A Bride To Honor

by Arlene James

  After several seconds the door opened, and a black man wearing a spotless white apron greeted them. “Spence!” He grabbed Paul’s hand and pumped it energetically. “Hey, man, why didn’t you let me know you were coming?”

  Paul grinned broadly. “Well, I thought I’d take my chances for a change, but I see that the place is as popular as ever.”

  “We’re hanging in there, man. We’re hanging in.” He switched his gaze abruptly to Cassidy. “Who’s this?”

  Paul placed an arm around Cassidy’s shoulders. “This is my good friend, Cassidy Penno. Cass, this old scoundrel is Hoot.”

  “Good friend, eh?” Hoot commented, nodding thoughtfully. “Like the coat.”

  Cassidy smiled. “Thanks.”

  Hoot spread out his arms. “Well, come on in!” He turned and led the way down a long, narrow hall past a bustling kitchen and a variety of other rooms to a small, dusty office, where he put them in chairs and offered them drinks from a small refrigerator in one corner.

  “No, thanks, I’m driving,” Paul said.

  Cassidy smiled and shook her head, saying, “I don’t drink much.”

  Hoot sent Paul a significant look and sat down behind his desk. Paul knew exactly what he was thinking. Paul didn’t drink much, either. Betina believed the “skill” of social drinking was a very important one and that he looked rude when he repeatedly turned down offers of alcohol. He stopped short of pointing out to himself that Cassidy’s feelings on the matter were much closer to his own.

  Hoot templed his fingers over the top of his desk and asked, “How did you two meet?”

  They both spoke at once. Cassidy said, “My brother works for Paul.” Paul said, “Cassidy’s my costumer.”

  Hoot latched onto that last. “Costumer! Costumer? As in Betina’s infamous costume party?”

  Paul made a face. “What else?”

  Hoot clapped his hands together and boomed laughter. “You poor sucker!”

  “I recall seeing your name on the guest list,” Paul reminded him sourly.

  “And do you have a costume, Mr. Hoot?” Cassidy asked brightly.

  Hoot looked surprised, then his face split in that huge white grin of his. “It’s just Hoot, no ‘Mister,’ and honey, I have the best costume. I plan to wear this big white apron here...”

  “That he never gets dirty,” Paul quipped drily.

  “And a chef’s hat,” Hoot went on.

  “Clever,” Paul said.

  “Cheap,” Cassidy added. “Oh, and you should get one of those big oven mitts, too.”

  “Hey, good idea!” Hoot said.

  “Do you have a chef’s hat?” Paul asked, his brow furrowed in thought.

  “No,” Hoot admitted, “but I figure I can find one.”

  “Actually I’ll be glad to rent you one,” Cassidy said. “Five dollars.”

  His thick, woolly brows shot up. “That is cheap.”

  “I’ll even throw in the oven mitt free. Now is that a bargain or what?”

  Hoot looked at Paul. “She’s sweet,” he said. “Why don’t you latch on to her and forget Betina the bi—”

  “I don’t think we want to go there,” Paul said quickly, frowning.

  Hoot linked his hands over a slightly protruding belly. “Hmph!” He looked at Cassidy. “It’s that family of his. Bunch of leeches, if you ask me.”

  “Hoot.”

  He waved a hand to indicate that he considered Paul’s protest so much spent air. “Long time ago there was a fight in the family over how to run the business, so they decided to pick a goat.”

  “Goat?”

  “He means a scapegoat,” Paul explained, “and he’s way off base.”

  “The ‘goat,’” Hoot said, “runs the business, and the rest of them go on their merry way, trusting him to take care of them all. He gets all the headaches, and they get nice fat checks dropped into their pockets at regular intervals.”

  “It gives me a free hand in running the business,” Paul said.

  “Is that the way you see it? Seems to me they tie your hands.” He said to Cassidy, “They leave him out on a limb and pretend not to notice when someone else comes along with a saw. He can’t vote their shares, and he can’t ask them to vote with him. If he could, he could tell Hydra to take her marriage scheme and stick it—”

  “Hoot!”

