Frankenstein In Love Page 21
When the others heard his questions, there was complete silence. It seemed that in one short moment birds stopped chirping, engines stopped roaring, babies stopped crying, trains stopped whistling, and planes stopped flying. It seemed that the whole world stood still to hear her answer. Tiffany gazed down at her beautiful ring and twisted it around on her finger, thinking about the day she received it, and the crumpled picture of herself she would see in her mind for the rest of her life. She could still hear Kirk’s words, Did you know Reyna was in love with you? Those words echoed over and over through her mind as she gazed out at the eager faces reaching and clawing, each one of them willing to sell their souls for a scoop. It would be so easy. If she let this story out, the press would go crazy. Her books would be the hottest thing on the market. She could write her own ticket, and be set for the rest of her life.
She regarded the sea of faces with a dazzling smile, the rapid flash of the cameras blinding her. Prepared to shock the city of New York, she opened her mouth to speak. No one moved. The crowd stood dead still, and with a strong, smooth voice she spoke into the microphones.
“Reyna, uh…Ms. Phillips was in love—” Hearing the electrified sound of her own voice echoing across the crowd of hungry, greedy faces she paused. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t tell Reyna’s secret to a mob of people that would tear her memory to shreds. “With her work,” she finally whispered, still seeing the bloody crumpled up photograph swirling in her mind. “We were friends, that’s all.” Refusing to say any more, she spotted a taxi at the curb, and walked toward it. She felt the crush of the reporters around her, shouting voices, and microphones that were continuously pushed into her face just before she disappeared into the safety of a taxi.
* * * *
Back in the hotel, Tiffany opened her briefcase and gazed down at all the notes of her book that she had written out in longhand. She pulled them out and tried to get them in some kind of order, and then called down to the hotel desk and asked for the use of a computer. The best they could do was an electric typewriter, so Tiffany instructed the hotel to secure a laptop through an electronics rental store and add the cost to her bill. In no time at all a bell boy appeared at her door with the laptop and a copy of her bill that required her signature. Tiffany thanked him with a tip, and enthusiastically assembled her notes and typed all night. She had to force herself to stay awake, drinking cup after cup of black coffee. When she was finally through, she gazed down at the title, Face in the Shadows.
Remembering Kirk as he lurked mysteriously in darkness, she wondered if she was doing the right thing. She had a reputation for taking chances, but this one was the biggest chance of all. Had she brought a man out of the shadows, only to see him return for a completely different reason? Had she experienced true love, only to see it snatched from her hands because of her devotion to the written page? She faced so many uncertainties. Not only was she worried about telling him, but she also worried about her fans. All of her books had been stories about handsome men strutting across the pages of her novels making love to their heroines. They were stories that held the readers spellbound as they imagined themselves in his arms. When he made love to the heroine, he made love to them. He was always dark, dashing, and handsome. He was the ideal man that took her story and led it through countless sizzling bedroom scenes, conflict, horror, and at last, to a happy ending.
She sat back against the bed’s headboard, grasping a steaming cup of coffee in her hands, wondering how she was ever going to tell them. How could she possibly explain to microphones, flashing cameras, inquiring faces, and adoring fans that a scarred up monster—a hulking Frankenstein that stayed buried in the recesses of an old mansion—an ugly deformed freak that lurked mysteriously in midnight shadows—a growling beast that had pulled a series of orgasms out of her that almost made her faint—was the hero of her next novel.
* * * *
Quinn walked into Kirk’s dimly-lit hospital room and gazed down at his bandaged head lying silent and unmoving on his pillow.
“How’s it going, old buddy? I thought I’d come down and see how you’re coming along.”
Kirk started to lift a finger in response, but before he got the chance, Quinn turned and scraped a straight chair along the floor and sat down.
