Page 53 of These Thin Lines

Chiara took a few careful steps towards the bar, stopping as she reached it, and nodded towards the broken glass on the floor in front of her. Vi shrugged, then shook her head when Chiara’s eyebrows lifted.

They shared a long look, and after a few moments, Chiara simply motioned for Vi to join her. Well, fair was fair, and so a few seconds later, Vi found herself sitting shoulder to shoulder with Chiara in her kitchen. To say that this was surreal was an understatement.

“I hope you don’t mind.” Chiara’s fingers were on the bar, tracing the marble veins as Vi’s eyes did the same with those mirrored on Chiara’s hands. She chose silence again and shook her head. Chiara sighed. “Everything changed today. I wanted to believe it’s alright that I’m here. And that you will allow me to apologize properly this time.”

Even in Chiara’s repose, her light and her shadows were tumultuous in the corners, and Vi found herself responding. If only to appease the beasts.

“There isn’t anything to apologize for. If anyone should, it’s—”

But Chiara interrupted her with a raised hand, and Vi’s eyes followed the movement as if mesmerized.Graceful, commanding.

Mercy.

Chiara slowly let her hand fall and shook her head.

“No, before you say something undoubtedly self-effacing, it’s Frankie who should be apologizing. To many people. Because it seems they knew all along and never told me.”

Chiara’s hands now lay flat and tense on the counter, and Vi wanted to cover them with her own. She didn’t dare, and the absence of courage was like a stab wound.

Before Vi found the voice to speak, to confess that she was also on that list of people who knew about Frankie’s affairs, Chiara made a dismissive sound. “I don’t care. I don’t. It makes me an absolute fool that, apparently this has been going on under my nose for years, and I never saw it. It doesn’t matter. So yes, this is on me…”

“You are nobody’s fool, Chiara! And none of this is on you.” And now Vi gave into her earlier impulse and touched the tense hand that was still gripping the counter. After a moment, she gentled her own fingers and simply traced the blue rivulets of veins running along the translucent skin.

In those shadows that Chiara had brought in with her, their hands looked like a study of contrasts. Chiara’s nervous, shaking. Her own relaxed, tender, apologetic. Chiara’s nails were painted crimson and Vi caressed them one by one, to assure herself they were real, that Chiara herself was real.

“I seem to be, though. I seem to be a fool for you this time, Vi.” The way Chiara said her name took Vi’s breath away. Again. How did this woman always do this to her? One syllable. One syllable that she almost never ever used, choosing to call her Ms. Courtenay ad nauseam, only occasionally stooping to a wayward ‘darling’ or ‘Cenerella’.

But when she did call Vi by her chosen name, it was devastating. Maybe that was why she so seldom did, because she knew the power she held?

Finally, the meaning of Chiara’s words reached Vi, and she lifted her face from staring at their hands so quickly, it made her dizzy. Unlike the trembling hands, eyes full of calm were watching her with the kind of soft expression one usually gives to someone who cannot, for the life of them, comprehend the most simple of concepts, but one indulges them anyway.

“Wha…”

Her chest was tight, taking a breath was impossible and yet vital. Because somehow tonight her life had taken a turn and everything she had ever dreamed of was here, in front of her, freely offered. Just to her. The tightness did not subside at the realization that her heart hammered a mile a minute in her ears. She tried to shake her head, but dislodging this feeling was impossible, since the one who was responsible for her heart was looking at her, eyes full of affection. She was lost in them, in this emotion, starving for it. There was no shaking it.

“Eloquent, so eloquent.” Responding to her earlier half question, Chiara sighed and leaned closer, and now Vi could see mischief along with fondness dancing in those amber depths. “I was having the worst day of my life. The absolute worst. And then, when my world was falling apart, when I was literally standing on the edge, deciding what to do next, and when that one step was so tantalizing… Amidst all that turmoil and pain and grief, I felt as alone as I’ve ever been—andaloneand I are on a first name basis. Yet, there you were, ready to save me, even though you were shaking with fear, your teeth chattering and your breath coming out in sobs. I heard you before I saw you. And I was no longer alone. The step was no longer tempting. Because you were there, Vi. You offered that I could hold on to you. And for a precious moment, I held tight.”

Chiara turned her hand, palm up, and their fingers tangled sweetly, even as she went on.

“It has been quite a journey, this day. But something kept tugging at my mind, at my heart, really. I wasn’t alone. You didn’t let me be. In fact, you haven’t let me be alone for months now. You’ve been with me. At first as an adorable peculiarity, but soon you became a steadfast, calming presence, a charming distraction from my crumbling marriage and daily troubles. Except the charming distraction very soon turned into someone I looked forward to seeing and spending time with. Who listened to me. Who inspired me. Vi, surely you know by now that the entire current Lilien Haus collection exists thanks to you. And for you, really. My small gift to you for being there for me.”

Vi knew she had tears in her eyes, but she didn’t care. The pendulum of the events of the days had swung again, and she was plunged from fear and dread to wonder. Chiara created because of her?

“You understood me, darling. Like nobody before you. You took one look at my vision, as raw as it was, and you saw what I wanted to see, you heard my words before I could utter them. Can you blame me for wanting to hold on to that? To you?”

Vi gripped the fingers holding hers tighter because this was wonderful, but while Chiara was ascribing her all these amazing qualities, she knew her own motives hadn’t always been pure. And she had to say so. Something about this woman never quite allowed her to hide the truth.

“I believe you think too highly of me. I’m… I was never… Never selfless…” She stumbled over her own words, and Chiara reached and lifted her chin a little higher, the gesture so familiar. How many times had Chiara raised her face exactly like this, how many times had she looked into her eyes while those cool fingers cradled her jaw, caressing her cheekbone with her thumb?

Vi’s eyes suddenly widened. And Chiara’s smile bloomed, the sensual lips stretching in mirth.

“I love it when you finally grasp something and it transforms your whole face. So expressive, so gorgeous. What, you were never selfless? My darling, neither was I. Yes, at first I found you interesting, certainly beautiful and too smart for your own good. But nothing more than what romance novels call ‘a cinnamon roll.’ One that was already so tortured by life. I gave you maybe a passing thought.”

Chiara’s thumb dropped to caress Vi’s lower lip, as her fingers gripped her jaw tighter, and for Vi, the world stilled. Even Paris outside was reverentially silent. Nothing else mattered but this, right here.

“But you are just too bright, too luminous. And even standing in my studio, in wet clothes and dirty shoes, teasing my ridiculous cat… I looked at you and I saw you. And I have kept looking ever since, because I couldn’t stop.”

The thumb on her mouth was sending ripples of pleasure all over Vi’s body and making her brave, braver than she’d ever been. She closed her lips, trapping the fingertip and giving it a slow lick, and it was Chiara’s turn to gasp. But she recovered rather quickly, and the now wet finger trailed down Vi’s throat and settled on her collarbone.

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