BEAUTIFUL STRANGER Page 18

  She stroked the scar with one finger. "I'm glad you lived, Robert." She raised her eyes and he saw the earnestness in her eyes. It was an expression he'd seen dozens of times in a woman's eyes. That soft yearning and admiration, that misty romantic glaze. Usually he ran like hell. This time he felt grateful. And with a wry sense of the world shifting, he wondered if she saw it in his eyes, too. Because he sure as hell felt it when he looked at her.

  "Me, too," he said roughly, and kissed her.

  * * *

  They ate ravenously, Robert drinking soda from plastic glasses filled with ice, Marissa sipping her bloodred wine from the same. "Real elegant, huh?" he said, wondering if she minded.

  "It's like a picnic."

  She ate heartily, leaving only the crust behind. "Don't you like crusts, baby girl?" he teased. "Were you one of those kids who had to have your sandwiches trimmed?"

  "Heck, no. I inhaled everything. I'm so hungry right now, though, that I want the nutritious parts." She examined the slice in her hand and looked at him. "It's moments like this, when I'm so hungry that I don't care if I'm ever thin, that I worry I'll be fat again someday."

  He lifted a shoulder. "Well, maybe you will. Maybe you won't. I'd guess your walking addiction will keep it down some." He picked up another slice. "In the end, it's really inside that matters."

  She huffed. "That is a big fat lie and you know it."

  He chuckled. "Is it? Are you really any different from the woman you were?"

  "If I were the woman I used to be," she said distinctly, "I would not be lolling half-naked with you eating pizza, now would I?"

  He raised his eyes, hearing real pain behind that, and because of that pain, he didn't answer immediately, trying to sort through his answer as honestly as he could. "I don't know," he said finally. "You were pretty prickly before. I always had a big thing about your hair and that—" he waved his hand in a circle, trying to describe the light that had always been there "—an exuberance or whatever. But you used to give me that haughty eye, like I was some bug."

  "I did not!"

  "Yes, you did." He plucked off a mushroom and tossed it on the box. "Miss Hoity Toity rich girl, with her biker boyfriends. You were too scary to talk to."

  She started to laugh. "I was scared to death of you!"

  "Sure, sure." He raised a brow. "The point is, Ms. Rich Girl, it was you who came on to me this time, not the other way around. I would never have had the guts."

  "I did not!"

  "Did, too. What was that bit about the dresses?"

  "I didn't follow me out to the deck at Louise's house."

  "Oh, yeah." He nodded. "Forgot about that. Wanted to kiss you, too, but you were too scary."

  She rolled her eyes. "Well, it's nice of you to say so, but I don't buy it for one second."

  He lifted a shoulder. "Believe it or not, princess. Up to you."

  "Stop calling me that!"

  He laughed, and, finally full, rolled over onto his back, staring up at the ceiling. Outside, the wind howled at the windows, a sad and lonely sound that took him back. "So tell me, princess, what's it like to be so rich, anyway?"

  She made a noise of disbelief. "What do you think?"

  "I don't know." He looked at her. "Serious question."

  "Fair enough." She closed the pizza box and moved it to the dresser, then came back, carrying her wine. Sitting cross-legged, dressed only in his shirt, she said, "It's pretty much what you think it is. I mean, what's not to like? Money can do almost anything. Save a condemned house, put a kid through college, build a shelter for runaways." She grinned, impishly. "Not to mention it's not that bad to fly off to Venice if you're in the mood."

  He put his hand around her foot. "Are those things you've done? Saved a house and built a shelter?"

  "Yeah, my house. It was trashed, ready for the wrecking ball."

  She didn't affirm the runaway shelter, but it gave him a sense of how much money she really did have. "You have more money than you'll ever be able to spend, don't you?"

  She nodded sadly. "'Fraid so. I can't even seem to give it away significantly. Foundations here and there and everywhere. But the thing is, seed money seems to just grow, so pretty soon they don't need me as much anymore."