  “All right, all right, I get it.” He pointed at Cassidy. “This one’s a lady. The other one is a she-devil.”

  Paul shot up to his feet, grabbing Cassidy’s hand. “I’ve had this lecture already, and I’m starved. Do you mind if we eat here, or would you like to ruin the rest of my evening, too?”

  Hoot rolled his eyes. “Dinner’s on me.”

  “Thanks,” Paul drawled wryly.

  Hoot got up and smiled at Cassidy. “You give that chef’s hat to the goat here, and don’t forget to charge him for it.”

  She laughed. “I’ll do that. Nice to meet you, Mr—” he glowered, and she amended “—Hoot.”

  He smiled. “We’ve got a honey-roasted barbecued chicken breast that ought to be sweet enough for you, sugar.” As Paul pulled her from the room, he added, “Tell ’em to give the goat sauerkraut and barbecued sausage links!”

  Cassidy giggled, flowing along in Paul’s wake. “He’s really a very nice man,” she said.

  “Yes, he is,” Paul agreed grudgingly. Suddenly he stopped, shoved her up against the wall, plastered his body to hers, and tilted her chin up with his hand. She knew what was coming and did nothing to stop him. He kissed her very deliberately, drawing it out as long as he could bear to. When he pulled back and looked down into her face, she showed him everything he could ever hope for. Her eyes were closed, and her pretty mouth was curved in a gentle, dreamy smile. He laid his forehead against hers and whispered, “Why did you let me do that?”

  She sighed. “I couldn’t help it.”

  He closed his eyes, thinking, Neither could I. But he had to. It wasn’t fair to either of them to let it go beyond friendship. He took a deep breath, opened his eyes and stepped back. Her smile remained gentle, understanding. He felt a wringing desperation, a sense of incomparable loss. He caught her hand again and led her down the hall to a black door. They went through it into a large dark room, buzzing with the noise of many people. A man at an upright piano in the center of the room played a meandering, almost desultory tune as if he were in a room alone and greatly bored.

  Paul led her through a warren of tables and chairs of every description to a dark place behind a square column. “This is the treats table,” he said as he helped her out of her coat and hung it on the back of her chair over the strap of her handbag, then shrugged out of his own and stuck it on a single hook protruding from the wall above and behind him before taking the chair opposite her. “You sit here by invitation only. That way the waiters and waitresses know you aren’t to be charged for your meal.”

  “That’s brilliant.”

  “I think so.” A candle in a tin can sat at the edge of the table against the wall. Some matchsticks lay scattered around it. Paul struck one and lit the candle. Light streamed out of dozens of tiny holes piercing the tin can. He looked around them.

  “What do you think?”

  “About the restaurant? Interesting. I never thought of shabby as a decorative theme, though.”

  He chuckled. “Hoot wants the place to feel comfortable, to evoke one of those hole-in-the-wall places where the only draw is the wonderful food.”

  She nodded. “Well, he seems to know what he’s doing.” “Umm-hmm.”

  They sat in silence for a moment before an obviously harried waitress in jeans and a halter top appeared. “Hey, Paul.”

  “Eileen. The place is certainly hopping tonight.”

  “Every night,” she said. “What’d you do to induce the boss to treat you?”

  Paul grinned. “Let him insult me and stick his nose into my business.”

  “Oh, he’s good at that,” she declared.

>   Paul reached across the table and took Cassidy’s hand. “This is Cassidy Penno, Eileen. Hoot says she’s to have the honey-roasted chicken breast.”

  Eileen’s eyes went wide. “What’d you do to rate the private specialty?”

  “It’s an off-menu item,” Paul explained. “They don’t even tell you about it unless Hoot gives his permission first.”

  Cassidy inclined her head, signaling that she was suitably impressed. She said to Eileen, “I offered to rent him a chef’s hat.”

  “A chef’s hat?” Eileen’s confusion was evident. She looked at Paul, but he just looked back at her. After a moment she shrugged, bent her head and scribbled the order on a pad. “One honey-roasted barbecued chicken breast dinner. Anything else?”

