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As Mr. Vandamm turned to leave the room, his hand fluttered momentarily in the air, he smiled at Leonard and then Eve, and he said, "Lovely to see the aquamarines on you this afternoon, my dear." His hand settled on her smooth blonde hair and stroked it with his usual possessiveness—currently inflected with something of the warm, pleased air of a satisfied cat.
Then he was gone, already propelling his underlings outside the door ahead of him on their assignments and leaving Eve and Leonard behind.
In his wake, Eve looked after him quizzically, then lifted her fingers to delicately touch the necklace at her throat, as if to check that it was there.
She wore an amber dress today, one that went well enough with the necklace Mr. Vandamm had most recently given her, but Leonard thought it likely that Mr. Vandamm would probably buy her a new dress soon, to suit the necklace even more strikingly.
He had indulged himself for a moment in thinking around the most central detail, but there was only so long one could avoid facing it. It would be a red dress, to match the red necklace she wore around her neck today. The aquamarines Mr. Vandamm had given her last week were nowhere in sight.
Leonard suppressed any impulse he might have felt to touch the item around his own neck to check it, but he knew—was excruciatingly and hotly aware—that today he wore a tie with a pattern of pale blue markings. One might even say, if one were fanciful perhaps, they were the same shade as aquamarine jewels.
A simple matter of crossed wires. A slip of the tongue, a momentary distraction. It could happen to anyone. But the moment of opportunity to dismiss the situation with such an innocuous turn of phrase was rapidly drawing to a close, and Leonard still found no words at all in his mouth as Eve's gaze met his from across the room, making him feel uncomfortably seen.
"He needn't hold himself back when it's just me here, you know," Eve said into the silence between them. "In public, in front of others—yes, I understand, of course. But it doesn't have to happen that way here."
"Hold himself back? From what?"
"From you." When Leonard didn't say anything, she continued. "I've noticed. When we're all together. He reaches for you first. Often. And then he…" Her hand darted into the air, reaching out toward him, then hesitantly withdrew. She touched her own hair with her fingertips as she tilted her head with a smile and finished, "He touches me instead."
Now that was interesting. Leonard didn't think anyone besides himself had ever noticed the ways in which Mr. Vandamm was physically drawn to him—very much including Mr. Vandamm.
Leonard had for some time observed a certain propensity in his employer, regarding the people he chose to keep closest to him. Mr. Vandamm ran his organization along logical lines, of course, and very successfully. His people were hired, retained, and promoted based on capability and accomplishment—on merit, if you would, reflected Leonard with a certain sly amusement, for certainly few would judge their activities as being at all meritorious. There was no personal favor or whim involved in these levels of advancement in Mr. Vandamm's organization.
But that last step, from trusted lieutenant to inner circle, from those he relied on to conduct all aspects of his business to those he wanted to keep within arm's reach, was reserved only for those with a certain vital, sleek attractiveness to them, and no others. The pasty-faced, generic men in suits might stand guardian outside the door with guns, but Leonard, among a select few others, was invited in, to be the one in the room with Mr. Vandamm when the real action happened.
Mr. Vandamm's preferences were obvious with respect to his girl friends, of course. He might go out or have fun with all kinds of women, but the ones he kept coming back to, the ones he invited into his life, were smooth, cool, put-together, unflappable. Like the current occupant of that unassailable position, Miss Eve Kendall.
But Mr. Vandamm never seemed to have noticed himself that this preference of his detectably extended to men as well. Perhaps it wasn't the sort of thing any man but one such as Leonard would have noticed.
Or a woman such as Miss Kendall, it seemed.
Now, what might she be trying to do with such information? By making such an offer? Threatening to drive a wedge between Leonard and Mr. Vandamm? Very possibly, even likely—though she would find Leonard's position less assailable than she thought. Could she even be angling to threaten Mr. Vandamm himself, perhaps with some ill-conceived attempt at blackmail? That wouldn't work anyway, but he couldn't let her even try it.
Leonard narrowed his eyes. Time to go on the offensive and see which way she jumped. "Do you think you can threaten me with innuendo? I hate to disappoint you, but there's no blackmail possible when a man offers you a job after your previous employer publicly fired you for being homosexual. He already knows about me, so you can't scare me with the idea of telling him anything."
Her cool eyes were smooth as stone. "Of course. It never occurred to me he wouldn't know about you. And there's no threat; I mean just what I say."
"And what is it you're saying, exactly?"
"That I could hardly begrudge you…anything you may have together. You were here first. And it's not as if we…could do the same things for him, really. He may show us both off, but it's to make very different impressions on people."
Anything they may have together. Christ.
Leonard tried to imagine for a moment the possible consequences of Eve broaching the subject to Mr. Vandamm of anything he might have together with Leonard being acceptable to her, and not something he had to hide. Mr. Vandamm was, of course, demonstrably untroubled by knowing the direction of Leonard's inclinations generally. Leonard thought he was even likely to react with good grace if he learned Leonard was inclined toward him specifically, though Leonard anticipated never having any reason to want to test the proposition. Mr. Vandamm would take it as a gratifying testament to his own admirability, and would hardly be inclined (as so many men would) to perceive any interest of Leonard's as offering any kind of threat to him.
But if Miss Kendall were to somehow succeed in unburying the secret truth that Mr. Vandamm might incline towards Leonard in return, if she brought it into the light before him and forced him to confront it…
A man could do many things, in response to being shown that his image of himself was incorrect. When faced with wanting something that he did not want to want. When a man's self-image shattered, many things could shatter along with it.
Miss Kendall would be in direct danger of his rage, of course, but furthermore, such a thing genuinely might stand a chance of driving a wedge between Mr. Vandamm and himself, as secure as Leonard felt in his position otherwise. He contemplated with alarm the damages to Mr. Vandamm's enterprises that would surely be the consequence even if they were only at odds, no longer able to work effectively together—and still greater, of course, if Mr. Vandamm were to choose to dispose of him entirely. Leonard knew he did not flatter himself to think that Mr. Vandamm's plans would be ruined, at least in anything resembling their present form and timeline, if Leonard was no longer there to play his part in bringing them about. He had worked alongside Mr. Vandamm towards those goals for too long, and took too much pride in his work, to allow that to happen.
He especially couldn't allow Miss Kendall to run the risk of bringing it all about by accident.
Exasperated, Leonard thought, was he actually going to have to do something as ridiculous as ask directly for what he wanted from her?
"There is no such thing between us, Miss Kendall," he said as evenly as he could manage, "and I am certain that Mr. Vandamm has no wish there could be. Though I'm sure your unexpected generosity of spirit is appreciated," he adds, trying to recover his usual flavor of irony.
"But—" Miss Kendall started, then reconsidered, looking down in thought. "I'm not wrong, though," she said after a pause, and it wasn't quite a question. "He does want to touch you. And he knows about you. But he doesn't know…about himself?" Her head lifted in question, looking at Leonard again.
He nodded once, eyes boring into her with deliberate seriousness.
"Well." Miss Kendall settled back in her chair. "Men don't always know what it is they desire, do they."
"No. And it can be dangerous to remind them."
"It certainly can." For once, the two shared a rare moment of perfect understanding. "You needn't worry—I won't say anything."
The immediate concern was now past, but Miss Kendall would bear close watching from now on. She saw too much, and such things were dangerous.