Picture Perfect

  She found him downstairs in his study, sitting in the tremendous leather desk chair, his body bent over a list of financial holdings. Spaced across the top of the desk were the three Oscars he'd won when she was in Pine Ridge. She stepped into the room, closing the door behind her.

  Alex looked up. "He's asleep again?"

  Cassie nodded. "For the next couple of hours, anyway."

  She reached across the desk and picked up the Oscar in the corner, smoothing her fingers over the streamlined back and the crossed arms. It was much heavier than she had expected. "I was so proud of you," she murmured. "I wanted to be here."

  "I wanted you to be here too."

  They looked at each other for a long moment, and then Alex's hand covered hers on the Oscar and set it on the desk. He pulled her onto his lap.

  Suddenly nervous, she splayed her hand across the sheaf of papers on the desk. "How much are you worth?" she teased.

  Alex looked away. "Not nearly as much as when you left," he said. "You probably noticed we're down to a skeleton staff, and I ought to tell you the apartment's been on the market for a couple of months now. I--I took a big loss producingMacbeth ."

  Again Cassie felt her stomach cramp at the pain he'd suffered as a result of her disappearance. Trying to smile, she tipped up Alex's chin. "The good news," she said, "is that I've learned a lot about roots and berries. We're in no danger of starving."

  The corners of Alex's mouth turned up. "I don't think we're quite at the brink of bankruptcy yet," he said. "But I would get a kick out of watching you forage your way through Bel-Air."

  Cassie wrapped her arms around Alex's neck and pressed her cheek against his heart. "I really missed you," she said. She wished he would put away his files and take her upstairs. She wished at the very least he would kiss her.

  "I have a favor to ask of you," Alex said.

  Cassie looked up, and then beamed, realizing he was giving her the choice. Hadn't he said he would sleep in a different bedroom if she wanted? Obviously all he was waiting for was a hint, a clue, a caress.

  "I know you're going to want me to see...someone. A psychiatrist or something. I was just hoping you wouldn't go mentioning it. You know, to someone like Ophelia, or your cop friend in South Dakota." He lowered his eyes. "That's all."

  Cassie felt his words tug at her. Did he really think that after all he'd been willing to do in order to get her back, she might intentionally try to hurt him? "Alex," Cassie murmured, "I never said anything to anyone before. I'm not going to say anything now." She stroked the back of his neck. "I have a favor to ask of you too." Alex swung his head toward her, his eyes glowing. "I was wondering if we could go to bed," she said.

  Alex's breath drained out in a long sigh. He tucked Cassie's head back against his chest. "I thought you'd never ask."

  HE WAS AS NERVOUS AS A TEENAGER. PACING NAKED IN FRONT OF the mirror, he thought about Cassie lying under the covers just a few feet outside the bathroom door. He wondered if her body had changed because she'd had Connor. He wondered what she would be wearing, if anything, and then he thought maybe he should wrap a towel around himself. She might want to talk first. Hell, he didn't even know if it was all right to do this, so soon after the baby.

  Placing his hands on either side of the sink, he leaned toward the mirror. "Get ahold of yourself," he ordered out loud. He closed his eyes and thought of all the love scenes he'd done over the years, takes and retakes with his hands on the breasts of beautiful women and his mouth roaming over their pancaked skin. He'd been able to act natural in front of an audience of cameramen, directors, gaffers, grips; but with his own wife and no crew in sight, he was terrified of doing something wrong. The truth was, there was no woman who could make him feel like Cassie did. She touched him without ulterior motives; she gave all of herself; she loved him simply because he was him.

  He took a deep breath and pulled open the bathroom door. Cassie was sitting propped up in the bed, the sheet drawn to her bare shoulders. The covers moved as she wriggled her toes. "Oh," she said, "I guess youdidn't fall in."

  Alex laughed and sat on the edge of the bed. "What did I do to deserve you?"

  Cassie gave him a cocky smile. "You got very, very lucky." She stretched her hand up to him to pull him closer, and the sheet fell away from her breasts. Alex had only the slightest glimpse of the milky skin, the dark spread nipples, before he crushed her against him.

