The next morning, she struggled into the Advertiser-Dispatch building and poured herself a large cup of the steaming sludge that Andrew cooked up and proudly called coffee.
“I need fifteen inches on the Lyons party,” he reminded her. “I thought you were going to upload that last night. And what happened to the feature on Russell Lyons? I’ve got the space blocked out on the front page but no copy.”
“Give me twenty minutes and I’ll give you your goddamn stories,” she growled. “And yeah, I got lots of pictures. What else have you got for me?”
“You already know about the H.S. basketball game. Our stringer is off with the debate club somewhere. And I got the St. Patrick’s Day Sale at Cochran’s. Heather called and said that this year they’re doing a fashion show using ordinary people instead of models. All very small-town. She’s hoping to bring in some shoppers from Jeff City and Sedalia.”
Heather. There was no way Cynthia could look Heather in the eye after what she’d done the previous night. Her legs still burned from the memory of Russ’s legs pressing between hers, pushing his hardness against the soft mound that she would have opened for him if only he’d asked.
Even though she’d known that Russ was Heather’s man, that any possible relationship between Russ and herself was simply a matter of him seeking a bit of variety for his sexual outlet, she had been ready to let him do anything he wished, just for the pure pleasure of his company, his time, the counterfeit of his love.
Ready? That was the understatement of the year. She’d been pulling him into her, practically raping him.
How could she possibly go on with her life here?
Since she’d moved to Shermann at the age of twelve, she’d wanted one thing—to fit into the community, to be liked by the women who defined the social structure of their town, and to be professional in her work. She knew many people would scoff at such a modest dream. But those people hadn’t lost their parents, had never been uprooted and taken in by an impoverished aunt who had never wanted children and had no idea what to do with one when her brother’s death had unexpectedly sent a young and needy girl her way.
Until Cynthia had come up with the idea of writing the story on Russ, she’d been getting ever-closer to achieving her dream. Now, her insane and Quixotic crush on Russ had put that dream at risk, maybe snatched it forever from her grasp.
Despite what she’d told her boss, she’d left the party without making sure she had everything she needed for the story. But the real story wasn’t what she would write. The real story was, she’d as good as made a move on the man Heather, Shermann’s unelected leader, had claimed as her own. By doing so, Cynthia had set herself up to be the laughing stock of the whole town.
“Give me the tear sheet,” she said, trying to pull herself together. “I’ll do the basketball story too.”
“I’m planning on being at the fashion show to take pictures. I could write the story if you're too busy.”
She shook her head. “No problem.” The Cochrans’ sale was exactly the type of story she needed to cover, the kind of reporting that would let her show that she wasn’t just the poor girl with bad clothes she’d once been. “You worry about selling ads.”
“You sure? You look like death warmed over. Late night with the boyfriend?”
“In my dreams.”
“I heard Charlie Daemon is single again.”
Despite what had seemed like an impenetrable miasma of gloom, a giggle escaped her. “I saw him last night at the Lyons’. He was bragging on his new car. Heather called it a humpmobile.”
Andrew’s eyes widened. “I didn’t know you and Heather were friends. Try to stay on her good side. She could be good for the newspaper, good for your career, and good for your standing in central Missouri.”
She could be, but if Heather ever learned about that late-night kiss Cynthia and Russ had shared, she would turn on Cynthia like a mongoose on a cobra.
“I’ll do my job.”
Andrew nodded, then sat down on her desk. “Hell, Cynthia, I know you do your job. You’re great. The only way we’re able to stay in business is that you turn out twice as much copy as any other reporter in the state for about half the pay. Even so, it’s rough. Cochrans came through with a big ad for their St. Patrick’s sale, but Daemon Auto cut back on their ads last month and all of the consolidation in the seed industry means there aren’t a lot of people buying ads for the farmers.”
“Got it, I’m like Boxer. I’ll try harder.”
