“I don’t know.” She dragged her voice out, slowing the reply. She could obviously feel his change of attitude and she wasn’t going to answer, at least not completely.
“Hadn’t really thought about the long term,” she continued with caution. “I wanted to get out of New York, expand my horizons.”
“Have they been expanded?”
“I think so. My syndication has grown. I’m not Robert Palmer or even close to what Craig Claiborne was, but I’m becoming known.”
“And is that what you want?”
She poked at her dessert. “As I said, I hadn’t really thought about long term.” He could read the lie on her face. She had every minute of her perfect little life mapped out.
He could hear the note in her voice. The clipped tone that a date always used when they wanted a subject change. Well, screw that.
“Always the critic. Always a step back. A step away. You know all of these wines, but do you really know the true heart of any of them?” He’d met more real people in three months at the marina than he had in twenty-five years in the city. ‘Oh, you’re one of those Morgans.’ And the whole fake-friendly façade would appear. Out here, no one knew but Angelo. And, now that he thought about it, Russell suspected that most of his new friends probably wouldn’t have cared.
Again that stillness dropped over her. During the meal he’d learned that’s when her emotions were working the hardest and was the only time they were hidden. She could be polite and funny, even, he had to admit, interesting. But whenever he’d asked a loaded question, she’d shut down and turned into zombie girl. She picked up her wine glass and eyed it carefully. Her expression unreadable, as if he suddenly didn’t exist.
He needed to shut up. That’s what he needed to do. He knocked back a glass of the dessert wine. It was so sweet he almost choked.
“Christ, I need a beer.”
She was sipping the wine. Holding the glass just below her nose as she sucked in her breath. Her lips pursed as if ready for a kiss.
What would she look like spread out on a bed, hair undone, clothes askew or missing? All missing except for that sweater.
He really did need a beer if that’s what he was thinking. If he was going to go there, he might as well go back to New York and beg Melanie’s forgiveness. Melanie at least knew what she was, knew what she wanted from life. And he’d been involved in it, had helped it along now and then even before they became an item.
This woman was so proud of her perfect acuity and ever so careful with her clothes. Clearly so full of herself for her achievements on something as futile as which damn wine was which.
“A lot of citrus,” she spoke to herself rather than to him. “Flowers.” She held the glass over the white tablecloth and looked down at it again.
“Amber. Not just gold. Amber.” Her tone shifted from interest to puzzlement.
“I thought you knew everything.”
“There are thousands of wines from nearly as many wineries.” Her voice was almost as chilly as the wine. “I can tell you it’s Italian, but I can’t place it. Perhaps Tuscan. Or close by.”
“Notice the lemon? The dry finish?” Why was he being such a jerk? She hadn’t earned this but he couldn’t help himself. He’d done it to Melanie without knowing, now he was fully aware he was doing it, but that didn’t stop the next words.
“Did you miss the high alcohol perhaps?” He couldn’t stop, even though he was being an asshole. He’d made Melanie think he loved her and then tossed her aside, practically called her whore with how he’d lavished gifts on her and then used her for sex.
“Obvious marks of a Cinque Terre Sciacchetra.” He felt like the old monk with the whip scourging his own back until it bled. He had to strike out. Rake his claws against the pain within.
“Not Tuscan. Ligurian. Very traditional. Very authentic.” He was a fucking mess. He knocked back the rest of the oversweet wine.
Staggering to his feet, he turned to see the look of horror on Angelo’s face as he stood looking out from the swinging door to the kitchen.
Turned back to the woman frozen with the wine glass an inch from her pursed lips.
“Hope you enjoyed the damn meal. Don’t bother to give me your number, you wouldn’t want me to call anyway.” He slapped a couple of hundred dollar bills on the table to pay for the meal and walked out before he could throw himself on his butter knife in atonement.
