A Husband for Beauty Page 7

  He shrugged. Time had little consequence to him. “I’m going to get up and find something to eat.”

  “There probably isn’t anything. I’ve been too busy to go buy groceries. Minnie stocked my fridge for me, but you’re out of luck.” She paused. “We could go across the hall.”

  “No.”

  “I could, then.”

  “Yes.” He remembered his manners in time. “Please.”

  “What would you like?”

  “Anything? It doesn’t matter. I need to get up and work. Food is just fuel. I only eat to survive. You know that.”

  “No.” She blinked. “I don’t know.” She leveled him with a direct stare. “Were you dreaming?”

  “I wasn’t.” He reached up and ran a hand through his own tangled hair. He realized how stale he smelled and how unkempt he looked. For some reason, he was suddenly self-conscious. This Leena wasn’t the old Leena. This Leena hadn’t seen him at his worst. She hadn’t seen him entirely helpless, paralyzed by his own mind.

  “What happened? All of a sudden I was being shoved off of you and you jumped out of bed like the hounds of hell were after you.”

  “I…”

  “Dallas-”

  Leena slowly unfurled her limbs. She swung her legs off the edge of the bed and stood. She lifted her arms over her head and stretched the kinks out of her back. His eyes strayed to her shirt, which was pulled tight over her breasts. Tight was an understatement. Her shirt strained. His body warmed uncomfortably, and his cock stiffened. He wondered what she looked like with that shirt off, her breasts naked and straining, the nipples peaked in pleasure.

  He gave himself a mental shake. It was the damn dream. He wasn’t in the right frame of mind. He’d never had a thought about Leena like that in his life. He was ashamed to admit he’d been so absorbed he’d barely noticed her other than as a sort of assistant and then as a partner, and much later, almost as an equal. He looked to her for help in the madness, for advice. She was his lifeline. She pulled him back time and again from the edge. She saved him from the black watery depths of his troubled soul. He’d never noticed her as a damn woman before.

  “It was Hannah, wasn’t it? You saw her?”

  “No.” He glanced down quickly, but not quickly enough.

  “I knew it,” Leena whispered, wonderment stealing into her voice. “I don’t remember her. Or wait, I do. Sort of. I remember she had long black hair. She was pretty. She was- she was my best friend.”

  “Yes.” Dallas couldn’t look at her.

  “She… god, I can’t remember!” Leena sunk down on the bed and pounded the mattress once with her fist. Dallas had never seen her exhibit any kind of physical violence before. It betrayed just how frustrated she was.

  He slowly looked up and found her studying him. Her eyes burned and cut straight through him. He knew he had to tell her. It wasn’t fair to her. He’d been unfair to her his entire life. Maybe if he did this one thing for her, it would give them both peace.

  “Yes, she was your friend. You came with her because she was afraid of me. She wanted to sing. She was like an angel. The purest voice I had ever heard. I was eager to teach her. You were just… there with her. She wanted the best. She wanted to be on Broadway one day. She was driven, amazing, incredibly beautiful and so very talented.”

  “And you fell in love with her?” The question was asked, void of feeling.

  “Yes. I fell in love with her. Later. Years later. She turned into a beautiful woman. I didn’t want to taint her. I felt like if I ever told her how I felt, I’d ruin her somehow. She was so bright. She improved, over the years. She was ready. I knew she was going to tell me she was leaving. I knew I was going to have to let her go. I knew it was going to kill me. I didn’t know she was seeing someone. He was the one who killed her. He was drunk. He killed them both that night. I was devastated. I never told her that I loved her. I just hoped she knew. I didn’t know that- that she had someone. I didn’t know until after she died. I knew she could never be mine, but like a fool, I dared to hope.”

  “Dallas…” Leena said brokenly. She stared at him and her sorrow cut him to the quick.