  He laughed. "Hell of a problem to have." He wondered why it didn't seem to matter so much tonight, that she was from that rare, strange world. But he knew: it was just the two of them. No outside influences. Idly rubbing her toes, he asked, "And what's bad about it? The way you grew up?"

  A shrug. "Not that so much. It was a drag, but it was survivable, always. No," she said, frowning a little. "The hard part is that old saying, you know, 'To him much is given, much is required.' I'm always worried that when it comes time to give an accounting for what I did, I'll be judged shallow and silly and not earnest enough."

  "Tiffany screens?"

  She toasted him. "Exactement. What earthly use is that?"

  "I don't know, but it sure is pretty." In the soft yellow light, her breasts showed a deep cleft, and he thought lazily about putting his hand, or maybe his mouth, there. "Maybe not everything has to be sensible, not every single bit. If there was no one to buy great art, what would artists do?"

  "That's true." Her gaze wandered a little, too, touching his chest, his mouth, and he quirked his lips in a smile. "Are you going to do the window?"

  "No. It's too big a project for me. I've never done anything close."

  "I think you should try anyway. There's plenty of time. If it doesn't work out, they can get someone else to do it."

  "Yeah, and waste all those materials."

  "But they won't pay you if it doesn't work out, so how much will they really be out?"

  He lifted his hand and unbuttoned the top button of her shirt, then the next. "I don't know."

  "I somehow suspect you don't really care," she said with an earthy little laugh as he pushed apart the loose fabric and exposed her breasts.

  "Nope," he said, bending close. "Not a bit."

  * * *

  Morning dawned cold but clear, and the road reports said that I-25 was clear to the Wyoming state line, so they headed out early. Before they could get out of town, Robert said he needed to go to the pueblo church and look at the window he admired, so his lie to Crystal wouldn't be a lie.

  They stopped at a gold-colored pueblo, old and somehow exhausted looking, even with a dusting of sparkling snow. "It'll only take me a minute," he said, and, sensing that he wanted to look at it alone, Marissa waited in the truck with the engine running for heat. She waited, but when he didn't come back for a little while, she turned the engine off and went looking for him.

  She found him inside, standing with his hands loose at his sides, his head tilted up to look at a stained-glass window. Sunlight set it ablaze, and bits of red and yellow and blue light fell on his figure. Marissa took an involuntary breath and came to stand beside him in awe.

  It was a Madonna image, a Native American Madonna with a Native American baby Christ. The colors were pure and perfect, the shape and form of the principles perfectly, artistically rendered, Mary's face so alight with motherly love that it brought an involuntary rush of tears to Marissa's eyes. "Oh!" she said softly. "It's beautiful!"

  "It's not Tiffany," Robert said.

  "No," Marissa agreed, her throat tight. The colors were much bolder, more primary—almost medieval. "It's different." Embarrassed at her easy emotions, she wiped a tear away. "Who's the artist?"

  He stuck his hands in his pockets. "Me." He looked at her, his mouth cocked in a rueful expression. His eyes were puzzled. "I'm kind of surprised. I didn't think it was very good."

  Marissa looked up at it, and that same deep wash of emotion came through her, a function of the work itself. "To whom much is given, much is required," she said.

  Only when the sun moved off the window did he move, tugging her hand lightly. They nodded to a youthful priest, so handsome, the local girls must be in a swoon at every Mass, and got back in
the truck. Robert didn't say a word.

  It was one of the best days of Marissa's life, riding with Robert in his truck, sometimes laughing, sometimes sober. Sometimes they talked about themselves, sometimes about world events, sometimes about Red Creek and the people there.

  And they talked glass. Endlessly. Marissa had never known anyone who knew as much about glass as she did. Colors, glazes, styles, artists. He knew everything. He'd spent six years in Europe with the army, and spent any free time wandering through the museums and cathedrals in the great capitals. It amazed her.

  But as they neared Castle Rock, a small town outside of Denver, the buoyant nature of the conversation changed. "Do you have any idea of what you're going to do?" Marissa asked.

  "None. Call every Trujillo in the phone book?"

  "That could take a century or two." Hesitantly she said, "I have some contacts who might be able to help."

