Danielle Steel - The Kiss

She only meant to rest for a few minutes, but in spite of herself, she fell asleep, and she awoke only when Sophie came in and gently touched her shoulder.

“Are you all right, Mom?” She had grown up too much over the summer, she seemed to have jumped from childhood into all the burdens of adulthood. And listening to her, she seemed more the parent now than the child. Isabelle rolled over on her back and smiled up at her. Without even saying it, she felt a new closeness between them.

“I'm fine, darling. I must have dozed off. I'm just a little tired.”

“Don't let Teddy wear you out. He's so happy to see you, he's like a big puppy. He's had a fever again for the past few days,” Sophie said, looking worried.

“He looks very thin,” Isabelle commented, patting the bed next to her so Sophie would sit down beside her.

“So do you,” Sophie said, looking at her mother more closely. She looked different than she had before, as though something enormously important had happened to her, and it had. She had nearly died, and been reborn. And she had fallen deeply in love with a wonderful man. The changes in her were visible even to her eighteen-year-old daughter.

“You've done a wonderful job with Teddy,” Isabelle praised her, and it was much deserved. She knew better than anyone that caring for a child as sick as Teddy was no easy job. He was loving and always appreciative of the things people did for him, but he had enormous needs, and had to be constantly tended to and monitored and watched. It was a life of eternal vigilance and literally no rest for those who cared for him. “I'm sorry it took me so long to come home,” Isabelle said softly.

“I'm just glad you're alive,” Sophie said with a tired smile.

“I want you to relax now,” Isabelle said, looking concerned about her. “I'll keep Teddy company again tomorrow. I want you to have some fun before you go back to school.” And this time, when Sophie smiled, she looked like a girl again. She didn't want to complain or tell her mother how hard it had been, or how lonely. She'd had no one to talk to or share her worries with, except her friends when they called. They came to visit her now and then, but after a few weeks they got tired of how tied down she was. And for most of the summer, her friends had been away. It had been a long, lonely, hard two months for her. And her father had been no help at all. It was as though he didn't want to know anything about Teddy. He had a sick wife, a sick child, and a life of his own. He had scarcely talked to Sophie while her mother was gone, and she had felt more like an overworked employee than his daughter.

Isabelle got up, washed her face, and combed her hair, and she thought about calling Bill, but she didn't think she had time before Gordon came home. As it turned out, he only came home at seven. Isabelle was in Teddy's room, reading a book to him, when she saw a tall, dark figure walk by. He must have recognized her voice, but he simply walked on without stopping to look into the room or greet her.

Isabelle finished the page, and put the book down. Teddy had eaten dinner on a tray an hour before, and after the emotion of seeing his mother again, he was tired. Sophie had gone out with friends for the evening, for the first time in two months. And after kissing Teddy gently on the cheek, and promising to come back, Isabelle walked quietly down the hall to see her husband. When she found him, Gordon was in his dressing room, making a phone call. He looked surprised to see her standing there, as though he had forgotten she was coming home. She knew that wasn't possible, but it was his style not to make a fuss about arrivals and departures. He rarely said good-bye when he went on a trip, never did when he left for the office in the morning, and when he returned, he usually went to his own rooms to relax for a while before seeing Isabelle or his children. And tonight was no different. He had assumed correctly that she was with Teddy, and knew that he would see her, in good time. He was clearly in no hurry.

“How was your trip?” he asked, smiling at her, from a distance. He made no move to come toward her as she stood cautiously in the doorway.

“Fine.” It was as though the past two months hadn't happened. She felt suddenly as though she had only been gone for two days, and he took no notice of the fact that she'd been gone for two months and had nearly died during her absence. Since she had still been comatose when he left her in the hospital in London, she had not seen him since she left Paris. “The nurse was very helpful. It would have been hard to travel without her. The children seem fine,” Isabelle said quietly, if you discounted the fact that Teddy had lost weight and was running a fever, and Sophie had aged five years in two months. Other than that, everything was “fine.” But she knew he wouldn't want to hear about it. As far as Gordon was concerned, matters that concerned the children and the house were not his province or concern.

“How do you feel?” He looked worried as he asked her, which surprised her. She had expected him to want her to pretend that she hadn't been ill at all. He hated illness and sick people so much, he thought it was a sign of weakness when people were ill. And as they both knew, illness of any kind reminded him of his mother, and was painful for him. In his mind, his entire childhood had been hampered and tainted by her illness.

“I feel all right. Just tired. I think it will take me a while to feel like myself again.” She had to see a specialist the following week for her heart and her liver, and the doctor had warned her that if she had headaches, even mild ones, she would have to be seen immediately by a doctor. The doctor in London expected her full recovery to take close to a year, if not longer.

“You look very well,” Gordon said pleasantly, wanting it to be so. For a variety of reasons, he wanted the past two months to have never happened. He still hadn't gotten up to hug her or kiss her. And he made no move toward her as they spoke. He was an entirely different animal from Bill. And once again, she wondered if Gordon was angry at her. He knew of her friendship with him, and Bill had told her that Gordon had banished him from her room. But he asked her no questions, and made no mention of him. She knew that Bill Robinson was now a subject that was entirely taboo between them. Gordon did not have to warn her, she understood it. “Have you had dinner?” he asked coolly.

She shook her head, and as it always did now, it gave her a slightly dizzy feeling. She had to remind herself not to make any sudden moves with her head, at least for a while. “Not yet. I was waiting for you. Teddy's eaten, and Sophie is out with friends.” Gordon frowned as she said it.

“I assumed you'd want to go to bed when you arrived, Isabelle. This has been a long day for you, for your first day out. I have a business dinner tonight, with an important client from Bangkok.”

“That's all right.” She smiled at him. She was still standing near the doorway. He had never actually invited her to come in, and it was a formality she respected. He had always made it clear to everyone that one needed an invitation from him to enter these rooms, and that applied even to her. “I'll have Josephine bring me up a tray. I'm not hungry anyway.” All she wanted was some soup, or maybe toast and eggs.

“I think that's an excellent idea. We'll have dinner tomorrow.” In the past, it wouldn't have surprised her that he had made no particular fuss about her return after her long absence. But now that she knew Bill so intimately and how he treated her, it startled her that Gordon was so distant and so cool. The two men couldn't possibly have been more different. There was no acknowledgment of her illness, no celebration, no flowers. He didn't even come to hug her before she quietly left his room. And she knew she would not see him again that night. She was actually surprised when he stopped in to see her for a minute on his way out. He was wearing a dark blue suit, a white shirt, a navy Hermes tie, and smelled of cologne. He looked like he was going to a dinner party, but she didn't ask him.