“Hey, you in there, pal?” Quinn asked, frowning down into the deep eye holes until he saw Kirk. Satisfied that he was awake and listening, Quinn began his rasping speech in suggestive tones. “You know, I would say it’s lonesome in the old mansion with you and Elaine here at the hospital, but…well, I can’t. You see, Tiffany keeps me pretty busy. Yeah, Kirk, you need to get up out of this bed, man. I think she’s going to wear me out. God, is she hot. Always thinking up ways to get me on top of her.” Quinn stared closely at Kirk, trying to get his reaction.
“For instance, the other night, right after she had taken a shower, she left her door open. Knowing I was out there she starts smoothing some kind of scented oil all over herself—” Quinn paused, his voice rasping. “And I mean, all over her, man. After that, believe it or not, she puts on this tiny little robe, corners me in front of the fireplace and pulls it off. Oh man. I don’t have to tell you my temperature shot up to the boiling point. Well, I mean why wouldn’t it, huh? She’s gorgeous, right? Before I know what’s happening, she rubs up against me, see, knowing I have a hard time resisting her anyway. But hey, I try, right? I try real hard.” Quinn leaned closer to Kirk’s bandaged head, his suggestive tone deepening.
“Well, to make a long story short, pal, she was wild that night. Wild and hot. This is one lady that needs more than one man to keep her satisfied, you know?” Quinn chuckled. “Well, you’ve read her novels, you know what I mean. God, is she good, or what? Always ready for a romp, right?” Quinn pulled his shirt collar back revealing some scars on his neck and shoulder, and chuckled. “Looks like my scratches match yours.” With a cruel grin on his face, he got up and pushed the chair back. “Oh, by the way, I just wanted to mention that little mole she has right near the nipple on her left breast…cute huh?”
*
Kirk clenched his teeth, listening as Quinn got up to leave.
When Quinn opened the door, he turned and gloated at Kirks misery, the cruel smirk right at home on his dark, handsome face.
The light in the room was dim and Kirk was quiet, but beneath his bandages were the red, sore, sutured lines of a surgeon’s scars—and tears.
Chapter 19
THE urgent sound of a woman’s voice echoed throughout the hospital, “Dr. Vincent Wilder, stat, 525! Dr. Wilder, stat, 525!”
Dr. Wilder turned his gaze double-quick to the cold, impersonal box of plastic and metal parts that was mounted up in a corner of the doctor’s lounge. He threw his almost-full cup of coffee in the trash and ran down to the elevator. He pressed the Up button, but too impatient to wait, he turned and ran to the stairwell and hiked up two steps at a time. When he burst in, he saw the nurse motioning for him to hurry. The two of them began a hurried stride down to the room. “That’s Kirk Kessler’s room, what’s wrong?”
“I don’t know everything. Elaine is with him. She’ll tell you.”
He threw the door open. “What the hell’s goin’ on here, Elaine? What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know. His pulse has dropped radically, and he’s getting weaker by the minute. He pushes me away when I try to do anything for him, and he keeps mumbling Tiffany’s name.”
He turned to the other nurse. “Nurse, get Tiffany Lovelace on the phone. The number is on the check-in form.” Turning back to his patient, he put his stethoscope to Kirk’s chest. “Is he in any pain?”
“I don’t think so.”
“When was his last medication?”
“Only two hours ago.”
The doctor reached up and opened his eyes through the small holes in the bandages. Shining a small light into them, he searched for signs of trouble.
“Let me die,” Kirk mumbled, the tor
tured words coming through the small hole in the bandage as he began fighting the doctor.
“Elaine, get some orderlies!”
Almost immediately two burly young men came in and managed to keep Kirk down while the doctor sedated him.
While examining Kirk, but talking to Elaine, the doctor spoke worriedly. “It’s as if he’s retreated back into his old shell.”
“Surely he’s not going to die!”
“No, but he’s had some kind of emotional shock.” The doctor continued examining him, and said, “Being in this state of mind, I don’t know what he might do. There’s only one thing I know of that could send Kirk back.”
“What?”
The doctor glared at her. “What the hell do you think, Elaine? If he thinks he’s lost Tiffany, that’s emotional suicide.”
The nurse ran in. “Doctor, there’s no answer.”
