Song Without Words Page 13

  'I don't believe that,' she protested.

  His brows went up. 'No? Well, after seven years of knocking around the country on the fringes of the music business, I didn't quite fit into his nice, middle-class view of life. Oh, he meant well enough. I suppose he wanted to give me the chance to be an ordinary sixteen-year-old kid. What he couldn't—or wouldn't—understand was that, at sixteen, I'd already seen more of life than most men twice that age. I lost my innocence young. Probably the day I realised that the world is made up of people who get used and those who use them… and decided I wasn't going to be one of the former if there was anything I could do to prevent it.'

  Innocence. Something in his voice as he said the word betrayed a profound regret. He was not ashamed of his past, yet Shauna sensed that he was bitterly aware of how much it had cost him.

  'Of course, you pay a price for that kind of decision,' he went on levelly, seeming to discern her line of think­ing. 'The real reason my mother called was to make sure her monthly allowance cheque would be made out in her new name from now on.'

  'You—you give her an allowance?' Shauna didn't think she'd heard correctly. 'You help support her?'

  'I pay her,' he amended. 'Don't interpret it as some noble act of generosity. Seven years ago, money was the lever I used to get her to agree that Jamie should be released into my custody. Since then—' he shrugged negligently. 'One of the things she used to throw at me when she got angry during that year I lived with the Cords was that I was just like my father. I'd never amount to anything, either, she'd say. Whether she knows it or not, I'm throwing those words back at her with each monthly cheque she takes from me.'

  'Do you ever see her?'

  He shook his head, 'No. It's a little late for that, don't you think?'

  'I… suppose…' An odd combination of feelings was welling up inside her. Compassion for the boy he must have been… understanding for the man he had become… and something deeper and far more abiding.

  'You Made Me What I Am'. The title of Michael's first hit flashed through her mind. Yet, for all the anger in that song, it was more a clear-eyed appraisal of reality than a finger-pointing catalogue of blame.

  He was tough, cynical, and ambitious. But there was so much more to him than that: so much his forced maturity might have destroyed or warped.

  There was the artistic sensitivity she'd discovered that morning in his apartment when he'd woven his music with her words. There was the personal strength and the professional integrity she'd come to recognise during the past week.

  So much to know, to admire. So much to—love?

  'Shauna, will you have dinner with me?'

  She stared at him, more shaken by her realisation of the inevitable conclusion of her train of thought than by his totally unexpected invitation. 'Dinner?' she got out. 'But why?'

  His smile was wry. 'Because it's late. Because I'm hungry. And because it's what I want.'

  And what you want, you get. She didn't say it; not because she didn't believe it, but because she heard the self-mockery in his final sentence.

  'Please,' he added quietly, rising from his chair. For a moment, he seemed on the verge of reaching out to her to underline his invitation, but something held him back. He stood, his gaze sharply watchful, allowing her to make up her own mind.

  She wanted to go with him. That, for the moment at least, was all that mattered to her.

  'I'm hungry, too,' she declared.

  He took her to the Russian Tea Room near Carnegie Hall. Shauna had walked by the restaurant many times, fascinated by its garishly dramatic window displays and by the glamorous people she saw sweeping in and out through the gilt-decorated revolving front door.

  'Have you ever been here before?' Michael asked conversationally as they were seated.

  Shauna shook her head, looking around with interest. She spotted several celebrities, including a famous ballet dancer who had defected from the Soviet Union. She was conscious that Michael was drawing interested glances from a number of the patrons; after all, he was a celebrity in his own right, too.

  'It's an amazing place,' she commented with un­affected appreciation. 'It's like being inside a Christmas ornament.' In the front of the restaurant, scarlet ban­quettes contrasted gaily with pink table linen. Further back, deep green walls sprouted a collection of ap­parently haphazardly hung oil paintings and brightly polished samovars. The chandeliers and sconces which lighted the room were cheerfully draped with strands of gold and silver tinsel.