Andrew gave her a funny look, but his phone rang and he headed back into his office before she could give him the Animal Farm reference.
Just as well, she needed to pound out some pages.
Usually, when she had a story like the feature on Russ or the anniversary party, she would get on the phone and firm up any details as she wrote. But the last thing she wanted now was to talk to Russ or his parents. The pain from his abrupt withdrawal was bad enough, but the certainty that she had let physical desire risk everything she wanted from life was worse. Worst of all, though, was her fear that she would succumb again if Russ only asked, and that her heart might break, again, if he didn’t.
She gritted her teeth and made do with her notes, her memory, and her photos.
* * *
By the time Russ had gotten back to the party, most of the guys his age had pulled off their tuxedo jackets and were deep into their drinks, so his mussed appearance hadn’t been noticed.
Heather had stayed to help supervise the clean-up crew, and then invited him to spend the night at her townhouse, but she’d taken his rejection stoically.
Not that he understood it himself. Heather was the woman for him. Only Heather could help him recover his memories, bring back everything he’d lost. Only Heather had stood by him when he’d been injured, when he had been alone in the world.
If he kissed Heather, bedded her, made love to her, he would certainly wash away the bizarre hold that Cynthia had taken on him. Refusing made no sense. Delaying only offended Heather, denied himself the sexual release he needed so badly, and hampered his re-integration into society.
But he couldn’t make himself do it.
He’d followed her home, made sure Heather got in safely, then headed for his own place, taking a slight detour to drive by Cynthia’s apartment. Not that he was interested.
Her cute green Mini sat outside a darkened apartment.
He’d been insane, of course, to tell himself that his kiss could have any devastating impact on her. Surely it had been special for him because it was the only real kiss he could remember. For Cynthia, it had probably been just another run-in with a man who couldn’t keep his hands to himself.
Still, he had stayed in her parking lot for twenty minutes listening to the soft ticking as Cynthia’s Mini gradually cooled, before finally returning to his own apartment over his investment office.
He spent the morning on the Internet, watching for shifts in the weather, hints of changes in fashion, anything that could impact commodity prices.
He bought coffee derivatives and sold corn futures that had appreciated during the week he’d held them. A ripple in the price of a wireless company let him flip an investment quickly, netting a cool thirty thousand dollars for a few hours of study.
None of it gave him any sense of accomplishment. It was only money.
Rather than going to the brew-pub for lunch, he raided his refrigerator, built a substantial sandwich, and settled back with his computer.
He made a few more investments but was perfectly happy when his phone rang. Could it be Cynthia?
“Lyons.”
“Russell? It’s Heather.”
Okay, the most beautiful woman in Missouri had called him. Where was the heart-pound? Why didn’t his palms sweat at the sound of her throaty voice, the thought of her perfect body beneath him?
“Hi Heather. What’s up?”
“Don’t tell me you forgot about the fashion show. You’re supposed to be judging.”
>
He had a vague memory of agreeing to do something, but she’d hit him up during the first couple of days when he’d returned, before he’d gotten himself organized. He’d lost whatever reminder he’d created.
“Guilty as charged. Am I too late?”
She laughed. “Get real, Russell. I never count on anyone to remember anything without being reminded. How else would I manage to stay in business?”
“Right. When do I need to be there and what do I wear?”
“Wear your tux. I’m going to have a lot of people there and you’ll want to look good.”
“But—“
“Listen, I gotta go. Be here at five.” She hung up before Russ could blurt out anything about his tux jacket riding home on the shoulders of another woman.
“See you then,” he spoke to the already dead phone.
He’d intended to stay away from Cynthia. Hanging around her wasn’t fair to either of them, or to Heather. But now that option was unavailable to him. He didn’t have time to be fitted for another tux.
He looked up Cynthia’s number and dialed, but hung up when her answering machine picked up.