“Keep trying,” he yelled, and directed a question at Elaine. “When was the last time she was here? Was there an argument? What the hell did she say to him?”
“No…it’s been…I haven’t seen her.”
All at once, Elaine ran out of Kirk’s room and told the nurse not to bother calling, that she would take care of it later.
* * * *
Tiffany was just walking in from her New York trip and the phone was ringing. Quinn didn’t seem to be anywhere around, so she answered it.
“Do you love Kirk?” the feminine voice on the other end rasped.
“Of course,” Tiffany answered, wondering what was going on.
“Then you’d better get down here on the double.”
“Who is this, and what are you talking about?”
“This is Elaine. It’s been days, why haven’t you been in to see Kirk since his surgery?”
“You know where I’ve been, I’ve been in New York. I had to attend a funeral and take care of some business. I’m coming to the hospital as soon as I get cleaned up.”
“Tiffany, Kirk is in trouble. For some reason he thinks he’s lost you. If I were you, I wouldn’t wait around, I’d get down here before he does something drastic. He’s already assaulted Dr. Wilder, and when he comes to, there’s no telling what he might try. You’re the only one that can help him, Tiffany, and I don’t think you have time for a leisurely shower. If you care about him, Kirk needs you now.”
“Oh my God!” Tiffany muttered, throwing down the phone. She left her luggage at the door and ran out to her car. She ran stop signs, red lights, veered around other traffic, arriving at the little hospital in half the time it would have ordinarily taken.
Running into the hospital, she hurriedly made her way around old people, invalids in wheelchairs, patients in walkers, and those that seemed determined to keep her from Kirk. When she finally burst out of the fifth floor elevator, she didn’t stop at the nurse’s station, she went directly to Kirk’s room. Stopping abruptly outside his closed door, she took a deep breath, and gently opened it. Her heart lurched when she saw him lying there so quiet and helpless. She walked over, and gazed down at him.
He looked dead.
“Kirk,” she whispered, a sob in her voice.
Nothing.
She turned around, grabbed a chair, and sat down beside him.
“Kirk. It’s me, Tiffany.”
She sat in silence for a moment before she heard his raspy voice.
“What in hell are you doing here, Tiffany?” Kirk said, barely mouthing the words. “Couldn’t Quinn take care of you?” He paused, his voice breaking. “Well, don’t come to me. The doctor put you on my list of don’ts for a while.” After a slight hesitation, he added, “But I’ve put you on there forever.”
“Everyone around here is talking in riddles. What is going on, Kirk? Why are you so bitter, and why is Elaine mad at me?” She noticed his fresh bandage and thought about the lip print she left on the other one. “Didn’t Dr. Wilder show you the lip print on the other bandage?”
“Yeah, real cute. Just like the little mole next to the nipple on your left breast.”
With a frown, Tiffany glanced down at her left breast, and up at him. “What is this all about, Kirk?”
“Hell, Tiffany, don’t act so fucking innocent. I know all about you and Quinn all alone in that big mansion together. Is that why you haven’t been to see me? He’s keeping you pretty busy, huh?”
“Me and Quinn? What do you mean?”
“I mean, he told me all about your night in front of the fireplace.”
Tiffany’s gaze widened. “He told you about that?”
“So it’s true, right?”
“Well, sure, but why are you upset with me?”
“What were you wearing?”
“Wearing? My little silk shantung robe.”
“Yeah, and what was under it?”
Tiffany immediately understood. “Nothing,” she whispered.
“Get the hell out, Tiffany.”
Tears began gathering in Tiffany’s eyes. “But, Kirk—”
“Stop right there. I don’t want to hear any more of your lies,” he spat angrily. “And I don’t want to hear any more about your little rendezvous with Quinn.”
“But, Kirk, it wasn’t like that. Don’t you see—”
“Goodbye, Tiffany.” He turned away, mumbling, “Have a good life.”
Those final words plunged deep into her heart like a knife. She felt so helpless. It would be useless to try and explain. He would never believe her about the night in front of the fireplace. Quinn had done too good a job of poisoning his mind against her. Without touching her, Quinn had cut her heart right out. He might as well have used the white-handled knife—she felt just as dead.