  Michael smiled. 'There's no place like it,' he agreed, accepting a menu from a waiter clad in a red cossack-style shirt. 'Do you want something to drink?'

  'White wine, please.'

  He ordered vodka for himself, making a quip about adhering to Russian tradition. He also asked for a plate of pirozhki. Shauna found the piping hot pastries—stuffed with spicy chopped meat and onions—absolutely delicious.

  Although the translations on the back of the menu made each dish sound like something fit for a Tsar, Shauna decided on the classic chicken Kiev. Michael ordered blini with red caviar and sour cream. Both dishes were presented at their table with a little flourish. After placing Shauna's plate in front of her, their waiter deftly thrust a small knife into the centre of her chicken, releasing a golden spurt of melted herbed butter on to the accompanying bed of fluffy white rice.

  'It's wonderful,' she said after sampling it.

  'I thought you'd like this place,' Michael observed, tasting his own selection.

  She glanced at him questioningly. 'You picked this restaurant because of me?'

  'It's not one of my regular haunts,' he conceded. 'But I hoped the atmosphere would appeal to you.'

  'Oh.' She took a sip of white wine, a faint line of puzzlement appearing between her brows.

  'Here, see if this appeals,' Michael offered lightly, extending a mouthful of his entrée across the table on the prongs of his fork. Feeling a bit conspicuous, Shauna leaned forward and accepted the morsel, savouring the delicate flavour of the buckwheat pancake, the tang of the sour cream, and the unfamiliar saltiness of the caviar.

  'Very good,' she told him, sitting back. She brushed a strand of hair back over her shoulder, still wondering about his previous comment. Having checked through Michael's appointment calendar on numerous occasions during the past week, she knew he patronised many of New York City's most outstanding restaurants—although she suspected that making deals, not merely dining out, was the reason for his endless round of lunches and dinners. She had assumed he'd chosen the Russian Tea Room because it was fairly near SEE and because he personally favoured it. That, it seemed, was not so.

  'I wrote a song about food once,' he volunteered with a crooked smile. It was the first personal comment he'd made since they'd left the office. 'I was about eleven or so at the time. It was in praise of ice cream and hamburgers.'

  'Not filet mignon and champagne?' she joked casually.

  'No. I had very simple tastes as a kid. That was all I could afford.' For a moment, she heard echoes of the revelations he had made to her earlier. She wondered if he regretted telling her so much about himself.

  'You—you draw on your own life a lot when you write your music, don't you?' she asked with a mixture of curiosity and hesitation.

  He swallowed the last bite of his food and set down his fork with a precise gesture. 'No more than you do when you write your poetry,' he countered, then frowned as she stiffened. 'No, damn it, don't do that!' he snapped with unexpected intensity. His green eyes darkened to jade.

  'Don't do what?'

  'Don't pull back. One moment you're all warmth and openness, then wham, Miss Whitney's back with a vengeance. You're always holding something back.'

  Shauna toyed with her fork, pushing a few remaining grains of rice around on her place. 'A girl doesn't want to give away all her secrets,' she responded after a mo­ment, managing to keep her voice light.

  'There's a difference between keeping secrets and building walls, Sha
una.'

  She looked at him. 'What about you?' she parried.

  'What—'

  'Don't you build walls? Don't you draw a line around yourself saying "so far and no farther"?' She was think­ing of the moments when he'd suddenly, without ex­planation, broken the line of communication that had sprung up between them. How many times had he breached her defences and drawn her towards him only to throw up his own barriers at the last moment, shutting her out?

  His jaw tightened. There was anger, frustration, and something else in his expression. 'I have my reasons,' he said after a strained silence.

  Her hazel eyes were lambent with vulnerability. 'Maybe I do, too,' she answered, with a catch in her voice.

  They were interrupted then by their waiter, who began clearing the table with the efficiency of long experience. His task accomplished, he asked Michael if there was anything else they wanted.

  'Would you like any dessert?' Michael looked at Shauna, his manner smooth and controlled.