# # #
“The” Ristorante Italiano:
Angelo’s Tuscan Hearth
There are moments in our lives that stand out. Moments when mother and daughter recognize the woman in each other. When the son finally throws the ball the father can catch. Those moments when a thousand different little things come together into a single event of perfection. When the symphony of musicians truly masters the composition and the composer’s intent is revealed, when the dancer disappears into the ballet.
“Angelo’s Tuscan Hearth” Italian restaurant has brought such finesse to the apparently simple task of a meal. Seattle has long been synonymous with salmon and other Northwest seafood. No longer. Now there is a restaurant that harkens us back to the Old World, when chefs were vied for by kings and cardinals alike. Their master is tucked away in Seattle’s Pike Place Market on Post Alley.
Cassidy described the meal easily and quickly. Reliving each taste as it had occurred. Making sidebars for tasting notes on the wines as she went. It was all part of her style, the “friendly, close, personal touch” that many column reviewers had so praised and more than a few had tried to copy. She explained the meal in simple terms that let the owner of an untrained palate imagine they were indeed a master of spice and flavor, of ambience and composition.
However, one must be careful to choose one’s dinner companions as carefully as one’s meal or you’ll end up with a jerk like Russell Morgan.
She glared at the screen—that wasn’t what she’d intended to write at all.
A couple of keystrokes deleted the sentence.
A fine meal can be destroyed as easily by…
Delete.
Then she was stuck.
The ending wouldn’t come. She scrolled back up and read down the page again hoping that when she hit her stopping point, the flow of words would carry her to the end.
Nope.
She looked out the window of her twentieth floor condo at Queen Anne hill, the top of a partially submerged mountain rising hundreds of feet right out of Elliot Bay. Seattle’s finest homes perched along its cliff edges. She could also see northern Puget Sound; rough water beneath a glittering sun and clouds zipping by as if they wanted to be anywhere but here. And straight ahead lay Bainbridge Island—no longer her home.
Her column was due by midnight. Seven hours to go and she could find no inspiration in her mind, on the screen, or out the window.
Her hand was halfway to the bookcase before she stopped it. She didn’t want to pull out her old columns. They’d just make her feel even less competent at the moment if that was possible. All those fun, enjoyable meals. Meals where a stupid blind date hadn’t slapped at her so hard she could still feel the sting across her face.
The door buzzer jolted her out of the chair as if she’d been electrocuted. The only friends with the passcode to the street door were Jo and Perrin. She really didn’t want to face either of them. Through the front door peephole she could see it was worse, it was both of them—Perrin with a happy smile and waving a bottle of wine.
She did her best to put on a cheerful expression before she let them in.
“Oooo, sad face,” Perrin threw her arms around Cassidy’s shoulders. “Didn’t go well last night. In that case we come with consolation rather than cheers.”
“Hi, Jo.” Her hug was less fierce, but lasted a moment longer. The consolation of a good friend who understood.
“Well, come on. G
ive us the worst of it. Mr. Ugly, huh? Boy, doesn’t that just suck the big one. Why do we say ‘boy’? If I said, ‘Girl, doesn’t that just suck the big one’ it wouldn’t work as well at all.” Perrin shed her yellow, woolen coat onto the hall chair.
Her outfit was ‘20s flapper, bright yellow with tassels. It looked perfect on her long, slender form. She didn’t remove the beaded hat that was nearly a skull cap and hid all but a few wisps of the bright green hair, that still managed to look cute. Even her perfume was a light lemony scent smelling like a blossoming tree rather than furniture polish. For a moment, Cassidy wished that she had a flat, lean figure like Perrin so she could wear such an outfit and look even half as beautiful.
“Remember that fashion model the last time we were at Cutters?”
Jo fetched a corkscrew and glasses from the small kitchen and continued into the living room. Perrin dug around for cheese in the fridge as Cassidy pulled out a selection of crackers and spread them around the edges of a cutting board. Jo sat down on one of the stools on the far side of the maple butcher block counter that separated the rooms, and opened the wine.
Cassidy poured the Lindemans Shiraz. A bit tannic, but one of the most drinkable wines at the price. Fresh, a bit spicy. No real demands on the palate. Exactly what she needed right now.
