“Hm. I don’t know. Idiots come in all shapes and sizes. Just look at me standing out here in the cold.”
“I am looking at you.”
“And what big eyes you have.”
“Are you insinuating I’m a wolf and this is some kind of fairy tale?”
Willa shook her head. “There’re a couple of other things I don’t believe in besides coincidence: fairy tales and happy endings.”
“Come on. Everyone loves a happy ending. Think of When Harry Met Sally, Bringing Up Baby, Gone With the Wind. “
“Gone With the Wind does not have a happy ending. Rhett leaves Scarlett.”
“All right, but they had the cute meeting. So did we. Now you’re standing in the snow with rosy cheeks. How romantic is that?”
“It’d be better if you were the one out here freezing.”
“You have me on that too. So how should I finish? How cheesy and trite should I get? How far do you want to take this little romantic comedy I think we’ve started?”
Willa sighed. Yes, it was a bit romantic, a little funny, and it felt wonderful, but she had more important things to tend to than effervescent chemistry. This cute little comedy was already over. “I have to clean out my gutters, shampoo my hair, and have a root canal.”
“What a coincidence. So do I.”
“No, seriously,” she moved her hand through the falling snow, “I’m passing through town and I have to be someplace by two. I don’t have time to fool around.”
He lifted his chin and sat up. “Fool around? Wait a minute. I wasn’t making a sleazy suggestion.”
“Weren’t you?”
His left eyebrow arched. “Is it the beard? Does it really make me look like the seedy type who’d suggest we get a room at some cheap motel for an hour?”
The rush of heat nearly made her knees buckle, and Willa actually considered the idea of a cheap motel. An hour, yes, an hour with those electric hands and that warm body on top of me, pushing me up against the wall, pushing inside me instead of a ghost or a faded memory or my own hands.
Then she remembered why she’d said yes to Oscar about the job.
Cold dread edged out the warmth that had begun to spread through her body. The fantasy of a dirty sixty minutes of carnal pleasure dissolved like the snowflakes falling on her coat.
She gave ‘Uncle John’ a little smile. “Rather than telling you what I really think of your hairstyle and that ridiculous grin you’re wearing, this is where we do a simple fade to black.” Willa took a couple of steps backwards and opened the driver’s side. “You have a nice life.”
”Wait a minute. This is not how romantic comedies end.”
“Then maybe we should consider this a bittersweet love story of what might have been.”
John watched her climb into her car. “Yeah. An hour wouldn’t have been enough for me either,” he muttered to himself as she shut the door.
3
Willa caught sight of Dominic through the plate glass window of his hardware store. Years ago, when she’d been an MIT Physics grad student, he’d been the Teaching Assistant for Professor Zweibach’s String Field Theory tutorial. Outwardly, he hadn’t changed much since then. There was gray in his walnut-colored hair, a few lines on his chiseled face, but he was the Dominic she remembered—all six-foot-three, head-turning, handsome man of him.
She hoped the rest of Dominic, the inside part of him, was still the same understanding, kind, open-minded Dominic.
In a way, Willa was glad she was seeing him at work instead of at home. Not that seeing him in his shop made this any less awkward, it just meant… She didn’t know what it meant. They hadn’t seen each other in nearly two years, and she was being presumptuous on several fronts.
She took a deep breath before she stepped inside Trujillo’s Hardware.
“Good afternoon.” The store manager smiled at her as she entered the shop. Willa recalled her name was Daphne Calderón. She held the phone against her shoulder as she spoke to Dominic. “Does it have to be lilacs, boss? There’s a place that can get you two-dozen purple hyacinth. They smell pretty too.”
“Lilacs. My wife loves lilacs. I want to get her lilacs,” he answered, frowning and squinting at the phone book as he stood in front of the service desk. “Where the hell did I put my glasses? Daph, do you know where I left my glasses?”
“Here,” Willa nudged his elbow with her tortoiseshell frames, “try mine.”
Dominic turned to take the spectacles. His frown dissolved into a wide smile. “Willa.”
