Dream Trilogy Read Free

to be married?
    She’d been nearly this miserable when Mr. and Mrs. T. had taken Laura and Josh and Kate to Europe the summer before for an entire month. And she had stayed home because hermother had refused the Templetons’ offer to take her along. She’d been desperate to go, she remembered, but none of her pleas, nor any of Laura’s and Kate’s, had budged Ann Sullivan an inch.
    “Not your place to traipse off to Europe and stay in fancy hotels,” Mum had said. “The Templetons have been generous enough with you without you expecting more.”
    So she’d stayed home, earning her keep, as her mother called it, by dusting and polishing and learning to keep a proper house. And she’d been miserable. But that didn’t make her selfish, she told herself. It hadn’t been as if she hadn’t wanted Kate and Laura to have a wonderful time. She’d just ached to be with them.
    And it wasn’t as if she didn’t hope that Laura’s marriage would be perfectly wonderful. She just couldn’t stand to lose her. Did that make her selfish? She hoped it didn’t, because it wasn’t just for herself that she was unhappy. It was for Laura too. It was the thought of Laura’s tying herself to a man and marriage before she had given herself a chance to live.
    Oh, God, Margo wanted to live.
    So her bags were already packed. Once Laura flew off on her honeymoon, Margo intended to be on her way to Hollywood.
    She would miss Templeton House, and Mr. and Mrs. T., and, oh, she would miss Kate and Laura, even Josh. She would miss her mother, though she knew there would be ugliness between them before the door closed. There had already been so many arguments.
    College was the bone of contention between them now. College and Margo’s unbending refusal to continue her education. She knew she would die if she had to spend another four years with books and classrooms. And what did she need with college when she’d already decided how she wanted to live her life and make her fortune?
    Her mother was too busy for arguments now. As housekeeper, Ann Sullivan had wedding reception on her mind. The wedding would be held at church, then all the limousines would stream along Highway 1, like great, glinting white boats, and up the hill to Templeton House.
    Already the house was perfect, but she imagined her mother was off somewhere battling with the florist over arrangements. It had to be beyond perfect for Laura’s wedding. She knew how much her mother loved Laura, and she didn’t resent it. But she did resent that her mother wanted her to be like Laura. And she never could. Didn’t want to.
    Laura was warm and sweet and perfect. Margo knew she was none of those things. Laura never argued with her mother the way Margo and Ann flew at each other like cats. But then, Laura’s life was already so settled and smooth. She never had to worry about her place, or where she would go. She’d already seen Europe, hadn’t she? She could live in Templeton House forever if she chose. If she wanted to work, the Templeton hotels were there for her—she could pick her spot.
    Margo wasn’t like Kate either, so studious and goal-oriented. She wasn’t going to dash off to Harvard in a few weeks and work toward a degree so that she could keep books and read tax law. God, how tedious! But that was Kate, who’d rather read the Wall Street Journal than pore over the glamorous pictures in Vogue , who could discuss, happily, interest rates and capital gains with Mr. T. for hours.
    No, she didn’t want to be Kate or Laura, as much as she loved them. She wanted to be Margo Sullivan. And she intended to revel in being Margo Sullivan. One day she would have a house as fine as this, she told herself as she came slowly down the main stairs, trailing a hand along the glassy mahogany banister.
    The stairs curved in a long, graceful sweep, and high above, like a sunburst, hung a sparkling Waterford chandelier. Howmany times had she seen it shoot glamorous light onto the