  "I'm listening," he said. But Marissa felt a clutch in her belly. It was one thing to hear that she had established foundations. If she used these contacts, he'd learn a lot more. But Crystal was the most important consideration here, and she told him where to go.

  * * *

  Marissa directed Robert to a downtown Denver office building, spanking new, in a central location. When he would have parked on the street, she said, "No, go around to the back. There's a ramp with parking below. I have my own spot."

  That was his first warning. The second was the deference of the security guard when Marissa popped her head into view. "Hi, George," she said sweetly. "It's me."

  The old black man bent into the window. "How you doing, sweetheart?"

  "Just fine. How's your wife's chemo going?"

  "Some days are better than others, but she's holding her own."

  "Tell her I said hello."

  "Will do." He straightened and hit the car on the hood, like Robert was a chauffeur. It rankled.

  Inside, things went steadily downhill. The building was a warren of offices, most of them referral services, Marissa told him, for various kinds of problems in the community. One floor was devoted to teens and their troubles, and Robert was slightly startled to see a room full of hoodlum-looking kids taking a martial arts class of some sort. "What is this place?" he said with a scowl.

  "It's all kinds of things," Marissa said. "Mainly resources of various sorts, a place people can come outside the government structure to get help for whatever it is they need help with."

  "Whatever they need."

  "Yeah." She gave him a puzzled smile. "Why is that so hard to imagine?"

  "Everything seems a pretty big palette."

  "It is sometimes. But that class for example, has really been a godsend. It keeps a bunch of kids off the street after school during that work period before parents get home, and it's free." A thin black woman spotted Marissa and rushed over to hug her. Marissa, startled but pleased, hugged her back.

  "I am so glad to see you!" the woman cried. "I missed your big night, and wanted to be there so bad. Did you get my present?"

  "The bowl! Yes, I did. It was wonderful." Marissa introduced her as Ruth Idamiller, head of counselling services, and Robert nodded politely, but the woman simply wanted to adore Marissa.

  It happened over and over as they made their way through the halls, up the stairs, down another hallway. Over and over people stopped, hugged her, kissed, asked after her health. It wasn't the obsequious bowing and scraping Robert had sometimes seen in the army when a four-star general showed up out of the blue, either. It was something else. They loved her. Young and old, the people who ran the programs and the people who presented them. They felt free to approach her, not awed, as he would have expected.

  She secured the use of an empty office to make phone calls, and gestured for Robert to make himself comfortable while she rounded the desk, tossed down her purse and picked up the phone. "It might take me a little while," she said. "Feel free to wander around or whatever. We can get some supper when we're finished."

  Oddly unsettled, Robert paced the office, peering at the books stacked in a tumble on the shelves—this must be a fund-raising office, since there were dozens of materials on how to write and apply for grants and special services. Degrees on the wall confirmed his guess. Idly he moved toward a series of framed newspaper articles, hearing behind him Marissa make small talk with various officials. No one was busy when Marissa Pierce was on line one, he noticed. They all took her calls, pronto.

  Amazing. He felt a stab of admiration and another of something else—maybe discomfort?—at the easy mantle of power that lay on her shoulders. He'd never have guessed it.

  The framed newspaper articles were matted nicely and showed the progression of the center, starting with one on the upper left, a photo of a group of people in hard hats breaking ground. Foundation Center Begun it read. The photo was blurry and showed a smear of smiling faces. Other articles, most without photos, chronicled the progress.

  It was the last one that stopped him cold. It showed a picture of a beaming Marissa—in that devastating blue dress she'd been wearing the first time he kissed her—with a giant pair of scissors in her hand and a symbolic ribbon between the blades. Benefactress Blesses Building it read. Nice bit of alliteration, he thought with a grin, leaning closer to read the article.

  And his heart sunk.

  He turned around to look at her hard. She'd put the phone down, scribbled a note to herself and seemed to feel his attention. "What?" she asked, obviously picking up something from his expression, because the word was defensive.

  "This whole place is your doing?"

  "Not at all," she said with a frown. "You see all these people in here."

