A Dime a Dozen

by Mindy Starns Clark

  I put my Bible on a side table and gestured for Harriet to follow me into my bedroom. Leaving the door cracked so I could hear if Pepe awakened, I gestured for her to sit on one of the beds while I sat down on the other.

  “I’m so glad you’re here,” I said, meaning it. “This has been a very long day.”

  “From what I’ve heard,” she replied, “things have been pretty wild since you got to town.”

  Reluctantly, I told her the full story. I started with the stabbing victim and his death, and continued through the fire at Luisa’s trailer to the mummy that was found today at the orchard. I had really hoped to avoid some of this stuff with her, because Harriet was very skittish when it came to things like murder and violence. It was usually easier to let her simply do her job while I did mine. But apparently she had already heard some things, so I thought it best to lay it all out for her straight.

  “Sorry for getting you into this,” I said.

  “It’s all right. I should have known going on location with you would get me into more than just debits and credits.”

  “Speaking of that, how do the books look to you?” I asked.

  “Oh, the place looks great,” she said. “Clean as a whistle so far.”

  “Good. I hope you’re still as impressed by the end of the week when you finish your audit.”

  “Me too. Especially because the people there are so nice.”

  She talked about the Webbers, which then led to the inevitable discussion of Bryan and what it was like for me to be here in the midst of all these memories.

  “I’m doing great,” I said. “In fact, I think this trip was probably just what I needed. Things will be changing for me soon, and I guess it’s good for me to see, finally, that I really am ready to move on.”

  “What?” Harriet asked, her eyes wide. “You’re not moving, are you?”

  “No,” I said. “I meant moving on emotionally. I’m in a new relationship now, and things are starting to get serious.”

  “I knew it!” she said. “It’s that gorgeous neighbor of yours, isn’t it? Ooo, honey, you have landed yourself a hunk.”

  “No,” I said, smiling, “it isn’t Kirby. He and I are just friends.”

  “Who, then? You spend so much time working, I don’t see how you have time to get out and meet—” She stopped, midsentence, and stared hard at me, as if she were working to form her thoughts. “Please tell me this isn’t about you and Tom again. I already explained to you—”

  “Tom came to see me,” I said.

  She blinked, silent for once.

  “Last November,” I continued, “after the whole mess with the smugglers and the INS and everything. He found out I had been in the hospital, and so he came to see how I was doing.”

  “He was in Singapore then,” she said skeptically.

  “Yes, he was. But he flew to Baltimore, rented a car, and showed up at my house. We spent about twelve hours together, and then he left again and went back to Singapore. In less than a week, he’s coming home, and he’s coming home to me.”

  “He came to see you as a friend,” she said uncertainly.

  “Well, sure,” I said, “if friends hold hands and talk about their future and kiss each other like there’s no tomorrow.”

  “Did he say ‘I love you’?”

  “No,” I told her. “But I think he does. And I think that I love him.”

  I wasn’t sure what her reaction would be, but she surprised me by jumping up, grabbing a pillow, and throwing it at me.

  “You’re lying!” she cried angrily, and I shushed her, pointing toward the other room. “You’re lying,” she said again, in a sharp whisper this time.

  “Harriet, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner,” I said. “But it was all so new, so private. Then the more time that passed, the harder it was to say anything. I hope you can forgive me.”

  She paced the floor for a few minutes and then stopped, hands on hips, and glared at me.

  “What are we to each other, Callie?” she asked. “You and me. Acquaintances? Coworkers?”

  “You know we’re more than that,” I said. “You’re one of my best friends.”

  She nodded.

  “That’s what I thought too,” she said, and then she turned on her heel and walked from the room. I could hear her clunk her way up the stairs, then down to brush her teeth and use the bathroom, then back up to her room, where I heard the creak as she climbed into bed.

  I decided to let her sleep on it, thinking that perhaps in the morning she would’ve cooled down a bit and we could talk some more. While I felt bad for keeping her in the dark all this time, I knew that if I had to do it all over again, I’d probably do it the same way. For some reason, talking about my relationship with Tom did not come easily to me.

  Putting Harriet out of my mind for now, I walked back into the living room, where Pepe was still sound asleep on the couch. Exhausted myself, I put a hand on his arm and shook him awake. I knew there were people who were worried about him. And the sooner we could talk, the sooner he could get back with his family where he belonged.

  Twenty-Four

  Pepe sat at the table while I reheated his soup and tea in the microwave. Since I had woken him up, he seemed almost embarrassed to be here, and I tried to think of some way to break the ice with him and let him know that I was a friend and was glad he had thought to come to me when he needed someone to talk to.

  “I bet if life had an ‘Undo’ function,” I said, using computer-speak, “then you’d click on this day and make it so that it had never happened.”

  I set his food in front of him and watched as he dug in.

  “No,” he said finally. “I’d click on that day last fall, when my dad got killed. That’s what I would undo.”

  Sitting across from him at the table, I told him we still didn’t know for sure if the man found today at the orchard was his father or not.

  “I heard what people were saying,” he told me. “We both know it probably is.”