  "God, you feel good," he whispered against her mouth. He dug his fingers into her hair and kissed her, telling himself to go slowly before it was over too fast. But Cassie's hands came to his waist to unknot the towel and before he could help himself he'd settled between her legs and driven into her, crying out.

  He collapsed against her chest, mortified. "I'm sorry," he said. "I feel like I'm fifteen again."

  Cassie stroked his hair. "It's nice to know you were even more nervous than I was." She shifted her hips beneath him, and he pulled her onto her side so she wouldn't bear his weight.

  He looked down at her body, still lined from her pregnancy and thick at the waist and stomach. "I'm fat," she announced.

  "You're beautiful," Alex said. His fingers traced a stretch mark on her hip. "Is this--okay to do?"

  Cassie laughed. "It's a little late to be asking, don't you think?"

  Alex shook his head. "No, I mean...did I hurt you?"

  Cassie's eyes met his, and he realized that the phrasing of the sentence went much deeper than he had intended. "No," she whispered. "And you won't."

  She felt Alex moving beside her again and she reached for him, but he gently pinned her arms at the sides of her head. "No," he said. "Let me."

  He began to love her, inch by inch, and this time it burned from behind her skin. When he came into her, Cassie saw for just a moment the skeleton of her life. There was no house, no Oscars, no Connor. There were no old secrets and no residual pain. There was just Alex, and Cassie. She remembered how Alex Rivers had stirred things inside her she'd never known about; how, always, she would love him. And with these beginnings shining so brightly again, it was difficult to imagine that for months she had passed them by without a second glance.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  IF nothing else, Hollywood had always been fickle, which was why only a few days went by before Alex Rivers was once again the hottest property in town. His Cinderella romance of Cassie had matured--now he was a movie star with family values, someone willing to sacrifice box office success and cancel production if it interfered with the time he needed with his wife. Suddenly, the pariah who had seemingly made a mess of his life was the celebrity whom everyone in America could relate to, a public figure who only wanted to be an ordinary guy.

  The house and Alex's production office were flooded with gifts for Connor--baseball mitts and rattles and tiny sweatsuits from fans, sterling spoons and Tiffany place settings from studio executives, who included notes for Alex that said they'd been behind him all along. Screenplays were sent to him by the dozens; Herb Silver called four times a day to offer him packages in which he was being asked to star and direct. Alex took the baby gifts--he liked to watch Cassie opening them--and he skimmed through the scripts, but as for settling another deal, he was planning to wait. He had more important things to do first.

  "He smiled," Alex said one morning, holding Connor up like a loving cup. Cassie grinned and kept walking into the dining room. "Hang on. I can make him do it again."

  Cassie lifted her eyes toward the ceiling and took a sip of her coffee. "Maybe you can have him rolling over by the time I get back."

  Alex settled the baby on his shoulder and gave her a jaunty grin. "Maybe I can," he said.

  He was beginning to think that Cassie had been right. He had wanted to hire a nanny--after all, that's what most couples in his position did when they had a baby--but Cassie wouldn't hear of it. "I will not have someone spending more time with Connor than me," she'd said firmly, "and that's not negotiable." She had arranged with Archibald Custer to take a
yearlong sabbatical. Her heart wasn't in fieldwork, not with Connor to distract her, and anyway, someone else had been teaching her courses. Alex had said she'd be screaming to get out of the house within a week. "You'll see," Cassie had said. "I'll know more about the neighborhood parks than anyone else."

  So far, she had been right. She spent most of her day on the floor of the den with Connor, making faces at him and sticking out her tongue and reading him fairy tales she'd dug up. In fact, the only problem had been that, watching them, Alex had no desire to leave. He'd taken to bringing his scripts home, and reading them in the den where he could watch his wife and his son play.

  "What time are you coming home?" Alex said.

  Cassie laughed and picked up her jacket. "Why? So you can have dinner on the table?" She shook her head and kissed him on the cheek. "You're turning into a house-husband, Alex."

  Alex grinned. "No one ever told me how much more gratifying a career it was."

