7

Tuesday morning Cassie slept in until eight o’clock. They had returned late from their trip to the mountains, wanting to wring the last drop of coolness and green from their long weekend, and waiting until evening to start back.

Cassie stretched and lay with her hands behind her head, smiling at the good time they had had. After her walk with Ben, there had been no uneasiness between them.

As she lay in bed she became aware of a throbbing, pulsing sound coming in from outside. It was a Latin rhythm. Mariachi music, she judged by the sound of trumpets and fiddles. Thinking that Luis, the pool tender, had brought a boom box, and wondering whether the residents would take exception to that, she partially opened the plantation shutters and peeked out the window.

It wasn’t Luis’s boom box; it was a real mariachi band. Smiling at the sight of eight black-clad musicians in huge black sombreros, she wondered aloud who was being serenaded. When she caught sight of Chan, just getting ready to sing, she stopped wondering.

After quickly putting on a pair of sweat pants and a T-shirt, she opened the sliding glass door and stepped out onto the balcony overlooking the pool. Chan was singing a lilting song, and the members of the band were all beaming as she stood on the balcony and listened.

When the song was over, Chan walked nearer and looked up. “I thought you’d never appear,” he said.

“Have you been here long?”

“About ten minutes. We’ve had five other people come out. I was beginning to think we’d missed you.”

“I must have been asleep. We got in late last night. But what is this all about?”

“You wouldn’t return my calls. I’m trying to get your attention.”

“You’ve got it.”

“Okay. Then listen.”

Chan cued the band and began singing another song. This one still had the same throbbing rhythm, but it was slower and more emotionally charged. Cassie sat on a wicker chair, leaned her arms on the railing, and rested her chin on her wrists. Trying to understand what the song was saying, she caught a word here and there: heart . . . night . . . sad . . . love . . . tomorrow. When the last strain had died away, she asked, “What does it say?”

“I’ll tell you tonight, if you’ll let me.”

Cassie smiled down at him. “Come at seven,” she said. “I’ve got leftover lasagna in the freezer. You can help me finish it off.”

“It’s a deal,” he promised.

“I’ve got to go,” she said, reluctantly. “I may have a new client locally. I have an appointment to talk to them this morning, and I can’t be late. See you tonight?”

“Yes, tonight.”

Cassie looked at the musicians behind him. “Thank you very much,” she said to them. “Muchas gracias.”

The musicians bowed and replied, and as she turned to go back inside, the guitarron player slapped Chan on the back and said he was a lucky man, that the girl on the balcony was very beautiful.

Cassie hummed as she showered and dressed. After catching herself daydreaming with her pantyhose in her hand, she glanced at the clock and realized she didn’t have time to woolgather. Taking herself to task, she determined that she wouldn’t think about Chan until dinnertime.

It was a resolve that was broken several times during the day, though she did pretty well at staying on task. She was working on a presentation for St. Alphonse Cancer Center, an account she really wanted to secure, so she focused on a flawless presentation.

The presentation was very nearly flawless and generated so much enthusiasm that people stayed afterward to ask questions and share hopes and dreams. Cassie was two hours later than she had thought to be going home. Then there was an accident that backed traffic up, delaying her an extra half hour. As she pulled into the parking lot, her pulse quickened when she caught sight of the white convertible parked in the shade at the back of the lot.

Chan Jordain was out of the car as soon as he saw her, striding over to open her car door and help her carry her things.

“Were you afraid I had stood you up?” she asked.

“No. I figured you got hung up somewhere. I was a little early.”

Opening the door to her condo, Cassie directed him where to put the computer. “Upstairs,” she said. “Middle bedroom. I’ve turned it into an office.”

As he did that, she went to the kitchen and peeked in the oven to make sure that the time bake had turned on as it was supposed to and that the frozen casserole she had put in that morning was bubbling. Then she popped the bread in the oven and got the salad out of the fridge. When Chan came downstairs, she was taking placemats and dishes out of the cupboard.

“Shall we eat out on the patio?” she asked. “I think it’s probably cool enough. It’s shady on this side of the building. If you’ll open the door, we can get the table set.”

Chan did as he was told, revealing a small paved area furnished with a table and two chairs and a glider swing. Surrounded with oleanders, the patio was private and secluded. They set the table, and Cassie brought out a tall pitcher of lemonade. Then she gave Chan a pair of mitts and asked him to carry the hot dish out while she followed with the salad and bread.

When they were seated and the blessing had been said, she offered him some salad. “So, where were you over the weekend? You missed a good time.”

“I had some traveling to do. Job-related.”

“And what is your job?” Cassie asked, looking up expectantly.

“Pharmaceuticals. I travel.”

“Oh? Tell me about it.”

“Nothing to tell. It’s not my life. It’s what allows me to live my life the way I want to.”

Cassie wrinkled her brow. “You don’t like what you do?”

“I don’t mind it. I’m willing to spend the couple of weeks a month away from . . . away from people I’d rather be around so that I can have the freedom to do what I want the other two weeks.”

She smiled. “Things like rock climbing?”

“Or following a dream to Scottsdale.”

“Oh . . .” Cassie concentrated on the long strands of cheese stringing out from her dish to the pan. Pinching them off, she licked her fingers. Only then did she meet Chan’s eyes, her own crinkling at the corners. “You embarrass me when you talk like that. Let’s talk about something else. Tell me where you’re from. Tell me about your family.”