  Cassidy grinned at Paul. “I think you were supposed to have the sauerkraut.”

  Paul grimaced and said to the waitress. “Make it two.” “Two honey-roasted barbecued chicken dinners. What’ll you have to drink?”

  “Iced tea.”

  “Same.”

  “I’ll have it out in a jiff.” She looked at Paul and added, “Hey, Paul, play something, will you? That guy’s boring me to tears.”

  Paul laughed and said, “Okay.”

  The waitress turned and hurried away, stopping by the piano to speak to the guy there. He got up and left without a qualm. Paul got up and pulled Cassidy up with him. “Come on. The least I can do is play for my supper.”

  Cassidy trailed him to the piano in the center of the room. He parked her on one end of the bench and sat down next to her. Flexing his fingers, he began to play a raggy version of “Old Man River.” Again, Cassidy was suitably impressed. Before he was through, the room had gone silent, and she was hanging on his arm, fascinated. He felt inspired and segued right into a soulful rendition of “Dixie,” followed by a jazzy interpretation of “Amazing Grace.” Eileen came by, left their dinners on top of the piano and stayed long enough to lean on her elbow, sigh and tap her toes a few times. He got up to applause, including Cassidy’s, and acknowledged it with a series of quick bows before helping her carry their dinners back to the table. His mood had mellowed. For the moment at least, all was right with his world. He knew, too well, that he couldn’t ask for more.

  Cass leaned back in the car seat and groaned with contentment. She was stuffed to the gills. The food had been fabulous. She had been kissed in a hallway by a fabulous man, who had then played her three fabulous songs and flattered her with his eyes the rest of the evening. A night to remember, she told herself, fully aware that she was falling in love with the wrong man.

  Did it happen like this often? she wondered. She didn’t think so. Never before had she just met someone and felt inexorably drawn to him. It was as if they fitted together like a hand in a glove or pieces of a puzzle. Naturally he would be practically engaged to someone else, someone he didn’t love but must marry. It wouldn’t happen any other way with her. She had never for a moment believed that it would happen any other way, that she would meet the perfect man, love him and have him, too. It was Paul for whom she felt sorry, Paul for whom her heart broke. He turned his head away from the windshield momentarily to look at her.

  “Why don’t you let me take you home? I’ll send someone to the shop for your car.”

  “Don’t be silly,” she said. “I’ll be fine. I’ve been going home alone for a long time now.”

  “Still,” he said, “I don’t like it. At least let me follow you to be sure you get there okay.”

  She smiled. “All right, you can follow me.”

  He relaxed. “Good.”

  A few minutes later she was driving her ancient compact convertible west on Woodall Rogers, then south on Interstate 35 to her little house in Oak Cliff. Paul’s luxury car followed right behind her. When she pulled into the drive of her small house, Paul pulled over to the curb and waited until she let herself in, turned on the living room light and waved to him. Then he pulled away from the curb and moved on down the street. She went inside, locked the door, threw off her coat and picked up the yellow cat rubbing against her ankles.

  “Hello, Sunshine. Did Granny Anna come by to feed you earlier? Did she stay to keep you company for a little while, hmm?” Sunshine meowed and rubbed his head under her chin. She carried him into the kitchen, where “Granny Anna” had left a note taped to the refrigerator. The refrigerator, according to Cassidy’s mother, Anna, along with the rest of Cassidy’s house needed “purifying.” In addition to teaching Tai Chi, Anna had recently taken up the study of attaining balance in one’s surroundings through various Oriental rituals and principles. Anna promised to be as ardent about this new “discipline” as she was about vegetarianism, healthful exercise, her own version of the work ethic and gardening. Not to mention her concern for her children and her criticism of their father, her ex-husband, Alvin, who at sixty had joined a motorcycle “gang” and grown a ponytail despite the fact that he had no hair on the top of his head. Cassidy sighed, wondering how much “purifying” she was going to have to endure in order to placate her mother.