He didn’t have her cell and so he decided to walk down to the newspaper office. If she wasn’t there, at least Andrew was likely to know where he’d sent her. Whether he’d tell or not, Russ wasn’t sure. Although Russ’s memory held only one meeting with Andrew, and that for less than a minute of total conversation, Andrew had a longer history with him. Maybe the earlier Russ had done something to Andrew, insulted him in some way. Whatever it was, Russ didn’t think he was imagining the friction.
“Anyone here?” The newspaper office was located not far from Russ’s loft in another of the warehouses abandoned when the Katy Railroad had pulled out a generation before. Around it, other warehouses, windows boarded up, gradually deteriorated.
Russ stopped at the open door, his mind automatically calculating rents, the costs of bringing the aging buildings up to code, the tax benefits of mixed-use properties. He grinned to himself and shook his head. He didn’t have time for investments now. He was here for one reason only, to get his jacket back so he could continue with his plan to recover his real life.
“Decide to come slumming, did you, Lyons?”
Behind a pair of unstylish glasses and a shaggy haircut, Andrew was a decent looking guy. Or he would have been if it hadn’t been for the scowl on his face. Maybe Russ should play matchmaker, help Cynthia and Andrew turn their shared interest in journalism into something deeper.
A queasy feeling in his gut made him reject that idea. If they’d been right for each other, surely they would know that by now, he reasoned. He assured himself that he didn’t really mind if another man held Cynthia, kissed her, made love to her. He could almost convince himself, in fact. Almost. But only if he didn’t think about it too hard.
“I need to talk to Cynthia.”
Andrew barked out a laugh. “Too late, Russell. She’s already finished the feature. If you remembered some other incident of your saintliness, you’ll have to save it. Maybe for your obituary.”
He willed his fists to unclench. “You have a problem with me, Sexton?”
“Problem? Why should I have a problem?” Andrew waved his hand around the shabby building. “Did you know that Shermann’s population actually grew ten percent over the past decade?”
Russ nodded. He didn’t know his parents, couldn’t find his way to the old swimming hole out back of the home where he’d grown up, but he could quote demographic statistics like an almanac. “Most of that in the past three years.”
“Right. So what would you guess has happened to the circulation of the Advertiser-Dispatch?”
“Up ten percent.” It seemed like a safe demographic. If say, thirty percent of the population read the newspaper and the population went up, thirty percent of a larger number would be bigger.
“Wrong. Down ten percent.”
“Sounds like the wrong business to be in. Maybe your dad should have integrated into television.”
Andrew clenched his fists. “Yeah. Maybe he would have, if they’d had lotteries back then.”
Russ thought he finally understood where Andrew was coming from. “Well, hell. Maybe stories about people like me are scaring away the readers. It’s got to be depressing reading about some guy who lost his memory in the war. I don’t know what my parents told you, but I don’t particularly care whether the paper makes me out to be a saint. So yank my story and lead with something that will attract readership. Something upbeat and feel-good. Aren’t there any lost puppies being found in this town.”
“Cynthia worked hard on that story. Besides, she knows how to slant things for our readers. The way the story comes out, Saint Russell will be the best tearjerker since Romeo met Juliet. It’s the kind of treacle the readers like.” He muttered something else into his hand.
“Sorry, didn’t catch that.”
“Besides, Heather Cochran really wanted that story.”
“You mean—“
“Okay, it isn’t great journalistic ethics. But Heather is my biggest advertiser. If she told me she wanted a story on how Attila the Hun was a misunderstood genius, I’d get it written.”
Russ suspected there was a bit more there than Andrew was letting on, but he nodded as if he understood. “I still need to talk to Cynthia. And not about the article.”
“She’s off at the high school. And she’s going to Cochran’s afterwards for the St. Patrick’s Day shindig."
“Where’s the high school?”
Andrew’s eyes almost popped out. “Damn, I keep forgetting you don’t have a memory. Man, if I’d been the most popular guy in school, the guy who set the record of most girls in the sack, the guy who still holds the state record in consecutive completed passes and yards of offense in a single game, I wouldn’t want to forget about that.”
