by Kit Frazier
“Wow,” Ethan said. “Has she said anything about me?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Remember, patient confidentiality? I do know she’s made several trips to San Antonio to spend time with Tiffany Parker.”
“Oh, yeah? How do you know?”
“Because I went down to see her, too, and Tiffany told me.”
“Is she all right?” He wiped chocolate off his chin.
I shook my head. “She’s better, but she’s a long way from being all right. She’s going to have more skin grafts. But she’s fighting infection and seems to get along with her bunk mate in the burn unit.”
Ethan nodded.
“You hear from Logan?”
“Not for three days now,” I said, staring at the office clock over Tanner’s office door as though I could will time forward and he would be home safe and sound in time for my birthday.
Mia grinned. “Yeah, but I have a good feeling about that,” she said, sucking the icing off a birthday candle. “Hope you didn’t waste your birthday wish,” she sing-songed, and stuck the candle in the penholder on my desk.
She picked up the Bogey Ball.
“Go ahead, try it,” she insisted, hopping up to read the answer over my shoulder. “Ask if you’re going to end up with Logan.”
Something inside me cringed. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know if the answer was “No,” I didn’t think I could take the disappointment.
“Is Logan safe?” I asked instead. The entire office went quiet.
I shook the ball, turned it over, and read, “I don’t mind a reasonable amount of trouble.”
I smiled. “From The Maltese Falcon,” I said.
Mia hopped up and down, her long hair bouncing against gravity. “He’s okay!” she chirped, hugging me around the neck. “He’s okay and he’s coming home!”
“Mia,” I said, “I think these answers are subject to interpretation.” “Yes,” she said. “My interpretation, Miss Pessimist.”
“You know, a pessimist is just an optimist whose heart’s been run over a couple of times,” Tanner said, and we stared at him.
A knock sounded at the entryway, and I looked up to find Harold escorting a good-looking guy in a suit. The guy was holding a yellow, legal-sized envelope. My heart skipped, gripped in a suffocating blanket of dread.
“No,” I whispered. “Please God, no.”
The guy looked through the middle of the office melee, and said, “Mike Tanner?”
“What’s this about?” Tanner said, stepping forward.
The guy shrugged, handing him the envelope. “You’ve been served.”
He looked around at the balloons. “Huh,” he said. “First party I ever saw before a divorce.”
Tanner was quiet, and everyone froze.
He nodded, looking down at the envelope in his hands. Turning without a word, he went into the Cage and shut the door.
Wiping the chocolate off my lips, I went after him, pulling the blinds closed as the door swung shut behind me.
He stood staring at the picture of his wife in front of the jar of licorice. I could hear his breathing. I didn’t know what to say, so I said the only thing I could think of.
“Tanner, I’m so sorry.”
He was quiet for a time, his jaw muscle working. “Yeah,” he finally said. “Me too.”
The dark circles under his eyes seemed to darken with his mood. He looked out the window onto the Hill Country, and then back at his desk.
Then he picked up the jar of licorice and smashed it against the wall.
He burrowed through the small drawer at the bottom of his desk and came out with a bottle of bourbon and an old box of cigars.
I looked up at the mangled smoke detector and sighed.
“Want one?” he said, shoving the box toward me.
“Wanna make me sick on my birthday?” I said, and he smiled a sad smile.
“Least you’d stay out of trouble,” he said. Uncapping the bourbon, he reached for two coffee mugs.
“A guy can dream,” I said.
Chapter Thirty-seven
“Yes, Mama, I made two,”
I said into the phone as I slid the last Crown Royal pecan pie into the oven.
Marlowe sat, nose twitching, watching the pie progress with great interest. Muse sat on the barstool near her cookie jar, bitching her little cat blues.
CNN droned in the background as my mother went over the list of items I was supposed to bring to my own birthday party. I could hear the sharp, expert snap of an eggshell breaking, and I knew she was mixing the batter for a sweet, sticky praline cake in the big, blue mixing bowl she’d had since I was a little girl.
“Have you heard from Agent Logan today?” she wanted to know, her voice moving in rhythm as she beat the egg.
“No,” I said, and it came out crankier than I meant it to. I was worried about him, but I knew Mama was, too. She had been sizing up Logan for a tuxedo from the minute she’d laid eyes on him. “He called yesterday and said he had some promising leads and not to worry if I don’t hear from him for a couple of days.”
“Does that mean he found that awful woman?”
“I don’t know,” I said honestly.
“Well,” Mama tutted. “He’ll be home soon. We’ll save him a piece of cake.”
My mother. The eternal optimist.
“Your sister is flying in with the kids tomorrow morning but she has to leave early. Campaign year, you know.”
