Magdalene (18 page)

I looked at him, sitting there all suave and
debonair, his wavy dark-blond hair a little mussed and looking more
gold against his navy suit, his blue eyes sharp and intense.

“Do you hang out with the sick and the
poor?”

“Yes. It’s my job. Actually, it’s one of the
reasons I don’t ask to be released. I get the inside information on
who needs what.”

“But it’s limited to your ward, so they’re
more like friends, right?” I said snidely. “No personal investment
there.”

“No. Every person who lives in my ward
boundary is my responsibility, whether they’re members of the
Church or not, and I take that responsibility very seriously. I see
a need, I meet it or get it met somehow.”

“I have a need.”

His nostrils flared, his eyes darkened, and
his lids lowered, but he only murmured, “I know.”

“Jesus hung out with Mary Magdalene,” I said
snidely, but only to take the edge off my arousal. “Maybe he liked
bad girls, too.”

“Magdalene wasn’t a prostitute,” he replied,
then took a bite. I knew that, but awaited his explanation while he
chewed. “There was the woman taken in adultery—”

“Cast the first stone, blah blah blah.”

“Right. And then there was Magdalene. Not
the same woman. And,” he continued, “I have reason to believe he
really
loved Magdalene.”

I blinked.

“Yes,” he said dryly. “Like
that
.”

“But—”

“Give me a reason why a Jewish man in a
Jewish culture wouldn’t have been raised to be completely,
thoroughly, totally, normally Jewish from being circumcised to
attaining Bar Mitzvah to getting married.”

“Is that what your church believes?”

“No. We speculate. But confirmed
bachelorhood within an ancient Jewish society built on strict
tradition doesn’t make sense to me.”

“Maybe he was gay and she was his BFF.”

He barked a surprised laugh. “Well, okay
then.” He paused. “Look, it’s not as if that idea hasn’t been
thoroughly explored by half the scholars in the world over the last
fifty years. I’m far from unique in believing it.”

“You’re a
Christian
who believes it.
That’s the bizarre part.”

He sighed.

I was as tired of the heavy conversation as
he, and only too grateful when the entrée was served: lamb.
Exquisitely spiced, not an insipid mint jelly in sight.

The awkward silence between us was
unbearable. It must have been to him, too, because when I looked up
at him and chirped, “So tell me about Paris,” he was only too happy
to comply.

After a truly delightful hour of
anecdotes—mostly involving Sebastian and his unconventional brand
of rebellion involving art galleries and museums and the stock
exchange—we wrapped up dinner with a salad and sorbet.

Mitch endured Polina’s scoldings for not
having brought me to her sooner for approval (she approved), and I
found my face between two puffy old hands, both my cheeks being
bussed heartily and with no small amount of moisture.

I returned the favor. Without the
moisture.

“Where now?” Mitch asked as he handed me
into the car.

“Fifty-fifth and Ninth.”

I knew by his expression that he suspected
what I had planned. Once inside the Ailey building, I led him to
the will-call window, and then allowed him to escort me into the
theater.

“Now it’s my turn to thank you,” he murmured
as he settled himself beside me. “I haven’t been here in a
while.”

“I wouldn’t have pegged you as a modern
dance fan,” I murmured, but he only smiled.

The performance was exquisite as usual, and
though I had always been proud of Paige’s talent and ability, I’d
never attended one of her performances with someone who seemed to
understand and appreciate it as much as I did. In fact, I usually
attended alone. Gordon and Nigel made sincere-but-standard
proud-dad noises, while her sisters only upped the stakes in their
competition for pats on the head.

Were it possible for me to watch Helene and
Olivia at work—Clarissa at school—and applaud for them, I’d do
so.

After the final curtain call, Mitch sat
silent, staring at the stage, oblivious to the people around us
streaming out of the theater, and I wondered if he had some rare
medical condition that had caused him to go catatonic.

“Mitch?”

He started. “Oh. Um, sorry. I was...”

“Somewhere else.”

“Yes.”

“Mind telling me where?”

He pursed his lips. “Long time ago,” he
murmured. “A girl I knew once. She would’ve loved this.”

“Not your wife?”