  “You still came around, even after Hannah was gone. I never could make you leave. You were always just there, in the background. You’d clean my house while I worked with Hannah. You’d do the dishes, pick up messes, do my laundry. It didn’t make sense and I just let it happen because then I could do what I really wanted to do. Concentrate on Hannah and on my work. As the years passed I guess I came to depend on you being there. I’d leave lists for you. You started doing my shopping. Taking my clothes out to be dry cleaned. You’d mail my packages, my music. You’d open my mail, sort out my bills. Pay them for me, do some of my banking when it could be done online. Slowly, without me even realizing it, you became a part of my life. You knew everything about me. I was sick once, so sick. I couldn’t leave the house. I refused. You were so worried you cried. You told me you were going to find a doctor to come to the house and you did. I was lucky. I had pneumonia. I was lucky you were stubborn. When other doctors offered me pills that would numb out the pain, numb out everything, you stood up for me. You said it would take away the music and you knew, as I did, that it would be a fate worse than death, no matter how many times I’d said I wished it would just go away. You knew I needed to write, to compose. You knew there was one last thing I needed to do.”

  “The play we’re doing now.”

  “Yes. I wanted to finish it. It was my plan to write it and… and just let myself give up.”

  “Except you couldn’t. You wrote it and you threw it in the garbage. I found it. The story of two lovers destined for pain and disaster. It was the story of your life. The story of you and Hannah. That’s when I first realized what Hannah meant to you. I didn’t even know that you loved her, and I was there all the time.”

  “You found me crumpled in a ball. I was weeping, and I couldn’t stop. I couldn’t stand what I’d written. It was the first time I’d cried since she died. I was weeping, weeping for the first time in my life. Not just for her, but for me.”

  “And what did I do?”

  “You put me to bed. Made me tea. Made me sleep. In the morning I woke up and you were gone. On the piano bench was my work. All the pages had been ironed out. Everything was there except the ending. You have no idea how shocked I was to see the writing, neat, tiny, so much different than my own, all the notes sprawling across the pages. Your notes. Your music. Your ending. You took the pain and you gave me back the only happiness you knew would ever truly get through to me.”

  “And I came back later, didn’t I?”

  “You did. I asked you to show me. I asked you to sing it. I played. You sang. I had no idea you could. You were beyond talented. You were flawless. I asked you were you’d learned.”

  “I learned it from you. All those years you thought you were teaching Hannah, but I was always there.”

  “Yes. You were always listening and learning.” Leena leaned forward, lips parted, but said nothing. He realized what he’d always been too blind to see. That not only was she a woman, but she was glorious. Her clothing was rumpled from sleep. The bruises were still fading, still marring her face, but she was gorgeous. Her hair spilled down her shoulders in glorious honeyed waves. The golden glow of the outside world trickled through the window and illuminated in her a golden bath. She looked a little like a modern statue, a beautiful enigma he’d finally opened his blind eyes to see.

  “You told me a few nights later about your dream of opening a theatre. You had it all worked out. We’d live there. I could write my music. You would be able to put on plays and be in a couple of it like you wanted to. We’d showcase other artists and new talent. You already had a building picked out. You were so young, but you had this dream. You wanted to give the world my art.” He realized, as he said it, that all Leena had ever wanted to do was make him happy. A stab of guilt ripped through him when he thought of the harsh words he’d
said to her the day of her accident. She’d accused him of basically wishing she was the one to die instead of Hannah. He hadn’t meant that. God, he’d never even thought anything like it, but he had hurled other, ugly accusations at her.

  “And somewhere in there, we got married.” Leena frowned. “Minnie told me it was because I needed to, legally.”

  “Yes. It made everything easier. Access to my funds and accounts. You were managing the entire project. You made all the decisions. I was… well, I was doing what I was always doing. Writing. You left me free to do that.” She made it completely seamless. She’s always looked after me. She’s given me everything and I’ve done nothing to deserve her kindness. Why had he been so blind to how selfless Leena was, to just how much she’d done for him?

  “You must have trusted me.”