I blew out a noisy breath.
“Be nice, Cauley,” Mama said, and I sighed.
I didn’t want to be nice. Suzanne and I never got to see each other since she married Roger the Republican and moved to Houston to be a senator’s wife.
I sighed. “I hoped she could stay longer,” I said. “Every time I see Ella and the boys they seem a foot taller.”
“I know,” Mama said, and a tenor of sadness betrayed her cheeriness. “Is your friend Mr. Tanner coming?”
I could see Mama, tapping her perfectly manicured nails, mentally revising the ever-increasing invitation list.
“I invited him and Mia and Brynn and Ethan,” I assured her. “Anyone else you haven’t thought of? The mailman busy tomorrow?”
“Ah,” Mama huffed her disapproval, and I smiled. Mama loves birthdays, as long as they’re not her own.
“Have you made your list yet?” she wanted to know, and I said, “No, mother, I’ve been making pies.”
Each year on our birthdays, Mama insisted Suzanne and I make a list of new yearly goals.
That woman has got to stop watching Oprah.
Mama’s phone beeped, and I said a silent prayer of thanks when she clicked over and said, “Your sister’s on the phone. It’s long-distance. See you tomorrow, sweetheart.”
As I disconnected, I felt even more restless and edgy. I poured myself a big bourbon and Diet Coke and made my way to the little library in front of the house.
A master to-do list was probably a good idea. I rolled a fresh sheet of paper into Aunt Kat’s old Remington Scout typewriter and stared at it as though something would magically materialize.
Most of what I wanted was to get Logan home safe and sound.
I stared out the window where storm clouds banked on the horizon. In my brown, dry yard, a dozen rain lilies lifted their delicate white blooms. The weather reports said we wouldn’t get rain, but rain lilies don’t lie.
I glanced at Daddy’s old pocket watch. I’d propped it up on the shelf next to a compass and my spanking new Bogey Ball. Five hours and the little clock would tick me into my twenty-eighth birthday. I wondered what Bogey would do about turning twenty-eight.
I turned the ball over and shook it. “Will Logan be coming home alive and in one piece?” I asked, dreading the answer.
I turned it over and the tumbler inside read: THIS COULD BE THE START OF A BEAUTIFUL FRIENDSHIP.
“Hmm,” I said to no one. Maybe Mia’s 8 Ball works better than the regular kind.
And then I hea
rd it.
On the television, the music changed the way it does when there’s important news breaking and I wondered who we’d started a war with this time.
I took the drink into the living room where the starch-haired CNN anchorman said something about a gun battle on the streets of Buenos Aires in Argentina.
My heart froze. Marlowe looked at me, then at the television, and then back at me.
The anchorman pressed his ear bud as though he was getting a bad connection. “We have unofficial reports that a gun battle broke out on a backstreet in Buenos Aires this afternoon involving fugitive suspect Selena Obregon, who escaped custody with a U.S. Marshal. Reports say that at least three Americans are involved in the shooting and that one American was killed. It is unknown at this time…”
Crash!
My drink dropped to the floor, splintering into a wet, flammable mess. “No,” I whispered. “No!”
Fumbling for the phone, I dialed Logan and got his voice mail. Fingers shaking, I pressed the off key and dialed again. The same.
Frantic, I dialed Cantu. “Have you heard from Logan?” I yelled.
“No, why?” he said.
“Turn on CNN,” I said on a breath. “There was a gun battle in Argentina sometime this afternoon. At least one American is dead!”
“What?” Cantu said, and I heard him flipping from Blue’s Clues to the news program. My phone beeped and I switched over.
“Mama, I can’t talk right now, I’m on the phone with Cantu,” I snapped, and a deep drawl came over the line. “Well, I wouldn’t want to interrupt…”
“Logan?”
“Yeah, kid,” he said, sounding tired. “I’m okay.”
“Logan!” I yelled, ushering Marlowe into the kitchen. He woofed and whirled, jumping up and down, and I was afraid he’d land on the broken glass.
“We got her,” he said.
“Someone got shot; I thought it was you,” I whispered, tears stinging the backs of my eyes.
“The marshal she conned into helping her escape,” he said, and there was iron in his voice.
“Oh,” I said.
“Just wanted to tell you Selena’s in custody, everyone but the marshal is okay, and we’ll head home tomorrow.”
Tears streamed down my cheeks. “That’s the best birthday present I could ever have,” I said.
“We’ll see about that,” he said, and heat flushed my cheeks. “I gotta go, kid. I’ll see you in a coupla days.”
And then he was gone.
I hugged the phone to me, letting out a long sigh of relief, and I jumped when it beeped.
I’d forgotten Cantu was on the other line.
