Chapter Twenty-Nine
Shafts of bright morning sunshine filtered through the curtains, and Isobel shielded her eyes from it as she awoke. Ryan lay face down on the bed, and she brushed her fingers along the fading lines her nails had left on his back. She kissed his neck and squeezed his shoulder but he did not stir and, knowing her body to be sated and loath to disturb him, she scribbled a note and left it next to his watch, setting off for the hotel pool.
Half a dozen guests were already bathing and others were having coffee or breakfast, nursing their cups in the still warmth of the morning. Approving and envious eyes followed her movement as she glided across the terrace, graceful as a swan, a flowing white wrap wafting around her in the breeze. She threw off the top and slipped into the pool, the cool touch of the water refreshing and cleansing her. She swam a few lengths, lithe and powerful beneath the water, and surfaced to see Ryan easing his muscular body into the shimmering blue.
“I wish you’d woken me,” he said as she swam up to him.
“Maybe I did, I’ve only just got here.”
He kissed her and ran his fingers through her wet hair. “You look good enough to eat.”
“Again! I should be so lucky,” she said laughing. “Come on, let’s swim.” They swam back and forth together, enjoying the water and silence for a long time before he spoke again, seeming unable to repress his words.
“You were something else last night. ‘Hot’ isn’t the word. I didn’t realise you had that in you.”
“Your healing hands did it all, lover boy. That and I read a lot.”
“You’ll have to let me in on what you’re reading…”
“I wouldn’t have said all those things if you hadn’t egged me on the way you did.”
“I don’t remember any ‘egging’ as you call it. My folks brought me up a good Catholic boy.”
“So do you disapprove?”
“Did it feel like it?”
“So I’m no longer your English prude?”
“I never said you were. And you don’t need to prove you’re not, in the bedroom or anywhere else.”
“I wasn’t trying to prove anything. I just let myself go, that’s all.”
“Were you talking dirty for the first time?”
“That’s not something to ask a lady.”
“Even if you love her?”
She pushed herself up in the water and ducked his head down into it. “Come on,” she said, as he bobbed back into the air, “I could do with a hot drink.”
They helped themselves to coffee and bagels, wrapped towels around their shoulders and sat in the sun by the pool.
“You’ve picked the most perfect place. So quiet, so romantic. I can’t believe we’re in the middle of the city.”
“I try my best. And it is Sunday morning, so that helps. So, you think you could get to like it here?”
“I love it here.”
“I mean in LA.”
She laughed. “I’m not sure I’d fit in. I’ve never been a big city girl. And doesn’t LA swallow up and spit out girls like me?”
He took her hands in his. “I’m serious, Isobel. I want you to come and live with me here in Hollywood. What I said in the pool about being in love with you, it’s not just a line.”
“What would your other girlfriends have to say about that?”
“What other girlfriends?”
“Please Ryan, I’m not a fool, much as I may act it sometimes. You’re surrounded by hot young things, some of them half my age.”
“I don’t care about all that, not any more, you’re the only one for me.”
She kissed the back of his hand, her eyes holding his. “It’s sweet of you to say that and I know you’re not playing with me. But we’ve both been on a roller coaster ride these last months. And not just in our relationship. You with everything that’s going on around your work, and me with all the complications back home.” A knot of chirping sparrows had gathered around them in the hope of crumbs. Isobel crushed a piece of bagel and threw it amongst them, searching for the right words as the birds fought over the scraps. “I’m here with you because I want to be. And I do think about the future. About whether we both have what it takes. But now is not the right time to make the kind of commitment you’re talking about. We need to give it more time. I’m only just getting my life back together in Coronado, I’m happy there.”
“And you can be just as happy here, it’s not about place, it’s about who you’re with. And don’t you have to move out of your house soon? You’ve got to find somewhere else to live. Moving in with me solves that problem straight away.”
“I’m not going to move into any relationship just because it’s convenient. That may work for a couple of students, but a woman needs more than that.”
“For Christ’s sake, I’m not asking you to marry me!” he exclaimed, dropping his coffee to the table, black lines descending the pure white mug in frenetic zigzags, “just to live with me, so we can be together every day, and every night. And we’ve known each other longer than my parents did before they tied the knot.”
“And are they still together?”
“That’s not the point. And they were only eighteen when they got spliced. We’ve both been married before. By now we know what we both want.”
“Do we? And do we know what each might want from the other? There are so many things we’ve never discussed.”
“Why can’t we discuss them now?”
“Because now isn’t the right time for me. It’s too early. I just don’t want to get in over my head, not when I have a divorce and everything to settle in England.”
“But can you afford to put your life on hold while that drags on? It’s your birthday next week, and neither of us is getting any younger.”
Isobel tensed, but she could not deny the validity of the message, or the aching within her womb. “Ryan, please, back off. I’m not saying no. I’m saying I need time. And before I would ever want to make the kind of move you’re asking, I’d want to be sure that it’s what you want too. At the moment you’re on an enormous high.”
“The sex is pretty damn good, I don’t mind saying.”
“I’m not talking about the sex. Everything is going your way right now. If we were to get together it would have to work in the lows as well as the highs. The next time I give my heart to anyone, I want it to be forever.”