“Hello, Dominic.”
He stood there looking at her for a moment, shaking his head as if he wanted to say something. Finally, he bent forward, pulled her into an embrace, and kissed her cheek.
She hugged him back. Hard.
“Daphne, you remember Willa, don’t you?”
On the phone, Daphne nodded with a smile. Willa waved at her.
“Must be cold outside. Your nose looks like one of those Valentine hearts, the hot ones. The last time I saw you, your nose was nearly the same shade.” Dominic felt a slight flash of awkwardness after he said that. Back then, a red, runny nose had been the only color on her miserable, pale face—well, that and the bluish circles under her eyes. “Glory days, Willa. I’m glad to see you.”
She smiled sheepishly. “I got your Christmas cards and wedding invitation, all the messages you left on the machine, and all your emails too. I appreciate that you kept it up, Dominic, even though I never responded. I’m sorry for that.”
“I didn’t take it personally.” He watched a little cloud darken her bright smile before she brushed hair back from her cheek.
“Sure you did,” she said.
”All right. I didn’t like it when you told me to fuck off. I didn’t like that you missed my wedding. I didn’t like it that you weren’t there, but you needed time. You’re back, and that’s all that matters now.”
“I was worried you’d be angry,” she said. “It’s been so long.”
“Now why would I be angry about you needing time? You and Alicia had a lot to deal with.” Dominic leaned against the counter and changed the subject. “So, did you wind up taking that job at Fermilab?”
“No. I stayed at Sandia, but I’m finished there.”
“You look great.” He meant that. She’d grown too skinny after Miles died, but she’d filled out since then, and her breasts had returned. Not that he’d paid much attention to her boobs in the past, but he had noticed when they’d disappeared, and that was only because of the dismal times he’d had to drag her out of bed where she hid, or out of the shower where she wanted to stay, to dress her and feed her, and jerk her out of a near catatonia. He shoved those memories away, not because they embarrassed him, but because he knew they’d embarrass her. “So how do I look?” he asked in his cockiest tone.
She chuckled and looked him up and down. “Married life agrees with you.”
“Yes, it does.”
“You seem very happy.”
“I am very happy.”
“I should have come to your wedding.” Willa sighed and put her glasses into the bag slung over her shoulder. “I really should have come to your wedding.”
“Stop apologizing. I understood. You weren’t ready.”
“I’m not so sure I’m ready now, but here I am. Except it’s not all—” The cell phone in her bag rang. “Excuse me.”
Dominic watched her set her shoulder bag on the counter and dig into it. She pulled out a folded newspaper, a fat manila envelope, and finally a touch screen phone. “Willa Heston,” she said as she pressed it to her ear.
He grinned when she rolled her eyes. The only person he’d ever seen capable of really riling Willa had been Alicia, and judging by the bits of conversation he overheard, it seemed the girl still could.
Willa paced back and forth, took two steps in one direction and then spun in the other. “No. I haven’t been to the office yet. … No. I haven’t been there either. I just got here. …
Because I had a flat tire. … Well. … Good. I’m glad they found the place. … No, I don’t want you to have a chat with anyone. … Oh.” Yes sir, no sir, three bags full sir! “Will you please give me a little time? I’ve been in town twenty minutes. … Thank you. Yes, yes. I’ll call you beforehand.”
Dominic watched her shoved the phone, envelope and newspaper back into her bag. “Has Alicia started college yet?”
“Last September. She’s at UNM.” Willa blew out a breath that made her lips putter. “How’s my godson?”
“Kyle’s a senior this year. I have no idea what happened to the time. He was ten just yesterday.”
“Yeah, and we were just eating pizza at Bertucci’s, discussing Feynman Diagrams last Saturday night.”
“I don’t feel old. Do you?
“The older I get, the more I think I’m still twenty.”
”See? Time is on one axis, space is on the other, and the interaction can be viewed as happening in both forward and reverse time.”
There was a pause as they looked at each other. Then they cracked up, laughing vigorously at a shared physics joke.
