One Good Turn (4 page)

“And leave the party with me,” he said.

“And take a walk around the block with you,” she emphasized. “So?”

“So, that’s the way these things are communicated.”

“Well—” she was feeling progressively more disillusioned about Lucas, and more sorrowful about it “—let me make myself clear. I do not want to go back to your place with you, nor do I have any desire to invite you back to my place.”

It dawned on her that his impatience had vanished, replaced by what appeared to be genuine bafflement. “Then why did you come over and talk to me?” he asked, as if he could think of no other reason for a woman to be friendly to a man.

“Because you looked lonely, that’s why,” she snapped, furious with him for proving to be so shallow, and with herself for having been so dense. Furious because she would have liked to know him better—but never would. Furious because she truly preferred to give people the benefit of the doubt, open to them, trust them—and it hurt to find out that some people simply didn’t deserve her trust.

Spinning on her heel, she stormed down the block to the town house and inside, refusing him a parting look.

LONELY. OH, GOD,
he was lonely.

Slamming the door behind him, he dove headlong onto the leather couch in the living room. He lay there in the dark, inhaling the rich scent of the leather, listening to the silence that surrounded him. No pounding rock music, no voices, no laughter. Just the sound of loneliness.

He hadn’t gone back to the party. After Jenny had stalked off in her self-righteous snit, he hadn’t had the desire. He wasn’t sure why he had even gone to the party in the first place; Taylor’s sister Holly had phoned him at work to invite him, and he’d figured attending a party would be no worse than sitting around the apartment, watching TV and drinking his father’s bourbon. Taylor had told Holly and Luke to look after each other that summer, since they were both going to be in D.C. Luke had done his part by taking her out to dinner, and Holly had done her part by informing him of this party being thrown by a group of guys she knew from Dartmouth.

He’d gone, figuring that if he didn’t Holly would feel obligated to continue inviting him to things—and figuring, as well, that it wouldn’t be a crime to check out some available females. Washington was supposed to be teeming with single women, but in the three weeks since he’d moved into his father’s duplex across the street from Folger Park, he hadn’t met anyone worth a second look.

Not that he’d knocked himself out trying.

For some reason, the notion of spending a couple of months in solitude appealed to him. He wasn’t interested in racking up conquests. This was his last summer of freedom; already he could feel the noose tightening around his neck: hustle, hustle. He had no overwhelming urge to hustle for dates along with everything else.

Come autumn, he’d be facing LSAT’s, law school applications, probably a few rejections—and his father’s wrath, followed by an intense campaign of string-pulling, if the rejections came from the more prestigious schools. James Benning had every intention of seeing his beloved son become a high-power attorney like himself, and ever since Luke’s older brother Elliott had abdicated, Luke had found himself in the unexpected but longed-for position of beloved son.

He didn’t want to go to law school, but he couldn’t bear to disappoint his father. For the first time in his twenty-one years on the planet, Luke had gotten the old man to notice him. How could he ignore his father’s wishes?

And yet...
law school
. The very words made him shudder.

As recently as four years ago, when he’d chosen to attend Princeton rather than his father’s alma mater, Yale, his father hadn’t cared what Luke might choose to do with his life. Elliott was attending Yale, Elliott was being groomed for law school, Elliott had been steered into the right classes, the right secret society, the right summer employment. Elliott had been the heir apparent and Luke had merely been “the other son.”

The one advantage of being ignored, he realized in retrospect, was that in the days when Elliott had still been on the scene, nobody had interfered with Luke. He could go his own way—even if his way was convoluted and full of false turns—and dream his own dreams.

Not anymore. Luke was the number one son now. He had a duty to follow his father’s direction and dream his father’s dreams—and at times he came close to convincing himself his father’s dreams could take the place of his own.

Even so, he couldn’t help but admire Jenny Perrin’s idealism. A school teacher, for God’s sake. The only people who became school teachers were those who lacked the ambition to become something better.

But Jenny had seemed pleased by her choice and at peace with herself. She’d seemed overjoyed by the prospect of molding children’s minds. It was her serenity and confidence, more than anything else, that had made Luke want to take her to bed.