I clicked over. “Cantu, that was Logan! He’s okay!”
“Jeez, Cauley, you gave me a heart attack. Maybe you should hook up with some nice electrical engineer or something. Not so dangerous, ya know?”
“Not on your life,” I said and disconnected.
Smiling, I headed back to the kitchen to check the pies, Muse eeling figure eights through my ankles, Marlowe prancing along beside us.
Muse yowled as I opened the oven to peek, and I said, “What, cat? What do you want?”
I scowled at her. “Do any of us really know what we want?”
She scowled back at me and stalked off to the jukebox, where she leapt with no apparent difficulty, staring at me with her unblinking, yellow stare.“Fine,” I told the cat. “I guess some of us do know what we want,” I said, wiping my hands on a dishtowel. “You want Aretha? You got it.”
The truth is, we all need a little Aretha sometimes.
I beeped the television off and hit the buttons of the jukebox, and Aretha began belting out the bliss of being a natural woman. Nodding to the beat, Marlowe and I waltzed back to the kitchen, waiting for the oven timer to ding.
I wiped some of the pie flour off my nose. Natural woman, indeed.
I was about to start wailing away when the doorbell rang.
Nobody ever rings my doorbell. A vision of armed cholos rushed through my head, and I shivered.
Marlowe bristled, staring at me.
I peeked through the opaque part of the stained glass, and I stood up straight, surprised.
There was Faith, standing on my front porch. Her dark hair was short and lovely, her cheeks pink and healthy. She was dressed in jeans and a jacket and was holding a large bag and a postal tube.
“Well, hello, stranger,” I said, wondering what on earth she was doing at my front door.
She smiled sheepishly. “Dr. T said it was your birthday.”
“Tomorrow,” I said, opening the door wider so that she could come in, Marlowe and Muse peeking out from behind my legs.
“I have something,” she said reaching into the bag.
I shook my head. “Faith, you didn’t have to….”
“Yeah,” she said, “I did.”
It was a professional-looking CD. The cover was a beautiful photo of her in a white dress, her hands open, Keates fluttering up and out of her hands. My breath caught. “Faith,” I said. “It’s beautiful.”
She shook her head. “I just…” her voice broke. Over us, the first drops of rain plopped heavily onto the porch.
“Come in before it starts pouring,” I said, ushering her into the house. “This is wonderful! Let’s listen…”
“No, you can listen later,” she said. “I have one for Ethan, too.” She blushed hard, and I smiled.
Thunder crashed outside the window, shaking the whole house.
“What are you doing tomorrow?” I said. “Because my mother is driving me crazy with this birthday party. Want me to call and have her set another plate?”
Mama would have a fit of joy when she saw Faith.
“I’d like that,” Faith said, her cheeks going pinker. “Will Ethan be there?”
“He will now,” I said, grinning.
“Oh,” Faith said. “This was on your porch.”
I frowned as she handed me a generic brown postal tube. No return address. My heart skipped a beat. The last two packages people had sent me contained loose body parts and a dead bird.
Marlowe sniffed the package, tail wagging like he’d found the last ham sandwich on earth.
Lightning struck so close that the following thunder was immediate and shook the house all the way up to the rafters. The lights dimmed and blinked off and then on.
Yikes! I hoped that wasn’t an omen.
Holding my breath, I peeled off the end of the tube and pulled out a large, architectural-sized piece of paper.
Faith gasped.
I read the accompanying letter.
“What does it say?” Faith wanted to know, practically bouncing on her toes for a peek.
I shook my head in disbelief. “It says it’s a star chart from the Star Registry. It says there’s a star named after me.”
I unfolded the document that came with it.
It spelled out the coordinates, along with my name and a handwritten note.
“So you’ll never lose your way,” the note said. “Happy birthday, kid. I’ll be home soon.”
Reading over my shoulder, Faith went into an actual swoon.
From the living room window, lightning split the horizon and the wind picked up, the rain lilies bowing in the new breeze.
The rain came hard now, pounding on the tin roof.
“Come on,” I said to Faith, making my way down the short front hall.
Smiling a smile I could feel all the way down to my toes, I rolled up the star chart and placed it next to the typewriter. Faith and I stared out the library window and into the thundering rain clouds that covered the stars. The sky was dark, but I knew my star was there, waiting for the clouds to part.
I wondered where Logan was. It didn’t matter. I knew he was thinking of me.
Muse hopped up on the jukebox, the tip of her tail twitching. Thunder crashed outside the window, and the rain rushed down the roof.
Marlowe woofed, shifting from paw to paw as I p
unched the familiar buttons on the jukebox.
Smiling, I turned to Faith. “Hey,” I said. “You like Aretha?”