Summer Desserts

it was? I don’t anymore.”
    “God, Lily, if you’d known how guilty I was. Tonight, I was nearly suffocating with—”
    “Good,” she said simply. “Now, you old fool, let’s get out of here so these children can iron things out. Monique—” She held out her hand, and as hands met, eyes met, things passed between them that would never have to be said. “Thank you for a lovely evening, and my best wishes to you and your husband.”
    “And mine to you.” With a smile reminiscent of the past, she held out her arms to B.C. “Au revoir, mon ami.”
    He accepted the embrace, feeling like a man who’d just been granted amnesty. He wanted nothing more than to go up to his own suite and show his wife how much he loved her. “Perhaps we’ll have lunch tomorrow,” he said absently to the room at large. “Good night.”
    Monique began to giggle as the door shut behind him. “Love, it will always make me laugh. So—” Briskly, she began to rewrap her gift and box it. “My bags are being held for me downstairs and my plane leaves in one hour.”
    “An hour?” Summer began. “But—”
    “My business is done.” Tucking the box under her arm, she rose on her toes to kiss Blake. “You have the good fortune of possessing excellent parents.” Then she kissed Summer. “And so, my sweet, do you, though they weren’t suited to remain husband and wife. The suite is paid for through the night, the champagne’s still cold.” She glided for the door leaving a trail of Paris in her wake. Pausing in the doorway, she looked back. “Bon appétit, mes enfants.” Monique considered it one of her very finest exits.
    When the door closed, Summer stood where she was, unsure if she wanted to applaud or throw something.
    “Quite a performance,” Blake commented. “More wine?”
    She could be as urbane and casual as he. “All right.”
    “And how was Rome?”
    “Hot.”
    “And your cake?”
    “Magnificent.” Lifting her freshly filled glass, she took two steps away. It was always better to talk of the unimportant when so many urgent needs were pressing. “Things running smoothly here?”
    “Amazingly so. Though I think everyone’ll be relieved that you’re here for the first run tomorrow. Tell me—” he sipped his own wine, approving it “—when did you first know that my father and your mother had had an affair?”
    That was blunt enough, she thought. Well, she would be equally blunt. “When it was happening. I was only a child, but children are astute. You could say I suspected it then. I was sure of it when I first mentioned my mother’s name to your father.”
    He nodded, remembering the meeting in his office. “Just how much have you let that bother you?”
    “It was awkward.” Restlessly she moved her shoulders.
    “And you were determined not to let history repeat itself.”
    His perception was too often killingly accurate. “Perhaps.”
    “But then, in a matter of speaking, it did.”
    With another attempt at casualness, she spread some caviar on a cracker. “But then, neither of us was married.”
    As if it were only general cocktail talk, Blake chose a quiche. “You know why your mother did this tonight.”
    Summer shook her head when he offered the tray. “Monique could never resist a scene of any kind. She set the stage, broughtin the players, to show me, I think, that while marriage might not be perfect, it can be durable.”
    “Was she successful?” When she didn’t speak, Blake set down his glass. It was time they stopped hedging, time they stopped speaking in generalities. “There hasn’t been an hour since the last time I saw you that I haven’t thought of you.”
    Her eyes met his. Helplessly she shook her head. “Blake, I don’t think you should—”
    “Damn it, you’re going to hear me out. We’re good for each other. You can’t tell me you don’t believe that. Maybe you were right before about the way I planned out my…courtship,” he decided for a lack of a better word. “Maybe I was too smug about it, too sure that if I waited for just the right moment, I’d have exactly what I wanted with the least amount of trouble. I had to be sure or I’d’ve gone insane trying to give you enough time to see just what we could have together.”
    “I was too hard that night.” She wrapped her arms around herself then dropped them to her sides. “I said things because you frightened me. I didn’t mean them, not all of them.”
    “Summer.” He touched her