Of course, her appearance hadn’t hurt, either. She was a bit small, both in height and physique, but she didn’t look dainty. He’d liked her narrow waist and boyish hips, and her eyes were awfully pretty, wide and almond shaped, sparkling with glints of green and silver. She had a nice smile, too, easy and natural, and while her chin was pointy it balanced her equally pointy nose. Her voice had a husky quality, which he’d found seriously sexy. As for her hair, that fiery stream of silk spilling down her back...

He still wanted to take her to bed. Despite her rejection, he wanted her.

Actually, now that he thought about it, she hadn’t exactly rejected him. She’d rejected his invitation to have sex with him, but she had seemed reasonably accepting of him as a person. The highlight of the evening—the highlight of his stay in Washington so far—had been the stroll he’d taken with her around the block. For the first time in ages, he hadn’t felt lonely.

That was the thing of it—not her appearance or even her serenity so much as the fact that she could look at him and understand his loneliness. How could he have been so crass, insinuating that she’d come on to him? How could he have tried to score with her?

He cursed. His voice was muffled by the plush upholstery, and he sat up and repeated the curse, letting the rarefied atmosphere of his father’s luxurious duplex resound with that one profane syllable. His eyes took in the marble tables, the mirrored wall, the vertical blinds and objets d’art and the plush maroon carpeting. It was all so well coordinated, so tasteful, so impeccable.

He couldn’t picture Jenny Perrin fitting into it—yet that didn’t trouble him. The truth was, even though he was lounging on one of the couchesÿin this starkly elegant room, he couldn’t really picture himself fitting in, either.

Somehow, that made him feel a whole lot better.

“I NEED A
phone number,” he said to Stella the next morning. “Can you help me out?”

Stella lifted her gaze from the unopened envelopes piled on her desk and regarded him with a skeptical look. A heavy-set woman in her mid-forties, Stella was an absolute marvel. She knew everything; she knew everyone; and if by chance there did happen to be something she didn’t know, she could find it out in less time than it took a leak to travel from the Executive Office Building to the Washington Post. Senator Milford was humble enough to think his chief aide, Lee Pappelli, was running the show. Lee was arrogant enough to agree. But the truth of the matter was, they’d all be utterly lost without Stella. She was the engine and the wheels of the senator’s staff, the backbone and the muscle, the wisdom and the know-how—the behind-the-scenes monarch reigning over this supposed enclave of democracy.

“Well, don’t you look spiffy today,” she said, appraising Luke’s summer-weight suit, two-tone shirt and red power tie. “You have special plans or something?”

“I’d like to have special plans, but I won’t if I can’t find out this woman’s telephone number,” he told her. “She’s a clerk in the Western Europe division at State. A summer temp, so she won’t be listed in the directory.”

“And you want me to get her phone number for you.”

He gave Stella his most ingratiating smile.

“Let me get this straight. We’re talking about a young lady who chose not to give you her number herself.” Stella’s grin was mocking. “If she didn’t give you her number, it just may be because she doesn’t want you to have it.”

“She probably doesn’t,” he conceded. “I behaved badly with her. But how am I going to apologize if I can’t reach her?”

Stella’s grin grew wider. “And meanwhile, I’ve got all this mail to go through.”

“I’ll go through it for you,” he volunteered.

She chuckled and handed him the four-inch thick stack of envelopes. “You’re on, doll. What’s the girl’s name?”

It took Luke several hours to open the letters, sort them and print out the appropriate computer-generated responses to the senator’s correspondence from his constituents. Luke considered the time well spent, however, when he returned to Stella’s desk. Her eyes on her monitor and her fingers flying across the keys, she didn’t look at him. “There it is,” she said, gesturing toward her message pad with her right elbow. “Invite me to the wedding.”

Luke grinned. “I’ll reserve a seat for you on the aisle,” he promised, tearing the pink sheet of paper from the pad, folding it and stuffing it into his breast pocket. “I adore you, Stella.”

“Yeah?” she said without a pause in her typing. “Maybe you ought to marry me instead of her.”