“So it’s a maybe?”
“For now, it’s a maybe. As you should know, a lady never says yes. At least not the first time.”
A valet hovered with a set of car keys when they left the hotel.
“They’re not my keys,” she said, looking to Ryan in confusion.
“We’re not taking yours, we’re taking mine.” He motioned to a red cabriolet with lines and curves that screamed “boy racer.” If a number had been painted on the side she would not have been surprised. Isobel didn’t know much about American automobiles but she knew a lump of fast depreciating metal when she saw it.
“Your car?”
“You’re impressed?”
“I’m flabbergasted. Please tell me you just hired it for the weekend?”
“Sorry, babe, it’s here to stay. Come on, get in.” He pulled open the door and she eased herself into the low-slung vehicle. He ran his hand along the white leather of the dashboard. “Cool, hey?”
“Ryan, I know it’s not my place to give advice, but is this wise? Spending all this money. A bike first and now a car. And you’ve been flashing cash all weekend like dollar bills are going out of fashion.”
“Wow, babe, I only just asked you to move in with me, and already you’re telling me how to live my life.”
“I’m only thinking of you. What about setting a bit aside for a rainy day?”
“Not many of those in LA. And here impressions count, the car you drive, the woman you’re with. That’s as much as most people see.”
“If that’s a compliment, thank you. But still—“
“Chill, bella. I didn’t buy it. Call it a company car. It’s one of Victor’s and as long as I work for him he wants me to look the part. Now let’s burn it up and down Melrose and turn a few heads.”
They whiled away the middle of the day in West Hollywood and Beverly Hills. She had never before felt so content in his company, and his unexpected suggestion that she move in still turned over in her thoughts. As they strolled along hand in hand she no longer dismissed the possibility. They stopped at the Urth Café on Melrose Avenue for a vegetarian brunch, agreeing they must cut down on red meat and that global warming was killing the planet, then continued on, window shopping along Rodeo Drive, admiring the furs and leathers inside and the gas-guzzlers outside. They ambled back to the car with Isobel chattering away about nothing in particular and Ryan seemingly happy to encourage her with “ums” and “ahs,” when he broke in to the trivia.
“The party this afternoon, it’s going to be typical LA,” he said.
“And you want to manage my expectations?”
“Kind of, yeah.”
“So what do you mean by ‘typical LA’?”
“It’ll be guys in gold medallions with fat cigars and the Hollywood set, movie types, and the sort that hang around the movie crowd. Think new money and hangers-on and you’ve got the idea. It won’t be an English garden party.”
“More Sodom and Gomorrah then, but without the tombola?”
He laughed. “I guess, though you’ll have to tell me more about tombola, whatever that is.”
“Trust me, you can die happy without ever knowing,” she said with a grin, his puzzlement endearing him to her, a happy reminder of how far she had come, and the life of coffee mornings and garden parties she had left behind. But he still seemed anxious, his fingers twitching against hers as he spoke again.
“So don’t be surprised if it gets a bit rowdy when people have had a few drinks. Guys out to score and girls out to encourage them.”
“Sort of difficult to tell the predators from the prey then?”
“I’m beginning to wonder if you’ve already been to a Hollywood bash?”
“No, virgin territory, if that’s the right phrase.”
“You gonna be able to handle it? You’re not going to get all judgemental on me or anything?”
“Now you really are starting to patronise me.”
“I just want you to have a good time.”
“As far as I’m concerned other people’s behaviour is not my problem, so no need to make it yours,” she said, eager to reassure him but unsure if she meant it.
They lapsed into silence, Isobel now looking forwards, not backwards, her thoughts on practical matters, her visa and her rental lease, and all the things she needed to sort out, and quickly, to stay on in America. The question in her mind no longer “if”’, but “how”.
“I don’t think I’ve ever felt this happy,” he said, breaking the silence.
She resisted the urge to respond in kind. “Thank you,” she said, hating the inadequacy of her words.
“Maybe this is how love feels,” he continued, his words demanding reciprocation.
“You must have been in love before,” she said, now on the brink of giving more, of saying more, of risking more. But if the words he wanted to hear were to ever come, she wanted them to be spontaneous or, at least, to come from within, and not be drawn from without.
“Not like this.”
She lifted his hand and kissed it, saying nothing.
He seemed content to let it go, and returned to where he had left off, before thoughts of love intervened. “I’d like you to spend some time with Victor this afternoon. Like I said, he’s looking forward to meeting you.”
“I hope you haven’t built me up too much.”
“Trust me, he won’t be disappointed. He likes beautiful things. You might find him interesting, he’s into art and stuff like that. Who knows, maybe he could even do something for you.”
“Like what?” she said, her eyes narrowing.
“I don’t know. You’re just starting out in the art world. His place is like the Getty Museum. So he knows people who deal in paintings. Maybe he could help with introductions. It could be anything. As I said, he can open doors when he wants to.”
“I appreciate the sentiment, but I’d like to think I can open my own doors.”
“A helping hand never hurts. You don’t need to take it if he offers it, but it would be a shame to miss an opportunity.”