  Cassie brushed the top of Connor's head with her lips. "It also pays less," she said.

  "Have fun with Ophelia," Alex said.

  Cassie groaned. "She's going to grill me for the next three hours. Do you know she actually asked if being at Pine Ridge was anything like what that white woman went through inDances with Wolves ?"

  Alex laughed. "What did you tell her?"

  "No buffalo," Cassie said, "more snow, and worse clothing." She shook her head and walked across the parlor, dodging a maid who was carrying a stack of tablecloths. When she got to the door, she turned around, biting her lip and checking to see that the hall was clear of people. "You didn't forget about tonight?"

  Alex looked up at her the way he often did these days, as if he did not entirely trust himself to believe that she was there, and that if she walked out that door she would actually come through it again only hours later. "I didn't forget," he said.

  DR. JUNE POOLEY WAS THE ONE THERAPIST CASSIE HAD SPOKEN TO who did not insist that the only way a battered wife could change her circumstances was by getting herself out of her husband's physical range. She told Cassie about something called battered women's syndrome, and she said that it was a sickness, like alcoholism. And as with alcoholism, through certain kinds of therapy both abusers and victims could come to understand their problems and the best way to deal with them.

  "If you're an alcoholic, you have to understand that you'll never be able to take a drink again. Not to toast your brother's wedding, not to fit in at a business lunch, never. If you're being beaten," Dr. Pooley said, looking at Cassie and then Alex, "or doing the beating, you have to understand that the impulses that let you get into those situations will have to be channeled elsewhere if you're going to remain together."

  Alex wove his fingers between Cassie's and squeezed her hand.

  Dr. Pooley took a deep breath. "You should also understand that the odds are against you. But even if you were to divorce each other, without therapy, it's almost a given that Alex would find a woman with a personality type like Cassie's and take out his rage on her, and that Cassie would search out someone like Alex who would, in turn, abuse her all over again. No matter what happens, you're taking a step in the right direction. The first part of therapy for each of you is going to be to see other people like yourselves, in the same situation you've been in."

  Cassie looked up at Alex, who was staring with calm, clear eyes at the therapist who was going to change their life. He didn't seem nervous at all--not about coming to the quiet oak-paneled office, and now, not even about admitting to a group of unfamiliar men that he hit Cassie. Cassie frowned at that, thinking ahead for Alex. She knew about doctor-patient confidentiality, but she wasn't sure if the same would hold true for the members of the support groups. And obviously, that was a requirement for Alex.

  "It's clear that you've made a commitment to each other, which I appreciate," Dr. Pooley said. She checked a clipboard, then looked up at Cassie. "I can put you into a women's group on Wednesday night," she said. "And our men's group meets on Sundays."

  "That's not a problem," Alex said.

  "ILIKE HER, " CASSIE SAID AS THEY WERE SLIPPING INTO BED. "WHAT did you think?"

  Alex yawned and turned off the light. "She's okay," he said.

  "She didn't do a double take when you walked through the door," Cassie pointed out. "She didn't ask you for your autograph."

  Alex nuzzled her shoulder. "She'll have it dozens of times over," he said. "Every time I send her a check."

  In the dark, Cassie turned to Alex and pressed her palms against his chest. "You don't mind talking about us in front of strangers?"

  Alex shook his head and bent his mouth to Cassie's breast. He could taste the faintest traces of milk that his son had left behind, and he suckled gently, loving the idea that she could nourish them both.

  "What about what else she said?" Cassie whispered. Alex pulled away from her, hearing the ragged note of fear at the edge of her voice. "What if we're in the majority and we can't stay together?"

  Alex gathered her into his arms and rubbed his hands down her back. "You have nothing to worry about," he said simply, "since I'm never going to let you go."

  LIKE THE OTHER SEVEN WOMEN IN HER THERAPY GROUP, CASSIE WAS married to a man who was wonderful ninety-five percent of the time. Like the other women, Cassie had spent more time as a child taking care of her parents than they had spent taking care of her, but no one had ever given her any credit for it. And then her husband had come along. He was the first person who made her feel special. He told her he loved her, he wept when he hurt her. He told her she was able to take care of him and soothe his pain as nobody else could.