“Get a divorce and I’ll consider it,” he shouted over his shoulder as he jogged down the hall to his windowless cubby of an office. That the room was gloomy and barely large enough to accommodate his desk and chair didn’t bother him, since he spent much of his time on the move, in other staff offices or across the street in the Capitol building. What mattered right now was that his office had a door—which he promptly closed—and a telephone—which he promptly used to dial the number Stella had written down for him. He recited the extension to the operator and counted the seconds while his call was connected.

After the sixth second he heard a click, and then “Jennifer Perrin” in that alluring voice of hers.

“Jenny?” he said, sounding more sure of himself than he felt. “Hi, this is Luke Benning.”

A long silence. “Lucas?”

“Well...yes. But—please call me Luke.”

Another long silence.

“From the party last night,” he added.

“I know who you are.”

Given her unenthusiastic reception to his call, he figured he was already doomed. Which meant he had nothing to lose by forging ahead. “I was wondering whether you might be free for dinner this evening.”

“Dinner?”

“Yes,” he said, infusing his voice with a certainty he had to fake. “I’d like to see you, Jenny. And I’m only talking about dinner. I swear, I’m not going to ask you to spend the night with me or anything.”

“Why not?”

He floundered. After her indignation last night, was she now playing coy? What the hell was she up to? “Hey, if you want to spend the night with me, that’s fine, too,” he offered. “Whatever you want.”

Then he realized she was laughing. It was a low, throaty chuckle, and it eroded his doubts. “I think we’d better just stick to dinner,” she said.

He wanted to let out a triumphant yell. He wanted to kick his heels, slap the ceiling, do all sorts of uncool things to celebrate. He wanted to race across the street to the Senate floor and enter the news into the Congressional Record. She had said yes to dinner. She’d said yes.

Instead, he said with masterful calm, “Dinner it is. What time should I pick you up?”

They decided on six-thirty. She gave him her address and then told him she had to get back to work. After saying good-bye, he hung up, punched the air with his fist and whispered, “Yeah!” Energized, he swung open his door, prepared to offer Stella his soul in gratitude for having ferreted out Jenny Perrin’s extension at the State Department.

Two steps before he reached Stella’s desk he heard a voice emerging from Lee Pappelli’s office. It was a smooth, assured baritone containing a well-practiced blend of humor and self-importance. Luke knew that voice; it was a voice that for nearly eighteen years he’d heard saying, “Oh, that’s my other son,” and now usually saying, “This is my boy, Luke.”

Luke suffered a strange mix of emotions, prominent among them delight and dread. It had been this way ever since Elliott had vanished and his father had anointed Luke the favorite child. There was always the thrill of knowing that his father actually saw him, recognized him, took pride in him—maybe even loved him. And there was the uneasiness that came from wondering what kind of love it was, how long it would last, how hard Luke would have to work to keep earning it.

He waited in the alcove near Stella’s desk, listening to his father exchanging a good-natured farewell with Senator Milford’s aide as they emerged from the inner office. A handshake, a final quip from Luke’s father and a final promise from Lee to look over an obscure clause in the latest revision of some farm support bill, and then James Benning turned and faced his son.

Luke experienced another twinge of ambivalence. The broad smile his father beamed at him left him unsettled; he wasn’t sure whether he’d done too much or not enough to merit it. He scarcely had time to brace himself for his father’s crushing hand clasp. “There’s my boy!” James boomed as he appraised Luke. “You’re looking a bit thin, son. Are you eating enough?”

From the day Luke was born his father had been complaining that he looked thin. Luke had inherited his mother’s lanky build and fair coloring, whereas Elliott had taken after their father, more robust in stature and endowed with jet-black hair and dark brown eyes. The fact that Luke had a perfectly healthy physique never registered on James. All that mattered was how lean Luke was in comparison to his father.

“I’m eating fine, Dad,” he said, managing a smile. “When did you get into town? Why didn’t you tell me you were coming?”

“It’s been hectic,” his father explained, flashing another blinding grin. He slung his arm around Luke’s shoulders and escorted him down the hall to the minuscule office Luke had been assigned. “I caught an early shuttle out of LaGuardia. It was all last-minute. As it is, I’ve got to catch a shuttle back tonight.”