“Eight months?”
“We got married because she was pregnant. After she miscarried, there wasn’t much point for either of us.”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“I was real sorry about the baby. Always wanted kids; still do. But the divorce, that part was OK. She’s a nice girl, but it wasn’t fair on either of us. She wasn’t what I wanted.”
Shouts rose from the back room, followed by a crash and a sharp crack like a cue stick breaking. I didn’t look away, and neither did Tommy.
“What do you want?” I asked.
“I think you know.”
Billiard balls came flying out of the back room, and the bartender ran past us, flourishing a baseball bat. Hope flowered inside me; I felt it unfolding, petal by petal.
“Why didn’t you call?” I asked.
“Couldn’t. Any personal contact between the victim and the investigators could have jeopardized the prosecution.” This came out in one breath, with a fluency that sounded rehearsed. It was my turn to wait in silence. Even in the dimly lit booth, I could see the color rising in Tommy’s face. He took a long pull on his beer.
“That,” he said, “and the other thing. How I felt about you. That hasn’t changed. So I stayed away.”
“Bit of a non sequitur, that last bit.”
“It’s not like before, when we were kids together in the big city. I’m not blind. I see the life you’ve made for yourself, the world you live in.”
“Maybe my world could use expanding,” I said.
Tommy caught his breath and stared. I’d have stared too. Brazen wasn’t my usual style, but there’s nothing like having nothing to lose.
“Are you flirting with me, Jo?”
“I think it’s way past flirting.”
The back-room fight spilled into the aisle beside us. One man punched another, and that one lost his balance and would have fallen on me if Tommy hadn’t jumped up and straight-armed him away. Instead of sitting back down, Tommy came around to my side of the booth and held out his hand.
Outside, a blast of exhaust enveloped us. Taxis blared their horns and jostled for position on the street while pedestrians played the same game on the sidewalk. Tommy led me toward the brick façade of the bar, out of the stream. He took me in his arms and we kissed for a long time. It felt as if someone had poured gasoline on me and lit it on fire, except that it didn’t hurt. His body felt strange against mine, yet deeply and dearly familiar. All the world flowed by us, yet we were alone together; for there is no place more private than the center of a crowd.
Or almost no place. “Come home with me,” I said.
But Tommy didn’t move. “I feel compelled to ask your intentions.”
“My intentions?” I said. “Kind of old-school, isn’t it?”
“I’m an old-school kind of guy.”
“At the moment I’d say my intentions are highly dishonorable. Is that normally a sticking point?” I pressed against him, and he held me close, strong hands splayed against the small of my back. Unless that was a gun in his pocket, I was fairly sure he wasn’t going anywhere; yet I sensed hesitation.
“Not normally, no,” he said. “Just tell me this isn’t some incredibly generous sort of thank-you.”
“They have cards for that. This is about you and me and nothing else.”
“You say that now, but what happens when the next Nobel Prize–winning bastard comes along?”
“Depends,” I said, straight-faced. “Is he hot?”
Tommy laughed. “You are a wicked woman, Jo.”
“No, I’m not. I know you have no reason to trust me. But Tommy, do I look like I’m playing?”
I held his eyes, and after a moment he smiled that slow, country-boy smile of his. “My place is closer,” he said.
“Closer’s good.” We looked toward the street. West Broadway was teeming with rush-hour traffic. What were the odds of snagging a cab at this hour? I wondered. Maybe Tommy could hail a patrol car. It felt like an emergency. We tacked across the pavement. Just as we reached the curb, a taxi pulled over and discharged two women. Tommy grabbed the door and held it for me. It’s a sign, I thought, climbing in. Not that I believed in signs and portents. I was trying, these days, to keep a solid yellow line between fiction and reality, fairy tales and life. Fictional romance may end in “happily ever after,” but “till death do us part” is the best mortal lovers can hope for.
On the upside, real people have bodies. We are bodies. Tommy’s, warm and solid, slid in beside mine. “Where to?” the cabby asked, looking in his mirror.
“Home,” Tommy said.
A Dangerous Fiction Page 31