CHAPTER30
But there were no last-minute seats to be had on any direct flight, at any price.
Graham stayed busy on the phone while Kari packed.
Ian helped Rafi unload the van, which held an astonishing amount of gear. Boxes of kitchen utensils, crates of bed linens and towels. An art deco chest of drawers. Matching table and two chairs. Standing lamp and a modern version of an Eames chair with its stool. The three wooden crates stampedLIMOGESthey left on the guesthouse kitchen’s narrow counter.
“She can find them later,” Rafi said. “Or the next time we’re up.”
Ian nodded agreement. Today was not made for exchanging gifts.
The van emptied, they settled the paintings going to Miami back into the crates, sealed the tops, and took them to the van. Sienna sat by the main house’s rear door, mewing through the screen as Ian passed, then vanishing whenever Rafi or Graham came into view. Each painting they lifted and settled into place had Ian wanting to freeze-frame, step back, lose himself in Kari’s work. But Rafi granted him only moments before insisting they resume work. Just the same, Ian was certain the man approved of his responses.
Ninety minutes after their arrival, they were ready to leave. Graham had booked two seats on the early-morning flight out of Santa Barbara, connecting through Dallas. Ian thought their accelerated pace actually helped Kari stay in balance. They all waited while she locked the doors to her house and settled in the Mercedes’s passenger seat. Ian drove because she had asked that he do so. They followed Graham’s van down the valley lane, through the main gates, and off they went.
Sienna’s response to yet more travel proved a pleasant surprise. Ten minutes down the county highway, she mewed to be released from her carrier. She endured a time in Kari’s lap, then clambered onto the central console and sat with her head cocked high. As they passed through San Luis Obispo, she climbed Ian’s right arm and settled on the back of his seat. She nuzzled his neck from time to time, but when they joined the freeway, she sat with her head up and watched the road unwind. The kitten’s calmness helped Kari enter a repose that he had not seen before. Legs tucked up under her, shoes left in the footwell, head back, and auburn-gold hair spilling everywhere. He wished she would take off her sunglasses so he could see those amazing eyes.
As they passed the Lompoc exit, Ian recalled his arrival. The dreadful flight, the awful rental car, the motel, the family in the next room shouting through the night. How long ago it all seemed.
Where the hills rose and tightened, the sky overhead blackened with a sudden Pacific storm. The car was buffeted with winds as strong as fists, causing the truck directly ahead of them to veer suddenly into the next lane, almost clipping Graham’s van. Sienna fled into Kari’s lap and huddled as the rain struck, reducing Ian’s visibility to the vehicle up ahead and little else.
As the world closed in around them, Kari said quietly, “I’ve been thinking about my family.”
In that windswept moment, Kari went from utterly silent to talking nonstop. Ian had no idea how to respond. He was filled with a sense that her words were an intimate gift, a rare glimpse into what she had spent a lifetime hiding away.
Kari stopped speaking only when they followed Graham off the freeway and entered the Santa Barbara resort’s front drive. She stood silently as Graham and Rafi checked them in, and then she walked down the hillside lane holding Sienna’s carrier. The hotel was composed of smallish villas built in the Spanish style, with broad balconies. The wind clutched at them, carrying the scent of more rain to come. It hastened their farewells, and soon enough Ian deposited his cases in his own room, then went next door. Kari’s room had a fireplace and a broad ocean-facing balcony with French doors, already wet from another incoming squall. Ian lit the gas fireplace, waited while Kari selected a meal from the room-service menu, called in their orders, then settled into the chair across from hers. Sienna climbed into his lap.
Kari picked up where she had left off.
Word by word, she painted a new series of images. The child lost to a trio of people who equated rage with strength. Who fought their way through a harsh realm, until eventually the two parents turned on each other. The young girl who did not share either their rage or their attitude toward the world. Who grew to despise everything their fury represented, the flash and clamor of a life lived in the public eye. Who retreated into a secret realm, where silence meant safety. Who lived a ghostlike existence on the periphery of her family’s world. Whose creative gift was sheltered within a lonely life.
Ian suspected she was not even aware of her own tears.
At a knock on the door, Ian walked over and insisted on taking their trays. They ate in silence at the fireside table, watching the storm lash the night-clad windows. The kitten climbed into Ian’s lap, allowed him to feed her for the very first time, and in so doing, she drew out Kari’s first and only smile.
Ian settled the trays outside the door, returned to the fireside table, and stood behind his chair. He had a sudden awareness of the king-size bed, Kari’s openness to his staying, the sudden burning temptation that took him totally unawares. As if he had been too busy listening and absorbing to realize where this was taking them both.
If he wanted.
A sudden blast of wind and rain pelted the balcony doors, as if the storm was actually trying to speak with him. What he heard was a reminder of his own wrong moves. The man he was trying so hard to leave behind.
Kari chose that moment to speak for the first time since their dinner had arrived. “I feel as if this is the destiny I’m forced to accept. All that’s changed is my location.”
That was all it took. The burning urge was transformed into nothing save more ashes, which Ian could actually taste.
She went on, “I’m so happy in Miramar. But there’s this whisper in the background. That I’m still fated to drift my way through a lifetime of lonely days.”
“Kari.” He remained standing behind his chair, waiting until she lifted her gaze. “You’re not drifting now. And you’re not alone.”
She blinked, dislodging a tear, which fell upon the purring kitten.
When she did not speak, Ian told her, “Get some rest. We leave early.”
She was still seated and staring at the fire when he left.
