I sighed again. It wasn’t exactly that. I think it was more that I had so little confidence in myself. Timothy was, as the newspaper had said, “San Jose’s most eligible bachelor,” and I was just a glorified secretary of sorts, one who was not sophisticated, well-traveled, or model gorgeous. I just didn’t fit.
His hold on me suddenly tightened, and he squeezed me, then released. “What can I do to make you feel more secure in our relationship, Penelope? Should I get Judy to vouch for me again, to explain that I’m not a playboy or someone who flits through girlfriends like I need to verify my virility. I have nothing to prove. I’m yours. I knew that the moment I saw you and talked with you. You are the person I’ve been waiting for.”
He was silent then, not arguing further about my indecision or my fears. I rested my head at the crook of his neck.
“I’m not the innocent you think I am, Timothy. I was involved with someone, but he hurt me badly. It is difficult for me to have faith in someone again.”
“I know.”
Timothy was so calm and so encouraging that I reached forward and pressed my lips to his. He accepted the kiss, then pulled me down into his lap and just held me. I’d never had anyone do that before, or at least not since I was a small child.
“My parents loved each other,” I said suddenly, pulling that thought out of the air as if we’d been discussing my childhood. “They were always touching each other: a tap on the shoulder, a pat on the back, or a quick kiss. I remember that so clearly. It’s how I want love to be — an always thing. A surety.
“But love isn’t like that anymore. It’s a quickie in the dark, a secret afternoon rendezvous in a hotel room. It’s an addition to the marriage, a casual affair, sometimes a disturbed drama that ends in heartbreak.”
“The Sanders have a loving marriage,” Timothy said with a quiet, comforting voice. “And that’s exactly what I want.”
“You say that now, but you’d get tired of me. I don’t belong in your realm. I’m not a model. I’m not sophisticated. I don’t know how to be the wife you need, one who can deal with CEO’s or class rich businessmen from other countries.”
Timothy dabbed a kiss on my forehead, then across my left cheek, the one facing him.
“That’s what you don’t understand, my darling. You are exactly the person I want you to be. If you feel that you lack certain qualifications, you can get that experience at my side. I’ll hire tutors for foreign languages or for anything else you want if that’s important to you. But none of that matters to me. It’s the essence inside you that has brought me to my knees. I love you. Simply. Completely. Forever.”
How many women ever found a guy who would say that to them. I was lucky, and I knew it. Timothy was holding me as if I were fragile, as if this were the perfect moment, well, almost perfect since I kept sticking my nose up in the air and saying more or less that I wasn’t worthy or that I didn’t trust in him enough to make this a permanent relationship.
I lay in his lap, surrounded by the warmth of his body, by the strength of him, and the lips that occasionally kissed whatever part of me he could reach. I was thinking, turning it all over in my mind. Why did I resist so hard? What was causing my indecision? But I knew. Some instinct inside me told me to journey cautiously, a subconscious warning that there were untold secrets. Timothy was too perfect.
It was probably five minutes or more before I finally spoke. “I want to believe in you, Timothy. I want to give you my heart, but something inside me says that there are things you’re not telling me, skeletons in your closet that might break my heart. Am I right?”