“I can’t. I didn’t exist until I met you. Tell me about your family, instead.”

Flattered by his interest, Cassie obliged, and as they ate she drew an affectionate and amusing portrait of her studious, unfamilial parents and her odd upbringing.

The shadows deepened and the mercury vapor lights came on in the complex, casting a dim light over the oleanders. A soft breeze tempered the warmth of the evening, and a cricket started sawing somewhere close by.

“Are your parents still alive?” Chan asked.

She shook her head. “No. It’s been eight years now.”

“Then you’re an orphan.”

She cocked her head and regarded her glass, running her finger around its edge as she thought. “I guess I am. I never would have classified myself as such, but I guess I am.”

“I’m an orphan, too, only it happened a long time ago.” He reached across the table and drew her hand away from the tumbler, holding it lightly and smoothing the fingers with his thumb. “Someday I’ll tell you about it, but not now.”

They sat in silence for a moment. He didn’t release her hand.

“You were going to tell me about that song you sang this morning,” she reminded him.

He stood and pulled her to her feet. “Come sit in the glider.”

They walked to the corner of the patio where the porch swing occupied the shadows under the oleanders. Chan seated her and then sat beside her with his left arm around behind on the back of the seat and his body turned to slightly face her. Taking her right hand in his, he said, “This is a very rough translation:”

Dearest, you are my heart,
You are my breath
You are my . . . life, or my being.
Tonight you are my love,
Your body is warm beside mine.
But dearest, what will tomorrow hold?
My sadness will stretch out forever
And though I live, I will be cold and alone
If I lose my heart, my breath, my life.

He began to sing softly. Not in the pulsing rhythm of the morning, but as a ballad, slow and intimate. As he sang the word corazon, he placed her hand over his heart, covering it with his own. Cassie had taken enough pulses to know that his heart was beating more rapidly than normal. But so is mine, she thought to herself. So is mine.

Cassie couldn’t take her eyes off Chan. She was bordering on sensory overload. The sound of his voice and the musky smell of his aftershave combined with the way the shadows played over the planes of his face and the feel of his beating heart, and it all washed over her like a floodtide. When the last sweet-sad note had quavered into the night, he bent toward her, and she, like a leaf being pulled down into the dark undertow, leaned forward with parted lips.

* * *

Punky came by early the next morning to bring Cassie her hair dryer. “Thought you might need this,” she said. “It ended up in my suitcase. You’re up bright and early. I figured I’d be getting you out of bed.”

“Why is that? You know I always get up early.”

“I was going to bring this by last night, but I saw Chan was here, so I didn’t want to bother you. I figured you’d be up late.”

“Um. No.” Cassie looked away.

“You’re blushing,” observed Punky. “What’s going on? You haven’t been doing anything you shouldn’t, have you?”

Cassie covered her scarlet cheeks with her hands and closed her eyes. “No. Oh, Punky, he kissed me! I’m thirty-two, and that’s the first time I’ve ever been kissed.”

“Holy Crow, Cassie! You can’t be serious! No, I’ve seen you kiss Ben. You’ve been kissed.”

“That was just a sisterly kiss. I mean, I’ve never been kissed by a man who made it perfectly clear that the kiss was just the beginning—of something more intimate.”

“He didn’t . . .”

“No. He was a gentleman. But, Punky, it just . . .” She closed her eyes again and shook her head. “I remembered what you taught your Mia Maids, when you said that there was nothing wrong with a kiss, but that when the breathing started to get heavy, that was when you went home.”

“Did I say that?”

“Yes. So I made him go home. Hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life.” She put the hair dryer in a drawer. “Oh, Punky. I’m in love. What if he doesn’t love me back?”

“He loves you. I can tell you that.”

“But what about marriage? I’d never be able to wait six months until I can marry in the temple.”

“Don’t wait. You marry now and go to the temple later.”

“But your Mia Maids! You wouldn’t tell them that!”

“No. They’re not mature women. Talk to the bishop. I’ll bet he’ll say the same thing. He’ll quote Paul about ‘better that they marry than burn.’”

Cassie sighed. “I don’t know that it’s an issue. I haven’t been asked yet.”

“He’ll ask you. Bet you five dollars he’ll ask before October.”

“October!” Cassie wailed. “That’s almost a month away!”

“Holy Crow, Cassie! You don’t even know him! You’ve seen him how many times? You don’t know anything about his family. Nothing.”

“He’s an orphan. I think he had a real hard childhood.”

“And . . . ?”

“He’s a returned missionary.”

“Okay. That’s good. Anything else?”

“He has a good job—something in pharmaceuticals. He works two weeks a month and is off two. He travels. Oh, Punky, wouldn’t it be fun to get my seminars coordinated with his trips? Then we could travel together. We wouldn’t have to spend that time apart.”

“Whoa, Nellie,” Punky cautioned. “Rein ’er in! Wait until you know a bit more about him.”

“I know all I need to.”

“Which is?”

“He’s the man I want to spend eternity with.”

“Oh, Cassie! Eternity is such a long time.”

“Well, how about, he’s the man I’m going to spend every extra minute with for the next four days. He leaves Saturday night and will be gone a week. I’m rearranging my schedule so I only have to work half days this week.” Cassie looked at her watch. “And I’ve got to get whistling if I’m going to get done what I need to do. Thanks for bringing the hair dryer by.” Gathering her briefcase and computer, she shooed her best friend out the door in front of her.