Russ gritted his teeth. “Believe me, I want it back.” Although a record for ‘girls in the sack’ didn’t sound especially admirable. Could that instinct for conquest have been what drove him to kiss Cynthia? Had he merely sought one more notch on his bedpost before committing to a lifetime with Heather?
“Well, head down Third Street about two miles. You drive here?”
“I jogged.”
Andrew was already heading back to his office when the words penetrated. “You jogged? Since when have you done that?”
Russ shrugged. “I don’t know. I assume I stayed in shape somehow before I went off to the war. When I was in the hospital, the physical therapist suggested it. He seemed to think I’d done it before.”
“You stayed in shape by staying in the sack and by working out at the gym. You never did anything as plebian as jog.”
The wheels in Andrew’s brain were clearly whirling and, from the look he gave Russ, what he was coming up with wasn’t as friendly as his fake smile pretended to be. “Say. You know there’s a fifteen-kilometer race this weekend. Since you’re a runner, how about entering it. It’s a benefit so you’d be doing your St. Russell thing. I’d even guarantee we’d cover it in the Advertiser.”
“I’m not interested in competing with anyone but myself.”
“Is that right? How about if we put a little money on it? I know I can beat you, but I’m willing to bet that even little Cynthia can run you into the ground. And I’ve got a hundred bucks that agrees with me.”
Andrew’s attitude was starting to get to Russ. “You’ve got yourself a bet.”
“See you Saturday morning, then.”
“Yeah, sure.” Russ took off in the direction of the high school. What had he been thinking? He needed to stay away from Cynthia, not find reasons why he could be close to her.
* * *
The guard faked right, spun around past the man guarding him and drove toward the hoop.
A hulky center stepped forward to block him off from the easy lay-up, but the guard dribbled behind his back, faked again, then passed it off to the Shermann strong forward for an ea
sy basket.
Cynthia snapped a shot of the fake and another of the swish as the ball whispered through the net—the dumbfounded faces of the opposing team forming the perfect frame for the picture, then a final image of the crowd going wild in celebration of Shermann’s one-point victory.
“Russell Lyons, you old dog. Decided to come down to your old stompin’ grounds, did you? I’d like you to meet Tony Black. He’s the first guard I’ve had since you who could pull some of those moves.”
Cynthia whirled around when she heard Russ’s name.
Coach Coslick was all over Russ, patting him on the back, draping an arm around his shoulder, yanking him toward the locker room.
“I’m sorry, I don’t know who you are.”
The coach’s face fell in disappointment. “Damn, I heard about your injury. Hard to think it would wash away something as important as remembering Coach Darrin Coslick.” He didn’t exactly shove Russ away, but he stopped yanking him toward the locker room.
Russ nodded. “That’s why I’m trying to get it back.”
“Tell you what. I’ve got to give the team a pep talk. Maybe we can get together this weekend, throw back a couple of beers, and I could tell you about the Shermann High teams you led, and the cheerleaders you—“ he stopped abruptly when he saw Cynthia watching.
“That sounds like fun,” Russ said.
The Russell of a year earlier would have thought it sounded fun, Cynthia realized. But the Russ of today sounded like he was going through the motions, paying whatever price necessary to recover his lost memories.
It was terrible that Russ had been injured, terrible that so many young men and women had been hurt or killed. But a part of Cynthia wished Russ would fail in his mission, would never recover his memories if doing so meant that the Russ she was getting to know would vanish.
“Anyway, we’ll talk. But not now. I wasn’t thinking when I invited you back to the locker room. It wouldn’t work with you being not all there, you know. They guys are on a high. You’re a myth to them and I don’t want them to see you--well, any less than a hundred percent. Besides, some of them are thinking about joining the service. We wouldn’t want them to get any wrong ideas, would we?”
Hometown Hero Page 6