Kirk watched her get up and walk to the door crying. “Tiffany!”
She turned and cast a hopeful gaze at him.
“Leave the ring on the table.”
Tiffany lifted her left hand and caressed the ring with love, before she carefully wedged it off, laid it down, and walked out of his life. When she went through the door, she had her head lowered, dabbing at her tears, and almost ran into Dr. Wilder.
*
“Tiffany! We’ve been searching everywhere for you. We called the mansion and Quinn said your luggage was there, but he hadn’t seen you.” The doctor indicated toward Kirk’s door. “I see you’ve been in to see Kirk.”
“Yes,” Tiffany sobbed.
“Hey, why the tears?” he asked, lifting her chin with one finger. “Now that you’re here, everything is fine.”
“Kirk and I are through,” she whispered.
“What?” the doctor asked, surprised. He watched her closely and recognized the signs, and just managed to catch her as she collapsed against his chest. “Oh, jeez,” he said as he gazed around the barren hall for a place to sit down. Remembering that the cafeteria was only one floor below them, he put his arms around her and said, “Here, come with me. What you need is a cup of good strong coffee, and after that I want you to tell me what happened.”
After several minutes of navigating Tiffany down concrete steps and through halls with a heavy antiseptic smell, the two were seated at the cafeteria table with a steaming mug of coffee in front of them. While taking short sips and wiping at the moisture coursing down her cheeks, Tiffany haltingly told Dr. Wilder the whole story. She watched him as he sat there breaking plastic spoons in anger.
“That bastard. I can’t believe he would do something like that.”
“I just don’t understand why Kirk listens to him. Quinn has lied so much, you’d think Kirk would be wise to him by now.”
“It’s easy to plant doubt in someone’s mind, and naturally Quinn mixed the truth with lies which is a hellish combination. When Kirk questioned you, he was hoping for just one little thing that didn’t line up with what Quinn had said.” The doctor shrugged. “When he didn’t find it, he had no choice but to believe him.”
“Do you think I should have tried harder to explain?”
“I don’t think so. After all, you had the right answers, he just asked the wrong questions. No, you can’t just sit down and tell him and expect him to even listen to you, much less believe you. We have to think of another way.” For several minutes Tiffany and the doctor sat there thinking, and saying nothing. All at once he turned to her, an idea floating around in his mind. “Tiffany, if I asked you to go back to the mansion and not come back until I call you, would you?”
“I hate to go back there, but if it’ll help I suppose I can.”
“I have an idea, and if Kirk loves you, it’s the only way I can think of to break down his defenses.”
Their heads hovered together, the doctor explaining what he had in mind.
Tiffany brought her hands up to her face. “But what about his…”
“That’s why you have to wait until I call you. It’ll be a while, but if I can give the healing process a little boost, maybe it’ll be sooner than we think. It’ll also give Kirk time to miss you real bad.” The doctor winked. “And I’ll make sure he does. After all, Quinn Kessler isn’t the only one who can plant ideas in someone’s mind.”
After Tiffany left, Dr. Wilder went searching for Elaine. When he found her, he told her in detail what he was planning, and gave her instructions. She nodded, making a beeline for the elevator that would take her to the newsstand, and then to Kirk’s room.
* * * *
When Tiffany got back to the mansion she tried to find Quinn, but luckily, he wasn’t there. She noticed her luggage wasn’t where she left it. Quinn must have taken it upstairs for her, and that made her suspicious. As she ascended the wide staircase her gaze darted around, thinking he might be hiding in some shadow. When she finally entered her room she saw her luggage, and laid out on the bed was a tantalizing black baby doll nightie made of totally sheer lace netting with a floral motif. It was edged in narrow off-the-shoulder ruffles. Alongside it were fishnet hose, a garter belt and a thong. Just below it, on the floor were black satin mules with four-inch heels and fur fringes. She stiffened, and snatched up the note laying on the nightie.