  She clenched her hands under the table. Challenging him had taken an unnerving amount of boldness; she wasn't ready to pursue the matter… not now.

  'No, thank you,' she replied politely, following Michael's lead. 'But—I would like some tea, please.'

  'Tea for the lady and a brandy for me,' he instructed the waiter.

  There was a small pause. It lengthened to the point of becoming awkward—even tense—before the waiter returned.

  'Thank you,' Shauna murmured. The tea was served in a glass set in a handled, wrought-metal holder. She took a few moments to slowly stir in a packet of sugar before looking across the table at Michael. He was making a small circular pattern on the tablecloth with his brandy goblet.

  'I have a confession to make,' he said, his mouth twisting. He tasted the amber liqueur in his glass. 'I had an ulterior motive for inviting you to dinner tonight.'

  'Ulterior motive?' She didn't even attempt to keep the wariness out of her voice.

  'Don't worry. I'm not plotting your seduction… at least not tonight.' As her heart performed an alarming flip-flop in response to this remark, he reached inside the breast pocket of his suit jacket and withdrew several folded sheets of paper.

  'What—?'

  'Lead sheets,' he told her, unfolding the papers. He smoothed them out on the table, face up. 'I wrote them out myself. When I was starting out, I used to do this sort of thing to supplement what I was earning washing dishes. It was as good a way as any to get contacts… I'm lucky enough to have a good natural ear for melodies and legible handwriting.'

  Shauna bit her lip painfully as she realised what the sheets were. Boldly inked-in notes danced across musical staves… words, lettered in an angular masculine hand, marched evenly beneath the notes.

  'My poem.'

  'My music. Our song.'

  Our song. The quietly spoken assertion sent a power­ful shaft of emotion through her. Her eyes settled on the top of the first sheet of paper. Although it bore no title, it did carry their names, paired together in strong script, in the right-hand corner.

  Michael reached across the table, his musician's fingers closing over one of her hands. 'I've been carrying these around since—well, for nearly two weeks. I've been wanting to share them with you.'

  'And then what?' The touch of his fingers was sure, gentle, and strong.

  He leaned forward. 'I know what your poetry means to you. I also know it can mean something to other people. Shauna, the music I used for this—the tune I played for you—it's something I wrote a long time ago. It means something to me. I always knew it was sup­posed to be a song, but I could never come up with the right words for it. And I tried. Believe me, I tried.' He smiled briefly. 'Some of the best lyrics I've ever written didn't work with this music. Then I read your poem and I knew… I knew.'

  'You want me to agree to let you use my—lyrics.'

  'Yes,' he said simply. 'We've made a good song together. It would be a shame not to have it sung so other people can hear it.'

  She took a sip of her tea. 'Do—do you have to have an answer right now?' She'd given him her answer once before, and it had been no. She'd been so certain it would always be no.

  Michael shook his head, releasing her hand. 'I can wait. I'm learning to be a patient man about some things.' He took a swallow of his brandy. 'Keep the lead sheets. No matter what you finally decide, they're yours. I've got my own copy.'

  About fifteen minutes later, he escorted her out into the night. They walked silently to Sixth Avenue where he flagged down a passing cab.

  'I hope you don't mind if we share,' he said, sliding into the black vinyl back seat next to her and pulling the door shut. 'The driver can let you out first.'

  'That's fine, thank you. I live at—'

  'I know, remember?' he cut in smoothly. Leaning forward, he told the driver her address.

  The ride was a stop-start journey up the West Side. As they neared her apartment building, Shauna felt a rising sense of anxiety. Would they go through a repeat of their Wednesday night parting? What did he expect from her at this point?

  They were long past a simple employer-employee relationship… if they could be said to have ever had one in the first place. Surely that confrontation in the studio—and what had followed from it—had put them on something other than a professional footing!

  As for their personal footing… they weren't really friends, and they certainly weren't lovers. But there was an intimate bonding, none the less.