  "Yeah, but none of them had the money to make it happen, did they? The seed money, you called it, I think."

  She frowned, pressing her lips together, smoothing a lock of hair from her face. "Right."

  He didn't know why he felt betrayed, but the emotion was unmistakable. "Twenty-five million dollars isn't seed money, Marissa." He swore. "How rich are you? Tell me the truth."

  She folded those clean white hands neatly on the desk blotter and met his eyes without a single hint of expression on her face. "One hundred and seventy-five million," she said calmly. "Feel better now?"

  If a knife had cut him from neck to belly, he could not have felt it more deeply. He closed his eyes, a little dizzy, and sat down in the chair. "God."

  "I told you you didn't want to know," she said, and stood briskly. "The good news is, I've got a lead. Let's go."

  * * *

  Crystal was cranky and restless on Thursday morning. Her back was achy, but not in the labor-pain way, but from lying around so much. She wanted to get out, do something, see real people instead of movies on the screen. And she was a little depressed, too, thinking of her uncle off with her teacher, maybe falling in love. Would there be room for her after that?

  She was slumped in the kitchen, working on her homework when Louise called to her. "Crystal, darlin', can you come here for a minute?"

  Crystal winced, threw down her pencil and lumbered into the room, holding her belly where the baby was sliding a foot in one long, slow kick all the way down her left side. She rubbed it hard, trying to make him stop. "Quit, baby, that hurts!"

  Louise stood at the window, her arms crossed, a funny expression on her face. "There's someone here," she said. "I don't know who it is, but you might."

  Something hot and scared went through Crystal, and for a minute she was frozen, her hand hard on the foot of the baby. Her breath had sailed away, and she couldn't quite get it back. Louise looked at her. "Come look."

  Crystal eased up to the window, afraid to see, afraid not to. Robert's truck was parked in front, and she saw him get out on the driver's side and stretch, followed by Marissa. The passenger door opened, and out stepped a figure with dark hair. No, not just dark.

  Her heart caught. It was the blackest hair she'd ever seen, shining the way it always did in the sunlight. He wore h
is leather jacket, the one his mother had saved to buy him for Christmas, and it made him look strong. With a noise she wasn't even sure came from her, Crystal turned and bolted for the door, yanking it open, running down the walk, tears streaming out of her eyes. It felt like her heart was exploding, burning up her chest, and she had to stop, just short of him, to cover her mouth, try to pull it together.

  It was only then that she remembered that he had not seen her pregnant, and might not like it, and she put her hands on her belly, hiding it, looking up to see how he would take it. He was standing very still, only a few feet away, and his chest was moving hard like he'd been running. One hand covered the side of his face, and he looked scared and sad all at once. "Mario?" she said.

  He held out a hand, his mouth moving, but no words came out. And she catapulted forward, touching the damage that made his eye crooked, damage from a beating that had nearly killed him. It marred his face, dragged his eye down, but he was still her Mario, her only only one, and she couldn't stop the wild swell of emotions in her any longer. She took that precious face in her hands and kissed it, kissed the mouth and the nose and last the ruined place.

  He made a harsh, deep noise, and she knew he was trying not to cry as he crushed her to him. "I was in the hospital a long time," he said. "And when I got out, I couldn't find you."

  And they were both crying. Laughing, crying, kissing. His hand on her tummy, questioning, and she nodded, and more tears. And then they just slumped together, her head on his shoulder, and she knew everything would be all right.

  * * *

  All three adults were misty-eyed to varying degrees, Marissa noticed, trying to blink away her own tears. Louise was unabashedly weeping at the window, blowing her nose on a blue tissue as she watched, and as Robert and Marissa came in, she gave them a beneficent smile. "They're gonna be just fine," she said.

  They all three watched the pair at the foot of the drive. The young couple touched each other's heads, as if to ascertain the reality of the other body, their hands tangling. Crystal pulled him down to sit beside her, and held his hand in both of hers, listening intently as he talked. Her face blazed with such happiness, Marissa could hardly believe it was the same girl. "Her knight in shining armor," she said, thinking of the way Crystal had always stared out the windows at school.