He shook his head. “No. Mina was a soccer
player.”

“Soccer? I thought she had early-onset
multiple sclerosis? How’d she manage that?”

“High school. She was the star forward, but
her coach would yank her out about halfway through the
game—sometimes he’d let her go a little longer—because she didn’t
have the stamina to finish the game, and she’d be in pain. She
racked up the points before she got benched. I don’t have a clue
how she endured practice.”

“Then why’d she do it?”

He paused. Looked somewhere over my
shoulder. “Her father made her. He pushed her too hard, wouldn’t
hear her when she complained, wouldn’t get her seen. Always raising
the bar, expecting her to conform in things that he thought were
appropriate for girls, discouraging things he thought weren’t.”

“Like?”

“Well, the soccer. That was the hip sport
for teenage girls at the time, and he expected her to be the best.
But then there was math. Calculus. Chemistry. He finally just
forbid her any math classes at all. Said she didn’t need it because
she was going to marry a man who could support her. Her job was to
be a good wife and mother, stay in shape and be pretty. Soccer was
the staying-in-shape part.”

I swallowed. No matter what had possessed my
father marry me off to Gordon in spite of his eleventh-hour doubts,
I never doubted his love, and my mother was never without a smile
or a word of support. I couldn’t imagine little Mina Monroe’s
life.

But...well, yes, I could. Gordon had had
that life with his father. Then Rivington had tried to cast me in
that mold as well and failed miserably.

The theater was empty, but here we sat,
Mitch churning through whatever unpleasantness with which he’d
arrived on my doorstep. I wanted him to meet Paige, but I know when
a man needs a sympathetic ear and has no one else, so I stayed
still and silent.

“He called me today,” he said abruptly. “My
father-in-law, I mean. He’s only spoken to me once in my life.
Twenty-five years ago. To warn me off Mina.”

My spine tingled.

“Demanded I meet him in Philly—why, I don’t
know. Told him to make an appointment with my clerk, make him come
to me as a bishop.”

“Well, so you won that little pissing
match.”

“Yeah, you know... Problem is winning all
the battles and losing the war.”

“War?” This was far too cryptic, but I
wondered— “Does this have anything to do with Greg Sitkaris and
the...delicate politics?”

He slid me a look. “You’ve been checking
into him, I take it?” I smiled, and he chuckled suddenly. “What’ve
you found out?”

“So far nothing important or interesting.
He’s just your run-of-the-mill penny-ante sleazeball.” I paused.
“And works for your father-in-law. Right-hand man?”

Mitch gave me a small salute. “Greg was the
man Shane had arranged for Mina to marry.”

Oh, my God. I couldn’t imagine what a man
like that would’ve done to such a fragile girl.

We stayed in our seats in the still of an
almost-empty theater.

“I,” Mitch said abruptly after a moment,
“would like to meet your daughter, if I might?”

Topic closed, but that was all right with
me. The parallels, both literal and metaphorical, between Mina’s
life and mine were getting a little too close for comfort.

We went backstage and I found Paige in her
dressing gown, cavorting with her boyfriend, a veritable Adonis
with gleaming mahogany skin, in the midst of dancers streaming in
and out and around.

“He’s here?” she squealed when she saw me,
hopping off André’s lap and blowing through the dressing room, out
the door. I stopped for a small chat with André, whom I really
quite liked, as he treated Paige well and seemed to be inclined
toward building a life and family with her—if she ever caught on or
he worked up the nerve to tell her.

I entered the hallway some minutes later to
find her in Mitch’s arms, her cheek on his shoulder, tears
streaming down her face and soaking into his suit coat. He cast me
a helpless smile over her head.

Something warm trickled down my cheek and I
wondered if I had any Benadryl.

•

“What’d you say to her?” I asked Mitch the
next day as we awaited Sheldon’s arrival. “First she was bawling
and this morning she was practically giddy. Wouldn’t tolerate
Clarissa’s opinions on the subject of Mom’s new friend.”

He shrugged as if he dealt with weepy young
women on a regular basis. “I told her I appreciated her artistry
and skill. Then I asked for her autograph and that’s when she
started to cry.”