  “Yes. Implicitly.” It was true. He’d trusted her with his life. She was the one who had saved him when he was at his lowest point. “I wanted you to have the security of my name. You never talked about it, but I knew that you reached a breaking point with your family. I sensed that you had nowhere else to go. I knew you didn’t have much of a job. You were always helping me. I wanted to be fair. You’d sacrificed so much. There was no one who would care for me like you did. You looked at me like I wasn’t just some broken thing. You saw me as an actual person.”

  “And that was enough to make me your wife?”

  “Yes.” He wished she could understand. He didn’t like the frown knitting her brow. “I was the one who suggested it. The theatre was completed, and we moved in. You took it over as naturally as if you’d been doing it all your life. You had help. You hired the best. Six months later we put on our first show. It was a huge success. You’ve been doing it ever since.”

  Though she wasn’t even aware of it, the glow in Leena’s eyes when she looked at him showed how much she cared. She’d always looked at him like that. The things he’d told her, it was like he was telling himself for the first time as he became aware, slowly, of just how deeply ingrained in his life she was.

  Unbidden, the image of her helping him into the shower when he was at one of his most helpless times, when she so patiently shaved him, dressed him in fresh clothes, literally fed him since he couldn’t do it, ripped through his mind. He’d wept in her arms before. He’d spent countless hours with her writing music. His music. She’d never asked for any recognition for the parts she contributed. She sang for him. He was a demanding partner. Unfair. Surly. Dark. Brooding. Difficult. He was the worst kind of man and he knew it. He’d never had any illusions about his desirability, yet she’d never left. She’d never judged him. She’d never told him he was broken or beyond redemption. She’d once told him that if he feared his own mind, it would only enable his thoughts to spiral out of control. Fear only bred more fear.

  Of course, she didn’t remember any of it, yet she still looked at him the same way, with the unbearable tenderness in her emerald eyes.

  Why?

  “Thank you for being so honest with me,” Leena whispered after a long silence. “I’ll go and get us something to eat. Please, stay here. I don’t want to have to help you off the floor again. I want you to stay in bed. Don’t let me catch you at the piano again or I swear I’ll slam that damn lid on your fingers so that you can’t play.”

  He laughed softly, startling her. “You actually used to say that before. I know you’d never do it. It’s a graphic image. I’m surprised you’ve stuck with it over the years. It’s generally your go-to saying.”

  She flushed and looked away. “Anyway, I’ll be right back. Don’t even think about being fussy. You’re getting what you’re given since I can’t remember what you like.”

  She used to say that too. That he’d get what she made when she was exasperated with him. Once she’d said it about the music she wrote. He got what she wrote. He got what she sang. She wasn’t a magician. She couldn’t produce music and notes out of thin air. He didn’t tell her that. He let her go.

  Dallas spread out on the bed. His head hit the pillow and he let out a long sigh. His body hurt. His chest hurt. His head ached. His back and shoulders felt like someone had taken a rod to them. His damn jaw felt like someone had hit him with a baseball bat. His hands felt like claws. He wondered if the cramps would ever come out of his fingers. Worse, he ached inside. His soul hurt.

  An image of Hannah from that dream, as sweet and innocent as she had been in life, swam before his closed eyes. He thought he loved her. With a start, he remembered what she’d said. Not anymore.

  As though someone finally pulled the veil from his eyes, he realized what the tender glow was in Leena’s eyes whenever she looked at him. To her, he wasn’t any of the things that other people saw. He was just Dallas. She’d always seen right through everything else. She accepted that the person he was wasn’t like other people. He was never going to be what other people termed normal. His madness was a part of him. The music was a part of him. She’d stayed with him through the worst of it and the best of it.

  She loved him.

  Now that he finally, after nearly a decade and a half, realized it, he didn’t know what to do with the discovery. Did she know, now that her memories were gone? Was the feeling still there?

  “I hope sandwiches are okay.” Leena’s voice filled up the room. Dallas’ eyes cranked open. She swept into the room carrying a plate piled high with pieces of bread, cheese, deli meats, pickles, olives. His mouth actually watered. He would have eaten anything, even if it was sand.