  I nodded, thinking we would know for sure tomorrow anyway, once the identification had been made by the medical examiner.

  “I’m so sorry, Pepe,” I said. “I wish I had some wise words or something, but the truth is, the whole situation is just really, really sad. I hope you and your family can look to God to find comfort.”

  He nodded.

  “I’ve been praying for months for my dad to come home,” he said. “Now I find out he was here all along.”

  “And that hurts,” I said gently.

  “It stinks,” he replied.

  He let me share with him a few verses of comfort from the Bible, but as he finished his meal, he pushed away from the table, looking as though he bore the weight of the world on his shoulders.

  “So was my dad murdered,” he asked me, “or was it an accident?”

  I took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

  “We won’t know that,” I answered, “until a forensic pathologist examines the body.”

  He nodded and then seemed to grow visibly agitated. Finally, he stood and began pacing.

  “What if there was something,” he said, “something I knew that I had never told anybody?”

  My pulse surged.

  “Then you should probably tell someone now,” I said evenly.

  He nodded, paced some more, and then came back to sit across from me.

  “Mr. Pete wasn’t the last person to see my dad alive that day, like everybody thinks.”

  “He wasn’t?”

  “No,” Pepe said. “I was. I saw my dad last on the day he disappeared.”

  “Why didn’t you tell someone before now?”

  “Because I didn’t think it was important.” He waited a beat, lowering his head. “And I was afraid I would get in trouble.”

  Though I wanted to lean forward and pull the words from his mouth, I forced my body language into a nonthreatening stance, my back relaxed against the chair, one elbow on the table.

  �
��Tell me about it,” I said.

  Nervously, he launched into the tale of how he had cut school that day, something he did frequently during the harvest season when there were so many kids at Go the Distance that no one noticed when one was missing.

  “See, during harvest, Mom and Dad usually leave the dorms at six o’clock in the morning, but the bus doesn’t pick up Adriana and me for school until six-fifty. That day, once my parents left for work, I got Adriana ready for school and sent her out with the other kids, and then I went back to bed.”

  “Were you sick?”

  “Nah. I just like to play hooky sometimes, you know? I’m always surrounded by people. Skipping school during harvest means I get the apartment all to myself. Get the whole compound to myself for that matter. Just peace and quiet. Room to think. It’s great.”

  “I understand,” I said, and I did. In fact, I was thinking that if I had to give up my solitude for the communal life of a migrant worker, I wouldn’t be able to stand it.

  “Anyway, that day I was just lying around, and about noon my dad all of a sudden shows up at the apartment.”

  “That was unusual?”

  “Yeah. Nobody ever came back there until quitting time. But there he was. He caught me.”

  “Was he mad?”

  “That was the weird thing. Instead of yelling at me like I would’ve expected, he just sat down and talked to me for a minute. He seemed like he really had something on his mind.”

  “What did he say?”

  “At first, he was like, ‘Son, you shouldn’t ever skip school.’ He never had an education, you know, so it was important to him that his kids did.”

  “I’m sure it was,” I said.

  Pepe stood and began pacing again.

  “Then he started talking about being poor but honorable, and that a man’s honor was the most valuable thing he could have. ‘You can’t put a price on honor,’ he told me.”

  “Okay.”

  “I thought he was just talking about me and skipping school, but after a while I realized he was really talking about himself. I don’t know what about, but it was a weird conversation.”

  “Then what happened?” I asked.

  “I asked him if he was okay, and he said something like, ‘No, not really. I think I know something I shouldn’t know. I’ve got to talk to someone.’ I was thinking maybe he saw one of the other migrants stealing or cheating or something. I go, ‘Why don’t you talk to the priest?’ and he goes, ‘No, it’s not the Padre I need. Maybe I should speak to Mr. Tinsdale.’”

  “Did he talk to Mr. Tinsdale often?” I asked.

  “Never,” said Pepe. “None of the migrants ever saw Mr. Tinsdale.”

  “So it had to have been something very important.”

  “Yeah,” Pepe nodded. “But the last thing he said to me was the weirdest. I thought we were finished, ’cause he got his lunch from the fridge and told me I was grounded. Then, just as he was leaving, he turned back to me and said, ‘I’m not sure who I can trust.’”

  Pepe and I looked at each other, and I felt sure we were thinking the same thing: Whomever Enrique had trusted, it must’ve been the wrong choice.

  Twenty-Five

  It was well after 1:00 a.m. when I finally climbed into bed, my body beyond exhausted. Dean had come to pick up Pepe and was taking him back home with him, where the Moraleses were spending the night. Upstairs, Harriet was lightly snoring, and I wanted nothing more than to close my eyes and drift into sleep as well. First, however, I needed to hear the sound of Tom’s voice. So much had happened today, and though I didn’t feel like explaining it all to him now, I just wanted to know that he was out there, that he was missing me as much as I was missing him.

  Fortunately, the time difference was in our favor for a change. Using the phone beside the bed, I dialed the numbers that would connect me to him in the middle of his workday half a world away.

  “Callie?” he asked when he realized it was me. “You’re up late. It’s almost two-thirty here!”