  Finally, Shauna shifted to look at Michael. 'Well,' she said, clearing her throat. 'Thank you for a—a lovely evening. I enjoyed the Russian Tea Room very much. I'm glad you thought of it.'

  Michael studied her for a moment, a gentle gleam of amusement in his eyes as he read the uncertainty that shadowed her face. The jade green of his gaze softened slightly.

  'Thank you,' he returned quietly. There was a mo­ment's hesitation on his part. Then, with infinite care, he reached for her. Gathering her close, he bent his dark head and kissed her.

  The taste and touch of him had a heady familiarity. As his mouth closed over hers—gently at first, then with deepening hunger—Shauna realised she had relived his previous kisses many times. She now knew the velvet soft caress of his lips and the teasing probe of his tongue … knew the way they helped define the shape and sweetness of her own yielding mouth.

  'Michael—' she breathed, giving herself up to the sensations he was arousing. Even through the cloth of her coat, she could feel the warmth coming off his body. It sparked an answering heat within her. The passions she had conjured up and poured into her writing were throbbing inside her, clamouring with aching eagerness for a new release.

  'Hey, mister, you gonna get out or do you want I should take it around the block a few times?'

  This nonchalant question came from the cabbie. Shaken, Shauna pulled away from Michael, her cheeks scarlet. The taxi had come to a full stop in front of her building. Knowing her face would betray the physical tumult within her, she did not dare look at Michael.

  Trembling, she glanced at the driver, who'd half turned round when he'd made his casually jocular en­quiry. The man gave her an understanding wink as if to assure her he was beyond being shocked by anything that went on in the back seat of a New York City cab.

  'Actually,' Michael said in a calm voice, dropping a quick, butterfly light kiss on the corner of her mouth before completely relinquishing his hold on her. 'Actually, the lady is getting out here. I'm going on.' He reached across Shauna and opened the door for her, his lean torso pressing briefly against the upper part of her body.

  Still quivering, she climbed out of the cab, astonished to find that her legs could still support her.

  'Good night, Shauna,' he said.

  'Good night,' she echoed, her hand on the door handle. She felt dazed. Impulse prompted her to bend down and look back inside the taxi. 'Michael… how old were you when you wrote the music to that—our song?' The question came out in a rush, seemingly of its
own volition.

  He did not reply immediately. 'I was seventeen and a half,' he replied at last. He did not ask why she wanted to know.

  'I… see. Good night again, Michael.' She shut the door and stepped back. A moment later, the driver eased the car into the rushing flow of night traffic. Shauna stood watching from the pavement, the chill autumn wind plucking at her hair, until the cab turned the corner and sped out of sight.

  She had to force herself to breathe. She was acutely aware of the beating of her heart and the insistent pounding of her pulse.

  The Shauna Whitney her Aunt Margaret had tried to mould—the one she had dutifully tried to be for half her life—knew it wasn't possible to fall in love with a man she had really only known for a week.

  The Shauna Whitney she was knew that was precisely what she'd done.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Knowing—and admitting it to herself—made every­thing harder.

  It had been much easier before, when she had been able to tell herself that what she felt for Michael Sebastian was either something as impersonal as ad­miration… or as transitory as physical attraction. She did admire him as a musician, and she was attracted to him as a man… but there was more than that. Much, much more.

  She loved him.

  For Shauna, love meant commitment—marriage and a family. Despite the cold shadow her aunt had cast over her life, she'd clung to the loving example her parents had set when she was a little girl. She'd always hoped that she could have with a man what they had shared as husband and wife.

  Instead, she'd given her heart to a man from a broken home who freely admitted he'd learned, with good reason, to distrust women from a very early age. A man whose music sang of momentary passions and seduced with no promises of tomorrow.

  And a man who was involved with another woman. Despite the fragment of telephone conversation she had overheard on Friday, Shauna had no illusions about the relationship between Michael Sebastian and Carla Decker. Carla no doubt gave him exactly what he wanted from a woman.