Dominic gave her a little pat on the head and Willa faked a punch to his gut. Then she glanced at her watch. It was earlier than she’d expected. All of this had happened so fast. She hoped it was an indication the whole thing would end quickly.
“You want to grab coffee at Starbucks up the street, or do you have somewhere you have to be?” Dominic asked.
Willa shrugged apologetically, looking up at him. “Work stuff.” She cocked her head, white locks falling across one eye, and exhaled with a huff. “Listen, this is a little embarrassing. I know it’s been a long time, a really long time, and you deserve some kind of explanation. I want you to hear this from me first. Is there somewhere we can talk?” She glanced at Daphne, who had politely turned her back to offer them privacy.
“Daph will hold down the fort. We’ll go to the office.” Dominic gave the store manager a nod and led Willa through the shop. He imagined that whatever she was going to tell him would revolve around her unruly stepdaughter. An old calendar flapped and swung on the back of the door as he closed it. He leaned on the edge of his desk and gestured for her to take a seat. “I’ve missed you, Willa. No one’s quite as cartoon goofy as you, the real-life Judy Jetson.”
She shrugged.
Well, well. He’d teased her about her hair, like he always had, and Dominic expected her to grin and call him ‘Astro.’ But she’d barely smiled. Shit. Whatever this was about, it was bad. It was bad enough for her to come all the way up The Hill and show up unannounced. “What is it? What’s up?”
Willa sat, bag in her lap. She reached into the satchel and pulled out the newspaper. There was no easy way to do this, so she just handed the Albuquerque Journal to him and pointed to the story. “Did you hear about this?”
Dominic tried to read it, chin tucked back, arm out straight.
“Here,” Willa dug in her bag again and handed him the reading glasses she’d offered earlier. Then she took out a black wallet, a tube of lip balm, and an electronic reader the size of a paperback book. She set everything on the desk.
Dominic put on the spectacles and read out loud, “Los Alamos Busts Meth Lab Ring. Yeah, I read this about two weeks ago.” When he looked back at her, she’d taken the top off some Chapstick. He’d expected Alicia had gotten into some trouble, but drugs were far worse than he’d imagined. “Oh, God. I’m sorry, Willa.”
“So am I. More than I can say. I’m about to start a job at the Lab.”
He nodded and pulled off the glasses. “Well, that explains it. There were a couple of government boys in here this morning.”
The lip balm paused at her mouth. “There were?”
“Yeah.”
“Damn it,” she said quietly.
He deposited the paper on the desktop, “You should have seen these two—this skinny kid with a pizza face wearing a three-thousand dollar suit, and a guy who looked like a stand-in for Robert Redford. It was the standard. They asked about you, The Dickstar, and Himesh Chandra.
She smoothed on the colorless lip balm, dropped it back into her bag, and exhaled. “They were FBI, and you’re not the only one they’ll talk to. You’re just the first.”
“Shit. So, how much damage is this drug bust with Alicia going to do to you? You think it’s something that can harm your Lab position?”
Willa scraped her bottom teeth over her top lip, tasting peppermint and honey. She exhaled again. “That bust has nothing to do with Alicia.”
“It doesn’t?” Dominic frowned, confused.
Willa shook her head and silently cursed Oscar. “This isn’t how I wanted to tell you, but now they’ve forced my hand. I figure I have a week, one lousy week. Ten days at most.”
“A week for what?”
“There’s something you have to know about me, and it doesn’t leave this room. Can you do that?”
“Oh, Jay-zus. What did you do?”
“Whatever they asked me to. I started before we even left MIT. We’ve been friends a long time, Dominic, and now you need to know. So here I am.” She stood, handed him the black wallet, and watched him open it.
Dominic’s rump slid off the desk. His head jerked up, bright blue eyes round with shock. “Are you shitting me?”
“No.”
“You’re an FBI agent?” He looked at the gold badge in the black leather holder again.
“I’m afraid so.”
“Did Miles know?”
“Yes.”
“Was he FBI too?