  Like the other seven women, Cassie didn't want Alex to hit her, but she knew he couldn't help it. She believed that in some way, it was her fault for not being able to avoid it. She felt sorry for him. She could convince herself it would never happen again, because she had been fixing problem situations for so much of her life that for her own well-being, she simply had to believe in her ability to set things right.

  And oh, there were rewards. Flowers, and tenderness, and smiles meant just for her. When she got it right--when she didn't send him over the edge--her life was better than anyone else's.

  But like the other women, Cassie understood that it wasn't normal to freeze up when her husband touched her shoulder, since she didn't know whether to expect a kiss or a kick in the ribs. She understood that it wasn't always her fault. That she didn't have to be unhappy more than she was happy.

  Dr. Pooley sat right in the circle with the women, many of whom, Cassie was surprised to see, were well dressed and well spoken. Somehow she had expected to be included with the wives of truck drivers, of welfare recipients. For the first few minutes she sat quietly, saying no more than her first name by way of introduction, and stared at the tulip-shaped bruise on the collarbone of the woman across from her.

  The session that night was a story swap. Dr. Pooley wanted everyone to think back to the very first time an incident of abuse had occurred. Cassie listened to a lawyer tell of her live-in lover, who had barricaded her in the bathroom for forty-eight hours to keep her from going out with her colleagues. Another woman cried as she described her husband dragging her from a dinner party where he accused her of talking too much to a male neighbor, and then punched her in the mouth until two teeth came out and blood gushed and she couldn't talk anymore at all. Others told of objects being hurled at them, of bones being broken, of fists being slammed through glass windows.

  When Cassie was the only one who hadn't spoken, she glanced up shyly at Dr. Pooley and started to describe the time she'd come back from her Chicago lecture on the hand. She talked slowly about the plane being late, about Alex's accusations as to where she had been, carefully censoring any information that would point clearly to Alex's career and reveal his identity. She felt lighter with each word she spoke, as if she had been carrying around stones in her heart all these years and was only now able to cast them away. By the time she finished,
having talked about the baby that might have been, tears were running down her cheeks and Dr. Pooley's arm was around her shoulders.

  Shocked at her lack of composure, Cassie sat bolt upright. She hastily wiped her face. "I have a son now," she said proudly. "My husband is wonderful with him." And then, more softly, absolving Alex: "That other time, he didn't know."

  As the group broke up, gathering their purses and their fragile understandings to take back to their homes, Cassie lingered behind. She waited until she and Dr. Pooley were the only ones in the meeting room, and then she tapped her lightly on the shoulder. "Thank you," Cassie said, shrugging a little. "I'm not quite sure for what, but...thank you."

  The psychotherapist smiled. "It'll get easier each time you come."

  Cassie nodded. "I think I expected to feel like I was going to have to defend myself. Like no one would understand how I can still love Alex after what he's done. I thought they'd all look at me like I was crazy for sticking around for so long."

  Dr. Pooley nodded. "We've all been there," she said.

  Cassie's eyes widened. "You too?"

  "I was married to a man who beat me for ten years," she said, "so I'm the last person who's going to judge you for your decision to stay." She held the door open so Cassie could walk through.

  Cassie continued to stare at the therapist. "I--I'm sorry. I just never would have guessed."

  "Well, we don't all brand it across our foreheads, do we?" she said gently.

  Cassie shook her head. "But things are better now?" she asked, trying to take as much hope as she could home to Alex.

  "Yes," Dr. Pooley said, sighing. She looked at Cassie for a long moment. "Now that we're divorced."

  ALEX WAS CIRCLING HIS HIPS, PRESSING DEEP INSIDE OF HER, RUNNING his mouth in a hot path down the curve of Cassie's neck, when Connor began to scream through the monitor beside the bed.

  Cassie's breasts tingled as her milk let down, and she felt it dripping down both sides of her as Alex rolled off her for the second time that night. He lay on his back, staring up at the ceiling, his jaw clenched. "For God's sake, Cassie," Alex bit out. "Can't you make him shut up?"