  “Yes.” He forced himself into a sitting position. She put the plate on the bed. “I’ll get some water after. Please don’t eat too fast. You haven’t had anything for a few days. I don’t want you to make your stomach sore.”

  “My stomach is like iron. It’s used to being starved.”

  She shook her head slowly. “You need a break from this.”

  “So, you said.” Dallas picked up a piece of cheese and crammed it into his mouth. He chewed slowly, savoring the taste.

  “Please, play the lead role with me. We wrote that play together. It’s our play. It only seems right. You told me once that you considered being an actor.” He paused, hand halfway to his mouth. Leena frowned in confusion. “I don’t know where that came from. I keep getting these snippets of memory like someone has this book and they flash a page at me and I can read a few words and then they slam it shut.”

  “I can’t,” Dallas protested. “I couldn’t stand up there in front of anyone.”

  “You wouldn’t be going out though. You’d be right here, in your home. You have this tremendous gift. Your voice. No one has heard it. I would be right there with you. I’m having a hell of a time trying to replace the man you fired. We’re running out of time. You know the music. You know the part. I wrote it for you. It was for you and you should be the one to give the gift of it to the world.”

  “I… I can’t, Leena.”

  “Dallas, I know that I’ve never asked you for anything. I know it, even though I can’t remember. Please, please do this for me.”

  “Leena, you know how I am.”

  “I know that. But I also know that you’re going to kill yourself in here. You need a break. I think you might actually enjoy it. Would you just give it a try? Just one practice? See how it goes? Maybe you would do just fine. You don’t actually know because you haven’t ever tried. Please?”

  He looked into her luminous green eyes. He wanted to deny her. It would have been easy before. Easy before he’d just sat there and told her how much she’d done for him. How she’s saved his life. Easy before he realized that she was in love with him.

  “Alright,” he finally agreed. “One practice.”

  The dazzling way Leena smiled at him lit up the room. It did something strange to his chest, to his heart, his soul. At the moment, he would have promised her the entire damn world and tried his best to get it for her.

  CHAPTER 10

  Leena

  Leena knew the exact moment
Dallas was spotted. The entire cast hushed, actors fell silent, dancers went limp. People turned to stare and soon the wild mumble of whisperings and hushed voices filled the empty auditorium.

  There were two main aisles dividing three sets of red seats on the main floor of the auditorium. Dallas walked slowly up the far-right aisle and paused at the stairs that led up to the stage. There were no stairs on the other side.

  It was impossible for Leena to hide her smile of delight. She and Minnie made the announcement that morning, that Dallas would be replacing Howard and playing the male lead. They had been met with silence. Dead, utter silence. No one voiced a protest, but she saw the looks of confusion and even outright hostility in some of the cast member’s eyes.

  She walked across the stage, down the stairs and met Dallas halfway. She didn’t take his hand, didn’t touch him at all, but she felt the incredible burn of being near him. Her blood soared, and her pulse raced. Whatever they’d shared two nights ago changed something for them. Not that she remembered what it had been like before, but she sensed that something was different. She knew somehow that she’d always been aware of Dallas, but it was a new level of awareness. Her skin prickled, the hair on the backs of her arms stood on end and her blood surged. He looked at her like he was truly seeing her for the first time. It was strange, given that she didn’t even know who she was herself.

  “I’m glad you came.” Her words were filled with delight, thick and rich with excitement. There was no point in pretending she wasn’t happy, excited and even overjoyed.

  Dallas looked good. His long golden hair was tied back at the base of his neck. He’d shaved and his skin, though still pale, gleamed with the health of a good night’s rest and enough food to at least sustain him. His grey eyes were calm, the burning, driving force behind them stilled for the moment.

  “I told you I would,” he ground out, voice gravelly. His eyes swept past her, over to the stage filled with tittering cast members. Behind them, someone actually laughed. Dallas bent to whisper in her ear. His breath was warm and gentle. “They don’t want me here.”