Danielle Steel: Passion's Promise

“Make it wine, and I’m yours for an hour. We have rehearsal at six.”

They shared a carafe of wine at The Partridge. George drank most of it while Kezia played with her glass.

“Know something, baby?”

“What, George?”

“You make me laugh.”

“Terrific. How come?”

“Because I know what you’re so nervous about, and you’re so damn scared you won’t even ask me. You gonna ask or do I have to volunteer the answer?” He was laughing at her.

“Is there something that maybe I don’t want to know?”

“Shit, Kezia. Why don’t you just go on up to his studio and find out? It’s better that way.” He stood up, put a hand in his pocket, and pulled out three dollars. “My treat. You just go on home.” Home? To Mark? Yes, in a way … even she knew it.

He shooed her out the door with another ripple of laughter, and she found herself in the familiar doorway across the street. She hadn’t even looked up at the window, but instead nervously searched strangers’ faces.

Her heart hammered as she ran up the five flights. She reached the landing, breathless and dizzy, and raised a hand to knock at the door. It flew open almost before she touched it, and she was suddenly wrapped in the arms of an endlessly tall, hopelessly thin, fuzzy-haired man. He kissed her and lifted her into his arms, pulling her inside with a shout and a grin.

“Hey, you guys! It’s Kezia! How the hell are you, baby?”

“Happy.” He set her down and she looked around. The same faces, the same loft, the same Mark. Nothing had changed. It was a victorious return. “Christ, it feels like I’ve been gone for a year!” She laughed again, and someone handed her a glass of red wine.

“You’re telling me. And now, ladies and gentlemen …” The endlessly tall young man bowed low, and swept an arm from his friends to the door. “My lady has returned. In other words, you guys, beat it!” They laughed goodnaturedly and murmured hellos and goodbyes as they left. The door had barely closed when Mark pulled her into his arms again.

“Oh baby, I’m glad you’re home.”

“Me too.” She slid a hand under his ragged, paintsplattered shirt and smiled into his eyes.

“Let me look at you.” He slowly pulled her shirt over her head, and she stood straight and still, her hair falling across one shoulder, a warm light in her rich blue eyes, a living reflection of the sketch of a nude that hung on the wall behind her. He had done it the previous winter, soon after they had met. She reached out to him slowly then, and he came into her arms smiling at the same moment that there was a knock at the door.

“Go away!”

“No, I won’t.” It was George.

“Shit, motherfucker, what do you want?” He pulled open the door as Kezia darted bare-chested into the bedroom. George loomed large and smiling in the doorway with a small split of champagne in one hand.”

“For your wedding night, Marcus.”

“George, you’re beautiful.” George danced down the stairs with a wave, and Mark closed the door with a burst of laughter. “Hey, Kezia! Could you dig a glass of champagne?” She returned to the room smiling and naked, her hair swinging loose down her back, the vision of champagne at La Grenouille in the Dior dress bringing laughter to her eyes now. The comparison was absurd.

She lounged in the doorway, her head to one side, watching him open the champagne. And suddenly she felt as though she loved him, and that was absurd too. They both knew she didn’t. It wasn’t that kind of thing. They both understood … but it would have been nice not to understand, just for a moment. Not to be rational, or make sense. It would have been lovely to love him, to love someone-anyone-and why not Mark?

“I missed you, Kezia.”

“So did I, darling. So did I. And I also wondered if you had another lady by now.” She smiled and took a sip of the too-sweet, bubbly wine. “I was queasy as hell about coming up. I even stopped and had some wine at The Partridge with George.”

“Asshole. You could have come here first.”

“I was afraid to.” She walked toward him and traced a finger across his chest as he looked down at her.

“You know something weird, Kezia?”

“What?” Her eyes filled with dreams.

“I’ve got syphilis.”

“WHAT!” She stared at him, horrified, and he chuckled.

“I just wondered what you’d say. I don’t really have it.” But he looked amused at his joke.

“Jesus.” She settled back into his arms with a shake of the head and a grin. “I’m not so sure about your sense of humor, kiddo.” But it was the same Mark.

He followed her into the bedroom and his voice sounded husky as he spoke from behind her. “I saw a picture of some girl in the paper the other day. She looked sort of like you, only older, and very uptight.” There was a question in his voice. One she was not planning to answer.

“So?”

“Her last name was French. Not ‘Miller,’ but her first name was blurred. I couldn’t read it. You related to anyone like that? She looked pretty fancy.”

“No, I’m not related to anyone like that. Why?” And now the lies had even begun with Mark. Not just sins of omission; now they were sins of commission too. Damn.

“I don’t know. I was just curious. She was interesting looking, in a fierce, unhappy sort of way.”

“And you fell in love with her, and decided that you had to find her and rescue her, so you could both live happily ever after. Right?” Her voice was light, but not as light as she wanted it to be. His answer was lost as he kissed her and eased her gently onto the bed. There was at least an hour of truth amid the lifetime of lies. Bodies are generally honest.

Chapter 3

“Ready?”

“Ready.” Whit smiled at her across the last of their coffee and mousse au chocolat. They were two hours late for the Marshes’ party at the St. Regis, but no one would notice. The Marshes had invited more than five hundred guests.

Kezia was resplendent in a blue-gray satin dress that circled her neck in a halter and left her back bare to show her deep summer tan. Small diamond earrings glistened at her ears, and her hair was swept into a neat knot high on her head. Whit’s impeccable evening clothes set off his classic good looks. They made a very spectacular couple. By now, they took it for granted.

The crowd at the entrance to the Maisonette at the St. Regis was enormous. Elegantly dinner-jacketed men whose names appeared regularly in Fortune ; women in diamonds and Balenciagas and Givenchys and Diors whose faces and living rooms appeared constantly in Vogue. European titles, American scions of society, friends from Palm Beach and Grosse Pointe and Scottsdale and Beverly Hills. The Marshes had outdone themselves. Waiters circulated through the ever-thickening crowd, offering Moët et Chandon champagne and little platters boasting caviar and pâté.

There was cold lobster on a buffet at the back of the room, and later on there would appear the pièce de résistance, an enormous wedding cake, a replica of the original served a quarter of a century before. Each guest would be given a tiny box of dream cake, the wrapping carefully inscribed with the couple’s name and the date. “More than a little tacky,” as Martin Hallam would note in his column the next day. Whit handed Kezia a glass of champagne from a passing tray and gently took her arm.

“Do you want to dance, or circulate for a while?”

“Circulate, I think, if it’s humanly possible.” She smiled quietly at him, and he squeezed her arm.

A photographer hired by their hosts snapped a picture of them looking lovingly at each other, and Whit slipped an arm about her waist. She was comfortable with him. After her night with Mark, she felt benign and benevolent, even with Whit. It was odd to think that at dawn that morning she had wandered the streets of SoHo with Mark, then left him reluctantly at three that afternoon to phone in her column to her agent, clear her desk, and rest before the onslaught of the evening. Edward had called to see how she was, and they had chuckled for a few moments about her mention of their lunch in the morning’s column.