“The one dressed like a centerfold?” Jo twirled her glass without really looking at it.
“That’s the one.”
“She was your date?” Perrin slapped her palm against her forehead. “Wow, Cassie, didn’t know you were walking both sides. If I’d only known, we could have had a whole different kind of fun in school. You remember Patty Jones? Ooo-wow did she have the hots for you.”
“Perrin!” Jo rolled her eyes.
“What?” Cassidy did her best not to laugh. “No. She wasn’t my date. And Patty Jones wasn’t my type either. Patty? Really? Anyway, remember the guy who was with her?”
Perrin shook her head. Jo thought a moment and shrugged.
“I don’t know how you missed him. He was incredible in a broad-shouldered, rough-and-rugged sort of way. Not so much handsome as solid, able to take the weight of the world on his shoulders and amble along as easy as sunshine. And eyes, ocean-deep eyes.”
“Damn!” Perrin stamped her stocking-clad foot on the oak parquet and her tassels shimmered about her hemline. “I knew I should have gone and sat in the corner last night. Jo, next time Cassidy goes on a date with him, you and I are going double to spy.”
Cassidy cut Jo off before she could reply. “There won’t be another. Not with this guy. Not ever.”
“Ouch! That bad? Let’s go to the living room and you can tell us all. I want every sordid detail. I love the sordid details and it’s always me who ends up providing them. Much less fun for poor Perrin. Old Miss Boring Lawyer over there hasn’t been laid in over a year or else she’s hiding someone in her closet when she could be sharing all the good bits with poor Perrin.”
Actually, Cassidy knew Jo had been on a few first dates since she’d finished the lawsuit that had consumed two years of her life. But none of them had led anywhere.
They took the wine and cheese into the living room and settled, she and Jo on the heavily-pillowed couch, Perrin sitting in the matching, oversized chair. The warmth of the decorative swirls in the dark brown cloth and the nearly-black wood of the overstuffed arms made her bright yellow attire stand out even more. Cassidy had always thought of them as hobbit couches, but Perrin was no hobbit. Perhaps a slender, shining elf come to visit Cassidy’s cozy cave on the twentieth floor.
“Hey, those are new. They’re so cute. Like a set or something.”
Jo turned to see where Perrin was pointing over their heads.
Cassidy’s four lighthouse and sailboat pictures. The boat’s red-and-blue colors strong against the egg-cream walls.
“Where did you get those?”
“I took them.” The second she spoke she wished she’d said they were from a flea market.
“You did? They’re great. Who’s on the sailboat? Some hunky guy I hope. Most sailboat guys are hunky. Egos the size of the Space Needle, but hunky.”
“I, um, don’t know. He just shows up.”
Jo stood up to look at the pictures more closely. “But they were taken at different locations.”
She sighed. Leave it to the lawyer to catch the details. Cassidy pointed to the calendar hanging where next month’s photo would go. Moving the calendar slowly across the wall made it more of a journey.
“My theory is that we’re both following the same calendar. The first of each month, he’s there.”
“Following the same calendar? Is that like having the same period?” Perrin was giggling at her own joke. She really did look like a twenty-year old flapper talking about something terribly improper.
“Yeah. Sort of. I guess. Not really.”
“Why are you there?” Jo took down the calendar and flipped through it for a moment as she settled back onto the couch. Then Jo focused on her.
Cassidy couldn’t look away from Jo’s dark eyes. Even the first day of school she hadn’t managed the slightest evasion once Jo focused that lawyer-to-be gaze on her.
“Look at the first day of each month.” Jo and Perrin did.
“ ‘Date with Ice Sweet’?” Perrin glared at her in mock anger. “Are you seeing some hottie and not telling us? I tell you, between you and Jo you always were a quiet pair. It’s a good thing I found you two or both would’ve graduated after four years without anyone knowing you were there. And you’d probably both still be virgins. Even today. You are both—”
“Dad’s nickname for me,” Cassidy cut her off. “Icewine, the sweetest and rarest wine.”