My throat constricted. “My kids might be
spoiled brats, but they— Excellence is the expectation. Praise
is...hard to come by. Add to that a big sister who’s a doctor
and...”

“I understand,” he said quietly, and I knew
that he did. “So what do you all do in the winter around here?” he
asked with a robustness that sounded forced.

“Hang out at each other’s apartments, drink
a lot of wine, and fuck. I’m game if you are.”

He laughed as Sheldon pulled up smoothly in
front of us, and I felt I had done my part to lighten what was left
of an emotionally draining weekend.

“You and I,” I said once he’d handed me into
the back of my car, “are going bowling.”

He looked at me strangely.

“A client taught me.” I waved a hand. “Good
ol’ boy from Texas, widower. Self-made gazillionaire who missed his
wife and wanted someone to talk to and play with. I was willing to
trade a perfect manicure and some time in a seedy bowling alley
drinking cheap beer for installing Rivington in front of a Slurpee
machine in a border town.”

Mitch began to laugh, as I knew he would.
“Herod?”

“The same. In this case, Salome learned how
to bowl and do it well because Herod wouldn’t tolerate anything
less than perfection.”

“Outstanding,” he said.

And he was, but not outstanding enough to
beat me—though he tried.

“Thank you for a wonderful weekend,
Cassandra,” he whispered in my ear that night once he’d wrapped me
in his arms. “May I see you Friday?”

I closed my eyes and sighed, unable to
remember a time I didn’t know this man, unable to imagine what it
would be like not to see him.

“Yes.”

Please.

* * * * *

Yentl

January 13, 2011

“Good morning, Cassandra.”

I smiled at the deep voice on the other end
of the line. “Good morning to you, too,” I replied, my voice rusty
from several hours of disuse. “What’s the occasion?”

“Just thought I’d give you a
Thursday-morning wake-up call. To be a mosquito.”

“I’ll play mosquito with you. Want to know
what I’m wearing?”

Long pause. “No.”

That made me laugh until I choked.

“Are you almost finished?” he asked wryly
when I’d begun to wind down.

“Had to think about that, didn’t you?”

“Er, yeah. So what’s on your agenda
today?”

Snickering, I said, “Oh, you know, take down
a CEO or two, install a dictator in a banana republic, assassinate
some other tyrant somewhere else.”

“All before lunch.”

“Then I have to consult with the President.”
Mitch chuckled and I closed my eyes. “So what are you doing
today?”

“I have a meeting with one of Eilis’s
competitors. He wants a price break for quantity.” That made me
chuckle. “Really,” he said dryly. “Eilis doesn’t get one, so this
guy sure as heck won’t.”

“And you’re making him come to you for a
refusal just to amuse yourself.”

“Exactly. Cassandra,” he said low, that
husky bass sending my libido into overdrive. “You have a good
day.”

“You too,” I whispered, suddenly shy and
unbearably aroused at once.

I hung up and lay stroking myself, imagining
what it must be like to writhe with Mitch Hollander in bed, nude,
skin to skin. Under him, on top of him.

I knew his suits weren’t padded, his chest
and arms muscular. His trousers lay exquisitely over his ass, but
unfortunately, I had never been able to get a good idea of that
part of his anatomy my body really wanted.

Craved.

I came thinking of Mitch. I’d really had no
need for that since I took my red light down, but since the night
he’d seduced me with a softly whispered “good night” in my ear,
then sent me roses, I couldn’t stop.

Mitch confounded me on too many levels to
sort out. Spiritual and celibate. Quietly ruthless and ornery.

God made mosquitoes.

Just thinking about him made me smile, no
matter what occupied me at the moment. It had struck me earlier in
the week during a business meeting; in the middle of a negotiation,
one of the players said something that reminded me of Mitch and I
had smiled to myself.

That smile had sealed that deal.

I showered and dressed, went down to get in
my car. No one had ever made me feel so special, in bed or out.
With anyone else, I would have been cynical, but Mitch had no
ulterior sexual motives. He’d fight me every step of the way to his
inevitable seduction, so his offerings of flowers, inexpensive
gifts, interesting dates, came without expectation of anything,
much less sex, which made them poignant and...innocent.

Knowingly so.