  “Yeah, I’m about to go to sleep,” I said. “But I wanted to hear your voice first.”

  “Perfect timing. You caught me in the limo, on my way to a meeting.”

  “Busy day?” I asked.

  “We’re wrapping things up right and left,” he said. “It’s really very exciting. I’m anxious to come home.”

  “Do you miss me, Tom?”

  I guess he could hear something in my voice, because he answered my question with a question.

  “What’s the matter, Callie? You sound very down.”

  “Things aren’t going well here,” I said, draping one arm across my eyes. “There are problems with the investigation, and then tonight Harriet and I got into a big fight…”

  “You got in a fight with Harriet?” he laughed. “That must’ve been something to see! Between the two of you, I’m not sure who I’d put my money on.”

  “Not a fist fight,” I chuckled. “An argument. I told her about us.”

  He was silent for a moment.

  “About you and me?” he asked finally. “Do you think that was wise?”

  “She’s my friend, Tom,” I said. “She deserved to know.”

  “It’s just that we have an odd sort of situation,” he said, “with me as the boss and you two as coworkers…”

  “The whole boss-employee thing hasn’t been an issue for us so far.”

  “No, but I think it might be hard for someone else to understand. So what started the argument? Is she convinced I’m not good enough for you?”

  “I think it hurt her feelings that I didn’t tell her before now. She and I used to talk about you all the time, you know, wondering what you looked like, what your life was like. Once things started changing between you and me, I wasn’t sure how to tell her. Then you and I finally met, and our time together was so special I kept it all to myself.”

  He was quiet for a while, and I was starting to wish I hadn’t called. It wasn’t going the way I had intended.

  “Am I really such a mystery man,” he asked, “that the people who work for me use me as fodder for conversation?”

  “Oh, Tom! Of course you’re a mystery man,” I said. “Who gives away millions of dollars and doesn’t take credit for it? Who has a foundation and never steps inside its doors except at night, when no one’s there? I even once asked Eli if you were horribly disfigured, like the beast in Beauty and the Beast.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He told me you were a good-looking guy and to mind my own business.”

  Tom laughed.

  “Fine,” he said. “At least you and I have moved beyond all of that now.”

  “Yes and no,” I said. “As close as we are, Tom, sometimes I feel as though I still haven’t solved the mystery of who you are.”

  “Ah, Callie,” he said, and I could hear sadness in his voice. “I’m afraid much of it has to stay a mystery. There are things about me, about my work, that you can never know.”

  “I know how I feel about you,” I whispered.

  “I know how I feel about you,” he replied. “And yes. The answer is a thousand times yes. I do miss you. Of course I miss you.”

  “That’s all I really wanted to hear,” I said. “I can go to sleep now, mysteries and all.”

  “Call me back tomorrow when you’re more awake,” he said. “I want to hear about the problems you’re having with the investigation.”

  “Have you got a couple of hours? That might be enough to get us started.”

  “Is there anything I need to know? Anything I can help facilitate from over here?”

  “No,” I said. “But thanks for asking. We can go into it the next time we talk.”

  We said our goodbyes, and then I hung up the phone and clicked off the light. I was asleep within minutes. In my dreams, Tom took my hand, and we went flying into the sky, the clouds mere puffs of cotton brushing our faces as we flew past.

  Twenty-Six

  It wasn’t
until I got up the next morning that I really thought about what Tom had said the night before.

  What was the big secret about his work?

  As I stood in front of the mirror and put concealer on the dark circles under my eyes, I thought about everything he had ever said to me regarding his job, and I had to admit that I didn’t know much. He had invented something that was pivotal to the internet infrastructure, his invention had made him a multimillionaire in the private sector, and now he worked primarily for the government.

  Beyond that, I had no idea what branch of government he worked for or what he did for them. My hunch had always been that he was some sort of programmer for the FBI or the CIA—or the Department of Defense. Certainly, he was connected at the highest levels. I supposed the biggest question I had to ask myself at this point wasn’t “What’s the big secret?” but “Can I live with not knowing what it is?”

  Deciding to put it out of my mind for now, I finished applying my makeup and then got dressed, pulling on a pair of black slacks and a soft gray Nicole Miller blouse. My head was muddled this morning, but I was going to stay true to my promise to myself and begin the day in a canoe.

  When I came out of my room, Harriet was sitting at the kitchen table, sipping a cup of coffee. She looked up at me, and I gave her a tentative smile.

  “Good morning,” I said.

  “Omelet on the stove,” she replied. I looked in the pan and, sure enough, half an omelet was there waiting for me.

  I scooped it onto a plate and warmed it in the microwave while pouring myself some juice, and then I joined her at the table.

  “All right,” she said the moment I sat down. “Here’s the thing. I am happy for you. I could not be more excited if you told me you had eloped with Santa Claus on Christmas Eve. I’m just hurt that you didn’t tell me.”

  “I know,” I said. “I’m sorry. I value your friendship more than you can imagine.”

  “Good,” she said, and then she pointed a finger at me. “So don’t ever keep a secret like that from me again! I feel like an idiot!”