt her looks, but Zoya knew that if she didn't stop, in time they would. And Zoya was less than pleased when, that December, she eloped. She had married a boy she had known for less than three weeks, and the fact that he was the son of a polo player in Palm Beach was small consolation to her. His life-style was as wild as her own, they drank and they danced and cavorted every night, and it was even more upsetting when Sasha blithely told her mother when she came to New York in March that she was expecting a baby sometime in September.

“On Matthew's birthday, I think.” She was decidedly vague as he wandered into the room. He was six and a half years old, with Simon's big brown eyes and gentle ways. He adored Nicholas, but he had learned to keep out of his sister's way long since. She drank too much, and she was either indifferent or openly unpleasant. She was twenty-one by then, and the inheritance Simon had left only hurled her faster toward her own destruction.