“So, you’re going even though he isn’t around anymore? That is sweet.” Perrin curled back into her chair and tucked her legs under her. “That’s really sweet. You and your dad are real close. I always envied that you are still. Um, now that he’s gone.”
She grimaced. “That came out all wrong as usual, but you know what I mean.”
“Yeah, thanks, Perrin. He left letters too.” She opened the drawer under the coffee table and pulled out the slim stack of envelopes. “They aren’t long, he wrote them in those last weeks when he was barely alive. One for each lighthouse.”
“Why didn’t you tell us? We’d have gone with you. Three women voyaging to the wilds of the Pacific Northwest. We’d be like the three Musketeers when they traveled with Lewis and Clark on the voyage of discovery.”
“Perhaps, Perrin, she wanted to do it on her own.”
“Jo’s right. Though your adventuring sounds like fun, I want it to be just Dad and me. His first letter said that he wanted to go to these places with me, bring us closer together. He’s telling me stuff about the past I didn’t know.”
Perrin waved her glass of wine at the photos, came dangerously close to spilling the red shiraz on the white carpet. “So, there’s this sailor guy in each photo. Maybe you should forget Mr. Wrong and track down Mr. Hunky Sailor. It’s easy to test if he has a sailor’s ego. Poke it with a pin and if he explodes, you know it’s huge.”
Cassidy turned to look at the photos over her shoulder. West Point, Alki, Lime Kiln, Slip Point. There was a continuity to their relationship, even if whoever he was had no way of knowing about it. She’d never been out on a sailboat, only her dad’s fishing skiff. What would it be like to go where the wind wanted to take you? To have so little control? Your life changing from one moment to the next due to the slightest whim of the winds?
She shook her head. “No, I’ll do as I’ve always done and leave the wild ones to their own devices.”
“Wimp!” Perrin waved her glass at her in a mock toast.
“Sensible,” Jo nodded her approval before turning to Perrin. “Have you had so much luck with the wild ones?”
Perrin grimaced. “N
ot much. Hell of a lot of fun while the ride is on its way up. A mess when it comes crashing back down on me. You remember Jeffie, he was so cute and I was so gone on him. Do you think I’m the reason he went to India to follow that Swami somebody?”
“And now who is it this month?” She always had the best stories.
“No one worth even telling about. But,” Perrin pointed a long finger at her. “You never told us about Mr. Wrong. Illegal change of subject. Five yard penalty.”
Cassidy grimaced, the last sip of wine distinctly sour.
“Did the sweater work? Did he,” Perrin leaned in and dropped her voice to a throaty whisper, “ravish you with his eyes?”
“Yeah. The sweater was perfect, just like you said. I guess I owe you some champagne. He was pretty decent about it once he realized what he was doing, but that sweater certainly gave him trouble more than once.”
“Kept him off balance, I bet.”
“Yeah. Right until the end when he hit me.”
“Hit you?” Jo and Perrin both jerked forward.
She raised her hands. “No, not that. Just metaphorically. A punch right to my gut.” She hunched forward and rubbed her face with her hands.
“It wasn’t good.” Her gut twisted once again, just as it had last night. Just as it had when she’d been trying to finish the article. The date had been going so well. A bit awkward now and then, but a nice change from the boring sameness of Jack James. She’d discussed the tastes of the food and wine to cover the silences. He’d really liked her, or so she’d thought. And she’d definitely started to think he had possibility.
“Turns out he’s from New York. For ten years we’d lived in the same city, me down by Greenwich, him on the Upper West Side. We saw some of the same plays, ate in a lot of the same restaurants.” They’d both been gentle with each other as they recalled the day the world changed when the Twin Towers fell, but folks outside of New York would never really understand what that day had been like. Even Perrin and Jo had only been able to give sympathy, rather than true understanding, when she’d finally been able to get a call out that she was okay.
Where Dreams Books 1-3 Page 13