She exhaled. “Miles was Department of Defense. You knew that. That was never a secret.”
“But you were.” Dominic plopped into the chair she’d vacated the moment before. He pulled the glasses from his nose and let them fall into his lap. “You’ve been a mole in the labs for all these years.”
“Basically.”
“You?”
“Me.”
The startled disbelief on his face turned to something else. “That means while you were working beside me, you were also spying on me?”
“I started out as an Intelligence Analyst. Then I got recruited into undercover work.”
“So you spied on me.”
“I did research, and observed the people I worked with.”
“Those sabbaticals and secondments you went off on were just cover.” Dominic made a hissing noise. His jaw clenched and his eyes darkened. “You’ve lied to me for over twenty years?”
“I never lied to you. I just … didn’t tell you everything.”
“You’re my son’s godmother. I was your man of honor. I was there for you when Miles died. Oh, Christ, I’ve seen you naked!” He was on his feet again. Badge gripped in one hand as the glasses clattered to the linoleum tiles.
“And I’ve seen you go drunk skinny-dipping.”
“What?”
Willa spread her hands. “It doesn’t matter if I worked undercover. It’s still me. I went on college road trips with you and laughed my ass off the time you drunk skinny-dipped in the kiddie pool in Tania Gaspar’s backyard. I’m Kyle’s godmother, I cried on your shoulder during the most miserable part of my life, and yes, I shut you out because everything got so complicated, so laborious, but I’m still the same person I was twenty years ago. I was your friend then and I’m still your friend now. It’s still me.”
“Nearly two years, Willa. Not one word and now this? You come to me with this?”
“It’s still me.”
“Is it?
“Yes.”
His expression was full of contempt, hurt. “The hell it is.” He shoved the wallet against her shoulder and let it go. It hit the floor with a thud. “Could you please leave?”
Willa bent to pick up the leather bi-fold and her glasses. “We need to talk about this.”
He crossed his big arms, his blue eyes hot as flame. “I don’t want to talk about anything with a liar, Special Agent Heston.”
; Willa took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “I don’t think you have much choice.”
He took two steps forward, towering over her by a good fourteen inches, and sneered down at her. “Are you threatening me?”
She glanced sideways, at the folded Albuquerque Journal and e-reader still sitting on his desk. “No, I’m trying to help you.”
“Help me?”
“That meth lab drug bust was Jacqueline Grafton’s place. You remember Jackie, don’t you? The redhead lab assistant with the melons you, Chandra, and The Dickstar couldn’t keep your eyes or hands off? That’s right. Didn’t you date her for a while?”
A somewhat sheepish hue cooled his anger, but only for a moment. “Big fucking deal. So I dated her.”
“It turns out crystal meth wasn’t the only thing the local PD found in her little ranch house. They also turned up classified information from the Los Alamos National Lab. I’ve got about ten days to figure this out before someone on the team turns up some dirt. It’s my job to find out how the documents got out, who took them, where they were headed, and whether there’s an ongoing leak. When what you did comes to light, and it will come to light, I’ll do my damnedest to make sure it amounts to nothing, to find out who is responsible, but that may not be enough. You could still be arrested, Dominic. Even if it doesn’t amount to anything, even if it was an absent-minded mistake or poor judgment, you simply have to be suspected. You don’t have to be charged, you just have to be a ‘person of interest’ and the government can hold you on a material witness warrant, just like Wen Ho Lee. He was held in solitary confinement for nine months.”
Dominic opened his mouth to say something, but nothing came out.
“Maybe it doesn’t seem like it, but I’m trying to help you.”
He found his voice and snarled, “Help me? Help me? Get the hell out of here!”
Willa stayed where she was. She lifted the slim electronic device from the desk and put it beside the bag of popcorn he’d had for lunch. “Take this. You’re going to need it later.”
“I don’t need a goddamn thing from you.” Dominic glowered at her toxically and jerked the door open. The old calendar on the back swung like a peek-a-boo pendulum.
For Your Eyes Only Page 4