He was planning to stay at the apartment with the girls for a week over Christmas. After that, Hilary and Courtenay were going skiing in Vermont with friends, and he and Fiona were going to the Caribbean over New Year's. They were going to St. Bart's, and stopping in Miami on the way home. He had an important new client in Miami, and she wanted to look around South Beach for the magazine. They were planning to be gone for two weeks. He had already promised to spend Christmas Eve with Fiona, and Christmas Day with his daughters. It was a hell of a way to live, but he had no choice for the moment. It was a tenuous peace between two camps, but nothing was perfect. His life with Fiona was as close as he'd ever gotten to real happiness. He was truly happy with her. And Adrian said he had never seen her look better. Work was going well for both of them, and in spite of the awkwardness of it, they even managed Christmas.
The Christmas Eve he spent with Fiona was peaceful and perfect, and after she went to bed, he went back to the apartment, and was there when his daughters woke up in the morning. He missed Fiona all night, but for the moment, it was a sacrifice he was willing to make for his children. Much to his chagrin, they never thanked him once for it. He and Mrs. Westerman maintained a cool distance. She looked at him now as though he were the incarnation of the devil.
But at least he and the girls enjoyed a nice Christmas Day. They loved the gifts he had gotten for them, and had each gone to a lot of trouble to find something meaningful for him. But their Christmases were always tainted now by the absence of their mother. And late that night, after they had gone out with friends, he slipped out to visit Fiona. Whenever he wasn't with her, he really missed her. She was already asleep in bed with Sir Winston when he got there. Selfishly, he couldn't resist waking her, and making love to her.
And then he left again, to go back to the apartment he stayed at with his daughters. But Fiona's house was home now. He knew he couldn't live this way for much longer. It was a divided life, and the running back and forth seemed so pointless. He had thought about it a lot recently, and he could only think of one solution. What he didn't know was how Fiona would feel about it.
The day after Christmas the girls left for Vermont, and that night he and Fiona flew to St. Martin, and then caught a puddle-jumper to St. Bart's. They stayed in a lovely old French hotel, and it was wonderful being there, with the heat and the sun and the good weather. It was yet another perfect vacation, and it only served to strengthen his resolve, and give him courage. He didn't want to rock the boat, but he also wanted to know that the boat was his now. He no longer wanted to simply charter. And on New Year's Eve, as he toasted her, she saw something odd in his eyes and suddenly got worried.
“Are you okay?” she asked with a look of concern. They had lain on the beach all day, and had made love that night before they went out to dinner.
“Very much so. I have something I want to ask you.” She couldn't imagine what it was, and thought he was teasing her about something. He had a mischievous sense of humor, just as she did.
“You want to know if I love you or Sir Winston more, I'll bet. You know, that just isn't a fair question. He and I have been together longer. But I love you nearly as much. And given time, who knows, I could grow to love you almost as much as I love Sir Winston,” she teased him.
“Will you marry me, Fiona?”
She could see in his eyes that he meant it. Her mouth opened and shut silently, and she stared at him in obvious consternation. “Oh, shit. You mean that, don't you?”
“Yes, I do. That's not exactly the response I expected.” He looked worried and somber.
“Why did you do that? Why did you ask me?” She looked upset, and so did he now. “I told you in the beginning, I don't need to be married. Things are fine the way they are. And if I married you, your daughters would put a contract out on me. And your housekeeper would sic the Hound of the Baskervilles on me. I don't need the aggravation. And neither do you,” she said, looking unhappy. This was not the answer he had hoped for.
“This is none of their business. This is about us. Mrs. Westerman is an employee. And my daughters are going to have to accept that I have a right to be happy and have my own life. They have theirs now. Never mind them. What about you? What do you want? Do you want me?” He couldn't have put it more simply, and that touched her.
“Of course I do. But I already have you, don't I? Do we need papers to prove it?”
“Maybe we do. I think I do,” he said honestly. “I don't like just camping out at your house, feeling like a guest, trying to find an empty closet. Besides, I figure I'll never get a decent closet in that house unless I build one, and it's rude to do that in someone else's house. It's a serious problem.” But as far as Fiona was concerned, so was marriage. Very serious. More serious than she had ever wanted.
“If I let you build a closet, do you still need to get married?” He could see that she looked frightened.
“Why are you so afraid of marriage?” He had never understood it. But she was phobic about it.
“If you get married, people leave each other, and die. They hurt and disappoint each other. They walk out. If all you do is live together, they just get bored with each other at some point, but they don't do as much damage on the way out.” It was all about the father who had abandoned them, he knew, but it was even deeper than that now. She didn't want to be owned, or to risk losing someone she loved. She wanted to hang on lightly. Marriage seemed too tight a grip to her, and she was afraid of being strangled. Even the situation with his daughters would be worse if they got married, and become more important. Now it was his problem, married it would be hers as well. This way she could sympathize with him, and just ignore it. If she married him, she'd have to own it.
“I like being married,” he said honestly. “I like what it means. It means I believe in you and will love you forever.”
“There is no forever,” she said softly. His late wife had proven that to him. People had been proving that to her all her life. There was no forever. There was only now. And they already had that. She didn't want to believe in forever, with anyone, it would only hurt her in the end.
“Yes, there is, Fiona. Or close enough. I want to be with you forever.”
“You mean that now,” she said quietly, “and you think there is. But one day if you get mad at me or fed up, you'll walk out. And if you do, it's simpler this way.”
“Don't you have more faith in me than that?” he asked sadly.
“In you maybe, but not in life. Life doesn't give you forever. It just doesn't.”