  Her door bell rang. Cassidy glanced at the digital clock on the microwave. Almost nine-thirty. Who could be calling at this hour? She let down the cat, tiptoed into the living room and peeked out the spy hole in the door. Heart leaping, she threw the bolt and ripped open the door. Paul stood with his forearms braced against the opening.

  “Paul? Uh, c-come in.”

  He shook his head, face serious. “We shouldn’t...we didn’t agree when to meet next.”

  “Oh! The first fitting. Well, let’s see. How’s Thursday? No, better make it Friday. Friday okay with you?”

  “No,” he said flatly. “It’s too far away.”

  She was thrilled, of course, but it would be Friday before she could get together something for him to try on.

  “Have breakfast with me Wednesday morning,” he said, “and we’ll do the fitting on Friday. Okay?”

  “B-breakfast?”

  His mouth began to curve up into a smile. “That’s all that’s left, isn’t it? We’ve already had lunch, coffee and dinner.”

  She laughed. “Breakfast it is. Where and when?”

  “Seven too early?”

  “Seven’s fine.”

  “How about if I just bring it with me?”

  “Here, you mean.”

  His expression grew serious again. “Unless you think it’s too risky.”

  She smiled, knowing that he was trying to protect her and that it was useless. It was already much too late for that, but it would not only be stupid but cruel to tell him that. She said, “Why don’t I just cook for us? I can scramble an egg, you know.”

  He laughed at that. “I’m not surprised, but keep it simple, okay? Cold cereal and milk will do me fine.”

  “I think I can do a little better than that,” she said.

  He cocked his head, his grayish eyes suddenly smoky. “It’s not the food, you know,” he told her. “It’s the company I’m after.”

  “Thank you.”

  “What for?” he asked ruefully. “Complicating your life?” She shook her head and reached out to stroke his jaw with the backs of her fingers. “Just for showing up in it.”

  “Won’t be for long,” he said softly, his smile growing bitter.

  “I know,” she told him, “but that’s all right. Better a little time than no time at all.”

  He reached out for her with a moan that was part pain and part gratitude. She moved into his arms as easily as if she’d done it a million times. He pressed his cheek against hers and held her close for a long while. Finally he pulled back, saying, “Gee, I’m a selfish bas—”

  She laid her fingers across his mouth. “No, you’re not. You’re just helpless, and I know how that feels.”

  He cupped her face in his hands, kissed her lightly on the mouth, and quickly stepped back out of reach. “Good night.”

  She closed the door at his back and locked it again. Then she wrapped her arms around h
erself and closed her eyes. Her mother often told her that she was a glutton for punishment, a natural victim. She had never been so glad that her mother was right.

  Anna would show up when the kitchen was full of the smell of bacon grease and smoke. She came in the back door, plunked down her woven grass bag and put her hands to her hips in a familiar, combative pose. Her long, gray hair lay in a loose braid across one shoulder. She wore a man’s old dress shirt and T-shirt belted over a long, gathered skirt, with high-top tennis shoes. “What are you trying to do,” she demanded, “burn down the house or poison yourself?”

  “I’m trying to make breakfast for a friend,” Cassidy said, blowing hair out of her eyes.

  “You poison your friends?” Anna asked. “Why can’t you understand that eating dead things kills you?”

  I should eat live things? Cassidy wondered, but she kept her tongue tucked firmly behind her teeth. Arguing was one of the things Anna did best, arguing and deduction.

  Her mother wandered around the room, pausing occasionally to sniff and pose with hands outstretched as she felt for vibrations. “It’s a man,” she said with some shock. “You’re having a man in for breakfast!”

  “I’m having a friend in,” Cassidy said, carefully stirring the gravy while checking the biscuits in the oven.

  “A man friend,” Anna insisted.

  “Well, it isn’t as if I haven’t had men friends before,” Cassidy pointed out.

  “For breakfast?”

  Cassidy rolled her eyes. “He didn’t spend the night here, Mom, if that’s what you’re implying.”

  “You know I don’t imply things,” Anna said truculently. “I speak my mind. Life is too short for implications and hints and—”